News Round-up
New UK Study Highlights How Food Structure Plays a Key Role in Digestion and Health
A new study, published in the journal Nature Metabolism, has shown how the physical structure of food plays a key role in how we digest it, contributing to the way modern diets can adversely affect health.
Researchers from the Quadram Institute in Norwich and Imperial College London showed that foods made with chickpea flour prepared in a way to keep the plant cells intact trigger a much healthier muetabolic response during digestion than nutritionally identical foods made with conventional milled flour.
Professor Gary Frost, Chair in Nutrition and Dietetics at Imperial College London, said: “Changing food structures could ultimately help to protect the population from chronic diseases such as type two diabetes, and that’s why this research is so exciting. It’s all building up the knowledge in this area which will be essential for improving foods in the future.”
Visit: www.nature.com/articles/s42255-025-01309-7
National Diet and Nutrition Survey Report – Key Findings
This latest report, published on 11 June 2025, covers data collected between October 2019 and July 2023. Data collection paused temporarily during the COVID-19 pandemic (March – October 2020). The report includes diet, nutrient intake, and biomarker analysis for various demographic groups, with breakdowns by age, sex, income, deprivation, and out-of-home food consumption.
Find out more here: www.bapen.org.uk/other-news/national-diet-and-nutrition-survey-report-key-findings/
Body Size in Children and Young People Hikes Bowel Cancer Risk
Having a greater weight at birth, or a higher body size as a child, adolescent or young adult, is associated with an increased risk of colorectal cancer in later life, according to new analysis by World Cancer Research Fund International.
This work is part of the Global Cancer Update Programme (CUP Global). The paper is published in the International Journal of Cancer.
The review was conducted by researchers at Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands. It is the first review to analyse and judge all the research examining how factors such as weight, height and body size in early life relate to our risk of bowel cancer as we get older. The results of the study were judged by our CUP Global Expert Panel.
Visit: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.35461
How does body mass index affect breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women with and without cardiovascular disease?
Research reveals that excess weight is linked to an especially high risk of developing breast cancer in postmenopausal women with cardiovascular disease. The findings are published by Wiley online in CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society.
“The findings of this study could be used to inform risk-stratified breast cancer screening programmes,” said Dr Freisling. “This study should also inspire future research to include women with a history of cardiovascular diseases in weight loss trials for breast cancer prevention.”
Visit: https://acsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/cncr.35911
New Paper Provides Roadmap for Optimum Maternal and Foetal Health
A new Briefing Paper, Diet in Pregnancy, published by the British Nutrition Foundation, combines the findings of academic research and recommendations from authoritative institutions, into a roadmap for good nutrition for parents and their babies, from preconception through pregnancy.
Diet in Pregnancy is published in the wake of the House of Lords Food, Diet and Obesity Committee’s report – Recipe for Health: a plan to fix our broken food system – which emphasises the importance of targeting pre-conception, pregnancy and early life to improve the overall health of people in the UK.
Visit: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nbu.70016
Covid-19 Pandemic had Bigger Impact on Women’s Health than Men’s
Published in Social Science & Medicine, the study aimed to understand whether the pandemic had differing effects on the health behaviours of women and men.
The research team, led by Professor Paul McNamee from the University of Aberdeen and collaborators from Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore and the University of Turin, analysed Understanding Society national data from January 2015 to March 2023 to compare results pre- and post-pandemic.
Researchers examined a range of health behaviours including fruit and vegetable consumption, alcohol use and physical activity as part of the study as well as comparing measures of mental health. They found that on both counts women were more negatively affected by the pandemic than their male counterparts.
Professor Paul McNamee who led the research at the University of Aberdeen said: “We found that women reported poorer overall changes in health behaviours than men during the pandemic. Specifically, women reported fewer days of fruit consumption and smaller reductions in alcohol intake. We also found that psychological distress increased for both women and men during the pandemic, with women experiencing a greater rise.”
Visit: www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953624010190