What Are Ultra-Processed Foods and What Are They Doing to Us?

Each year WNYC hosts a "health convening," with support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, as an opportunity for healthcare experts and practitioners to inform WNYC's health reporting. This year, the topic is ultra-processed foods and how they affect our health. 

Kevin Hall, Ph.D., former senior investigator at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) discusses his groundbreaking, tightly controlled metabolic ward trials and mathematical models tracking how human bodies respond to ultra-processed foods.

Photo: PRODUCTION - 02 June 2026, Bavaria, Erlangen: A laboratory employee at the Bavarian State Office for Health and Food Safety (LGL) inoculates a culture medium in a Petri dish with an eyelet as part of a food analysis. The LGL examines around 60,000 samples from the food sector every year for a wide range of parameters. Whether testing for microbial contamination or the composition of food: Official laboratory analysis is a key factor in the early detection of food-related health risks. Photo: Daniel Karmann/dpa (Photo by Daniel Karmann/picture alliance via Getty Images)