Daily sugar recommendation

crevtion

I just want to know once and for all what the daily recommendation is all about. The WHO says that it should be 25g, okay fine, BUT is that for added white sugar or are they also referring to naturally occuring sugars in foods like fruit.

I have no added sugars and don't eat processed foods but I love my fruit which of course contain loads of sugar. Eating even a small amount of fruit would already would set me over the recommendation if it does in fact refer to every type of sugar. I get about 70-90g a day on average which of course is going way above the recommended 25g, but it's all natural from fruit, so I guess I'm asking if this is actually a large amount? If it was white sugar it would be, but surely it isn't the same?

seska422

Sugar is sugar. It doesn't come with a label to identify the food source when it's processed by your body.

The WHO recommended amounts are for free sugars. From Wikipedia:

Free sugar is defined by the World Health Organization and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in multiple reports[1][2] as "all monosaccharides and disaccharides added to foods by the manufacturer, cook, or consumer, plus sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, and fruit juices".

vingogly

The American Heart Association says: "Limit your consumption of foods with high amounts of added sugars, such as sugar-sweetened beverages." They recommend no more than 24g/day for women, 36g/day for men of ADDED sugar -- which is in line with what WHO is recommending.

My approach is: read labels, limit things with added sugars in all its forms. I don't bother tracking sugar any more on MFP as a daily thing. I'll look at the 90 day consumption graph once in a while.

http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/HealthyLiving/HealthyEating/Nutrition/Added-Sugars_UCM_305858_Article.jsp#.V_FP2DKZORs

ninalatimer

Several years ago I was borderline diabetic. My latest A1C bloodtest results were in the pre-diabetes range, thus I am very concerned about how much sugar I have each day. A few days ago I read an article about pre-diabetes on endocrineweb.com that gave me a little guidance. This article recommended that the number of calories we consume from carbs each day should ideally be about 50% of our total calories per day, but a range of 40% to 60% of our total daily carbs is acceptable. Since most, if not all, of my sugar calories are NOT from added sugar, I am not going to worry about my sugar consumption as long as my total carb calories are not higher than 60% of all my calories.