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Sugar - the sweet truth

zoeysasha37
zoeysasha37 Posts: 7,089 Member
in Debate Club
A friend showed me this-

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27418186?dopt=Abstract

And I thought it was outstanding!
I consume all things in moderation, I have no medical issues. I believe that sugar isn't anything to fear!
Obviously nobody would suggest a diet of only sugar but I do truly believe that sugar can be a part of a healthy well balanced wide variety diet.

What are your thoughts?
How do you feel when you see so much fear mongering about sugar( or any food)?
«1

Replies

  • Packerjohn
    Packerjohn Posts: 4,855 Member
    edited July 2016
    Part of the article you linked:

    The purpose of this review is to present data from recent RCTs and findings from recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses related to sugar consumption and its putative health effects. This review evaluates findings from recent randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews and meta-analyses into the relationship of sugar consumption and a range of health-related issues including energy-regulating hormones, obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and accumulation of liver fat and neurologic responses. Data from these sources do not support linkages between sugar consumption at normal levels within the human diet and various adverse metabolic and health-related effects.

    The bolded part is the elephant in the room (no pun intended). Consumption at normal levels is not a problem, over consumption is, just like it would be with any food. However, sugar and its cousins like HFCS are some of the main sources of calories in foods with high calories and little nutritional value that are often over consumed.

  • Packerjohn
    Packerjohn Posts: 4,855 Member
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    P.S. I don't think sugar from whole foods are a problem. I also don't think free sugars are a problem in small, moderate amounts. But I think the term "moderation" is meaningless and a lot of people who think their sugar consumption is moderate are actually eating excessive, harmful amounts.

    This is a valid point. Words like "moderation" and "junkfood" often get thrown about without any real context or explanation. Almost without fail, when asked to define either, you'll get a "you know what I mean" response. That's not exactly helpful to someone who hasn't the slightest clue, or may actually be incredibly misinformed to begin with.

    Yep, moderation is up for grabs. An example, Americans drink 650 8 oz servings of soda per person per year.
    http://abcnews.go.com/Business/us-soda-consumption-lowest-level-30-years/story?id=38036424

    of that more than 50% is non-diet: http://www.businessinsider.com/charts-show-diet-soda-vs-regular-2014-1

    If for simplicity you assume 50% is regular soda, it works out the average American is getting almost 33,000 calories a year from regular soda, or around 10 pound worth of calories. This amount of calories is coming from less than 1 20 oz bottle a day, what most people would consider "moderate consumption, given the norms today.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    Packerjohn wrote: »
    Part of the article you linked:

    The purpose of this review is to present data from recent RCTs and findings from recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses related to sugar consumption and its putative health effects. This review evaluates findings from recent randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews and meta-analyses into the relationship of sugar consumption and a range of health-related issues including energy-regulating hormones, obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and accumulation of liver fat and neurologic responses. Data from these sources do not support linkages between sugar consumption at normal levels within the human diet and various adverse metabolic and health-related effects.

    The bolded part is the elephant in the room (no pun intended). Consumption at normal levels is not a problem, over consumption is, just like it would be with any food. However, sugar and its cousins like HFCS are some of the main sources of calories in foods with high calories and little nutritional value that are often over consumed.

    Overconsumption is not recommended, but is a matter of personal responsibility and choice, and not a reason to claim that sugar itself is inherently unhealthy or that eating it in reasonable quantities is bad for you or an irresponsible choice.
  • Packerjohn
    Packerjohn Posts: 4,855 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Packerjohn wrote: »
    Part of the article you linked:

    The purpose of this review is to present data from recent RCTs and findings from recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses related to sugar consumption and its putative health effects. This review evaluates findings from recent randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews and meta-analyses into the relationship of sugar consumption and a range of health-related issues including energy-regulating hormones, obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and accumulation of liver fat and neurologic responses. Data from these sources do not support linkages between sugar consumption at normal levels within the human diet and various adverse metabolic and health-related effects.

    The bolded part is the elephant in the room (no pun intended). Consumption at normal levels is not a problem, over consumption is, just like it would be with any food. However, sugar and its cousins like HFCS are some of the main sources of calories in foods with high calories and little nutritional value that are often over consumed.

    Overconsumption is not recommended, but is a matter of personal responsibility and choice, and not a reason to claim that sugar itself is inherently unhealthy or that eating it in reasonable quantities is bad for you or an irresponsible choice.

    I would say that is what groups like the WHO, CDC, etc are doing, providing guidelines on what is a reasonable amount.

    Fact of the matter is we as a society are paying for people's lack of taking personal responsibility and poor choices when they eat anything in excess.
  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
    Funded by ? ....

    I wish people would do actual experimental science rather than publish opinions or reworking of old data.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    edited July 2016
    Packerjohn wrote: »
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Packerjohn wrote: »
    Part of the article you linked:

    The purpose of this review is to present data from recent RCTs and findings from recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses related to sugar consumption and its putative health effects. This review evaluates findings from recent randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews and meta-analyses into the relationship of sugar consumption and a range of health-related issues including energy-regulating hormones, obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and accumulation of liver fat and neurologic responses. Data from these sources do not support linkages between sugar consumption at normal levels within the human diet and various adverse metabolic and health-related effects.

    The bolded part is the elephant in the room (no pun intended). Consumption at normal levels is not a problem, over consumption is, just like it would be with any food. However, sugar and its cousins like HFCS are some of the main sources of calories in foods with high calories and little nutritional value that are often over consumed.

    Overconsumption is not recommended, but is a matter of personal responsibility and choice, and not a reason to claim that sugar itself is inherently unhealthy or that eating it in reasonable quantities is bad for you or an irresponsible choice.

    I would say that is what groups like the WHO, CDC, etc are doing, providing guidelines on what is a reasonable amount.

    Yes, I agree. I think someone more in tune with their diet may not need to follow them precisely, but that as a general rule of thumb those are good recommendations and my own diet is in line with them.

    Of course, same with some of their other recommendations like about sat fat and fiber and so on, which many of the most anti sugar would dismiss.
  • Gallowmere1984
    Gallowmere1984 Posts: 6,626 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    P.S. I don't think sugar from whole foods are a problem. I also don't think free sugars are a problem in small, moderate amounts. But I think the term "moderation" is meaningless and a lot of people who think their sugar consumption is moderate are actually eating excessive, harmful amounts.

    This is a valid point. Words like "moderation" and "junkfood" often get thrown about without any real context or explanation. Almost without fail, when asked to define either, you'll get a "you know what I mean" response. That's not exactly helpful to someone who hasn't the slightest clue, or may actually be incredibly misinformed to begin with.

    I disagree. There has been a lot of talk about moderation and how we define it here.

    My personal definition: moderation means that your consumption neither causes you to go over calories nor replaces other, more important, nutritional needs. So moderate added sugar, to me, would be an amount that (along with the fat that normally goes with it) does not result in excessive calories, inadequate protein or healthy fat, inadequate fiber, inadequate vegetables and other sources of micronutrients. Since I'm small and older, for me that's not a huge amount, but much more on a day when I do a long run or bike ride (one reason I feel no worries about fueling those with some sports products on occasion, like gels, as well as including some more enjoyable sugar+fat in my diet, like ice cream).

    Looking back on my childhood and the cultural norms at the time, I think we used to do this just naturally, as part of how people understood what a sensible diet should be. If some have gone away from that, that's not the fault of sugar or mean that there's something overly difficult about being sensible and moderate re consumption. Some just don't want to or choose to.

    "Here" is the important word that you mentioned. I wasn't referring to MFP users (who by and large have better nutrition knowledge than average). I was talking about everyday, run of the mill conversation. As packerjohn pointed out, what passes for moderation, given recent social norms, is actually a bit excessive, especially using the definition that you just gave.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    P.S. I don't think sugar from whole foods are a problem. I also don't think free sugars are a problem in small, moderate amounts. But I think the term "moderation" is meaningless and a lot of people who think their sugar consumption is moderate are actually eating excessive, harmful amounts.

    This is a valid point. Words like "moderation" and "junkfood" often get thrown about without any real context or explanation. Almost without fail, when asked to define either, you'll get a "you know what I mean" response. That's not exactly helpful to someone who hasn't the slightest clue, or may actually be incredibly misinformed to begin with.

    I disagree. There has been a lot of talk about moderation and how we define it here.

    My personal definition: moderation means that your consumption neither causes you to go over calories nor replaces other, more important, nutritional needs. So moderate added sugar, to me, would be an amount that (along with the fat that normally goes with it) does not result in excessive calories, inadequate protein or healthy fat, inadequate fiber, inadequate vegetables and other sources of micronutrients. Since I'm small and older, for me that's not a huge amount, but much more on a day when I do a long run or bike ride (one reason I feel no worries about fueling those with some sports products on occasion, like gels, as well as including some more enjoyable sugar+fat in my diet, like ice cream).

    Looking back on my childhood and the cultural norms at the time, I think we used to do this just naturally, as part of how people understood what a sensible diet should be. If some have gone away from that, that's not the fault of sugar or mean that there's something overly difficult about being sensible and moderate re consumption. Some just don't want to or choose to.

    "Here" is the important word that you mentioned. I wasn't referring to MFP users (who by and large have better nutrition knowledge than average). I was talking about everyday, run of the mill conversation. As packerjohn pointed out, what passes for moderation, given recent social norms, is actually a bit excessive, especially using the definition that you just gave.

    Well, it really depends, especially with something like sugar. I know a lot of people (not overweight) who tend to eat added sugar in moderation, much like most people did when I was growing up. Soda is a good example -- you can't average soda consumption across the population, because a lot of people drink no sugary soda (or no soda at all), whereas a significant portion of those who do drink crazy (IMO) amounts. So yeah, there's a problem with moderation (I'd say it's the same problem as the fact that a significant portion of the population eats basically no vegetables unless french fries count and way too much sat fat and fried stuff), but this is not a problem with sugar specifically. It's that people, for whatever reason, choose not to exercise restraint when it comes to diet.
  • Gallowmere1984
    Gallowmere1984 Posts: 6,626 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    P.S. I don't think sugar from whole foods are a problem. I also don't think free sugars are a problem in small, moderate amounts. But I think the term "moderation" is meaningless and a lot of people who think their sugar consumption is moderate are actually eating excessive, harmful amounts.

    This is a valid point. Words like "moderation" and "junkfood" often get thrown about without any real context or explanation. Almost without fail, when asked to define either, you'll get a "you know what I mean" response. That's not exactly helpful to someone who hasn't the slightest clue, or may actually be incredibly misinformed to begin with.

    I disagree. There has been a lot of talk about moderation and how we define it here.

    My personal definition: moderation means that your consumption neither causes you to go over calories nor replaces other, more important, nutritional needs. So moderate added sugar, to me, would be an amount that (along with the fat that normally goes with it) does not result in excessive calories, inadequate protein or healthy fat, inadequate fiber, inadequate vegetables and other sources of micronutrients. Since I'm small and older, for me that's not a huge amount, but much more on a day when I do a long run or bike ride (one reason I feel no worries about fueling those with some sports products on occasion, like gels, as well as including some more enjoyable sugar+fat in my diet, like ice cream).

    Looking back on my childhood and the cultural norms at the time, I think we used to do this just naturally, as part of how people understood what a sensible diet should be. If some have gone away from that, that's not the fault of sugar or mean that there's something overly difficult about being sensible and moderate re consumption. Some just don't want to or choose to.

    "Here" is the important word that you mentioned. I wasn't referring to MFP users (who by and large have better nutrition knowledge than average). I was talking about everyday, run of the mill conversation. As packerjohn pointed out, what passes for moderation, given recent social norms, is actually a bit excessive, especially using the definition that you just gave.

    Well, it really depends, especially with something like sugar. I know a lot of people (not overweight) who tend to eat added sugar in moderation, much like most people did when I was growing up. Soda is a good example -- you can't average soda consumption across the population, because a lot of people drink no sugary soda (or no soda at all), whereas a significant portion of those who do drink crazy (IMO) amounts. So yeah, there's a problem with moderation (I'd say it's the same problem as the fact that a significant portion of the population eats basically no vegetables unless french fries count and way too much sat fat and fried stuff), but this is not a problem with sugar specifically. It's that people, for whatever reason, choose not to exercise restraint when it comes to diet.

    Conjecture on my part, but I'd be willing to wager that it's because there's little reason in the Western world to exercise said restraint, at least in the short term. Food is far from scarce, it's cheap as hell, and we keep being beaten over the head with the "being overweight is okay" hammer by the feels media, while actual scientists get ignored in the background.

    So, add all of that together with the fact that most of the problems with overeating take a long time rear their heads, and it's far less shocking. Funny how most people seem to wait until they get a T2 diabetes diagnosis before they acknowledge that it's a problem.
  • AlabasterVerve
    AlabasterVerve Posts: 3,171 Member
    I think this recent study that concludes people define moderation as more than they personally eat is probably pretty accurate at a population level. Everyone knows that "too much" sugar is bad but I don't think the people who are consuming excessive sugar realize it and I'd bet they'd describe their intake as moderate.

    "In Study 3, participants generally perceived themselves to eat in moderation and defined moderate consumption as greater than their personal consumption. Furthermore, definitions of moderate consumption were related to personal consumption behaviors."
  • stevencloser
    stevencloser Posts: 8,911 Member
    edited July 2016
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    I think this recent study that concludes people define moderation as more than they personally eat is probably pretty accurate at a population level. Everyone knows that "too much" sugar is bad but I don't think the people who are consuming excessive sugar realize it and I'd bet they'd describe their intake as moderate.

    "In Study 3, participants generally perceived themselves to eat in moderation and defined moderate consumption as greater than their personal consumption. Furthermore, definitions of moderate consumption were related to personal consumption behaviors."

    What is moderate for someone has to be directly dependent on their behaviours. Someone regularly doing hard cardio workouts is going to have a much higher percentage of sugars in their total calories than a sedentary person, because the only thing that ends up going up further is carbs the higher your expenditure is. Both protein and fat are pretty static at an optimum that depends on your weight while carbs can be increased and decreased as needed for your goals.
  • Packerjohn
    Packerjohn Posts: 4,855 Member
    stevencloser wrote: »
    AlabasterVerve wrote: »
    I think this recent study that concludes people define moderation as more than they personally eat is probably pretty accurate at a population level. Everyone knows that "too much" sugar is bad but I don't think the people who are consuming excessive sugar realize it and I'd bet they'd describe their intake as moderate.

    "In Study 3, participants generally perceived themselves to eat in moderation and defined moderate consumption as greater than their personal consumption. Furthermore, definitions of moderate consumption were related to personal consumption behaviors."

    What is moderate for someone has to be directly dependent on their behaviours. Someone regularly doing hard cardio workouts is going to have a much higher percentage of sugars in their total calories than a sedentary person, because the only thing that ends up going up further is carbs the higher your expenditure is. Both protein and fat are pretty static at an optimum that depends on your weight while carbs can be increased and decreased as needed for your goals.

    Very true, but the % of people with an active lifestyle, especially one that is very active is pretty small.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,970 Member
    The takeaway for me is that (as we've known) sugar isn't the devil. At least for people who don't have specific medical conditions. The "war on carbs" is woo.
  • ziggy2006
    ziggy2006 Posts: 255 Member
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    and we keep being beaten over the head with the "being overweight is okay" hammer by the feels media, while actual scientists get ignored in the background.

    Huh? Maybe this is a gender thing, but I haven't gotten beaten over my head with a message that says anything resembling "being overweight is okay" by the media. That still seems to be an opinion expressed by a small minority of vocal social media users.

  • Packerjohn
    Packerjohn Posts: 4,855 Member
    ziggy2006 wrote: »
    Gallowmere1984 wrote: »
    and we keep being beaten over the head with the "being overweight is okay" hammer by the feels media, while actual scientists get ignored in the background.

    Huh? Maybe this is a gender thing, but I haven't gotten beaten over my head with a message that says anything resembling "being overweight is okay" by the media. That still seems to be an opinion expressed by a small minority of vocal social media users.

    Are you referring to the Fat Acceptance Movement, Dad Bods, etc? In that case I would agree

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