Is soda really "evil"?

carbonated water is not "evil" if that is the word you choose to use.

In fact you can create your own soda drinks by squeezing fresh fruit juices, veggie juice and adding these to the carbonated water,
Carbonated water is fine.

With the sodas it is the added ingredients eg aspartame, the food coloring, the caffeine, the ascorbic acid that people find cause to be concerned about.

I'm tired of the "not good for your teeth" argument. It's merit less.

Strawberries, lemons, limes, tomatoes, and vinegar are all bad for your teeth also, as are cherries, grapes, oranges, in fact, just about every fruit is bad for your teeth due to the acidity.

I'm not sure I understand your argument here. Because other acidic things are bad for your teeth, the argument that soda is bad for your teeth is without merit?

Yes. It is without merit, because if you brush your teeth and practice good dental hygiene, soda isn't bad for your teeth, any more so than any other food. You don't hear people saying to avoid lemons because they are bad for your teeth. In fact, people usually suggest lemons as a substitute.

I'm tired of the "not good for your teeth" argument. It's merit less.

Strawberries, lemons, limes, tomatoes, and vinegar are all bad for your teeth also, as are cherries, grapes, oranges, in fact, just about every fruit is bad for your teeth due to the acidity.

I'm not sure I understand your argument here. Because other acidic things are bad for your teeth, the argument that soda is bad for your teeth is without merit?

Yes. It is without merit, because if you brush your teeth and practice good dental hygiene, soda isn't bad for your teeth, any more so than any other food. You don't hear people saying to avoid lemons because they are bad for your teeth. In fact, people usually suggest lemons as a substitute.

I know several healthy people who drink soda daily and have for decades.

It is difficult to use pubmed to find the desirable articles to support a case. Sometimes because the key words do not align (typing in 'soda' often pulled up articles by a man named Soda, haha) and two, because a lot of articles linked to pubmed are not free for public viewing.

Here's one, though, that I found interesting.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3738277/
Papandreou D, Andreou E, Heraclides A, Rousso I (2013). Is beverage intake related to overweight and obesity in school children? Hippokratia 17(1): 42-46.


This study looked at the consumption of fruit juice without sugar added, fruit juice with sugar added, soft drinks and milk (whole, half-and-half, 2%, 1%, skim) in their correlations to obesity in children.

Basically it states that sugary drinks (fruit juice with sugar added, soft drinks, etc.) were found in statistically significant higher consumption of obese children than normal and overweight children. Children consuming sugary drinks were found to be over 2.5 times more likely to develop obesity. They also pointed out that these sugary drinks may trigger genetic predispositions to fat development.

Other drinks (100% fruit juice with no sugar added and milk) were not statistically significant between normal, overweight, or obese children. They concluded these drinks are not affecting the development of obesity.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3518794/

Qibin Q, Chu AY, Kang JH, Jensen MK, Curhan GC, Pasquale LR, Ridker PM, Hunter DJ, Willett WC, Rimm EB, Chasman DI, Hu FB, Qi L (2012). Sugar-sweetened beverages and genetic risk of obesity. N Engl J Med. 367(15): 1387-1396.

This study concluded that higher sugary drinks resulted in higher genetic associations of BMIs across adult men and women individuals. They found that increased sugary drink intake resulted in increased risk of obesity allele frequency (meaning how likely they were, genetically, to develop diabetes).

For their sugar-sweetened drinks, they included caffeinated colas, caffeine-free colas, carbonated non-cola soft drinks, and noncarbonated sugar-sweetened drinks (lemonade, fruit drinks). For artificially-sweetened drinks, they included caffeinated, caffeine-free, and noncarbonated low-calorie drinks.

Interestingly enough, they noted that dietary and exercise changes did not buffer the individuals from this risk allele increase. (So eating better to accommodate drinking a pepsi does not seem to be as effective as you might think.)

According to Table 3 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3518794/table/T3/ ) sugar drinks were statistically significant in increasing BMI (in science, we accept any p-value below 0.05 as ‘significant’, while rejecting any number higher than this. As you can see on the right, sugar-drinks have p-values below 0.05 (meaning they are significantly contributing), whereas artificial drinks had p-values above 0.05 (meaning they were not significantly contributing).

They concluded that if a person were to drink these beverages less than once a month, they will have half the risk of someone who drinks one every day. Genetic susceptibility is also something to consider when drinking these drinks, as some people are more prone to react genetically to
sugary beverages than others.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2862465/

Malik VS, Popkin BM, Bray GA, Despres JP, Hu FB (2010). Sugar sweetened beverages, obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease risk. Circulation 121(11): 1356-1364.

This study found a positive association between sugary drinks and weight-gain of obese individuals. They also found in a study focusing on black women who consumed at least one sugary drink a day were 83% more likely to develop type 2 diabetes than those that only drank one once a month. Although they also noted one study which contradicted this information, stating no significant correlation existed for individuals between sugary drink consumption and type 2 diabetes after a 9 year follow up. But, this study was done on heavier and older participants. Popkin et al.’s conclusion is that, maybe once BMI is higher, sugary drinks do not have as strong of an effect on the consumer.

MetSyn was also reported to increase with soft drink (regular and diet soda) consumption; once a day versus once a month increased by 39%. However, Popkin et al. commented that it was more likely the regular contributing most of the change.

They say that as of 2010 the data was limited on sugary drink and heart disease interactions. But, there was some evidence starting to indicate that sugary drinks may also increase the development of hypertension, inflammation, and clinical cardiovascular heart disease.
They add that studies have also pointed at sugary drink intake to weight gain to be a much higher contribution than solid food.

Sugary drinks lead to rapid increases in blood glucose levels as well as insulin production and a higher glycemic load. They can both lead to glucose intolerance and insulin resistance. Fructose can lead to increased blood pressure. Reactive oxygen species (which are really bad; they destroy your cells and proteins and tissues) were significantly increased when fructose and glucose were consumed (according to Ghanim et al. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17384340). Fructose also increases blood uric acid.

Something I found cute was at the end they talked about water intake, and how it’s better and why. It made me chuckle because it should be a ‘no duh’, but the information still made me smile.

They also talked about diet soda and how it is still unknown about (at the release of this study). Artificial sweeteners, they say, do not have calories, but also have little to no nutritional value, and may subject a person to desiring stronger sweets in their appetites. They say it is unknown and highly controversial as of the publication of their study. Further research is needed.

This post is getting long, so I will end it here. But here are some more readings if you are interested.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3210834/

Malik VS, Schulze MB, Hu FB (2006). Intake of sugar-sweetened beverages and weight gain: a systematic review. Am J Clin Nutr. 84(2): 274-288.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3192470/

Malik VS and Hu FB (2011). Sugar-sweetened beverages and health: where does the evidence stand? Am J Clin Nutr. 94(5): 1161-1162.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3151731/

Mozaffarian D, Hao T, Hu FB (2011). Changes in diet and lifestyle and long-term weight gain in women and men. N Engl J Med. 364(25); 2392-2404.

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/115/2/e223.long
Welsh JA, Cogswell ME, Rogers S, Rockett H, Mei Z, Grummer-Strawn LM (2005). Overweight among low-income preschool children associated with the consumption of sweet drinks: Missouri, 1999-2002. PEDIATRICS 155(2): 223-229.

thank you.

Hey guys, were these the studies you wanted everyone to look at? :laugh:

Not really, I much prefer clinical studies, done with actual controls, not epidemiological studies that rely on subject recall and food surveys to draw very shaky correlations that ultimately mean nothing.

I mean, after all, the average temperature of the Earth has increased while the average number of pirates has decreased, so pirates must have been preventing global warming, right?

Not really, I much prefer clinical studies, done with actual controls, not epidemiological studies that rely on subject recall and food surveys to draw very shaky correlations that ultimately mean nothing.

I mean, after all, the average temperature of the Earth has increased while the average number of pirates has decreased, so pirates must have been preventing global warming, right?

This guy gets it.

Hmmm. It'd be nice to know what he 'gets' since he refused to post any links to these studies he is referring to despite repeated requests for him to do so.

I know several healthy people who drink soda daily and have for decades.

I know several healthy people who have smoked for decades.

I'm truly not trying to be a smartass -- I'm only trying to say that every chemical, everything we do to our bodies impacts our own genetics differently. I had an aunt die of lung cancer -- she never smoked. I had a grandfather who smoked 2 packs a day die of stomach cancer. Makes absolutely no sense. I have a boss who drinks TEN 20 oz Mountain Dew sodas a day (!!!!!!), runs 5 - 10 miles every morning and is the epitome of health. Will the sodas end up hurting him? Are they hurting him now? Who knows? I don't think there is a right or a wrong answer to whether sodas are unhealthy for the general population.