Sugar's Hidden Dangers

Refined sugar's Hidden Dangers

Some natural sources of fructose include fruits, vegetables and honey. It is also found in refined sweeteners such as ordinary table sugar (sucrose) and high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Sucrose is made up of 50 percent fructose, and 50 percent glucose. HFCS is made up of 55 percent fructose, with the rest mostly glucose. HFCS is cheaper than sugar, and food companies have therefore put it in almost all sweetened beverages, and nearly every available processed food on the market, so we often eat or drink more of it than we realize.

However, both HFCS and sucrose are absorbed into the body in the same way. The glucose component of sugar, with the help of insulin, is metabolized by every cell in the body. The fructose component does not need insulin, and is metabolized mostly by the liver. So the more sugar, or HFCS you eat, the more work there is for the liver, because both sweeteners consist of half or more fructose.

When sugar or HFCS is taken in liquid form, such as in soft drinks and fruit juices, the liver is called upon to process all that liquid fructose much quicker than it would if the fructose entered the body naturally in the form of a peach or a pear. If enough fructose hits the liver quickly and in a large enough quantity, much of it will be converted to fat — the saturated fat we’ve all been told to avoid.

If everybody just ate fructose in its natural unrefined form as whole fruit, there would not be a problem, because fiber seems to mitigate the effect fructose has on the liver. However, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, our sugar consumption (that is both sucrose and HFCS) has been increasing from 75 pounds per year, per person in 1986, to 90 pounds per year, per person in 2000. This is sugar above and beyond what we would get naturally in fruits and vegetables. With that increase there has come an alarming increase in obesity and diabetes, to the point that they are now considered to be epidemics.

What is interesting to note here is that fat continues to be demonized as the culprit in the obesity wars, with people being encouraged to eat low-fat diets, which inevitably deprive them of nutrition found in natural fats like butter, whole milk, cheese and egg yolks. All the while our increased intake of sugar in soft drinks, juices and processed foods is surreptitiously working in the background steadily being converted to fat in the liver, and adding to our weight gain.

But something far worse is happening. As fat gets accumulated in the liver, a chain of events begins that ultimately results in insulin resistance, which causes the body to produce more and more insulin. The sugar-produced excess fat in the liver triggers other symptoms including: high triglyceride levels, low HDL (good cholesterol), high blood pressure, and an expanded waistline. This set of symptoms is classified as metabolic syndrome. According to the American Heart Association, metabolic syndrome is now considered to be a major factor for diabetes, heart disease, stroke and other cardiovascular conditions.

However, researchers have discovered that insulin resistance itself is a serious threat for another reason. It seems that when there is an abundance of insulin, the insulin acts as food for cancer, actually promoting cancer cell growth. This puts people with insulin resistance at a higher risk for cancer, most notably cancers of the breast, colon, endometrium, and possibly the pancreas and kidney

According to researchers at the Yale School of Medicine, too much fructose consumption can lead to excess levels of fat in the liver, which then activate proteins that block insulin signaling, resulting in insulin resistance. And if more fructose is available, more fat will accumulate, but if fructose consumption is reduced or stopped, fat accumulation also halts. What this means is that if we stop eating the fructose found in sugar and HFCS, the liver fat goes away along with the all the dire possibilities of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome, and their resulting diseases. The trick is to stop before too much damage is done.

Robert Lustig, an expert on childhood obesity at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine believes that sugar, particularly fructose is poison, and that our overuse of it is responsible for many chronic diseases such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, as well as a number of cancers. He makes his case quite convincingly in his 90-minute lecture called "Sugar: The Bitter Truth," which is posted on YouTube.

Gary Taubes’ well-researched article, "Is Sugar Toxic?" in the April 17, New York Times Magazine explores the dangers of sugar and what it does to our bodies. In addition, he goes into how in the history of nutrition, fat got to be demonized, while sugar got a free pass, sending us well on the way to a rash of ineffective low-fat diets and an epidemic of obesity.

What all this boils down to is that fructose is a toxin, and if we eat too much of it, our bodies will become so toxic that we will become sick and possibly die from the result of what can only be termed a sugar overdose.

As always, if we eat the foods in their most natural state, raised in the most natural way, and avoid most processed foods, soft drinks and juices, we will be able to avoid diet-caused chronic illnesses.

SMALL STEPS Toward Living in Harmony

According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) the number of high school students who drink soda every day has declined in the past 10 years to one in four. The CDC report that came out in June, added that if other sugary drinks are included, the number is closer to two-thirds of students. In the 1990s and early 2000, the CDC reported that three-quarters of teens were having a sugary drink. One of the factors implicated in this reduction is the fact that many schools are no longer allowing sugary drinks in their schools. The CDC also found that teens drink water, milk and juices most often.