Robert H. Lustig, MD, MSL

ICYMI: Everyone postulates that real food in school cafeterias would improve kids' learning and cognition, but no one had any data. Well, now we have proof that our non-profit Eat Real Certified improves grades.

Yeesh. Yes, ultraprocessed food is a problem. Yes, real food is better. And there's nothing inherently disastrous about the alternative foods in this article (except raw milk gives me the willies, due to bacterial contamination).

But can't we find a happy medium in between these two extremes? The diet we should all strive for is a diet low in low reactive oxygen species - the ions that do damage to cells. Foods high in ROS are sugar, refined carbs, heated fats, burned proteins, emulsifiers, pesticides, and food dyes.

The Metabolic Psychiatry Summit starts this week, and it's free. If you or someone you love has been told a diagnosis is something to manage for life, these five days are worth your attention. By the end of them, you'll have:

A clear picture of what a metabolic approach to mental health actually involves, from the first meal to the daily routine. The research, explained for real life, by real doctors and psychologists leading the field. What to ask your doctor or care team, and the exact words to use with skeptics.

When The Atlantic gave me space to write about sugar and the brain in 2012, I asked: when did we become so obsessed with pleasure?

The Bible warns against indulgence, and the Declaration of Independence promises the pursuit of happiness, not pleasure. Yet pleasure dominates our lives, while delayed gratification seems quaint.

Hey all, what are you doing MLK weekend? Come to Esalen Spa at Big Sur for our second workshop on mindfulness, metabolism, and mitochondria.

There are 250+ names for sugar on a food label. That's camouflage. The food industry has spent decades making the label tough to read, then told you it's your job to read it. Perfact flips that. Scan the product and get a thumbs-up or thumbs-down in a second, with no PhD required.

The food industry has spent decades making the label tough to read, then told you it's your job to read it. Perfact flips that. Scan the product and get a thumbs-up or thumbs-down in a second, with no PhD required. You pick the criteria (keto, allergens, whatever matters to you).

RFK is right. And he's wrong. Yes, dyes and pesticides and toxins damage health, because they cause mitochondrial dysfunction. He's right to focus on that.

But infections also cause mitochondrial dysfunction. And RFK isn't even interested in handling that, quite the opposite (e.g. raw milk). And most importantly, specific foods cause mitochondrial dysfunction. In particular, sugar and heated fats. He pays lip service to sugar, but nothing substantive.

Is Big Food really selling food? Professor Tim Jackson has analyzed the updated report called The False Economy of Big Food, and the numbers are worse than two years ago. The hidden health cost of Britain's diet has gone from £268 billion to £298 billion a year.

Jackson cites my work and asks whether Big Food is selling food at all. Real food protects the liver, feeds the gut, and supports the brain. Ultra-processed products strip out the fiber, load in the sugar, and are not engineered for your metabolism.

The Added Sugar Repository (ASR) was originally made by the Eradicate Childhood Obesity Foundation (EChO), in collaboration with Perfact, to serve as a public reference for the many names of added sugar used in the U.S. food industry. This list of extends beyond the information provided by the FDA.

Two years ago, I sat down with Steven Bartlett for almost two hours. Here's the part that clips leave out: a calorie of glucose and a calorie of fructose are not metabolized the same way. Count them the same, and you're doing bad math...

In case you missed it: I’m looking forward to speaking at the World Medical Innovation Forum in Boston, September 22nd–23rd. The Forum brings together leaders across healthcare, life sciences, and investment to examine what is driving innovation.