This is what gorging on junk food does to your body in JUST one hour – and it ain’t pretty
IT'S no secret junk food is bad for you - the key is in the name.
But do you REALLY know what scoffing down a burger and fries will do to your body?
Boffins recently found grub laden with fat and sugar sends the body's immune system into meltdown.
Scientists in Germany found in tests on mice that their body's defences reacted as if they were under attack from a serious bacterial infection.
So what else is going on moments after you let that double cheeseburger, fries and fizzy drink pass your lips?
Here, dietitian Helen Bond reveals step-by-step what happens in the hour after eating junk food - and warns of the longer term dangers of making it a regular treat.
5 minutes
From the moment you swallow that first bite of your burger and take a gulp of your Coke, your blood sugar begins to rise.
Within around five minutes you'll feel a rush of sugar, giving you a surge of energy.
Washing down your burger and fries with a sugar-laden drink will likely tip you right over the edge of your recommended allowance for the day, Helen warns.
For adults, the NHS recommends eating no more than seven teaspoons a day - there are around NINE in a can of regular Coke.
And kids should be eating far less sugar. Tots under two should have no more than three teaspoons a day, and kids three to six can have one extra.
Those aged seven to ten should eat no more than six a day.
15 minutes
When it comes to junk food, sugar is far from the only villain - salt is another one to watch out for.
It may make your food taste delicious, but within around quarter-of-an-hour it will leave you dehydrated and gasping for a drink - that sugar laden one we warned you about!
Adults should only eat around 6g of salt a day, and like with sugar, kids need a lot less.
The carbs and salt in your junk food also have their own effects on the body.
"The salt also makes you feel thirsty as well, so you want to go back for more drinks," Helen warned.
"That’s fine if you're going for water to dilute the effects, but if you're going for more sugary drinks then you are just going to add more calories to your diet."
20 minutes
Perhaps the most obvious on the junk food hit list, is fat.
Burgers, fries, chicken nuggets... you name it, it's drenched in the stuff.
And for many people within about 20 minutes all that fat can trigger a nasty bout of heartburn.
30 minutes
So, just half-an-hour after wolfing down your meal, chances are you're already on a sugar high, gasping for a drink and feeling a deep burning pain in your chest.
But, next comes your stomach... as your body struggles to cope with digesting the junk, you'll start to feel gassy and bloated.
Helen explained: "Often people who are more susceptible to salt suffer water retention, so some people find they often feel quite puffy or swollen or bloated after they eat fast food.
50 minutes
While your meal may feel like a distant memory, almost an hour later that sugar high you were riding comes crashing down around you.
Helen said: "You will get a sugar rush and your pancreas responds to that by producing more insulin.
“You will get a real insulin peak and blood sugar rise but it is not sustainable so your hunger is just going to come back.
“Over time that is not good in terms of regulating your blood sugar and we know, with regards to sugar, it is also damaging to your teeth."
55 -60 minutes
With the dreaded sugar crash comes the inevitable slump in your mood.
You'll feel irritable and grumpy, and you'll struggle to concentrate.
Within the next five minutes you will start to feel sluggish, tired, irritable and you will lack concentration.
"Probably about 60 minutes afterwards the sugar crash will come in you are going to start feeling tired and sluggish," Helen said.
"This can affect things like your concentration, your mood, you may feel fed up in the afternoon, so that’s a follow on from not having sustainable energy.
"To counter that the body is going to start looking for more energy, so it drives your hunger for a start.
"The body will have lots of glucose in it from the original meal but if it is not used instantly it is going to get stored as fat."
That, and your body will be craving more sugar, so you will feel ravenous again!
Bedtime...
Gorging on junk food during the day may seem harmless, and you may think the effects are done and dusted after that first hour.
Think again! By the time you're ready for bed, the caffeine from the fizzy drink will likely have you buzzing.
And all that fat, especially if you eat it in the evening, can cause indigestion before bed too.
"With a heavy meal things like heartburn come into effect," Helen said.
JUNK FOOD EFFECT IS SIMILAR TO A LIFE-THREATENING BUG
EATING junk food has a similar effect on your body as a bacterial infection, experts have warned.
Experts from the University of Bonn in Germany found unhealthy food triggered an inflammatory response in the body, which they say may be involved in the development of long-term conditions like arteriosclerosis, the hardening of the artery walls, and type 2 diabetes.
The scientists fed mice a high fat "Western diet" and discovered it genetically reprogrammed their cells to make them more susceptible to illness.
After four weeks of switching to a healthy diet the initial inflammatory response disappeared but the genetic reprogramming hadn't.
Dr Eicke Latz, director of the institute for innate immunity at the university, said: "After an infection, the body's defences remain in a kind of alarm state, so that they can respond more quickly to a new attack.
"The foundations of a healthy diet need to become a much more prominent part of education than they are at present."
Latz and his team noted that the average life expectancy of people in Western countries is slowly decreasing for the first time.
People born today will live, on average, shorter lives than their parents and unhealthy diets coupled with minimal amounts of exercise likely play a decisive role in this, they said.
"Often if you have a very high-fat meal it sits in the stomach because it is harder to digest and that can cause a heartburn flare-up.
"Sometimes people also struggle to sleep with that because when they try to sleep it relaxes their lower oesophageal sphincter, so it allows the food to come back up.
"For people who are susceptible to caffeine, like people with irritable bowel syndrome, it can sometimes cause a flare-up."
AND WHAT ABOUT THE LONG-TERM EFFECTS?
Think the effects of your burger and fries only last 24 hours? Not so.
It's well known that junk food is a leading cause in obesity, which in turn has a number of deadly chronic diseases.
Obesity has been linked to 13 different types of cancer, as well as diabetes, heart disease and stroke.
"If you are obese you are more at risk of obesity related cancers, you are more at risk of heart disease and stroke," Helen said.
"And also the fat content within junk food is quite high in saturated fats and trans fats and they can increase the risk of bad cholesterol and over time that is not good news for your heart health.
"Obesity is also linked to insulin resistance, pre-diabetes and also type 2 diabetes.
"In the long-term we know too much salt can cause raises in blood pressure."
On top of that, your junk food doesn't contain anywhere near as much fibre as you need to maintain a healthy gut.
"If your diet is very heavily reliant on junk food then it is very difficult to get the 30g of fibre recommended per day," Helen added.
"Your gut bacteria needs food that is nourishing and we are learning more and more about the importance of gut health in relation to things like immunity, to weight to digestive issues.
"For people that have digestive issues where absorption [of vitamins and minerals] is a problem then making sure your gut is as healthy as possible goes hand-in-hand with a high fibre diet.
"There are some people with issues like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) where a high fibre diet may cause them problems, but generally people should be eating more of it in our diet."
Obesity levels in the UK have trebled in the last 30 years and about 27 per cent of the UK population is considered obese.
A further 34 per cent are considered overweight, according to the latest Government statistics.
We are officially the fattest nation in Europe.
Obesity is costing the NHS about £16bn a year and greatly increases a persons chances of developing deadly diseases like type two diabetes, 11 different types of cancer, stroke and heart disease.
World Cancer Research Fund estimates 25,000 cases of cancer could be prevented every year in the UK alone if everyone was a healthy weight.
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