Beyond False Dichotomies in Ultra‐Processed Food Policy

e appreciate the thoughtful response to our article and strongly agree that improving diet quality should remain a central public health goal.Diets rich in minimally processed, fiber-containing, and diverse foods are associated with better health outcomes and may support healthier gut microbial ecosystems. 1 Public health should continue promoting nourishing dietary patterns and improving access to real food.However, we are concerned that the response frames these goals as somehow separate from, or even incompatible with, addressing the addictive engineering of ultraprocessed foods (UPFs).In our view, this creates a false dichotomy.For decades, public health messaging has encouraged people to "eat healthier."Yet during this same period, the food environment has become increasingly saturated with industrially formulated products engineered to maximize reward, convenience, and excessive consumption.These products are designed to be rapidly consumed, intensely palatable, heavily marketed, and difficult to resist under conditions of stress, time scarcity, and repeated cue exposure.Increasingly, they are also wrapped in health-oriented marketing related to "plant-based," "gut health," "high protein," or "functional" nutrition, further blurring distinctions between genuinely nourishing foods and products optimized primarily for overconsumption.This is precisely why discussions of addictive design and corporate engineering remain important.Public health would never have addressed smoking-related disease solely by encouraging people to breathe clean air while ignoring that the air itself was saturated with cigarette smoke from industrially engineered products designed and marketed to sustain compulsive use.Similarly, people attempting to follow healthier dietary guidance today must navigate food environments saturated with intentionally tempting UPFs in order to access and sustain minimally processed dietary patterns