All sugars are not created equal when it comes to how our bodies metabolize the sweeteners, a new study suggests.
People who drank beverages sweetened with fructose, but not glucose, showed an increase in intra-abdominal fat and blood lipid levels and decreased sensitivity to the hormone insulin, researchers reported in this week’s issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
The findings suggest that fructose-sweetened beverages can interfere with how the body handles fat, leading to medical conditions that increase susceptibility to heart attacks and strokes.
The results could be important given that in 2005, the average American consumed 64 kilograms of added sugar, a sizeable proportion of which came through drinking soft drinks, said study author Peter Havel of the University of California at Davis and his colleagues.
Consumption of sugars and sweeteners in the U.S. went up by 19 per cent between 1970 and 2005, according to a commentary accompanying the study.
Increased use of high-fructose corn syrup as a sweetener in pop in the last few decades has been proposed as one dietary change fueling obesity in developed countries, Matthias Tschöp and Susanna Hofmann of the University of Cincinnati-College of Medicine noted in their commentary.
These sorts of posts and articles bring the HFCS PR folks out of the woodwork to debunk all these studies. It’s fun to watch them scramble.
Found by Tom Hofstatter.
John…
I sort of assume you have read ‘Michael Pollan – The Omnivore’s Dilemma’
I was delighted to hear your account of buying a grass fed cow (or a portion of one, I cannot remember which it was).
Mexican and Kosher Coke FTW.
High Fructose corn syrup can only be metabolized by your liver. The liver turns it into triglycerides which in turn attacks the heart and arteries. But they don’t put that in those cute little pro HFCS commercials for some reason.
It’s an issue. We have a lot of sweeteners available but we seem to be about down to two in most drinks. Fructose is about it in the non diet drinks. Apartame is in all the diet drinks except one maker locally. If they’d mix them up so that you weren’t being contantly hit with the same thing I suspect we’d be better off.
I prefer Aspartame – I consider the brain tumors to be a minor side effect.
Fructose is fruit sugar. What implications are there for eating fruit?
RBG
I’m not a HFCS PR person, but I have looked at a lot of these studies as they have come out. As usual, they are rife with hyperbole.
Sugar is sugar. We eat too much, and should eat a more natural balance of all foods. Everyone wants to make some specific thing the bogeyman.
Recent studies surprised some scientists when they discovered that HFCS is, in fact, processed the same way by the body as other sugars. So, are THEY lying? Or is this simply another case of scientists finding what they WANT to find?
There are studies to support both sides. As usual, the anti- crowd accuses the other side of bias because the industry is funding the research or other accusations. And who is funding the studies of the anti-HFCS crowd? What is the truth? You need to decide for yourself.
I, myself, don’t buy the hype from either side, the truth is surely someplace in the middle.
The US grows enormous amounts of corn (maize for non-US readers). But something like 90% of it is a species that is simply inedible for humans. Indeed, much of it is used for animal feed but the rest is chemically converted into human food – mostly HFCS. So, a huge percentage of American farmers are supported by growing HFCS. Meanwhile, the soda manufacturers discovered that HFCS is much sweeter than glucose. So, instead of having to ship in say 100 tons of cane or beet sugar, they only have to pay for shipping in 40 tons of HFCS. Not to mention the corn is a US product but the glucose in an increasingly foreign-produced product.
Now, why do you suppose the government doesn’t step in a regulate the damned stuff? I am not an intentional user of either product but I’d rather see them legalize marijuana and criminalize HFCS.
Its ironic, that the government has been screaming for a few years now about “The Obesity Epidemic” and the “type 2 Diabetes Epidemic”. Yet for decades now, they have been heavily subsidizing the corn industry to the point that this poison is far cheaper to use than actual cane sugar. The hypocrisy of our government knows no bounds.
HFCS is the new trans fat. Snapple is already starting to step away from it in their iced teas, well see how many others follow. And I cringe every time I see those stupid pro HFCS commercials where the person who thinks HFCS’s are dangerous is made to look stupid and un educated.
#2. Yes. I can buy the Mexican Coca-Cola (in glass bottles)here in Colorado. Fructose free, real sugar! I was amazed at the difference. Remember the 6oz. Cokes in the green bottles we got as kids? It tastes just like that. We have become so acclimated to this crap, we don’t know what is good anymore.
Corn: The source of and the answer to all our problems
Never been a desert person. Meat & potato [fat and starch] for me. Of course since I live in the great USA I am 210 lbs instead of a healthy(?) 180 lbs for my height.
>> McCullough said,
>> We have become so acclimated to this crap, we don’t know what is good anymore.
Couldn’t you say that about soda pop in general — Mexican or not?
My favorite beverages are beer, coffee, wine and whiskey — which I find much better than soda pop.
(Fresh fruit juices are also much tastier but I don’t drink them that much.)
My #1 beverage is water — here in Portland we have really great tap water. The very best is to drink straight out of the streams and rivers, which we can do in the northwest with relative safety. (less dangerous than peanut butter, apparently!)
It’s all part of the plan.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=eAaQNACwaLw
Hot dang! Corn! Now we can make whiskey!
–Firesign Theater
I am sorry, I can’t stop ROFL as the well informed brain knows that there are varieties of sugar and none of them are poison. It’s headlines that are poison. The brain uses glucose for fuel, fructose has to be processed an extra step to convert to glucose. It’s a subset of the broader term “sugar” which has various forms. Oh rats, I forgot to add sucrose which has both glucose and fructose.
But what about the Pepsi Generation ?
#16 for the win! That’s been known for some time, but it’s good that you debunk the notion that some sugars are healthier than others, and go on to say that sucrose is just a complex sugar made of fructose and glucose linked together. I think I heard that first in high school biology.
However, Mexican Coke (with sucrose) really does taste better than the American made stuff.
Real Surgar from Sugar cane taste better then any Sugar! Kids been drinking Juice from Canes for more then 1000 years and have less problems with health then HFCS which only been around for a few decades.
As usual, there is hyperbole and reporting of only half of the facts, in order to illicit the necessary FUD response. Please read the entire article. I quote here:
“Fructose is no worse than glucose if taken in moderation, said Dr. David Jenkins, who holds the Canada Research Chair in nutrition and metabolism at the University of Toronto.
“We’re talking about excess in people who are gaining weight, people who are overweight to begin with and people who are not exercising to begin with,” Jenkins said.
The long-term effects of fructose remain unknown, but it’s clear that chronic overconsumption of dietary sugars in general is harmful to health, the commentators said.”
In other words, the particular sugar is NOT the problem. OVER-CONSUMPTION of the particular sugar is the problem, coupled with a perceived sedentary lifestyle and weight issues.
7 PolarBear “Sugar is sugar… Recent studies surprised some scientists when they discovered that HFCS is, in fact, processed the same way by the body as other sugars.”
Not quite. As diabetics and hypoglycemics know, fructose is a special sugar that is processed by the body a slightly different way allowing a higher tolerance for this type of sugar.
13 Greg Allen
You should be treating every stream in the Pacific NorthWest & BC (at least) with suspicion as Giardia cysts (Beaver Fever) can potentially be in any one of them. People get this nasty thing all the time, including my brother who used to laugh at such an idea.
RBG
I usually don’t drink Coke any more, but have had a couple here in Israel in the last few weeks, and they were just like I remembered during the 1970s (in the USA). I didn’t put any effort into looking at the label for סוכר, but I will today at the Russian supermarket (being that is it Shabat).
Ok, so just another reason the fatties should drink diet soda.
Carry on …
#16 you must work for a company that makes HFCS.
The problem, for one, is everywhere you look…fat fat fat. I think it’s not just HFCS, but also hydrogenated oils. Push that extra hydrogen atom into the fat, and voila…doesn’t rot (really…Crisco never turns rancid..not ever, not EVER). But, just as H2O would be similar, just not the same with an extra hydrogen atom….think H202. It’s not like you couldn’t drink hydrogen peroxide(the H202), but your body wouldn’t like it. I think hydrogenated oils are the same thing…”what in the heck do we do with this? Can’t use it for energy…might as well just shove it over here”. Your body can’t figure out what to do with these new altered foods. So, now we have people who look like melted candles…big blobs o’fat waddling around.
HFCS tastes sweet (too sweet actually). And unlike the Cane Sugar that we’ve been lapping down since about 500b.c. (It is believed to have originated in Polynesia, then spread to India. In 510 BC the Emperor Darius of what was then Persia invaded India where he found “the reed which gives honey without bees”.) That’s a LONG time for our bodies to adapt. High Fructose Corn Syrup is not what it sounds like.
How it’s made (thanks to the wonderful http://www.westonaprice.org website, and author Linda Joyce Forristal) “High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is produced by processing corn starch to yield glucose, and then processing the glucose to produce a high percentage of fructose. It all sounds rather simple–white cornstarch is turned into crystal clear syrup. However, the process is actually very complicated. Three different enzymes are needed to break down cornstarch, which is composed of chains of glucose molecules of almost infinite length, into the simple sugars glucose and fructose.
First, cornstarch is treated with alpha-amylase to produce shorter chains of sugars called polysaccharides. Alpha-amylase is industrially produced by a bacterium, usually Bacillus sp. It is purified and then shipped to HFCS manufacturers.
Next, an enzyme called glucoamylase breaks the sugar chains down even further to yield the simple sugar glucose. Unlike alpha-amylase, glucoamylase is produced by Aspergillus, a fungus, in a fermentation vat where one would likely see little balls of Aspergillus floating on the top.
The third enzyme, glucose-isomerase, is very expensive. It converts glucose to a mixture of about 42 percent fructose and 50-52 percent glucose with some other sugars mixed in. While alpha-amylase and glucoamylase are added directly to the slurry, pricey glucose-isomerase is packed into columns and the sugar mixture is then passed over it. Inexpensive alpha-amylase and glucoamylase are used only once, glucose-isomerase is reused until it loses most of its activity.
There are two more steps involved. First is a liquid chromatography step that takes the mixture to 90 percent fructose. Finally, this is back-blended with the original mixture to yield a final concentration of about 55 percent fructose–what the industry calls high fructose corn syrup.”
So, forget “good sugar bad sugar”, lets just go for sugar that our bodies know, and can tolerate well, and crap that we’ve concocted in the last 20 years. Hmmm, let’s see….one is tried-and-true, and fine in reasonable quantities, the OTHER is made in a refinery and needs Aspergillus, a fungus to be created. Hmmm….which do you THINK might be a “better”? Aspergillus, the fungus, can cause allergic reactions in people, and some species of the fungus is able to cause serious disease in humans and animals. Oh yeah, sounds like something I want to ingest in QUANTITY. No thank you, I’d rather just eat a hand full of good ol’ Sugar Cane crystals. The Persians ate it, in the 11th century (A.D.) the Crusades brought it to Europe. It’s sugar cane juice, boiled down and dried. Simple!!! You could do it in your basement. (Try making HFCS down there.)
HFCS also only has GRAS status with the FDA (1983, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration listed high fructose corn syrup as “Generally Recognized as Safe”). However, no dietary studies were done to obtain this status. The jury is still out if it is really safe.
GRAS status is usually based on the chemical make up — it’s mostly fructose, which is safe, and corn is safe..blah blah blah, award it. (And remember, plus, big corporations wanted it to be granted GRAS status so…there you go!) Our bodies know the difference though….we have fat kids, we have fat babies, more allergies, more lethargy, more autism, more bipolar, more depression. …gee..something has changed. What? I don’t know, maybe it’s because our food supply is poison? Remember the life expectancy tables are based on how long the LAST generation lived…not the one living now.
I think we ARE the lab rats.
I don’t like it. I don’t eat it. I have no reason to eat HFCS OR Hydrogenated oils. Why eat something that doesn’t taste good?
Life is too short to eat CRAP.
# 23 meetsy said, “…just as H2O would be similar, just not the same with an extra hydrogen atom….think H202. It’s not like you couldn’t drink hydrogen peroxide(the H202), but your body wouldn’t like it. ”
Damned tootin’ your body wouldn’t like it! H202 is a very strong oxidizing agent. The stuff you buy over the counter is only 3% and in significant doses will cause blistering and irritation of the mouth and alimentary tract and cause serious diarrhea, vomiting and major tummy pain. At higher concentrations, it becomes a corrosive substance in the belly and will easily cause you great pain before your death. It’s also a know carcinogen and long exposures are associated with the skin disorder vitilgo. I’d strongly suggest you read the warning label before suggesting it is drinkable.
This is why America and Europe has become so fat in the past 30 years. I suffer from the effects of HFCS. I’m over weight, diabetic, with high blood pressure and high cholesterol, and I’m only in my mid 30. Now im on drugs that help control them to a point, but im also suffering side effects from those drugs as well. I’m double fucked.
I’m not going to point blame at only HFCS, I also blame my heritage, and the fact I’m a lazy bastard. I’ve lost a significant amount of weight in about 1 year since I stopped my addiction to soft drinks (coke mainly). I’m drinking more coffee now with artificial sweeteners (splenda lately). And maybe drink a coke once a week at the most, vs 6-8 cans of it every DAY.
HFCS is cheaper than sugar, which is why it’s used in producing so many products. Yet what I don’t understand is why HFCS isn’t used in Mexico soft drink production considering they aren’t exactly a very rich country, and would benefit from using chaper HFCS. Unless the claim HFCS is helps lower production costs is bogus. Yay conspiracy theories!
Also Pepsi has announced they are going “retro” and will produce Pepsi using real sugar in the US market, but only for a short time (till the end of summer I think). The cans will look different (looking retro), but probably cost more. But taste WAY better.
#25, Frag,
Yet what I don’t understand is why HFCS isn’t used in Mexico soft drink production
Cost. While the corn industry in the US is subsidized, it isn’t in Mexico. (Partly the reason so many Mexican corn tortilla makers went belly up after being flooded with US made products after NAFTA) Sugar cane is actually cheaper in Mexico than processing expensive corn.
Canada resisted using corn sweeteners for many years. When COKE went to corn sweeteners in the mid ’80s (remember “new Coke”)Canada didn’t. Since they used a lot of Cuban sugar in Canada, sugar was cheaper there. I can’t say if they still use sugar in Canada, maybe one of our Canadians could read the back of a Coke can.
#23, meetsy
While a generally good post, I have one thought I would like to comment on.
While you make a good point about the processes used to obtain HFCS, very few commercial foods look pretty when they are produced. For example, if someone had to watch the entire process of seeing chickens stuffed into a cage through to the Chicken Nuggets on their plate, they might become vegetarians.
The attractiveness of the process should not be the determining point of whether or not we eat something. That should be left to whether or not the food is healthy for you.
HFCS in our food, questionable (perhaps even negative) energy balance ethanol in our cars. Gee, ya’ think there’s a corn-related lobby involved in this somewhere (like ADM and farmers)? A corporate owned Amerika with the best government their money can buy.
I was using the substitute sweeteners until I kept reading about how bad they were for you and decided to go back to sugar. Honestly with sugar you know what you’re getting.
#15 Bubba Ray, Nick Danger could sort it out.
Came by for my morning chuckle and was surprised by the Firesign Theater reference…..the flashbacks, ohhh the flashbacks…..