The new system classifies food, drinks and mixed meals. I don’t think anyone is surprised that raw fruits top the list, while instant meals and most desserts score only 1 point out of 100.
Invented by experts at Tufts University, the chart includes more than 8,000 foods, drinks, and combination meals like pizza. The Food Compass Nutrient Profile System rates foods based on their total health benefits and drawbacks out of a total of 100 possible points.
Curiously, white rice with soy sauce and ice cream are on par in terms of health, and both score poorly on the nutritional scale. This is because white rice is a fast-acting carbohydrate, similar to the sugars in ice cream, and with fewer nutrients and less fiber than brown rice, which scores higher on the scale.
Scientists say the graphic is designed to help consumers make healthier choices, encourage companies to make healthier products, and provide public health agencies with a labeling system.
The system has been developed over three years to rate the safety of the foods we eat and promises to be the most comprehensive and science-based nutrient profiling system to date.
“Once you get beyond ‘eat veggies, avoid soda,’ people are quite confused about how to identify healthier options in grocery stores, coffee shops, and restaurants,” said study lead author Dariush Mozaffarian, dean of the Friedman School. “Consumers, policy makers and even industry are looking for simple tools to guide everyone to healthier choices.”
The new eating compass has been selected based on nutritional attributes related to diseases such as diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular problems or cancer, as well as the risks of malnutrition.
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To create a score, 54 attributes are scored in 9 domains relevant to health : nutrient ratios, vitamins, minerals, food ingredients, additives, processing, specific lipids, fiber and protein, and phytochemicals. Mastery scores are added together to create a final Food Compass Score (FCS), ranging from 1 (least healthy) to 100 (most healthy) for all foods / beverages.
The healthiest foods
- Raspberries (100 points)
- Carrot juice (100 points)
- Almonds (95 points)
- Vegetable curry (90 points)
- Yogurt, chocolate, skim milk (81 points)
- Tuna salad, light mayonnaise (73 points)
- Cappuccino (73 points)
Less healthy foods
- Pizza with meat (25 points)
- Cheeseburger -fast food- (8 points)
- Noodles or instant noodle soups (1 point)
- Ready-to-eat pudding (1 point)
- Monster, Powerade or Gatorade (1 point)
For the 8,032 foods, the mean compass score was 43.2. The lowest scoring category was that of snacks and sweet desserts with an average of 16.4.
Unsurprisingly, the big winners were fruits with an average of 73.9, vegetables with an average of 69.1, and legumes, nuts and seeds, with an average of 78.6. In terms of meat, seafood was the healthiest option with an average score of 67, poultry in second with an average of 42.7, and beef last with an average of 24.9.
Referencia: Mozaffarian, D., et al. (2021) Food Compass is a nutrient profiling system using expanded characteristics for assessing healthfulness of foods. Nature Food. doi.org/10.1038/s43016-021-00381-y.
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