Here is an article my friend sent to me yesterday. I have talked about sugar in my blog but have never really gotten too deep into the subject. The following article shares some research from Dr. Lustig who I have heard speak. He does a lot of scientific research and has even had one of his peer-reviewed journal articles published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. I just thought this would be an interested article to share. Maybe it will make you think a little differently about sugar.
A spoonful
of sugar might make the medicine go down. But it also makes blood pressure and
cholesterol go up, along with your risk for liver
failure, obesity, heart disease and diabetes.
Sugar and
other sweeteners are, in fact, so toxic to the human body that they should be
regulated as strictly as alcohol by governments worldwide, according to a
commentary in the current issue of the journal Nature by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).
The
researchers propose regulations such as taxing all foods and drinks that
include added sugar, banning sales in or near schools and placing age limits on
purchases.
Although
the commentary might seem straight out of the Journal of Ideas That Will Never
Fly, the researchers cite numerous studies and statistics to make their case
that added sugar — or, more specifically, sucrose, an even mix of glucose and
fructose found in high-fructose corn syrup and in table sugar made
from sugar cane and sugar beets — has been as detrimental to society as alcohol
and tobacco.
Sour
words about sugar
The
background is well-known: In the United States, more than two-thirds of the
population is overweight, and half of them are obese. About 80 percent of those
who are obese will have diabetes or
metabolic disorders and will have shortened lives, according to the UCSF
authors of the commentary, led by Robert Lustig.
And about 75 percent of U.S. health-care dollars are spent on diet-related
diseases, the authors said.
Worldwide,
the obese now greatly outnumber the undernourished, according to the World
Health Organization. Obesity is a public health problem in most countries. And
chronic diseases related to diet such as heart diseases, diabetes and some
cancers — for the first time in human history — kill more people than infectious diseases, according to the United
Nations.
Less
known, and still debated, is sugar's role in the obesity and chronic disease
pandemic. From an evolutionary perceptive, sugar in the form of fruit was
available only a few months of the year, at harvest time, the UCSF researchers said. Similarly, honey was
guarded by bees and therefore was a treat, not a dietary staple. [6 Easy Ways to Eat More Fruits & Veggies]
Today,
added sugar, as opposed to natural sugars found in fruits, is often added in
foods ranging from soup to soda. Americans consume on average more than 600
calories per day from added sugar,
equivalent to a whopping 40 teaspoons. "Nature made sugar hard to get; man
made it easy," the researchers write.
Many
researchers are seeing sugar as not just "empty calories," but rather
a chemical that becomes toxic in excess. At issue is the fact that glucose from
complex carbohydrates, such as whole grains, is safely metabolized by cells
throughout the body, but the fructose element of sugar is metabolized primarily
by the liver. This is where the trouble can begin — taxing the liver, causing
fatty liver disease, and ultimately leading to insulin resistance, the
underlying causes of obesity and diabetes.
Added
sugar, more so than the fructose in fiber-rich fruit, hits the liver more
directly and can cause more damage — in laboratory rodents, anyway. Some
researchers, however, remained unconvinced of the evidence of sugar's toxic effect on the human body at current
consumption levels, as high as they are.
Economists
to the rescue
Lustig, a
medical doctor in UCSF's Department of Pediatrics, compares added sugar to
tobacco and alcohol (coincidentally made from sugar) in that it is addictive,
toxic and has a negative impact on society, thus meeting established public
health criteria for regulation. Lustig advocates a consumer tax on any product
with added sugar.
Among
Lustig's more radical proposals are to ban the sale of sugary drinks to children under
age 17 and to tighten zoning laws for the sale of sugary beverages and snacks
around schools and in low-income areas plagued by obesity, analogous to
alcoholism and alcohol regulation.
Economists,
however, debate as to whether a consumer tax — such as a soda tax proposed in
many U.S. states — is the most effective means of curbing sugar consumption.
Economists at Iowa State University led by John Beghin suggest taxing the
sweetener itself at the manufacturer level, not the end product containing
sugar.
This
concept, published last year in the journal Contemporary Economic Policy, would
give companies an incentive to add less sweetener to their products. After all,
high-fructose corn syrup is ubiquitous in food in part because it is so cheap
and serves as a convenient substitute for more high-quality ingredients, such
as fresher vegetables in processed foods.
Some
researchers argue that saturated fat, not sugar, is the root cause of obesity
and chronic disease. Others argue that it is highly processed foods with simple
carbohydrates. Still others argue that it is a lack of physical exercise. It
could, of course, be a matter of all these issues.
Christopher
Wanjek is the author of the books "Bad Medicine" and "Food At Work." His column, Bad
Medicine, appears regularly on LiveScience.
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