Every food choice leaves an imprint on your health. Some foods strengthen the body over time. Others quietly erode well-being, minute by minute, meal by meal, until years can slip away from an otherwise healthy lifespan.

Researchers at the University of Michigan sought more than general warnings about poor diets or vague encouragement to “eat healthier.” They wanted hard numbers—specific estimates of how many minutes of healthy life every food adds or subtracts.

To find answers, they evaluated 5,800 foods and beverages, giving each a score based on nutritional composition, health impacts, and environmental footprint. Their findings revealed surprising, measurable time costs attached to everyday dietary choices.

A single cold soda costs 12 minutes of healthy life.
One hot dog? Thirty-six minutes.
A double cheeseburger? Nine minutes.
Even bacon costs six minutes per serving.

But some foods work in the opposite direction. Nuts add 25 minutes. Baked salmon contributes 16 minutes. A banana gives back 13.5 minutes.

In 2021, scientists Katerina Stylianou and Olivier Jolliet published these results in Nature Food, introducing what they call the Health Nutritional Index (HNI)—a tool designed to quantify the real-world impact of the foods we eat.

Numbers don’t lie: the choices you make at lunchtime today determine how much healthy life you keep tomorrow.

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Meet the Health Nutritional Index: A New Way to Think About Food

Stylianou and Jolliet wanted to close the gap between knowing that food affects health and understanding exactly how much each decision matters. Most people understand that vegetables are healthy and processed foods aren’t. But real-life choices happen quickly—in grocery aisles, fast-food lines, and restaurant booths—where convenience often defeats intention.

Their index provides what people rarely receive from nutrition advice: concrete, easy-to-understand data. Instead of simply urging people to “choose better,” the HNI shows precisely how much better (or worse) a food is, expressed in units everyone can relate to—minutes of life.

To build the index, scientists relied on the extensive Global Burden of Disease (GBD) project, a research effort involving more than 7,000 scientists worldwide. GBD tracks how environmental, behavioral, and physiological factors, including 15 dietary risks, influence long-term health outcomes.

Stylianou and Jolliet adapted this population-level data to individual foods, creating a comprehensive model capable of assessing more than 5,800 items by their net health impact per standard serving. Their calculations reflect how each choice accumulates into lifelong effects, one snack or meal at a time.

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How Researchers Calculated Minutes Gained or Lost

The calculations behind the Health Nutritional Index are remarkably detailed. Researchers began with GBD data linking specific dietary components to disease outcomes, relying on more than 6,000 risk estimates categorized by age, gender, disease type, and risk factor.

For each dietary element, scientists determined the health burden per gram. For example, processed meat in the United States leads to an estimated loss of 0.45 minutes of healthy life per gram. Multiply that by the 61 grams of processed meat in a typical hot dog, and 27 minutes are already lost—before accounting for sodium, trans fats, and other harmful elements. Adjust for minimal protective nutrients like polyunsaturated fats or fiber, and the final toll reaches 36 minutes.

Researchers repeated these calculations for every food item, weighing positive and negative components. Some foods accumulated penalties, others earned health credits, and a few landed in the middle with mixed effects.

Beyond nutrition, the team also evaluated 18 environmental indicators, making the HNI one of the few tools that integrates both personal health and planetary impact into a single score.

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Why One Soda Costs 12 Minutes of Healthy Life

Sugary soft drinks are among the clearest examples of foods with strong negative health consequences. A serving of cola delivers large amounts of refined sugar without providing any beneficial nutrients.

The harm stems primarily from high sugar intake, which causes insulin spikes, strains metabolic systems, and contributes to obesity, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes risk. Additives—artificial colors, flavors, and phosphoric acid—further stress the body and may interfere with bone mineralization.

Perhaps most importantly, soda often displaces healthier choices. When sugary drinks fill you up, fruits, proteins, whole grains, and vegetables naturally decline.

Twelve minutes may not sound dramatic, but a daily soda habit adds up quickly:
84 minutes lost weekly, 73 hours yearly, and thousands of minutes over a lifetime.

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The Worst Offenders: Hot Dogs, Bacon, and Burgers

Processed meats dominate the “red zone” of the HNI. A single hot dog’s 36-minute life cost makes it the most damaging item on the list. Cured meats like prosciutto remove 24 minutes per serving. Bacon takes six minutes. Even fast-food staples like double cheeseburgers shave nearly nine minutes off healthy life.

Serving size is crucial: few people eat only one hot dog at a barbecue or a single wing during a sports event. The impacts multiply quickly.

Cheese, while nutritious in some ways, also contributes moderate losses due to its saturated fat and sodium content—about one minute per serving.

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The Green Zone: Foods That Add Time to Your Life

Fortunately, many foods contribute positively to longevity. These “green zone” items strengthen metabolic function, reduce inflammation, and support long-term disease prevention.

• Nuts and seeds: +25 minutes

• Baked salmon: +16 minutes

• Bananas: +13.5 minutes

Whole grains, legumes, vegetables, and other fruits also perform well. These foods pair nutritional benefits with low environmental impacts, making them ideal daily choices.

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The 10% Solution: Small Changes, Big Impact

The researchers found that you don’t need a drastic lifestyle overhaul to boost longevity. Simply replacing 10% of daily calories from beef and processed meat with plant-based foods yields remarkable improvements:

• One-third reduction in dietary carbon footprint

• 48 minutes of healthy life added per day

That adds up to:
– 5.6 hours weekly
– 292 hours yearly
– Over 120 healthy days in a decade
– More than a year of added healthy life over 30 years

According to Jolliet, “Small, targeted substitutions offer a powerful and achievable way to gain significant health and environmental benefits without dramatic dietary shifts.”

These small changes compound: swap a hot dog for grilled chicken once a week, choose water over soda, snack on almonds instead of chips. Over time, these choices turn minutes into hours, hours into months, and months into healthier years.

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How Your Food Choices Affect the Planet

The Health Nutritional Index also considers environmental impacts, linking personal well-being to global sustainability. Foods were evaluated across 18 indicators, including carbon footprint, water use, and air pollution.

Beef emerged as the most environmentally harmful food, producing far more greenhouse gases than poultry, pork, or plant-based foods.

Water use varied widely: animal products demanded the most when accounting for feed production, while certain crops required intensive irrigation depending on growing region.

Surprisingly, not all plant-based foods scored well. Greenhouse-grown vegetables often had high emissions due to heating and energy use—showing that production methods matter as much as food type.

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The Traffic Light System: A Simple Guide to Smarter Eating

To make the data more accessible, researchers used a color-coded system:

• Green foods: High health benefits, low environmental impact

• Yellow foods: Mixed effects, suitable in moderation

• Red foods: High harm to health, environment, or both

This simple “traffic light” approach makes navigating grocery stores easier by turning complex data into intuitive guidance.

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Experts Recommend Realistic, Not Perfect, Change

Stylianou and Jolliet emphasize that perfection is unnecessary. People rarely succeed with extreme diet overhauls. Instead, incremental, sustainable shifts create long-term success.

Because the green-zone category includes a wide range of foods, people can choose items they enjoy while improving both health and environmental outcomes. Most cultural diets already include green-zone staples—meaning improvements don’t require abandoning tradition.

Nutrition science will continue evolving, but today’s data provides a powerful reminder: food choices shape not only our future health but the planet we live on.

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The Takeaway: Your Next Meal Matters

Every meal is a vote for more—or fewer—minutes of healthy life.
That refreshing cola costs 12 minutes you can’t get back. Water preserves those minutes. Nuts add minutes. Hot dogs subtract them. No single choice determines your fate, but the sum of your daily decisions does.

Your next bite has consequences—and opportunities.