Natural sugar vs. Added sugar

RadishEater

My roommate gave a statement "according to the American heart association you don't need any added sugar but 25g per day is a maximum"

My question to her was "why does it matter where sugar comes from", "does it really matter if those 25g of added sugar comes from coke, versus eating 25g of sugar from strawberries?"

I don't actually know, I was walking somewhere so I couldn't google the answers and respond to my roommate.

Of course, strawberries have added nutritional benefits, but if you look at sugar alone does it actually matter what source makes up your daily allotment.

quiksylver296

Nope. Your body doesn't know the difference.

But you are right, strawberries would have other nutrients that would be beneficial that Coke doesn't have.

CSARdiver

Bear in mind that when groups like AHA make statements like this they are attempting to influence behavior in mass populations. These statements are made to help people with absolutely no understanding of weight management or nutrition.

Your metabolic pathways don't care where the molecules come from, they respond based on receptor sites.

diannethegeek

That's sort of an oversimplification of the AHA's position: http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/HealthyLiving/HealthyEating/Nutrition/Added-Sugars_UCM_305858_Article.jsp#.WtjXRHrwYdU and http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/circulationaha/120/11/1011.full.pdf

They recommend 25 grams for the average woman and 36 grams for the average man, or half of your daily discretionary calories once you've met your daily nutritional needs. They're also fairly clear on why. It's an attempt to get people to lower their daily calories without having to count.

lemurcat12

I wrote a jokey post about this a while back that the issue with added sugar vs. natural sugar are assumptions (not always accurate) about the company they keep. More often than not, intrinsic sugar comes with micronutrients and fiber (and when they don't, as with honey or syrup or, to a lesser extent, juice, which has micros but no fiber and is easy to overdo), the WHO et al. basically redefine them as added (or "free") sugars. Similarly, more often than not (but not always), significant amounts of added sugar are in lower nutrient, high cal foods (like soda, coffee drinks, candy, cookies and donuts and ice cream, etc., although in many of those the calories come as much from fat as sugar). It's worth noting that added sugar ALSO can be found (usually in smaller amounts) in plenty of other foods WITH micronutrients and fiber in larger amounts, like some add it to oats or a rhubarb sauce or put a bit in a BBQ sauce and so on.

Anyway, no, the sugar is sugar, but I think it does make sense for overall nutrient density of diet and satiety to either pay attention to added sugar or, perhaps easier, to pay attention to how much not particularly nutrient dense things you are eating as part of your overall calories.