The Truth About Sugar
The truth about sugar by Dr. Derek M. Legg, DC. There has been a large increase in the amounts of sugar that is getting put into the foods we buy every day. Food industries are being very sneaky about putting out more low fat and no fat foods, in which the fat has been replaced by sugar to make these foods more enjoyable. But with an increase in sugar comes a risk of developing a number of health related diseases. It has been reported that up to 40% of US health care expenditures are for diseases directly related to the over consumption of sugar.
One thing everyone needs to start doing is reading the food labels and knowing what things mean on there. When looking at the food label it is hard to know how much sugar is natural to the food, and how much sugar was added. Even health foods out there can contain large amounts of high fructose corn syrup which is just a form of sugar with high amounts of fructose in it. The risk of consuming large amount of high fructose corn syrup is studies have showed that is you consume it you tend to develop higher risk for cardiovascular disease within as little as 2 weeks.
Sugar is also a primary driver of chronic inflammation and other health related problems, such as: obesity, diabetes, and heart disease to name a few.
The biggest thing to avoid when avoiding sugar is soda. An increasing amount of people are staying away from this sweet drink because of the health risks associated with it. Soda has so many different ingredients to make you want more and more of it. Soda contains caffeine which is a mild diuretic, this will make you urinate more, which will take more water out of your body. But soda also contains roughly about 55 mg of salt, and when you consume salt and excrete water, you will become thirstier. Now the reason soda contains so much sugar is to mask the taste of salt. Soda companies have to put so much sugar in the drink to make it enjoyable to consume.
The Truth about sugar is that when you consume large amount of sugar and processed fructose your liver can only metabolize so much. Your liver can metabolize about six teaspoons of added sugar per day. Each teaspoon is equivalent to four grams of sugar. The average American diet consumes 22 teaspoons of added sugar a day or 88 grams! This gives us as average of 350 calories a day coming from sugar in the American diet. The sugar that is not metabolized is stored as fat and leads to chronic metabolic diseases.
Some tips on reducing your sugar intake is to cut back on processed foods, most of these foods are the ones that will have large increased amount of sugar. You should also cut back on the amount of sugar you personally add to your food or drink. A good alternative to adding processed sugar is to add Stevia or Luo Han instead. Another great way to cut back on sugar is to use fresh fruit instead of canned fruit or sugar for meals or recipes also use spices instead of sugar to add flavor to your meal. So that’s the truth about sugar…
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