Dangers of Sugar

What do fat, salt and sugar have in common? We all know that we should limit our intake of them. However, there isn’t much information available on recommended maximum intake of sugar.

According to Statistics Canada, the average Canadian consumes 26 teaspoons of sugar per day. That works out to 40 kilograms per year, or 20 bags. When you metabolize excess glucose and fructose in sugar, the liver turns that energy into fat, which can cause issues with metabolism and heart function.

Excessive sugar intake leads to conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, high cholesterol, dyslipidemia and obesity.

There is also an association between sugar intake and dyslipidemia (which is a condition associated with high triglycerides and low HDL cholesterol levels). In a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), people who ate the largest amounts of added sugar had the highest blood triglyceride levels and the lowest HDL (good) cholesterol levels. That study also showed that excessive sugar intake more than tripled the odds of having low HDL cholesterol levels, which is a strong risk factor for heart disease. This effect was found to be independent of obesity rates, despite the fact the two are often correlated.

Another study was performed on sugar intake and mortality. Over the course of the 15-year study, participants who took in 25% or more of their daily calories as sugar were more than twice as likely to die from heart disease as those whose diets included less than 10% added sugar. Overall, the odds of dying from heart disease rose in tandem with the percentage of sugar in the diet—and that was true regardless of a person’s age, sex, physical activity level, and body-mass index (a measure of weight).

A study out of Connecticut College claims that Oreos have the same addictive properties as psychostimulants and opioids. Cravings for drugs as well as high sugar foods can be triggered simply by exposure to a reward-paired environment. This study found that in rats, the reward behavior associated with consuming high fat/sugar food (Oreo cookies) is equivalent to the rewarding properties of cocaine and morphine. When the brains of the animals were examined, it was found that Oreos caused a higher level of activation than cocaine or morphine in the nucleus accumbens, a brain area responsible for feelings of pleasure and addiction.

This suggests that since high fat/sugar foods have a similar addictive effect as drugs, maladaptive eating behaviors contributing to obesity can be compared to drug addiction.

Overall, there is a considerable health risk behind high sugar intake. Careful analysis of sugar content, especially in processed food, and intake moderation should be exercised.

Resources

http://www.conncoll.edu/academics/student-research/are-oreos-addictive-nucleus-accumbens-c-fos-expression-is-correlated-with-conditioned-place-preference-to-cocaine-morphine-and-high-fatsugar-food-consumption.htm