Scientific team believes sugar source of disease

[Alan C.]

Scientific team sounds the alarm on sugar as a source of disease

 

Is sugar making us sick? A team of scientists at the University of California in San Francisco believes so, and they're doing something about it. They launched an initiative to bring information on food and drink and added sugar to the public by reviewing more than 8,000 scientific papers that show a strong link between the consumption of added sugar and chronic diseases.

The common belief until now was that sugar just makes us fat, but it's become clear through research that it's making us sick. For example, there's the rise in fatty-liver disease, the emergence of Type 2 diabetes as an epidemic in children and the dramatic increase in metabolic disorders.

Laura Schmidt, a UCSF professor at the School of Medicine and the lead investigator on the project, SugarScience, said the idea is to make the findings comprehensible and clear to everyone. The results will be available to all on a website (SugarScience.org) and social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

 

[Wuzzums]

Here's my problem with the article.

 

It says sugar is linked to fatty-liver, metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes. Fatty-liver disease has many causes, metabolic syndrome is not a disease (hint: "syndrome") and type-2 diabetes in young people is almost exclusively fat related (i.e. you eat lots and sugars and get fat and get type 2 diabetes, you can't skip the getting fat bit).

 

It says the FDA should force companies to list the sugar names just like they do for fat, protein, carbohydrates. Carbohydrates and sugars is a redundancy, they're synonyms.

 

Carbs are easy to digest, given enough time they easily break down in the saliva. Sweet carbs (like candy) give your body a quick small jolt of energy because they break down almost instantly. Bread however breaks down harder and gives a lower dose over a longer period. So eating sweet carbs often will put a strain on your pancreas because it's forced to release insulin in an abnormal fashion. This has nothing to do with how the carbs are processed in a factory and whatnot, this has everything to do with eating habits.

 

Sugars are only used for energy in the body. If some soft drink contains some sugar molecule that's unnatural the body won't metabolize it, basically it would be innocuous. In contrast, fats, salts and proteins are used for a large variety of things. Carbs are the only nutrient that is not necessary for life, it only helps.

[ancapzeebo]

UC had to steal money in order to tell us that eating too much sugar can make you fat and unhealthy?  

[J. D. Stembal]

Diabetes and obesity are so strongly correlated that some researchers consider them to be the manifestations of the same disease. Metabolic syndrome is a condition where the body is unable to partition fuel from fat stores due to chronically high insulin levels and the resistance of the body's cells, like muscles, to respond to this hormone. Excess carbohydrate gets trapped in the adipose tissue as triglycerides and obesity sets in slowly over years and decades. This syndrome is thought to influence high blood pressure, cancer, Alzheimer's, and heart disease because there is also a strong correlation between them and obesity and chronically high insulin levels.

 

Carbohydrates are the only non-essential macro-nutrients, otherwise humans would have died out long before agriculture was invented. In fact, diseases like cancer and heart disease were first documented in agricultural societies, and are not present in any society which doesn't use agriculture today.

 

Eating fatty foods doesn't make you obese. It is biochemically impossible. This should be obvious to anyone who reads a college level biology textbook.

[shirgall]

I've heard metabolic syndrome called the warning sign of oncoming Type 2 Diabetes. Because it does not prevent normal activity, it can't be a disease--but that doesn't mean it's not harmful.

 

For the record, I had metabolic syndrome and had to take fairly extreme measures to combat it.

[MMX2010]

I've heard metabolic syndrome called the warning sign of oncoming Type 2 Diabetes. Because it does not prevent normal activity, it can't be a disease--but that doesn't mean it's not harmful.

 

For the record, I had metabolic syndrome and had to take fairly extreme measures to combat it.

 

 

What measures did you take? 

[shirgall]

What measures did you take? 

 

Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy. Lost 50 pounds in 3 months. Now I have no high blood pressure or sleep apnea.

[J. D. Stembal]

Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy. Lost 50 pounds in 3 months. Now I have no high blood pressure or sleep apnea.

 

I'm happy to hear of your complete recovery, but I also feel genuinely saddened that surgery was deemed the appropriate solution. What other remedies were explored before the gastrectomy, if you don't mind me asking?

[shirgall]

A variety of diets and exercise were tried. Often initially successful but ultimately I gained the weight back, and more.

[Crallask]

 

 

I watched this presentation years ago. I'm no expert nutritionist, but I find it very fascinating and am fairly convinced by it. I try to keep my sugars low on a weekly basis. Some general health practitioners I've seen recommend male adults get under 15 grams per day of added sugars. I believe a single can of pop has over 40 grams of sugar, just for perspective.

[BD91]

Carbs are easy to digest, given enough time they easily break down in the saliva. Sweet carbs (like candy) give your body a quick small jolt of energy because they break down almost instantly. Bread however breaks down harder and gives a lower dose over a longer period.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am fairly sure that the carbs found in bread & grain products are also fast-release carbhydrates. Slow-release carbohydrates come from things like vegetables, nuts & butters, fresh fruits (though I think most fruits have a bit of fast-release carbs in them as well).

[Alan C.]

Yes, simple carbs break down quickly and can cause your blood sugar to spike.

 

Many fitness and bodybuilding videos talk about simple vs. complex carbs. Pro bodybuilders minimize simple carbs while cutting, prior to competitions, to prevent fat accumulation. During the cutting phase, they will often eat only lean protein (fish, chicken, egg whites) and vegetables.

[Wuzzums]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am fairly sure that the carbs found in bread & grain products are also fast-release carbhydrates. Slow-release carbohydrates come from things like vegetables, nuts & butters, fresh fruits (though I think most fruits have a bit of fast-release carbs in them as well).

Yeah, you're right. I knew that sweet processed food was made out of fast-release carbs and for the slow-release carbs I just picked the first thing that came to mind without checking.

[J. D. Stembal]

Yes, simple carbs break down quickly and can cause your blood sugar to spike.

 

Many fitness and bodybuilding videos talk about simple vs. complex carbs. Pro bodybuilders minimize simple carbs while cutting, prior to competitions, to prevent fat accumulation. During the cutting phase, they will often eat only lean protein (fish, chicken, egg whites) and vegetables.

 

You are talking about the glycemic load, I think.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glycemic_load

 

The reason why vegetables often have a very low insulin response is because there are so few actual carbohydrate calories in them. They are mostly water and plant fibers.

 

http://www.weightlossforall.com/carbohydrates-vegetables.htm

 

Take a look at this list and compare spinach and mushrooms to a yam. There is at least one order of magnitude difference in carb content. Now compare it to wheat flour:

 

http://skipthepie.org/cereal-grains-and-pasta/wheat-flour-white-industrial-protein-bleached-unenriched-3/

 

Two orders of magnitude difference between spinach and wheat. Remember the old USDA food pyramid with 6-11 servings of wheat or corn and 3-5 of vegetables. This is why Americans got so obese during the last generation. The government propagandized us into doing it by exploiting our child naivety in public schools. Obesity is a government program.

[Daniel Unplugged]

Scientific team sounds the alarm on sugar as a source of disease

I havent read the full article, but based on what I read here, it seems that they forgot the cardinal rule of data analysis - correlation is not causation. It is very unscientific of them, and unless they can show a causal link, their conclusion should be disregarded as politically motivated scaremongering.

[Daniel Unplugged]

 

Note that there is a strong link between being wealthy and dying from heart disease. That link does not mean that being wealthy causes heart disease or vise versa (it is getting older that tends to increase both your wealth and your risk of heart disease).

[SueBee]

Regarding the "correlation is not causation" comments I often see thrown about...

 

If you read study methodologies and the author's analysis of their results; they will often have a short section on why they accept the expected results, and then a huge section on why their data are/could be flawed. Any study that does not provide a data analysis which includes this, is, in my professional opinion, proving their biases simply by omission.

 

Over the years I've come to think that any form of stats and numbers used to make a point are highly suspect and worth scrutiny because the conclusions drawn through which ever methodology chosen can influence the outcome, yes even in the empirical sciences. It's one thing to be a systematic scientist, it's another to apply blind faith in the act of scientism. The latter said in regard to taking these studies at face value...and then tossing out the conclusion- because "correlation is not causation". Oldest dismissal in the book it seems to be, and if your dismissals are going to hold up against the people who blindly agree, they could be based on a more in depth analysis which addresses flaws in their actual methods and means of data collection.

 

The doctor in that video linked above does a pretty good job at outlining the biochemistry behind how they elucidated that fructose is a poison to the liver and why livers become fat. I say this as someone who has studied biochem, chemistry and some topics in toxicology, but haven't verified what's presented in that video by fact-checking and doing homework on it. He breaks it down somewhere in there, and I don't have any textbooks that I can use to verify it, however, the presentation is compelling. (That's my disclaimer, I suppose.)

[J. D. Stembal]

Note that there is a strong link between being wealthy and dying from heart disease. That link does not mean that being wealthy causes heart disease or vise versa (it is getting older that tends to increase both your wealth and your risk of heart disease).

 

 

Start the video at 51:40 for the causal medical inference between sugar and diabetes.

 

While I appreciate Lustig's scientific data and presentation, he's clearly a Leftist in his views. He concludes that the health crisis is a result of the conglomerated food industry, and it will "bankrupt" our health care system. He gets that the food industry lobbies the federal government, but he doesn't identify government as the real problem behind our health crisis.

 

I believe that ACA is a big step backward in public health because universal healthcare without penalty for preexisting conditions creates a significant moral hazard. Healthy people aren't motivated to stay healthy because they not only have to spend more on their grocery bills, but they are expected to pull the weight of the sick by subsidizing them through taxes. The sick have no incentive to change when they are simultaneously saving money buying all the subsidized carbohydrates off the aisle shelves while getting subsidized healthcare. Whatever you tax decreases, and whatever you subsidize increases. Healthy people will dwindle in number, while the sick will explode.

 

Consequently, you have vegans such as Freelee the Banana Girl promoting the raw diet chalk full of fructose and carbohydrates, and they honesty think this is healthy. Check this video out.

 

 

Then, in this video, she teaches you how to suck in your bloated and inflamed digestive tract. The cognitive dissonance is remarkable. Apparently, eating air causes bloating.

 

[trout007]

Like most things in medicine the reason this issue is so complex is there is no one answer for all people. Surprise people are different! What works for me might not work for you. The real advances in the future is going to be individualize a diet. I think the best we have right now is to try one of the extreme elimination diets that slowly add items back into your diet to see how your body reacts. I do great on fatty or cultured dairy. Some people have terrible responces. I do fine on nuts. Other people not so much. Sweets cause me inflamation but some people are fine.

[Snafui]

I contacted the lead researcher that had mixed conclusions over a study he did on a set diet and different exercise types where it was stated that the type of exercise, aerobic only, anaerobic only, or mixed made no difference to weight loss. So, I asked him if he accounted for somatotype; his response was that that could NOT make any difference.

 

People trust one size fits all conclusions from studies all the time despite errors like that. I'm stunned.

[J. D. Stembal]

I contacted the lead researcher that had mixed conclusions over a study he did on a set diet and different exercise types where it was stated that the type of exercise, aerobic only, anaerobic only, or mixed made no difference to weight loss. So, I asked him if he accounted for somatotype; his response was that that could NOT make any difference.

 

People trust one size fits all conclusions from studies all the time despite errors like that. I'm stunned.

 

Which study was that? It sounds vaguely familiar.

 

Exercise doesn't cause weight loss singlehandedly. A change in the endocrine balance of the body causes weight loss, which comes about through better diet and sleep. This is why you see the same fat people laboring on treadmills week after week and they're not getting any thinner.

 

The three somatotypes aren't useful illustrations in fitness or health. Yes, everyone is unique by virtue of our DNA, but you can change how your DNA expresses by changing your habits, activities, and behaviors.

[Snafui]

It was several years ago--no way to recall, but for some reason I think it might have come out of Iceland, sorry.

 

The somatotypes can matter more for the beginner to an exercise and diet change in lifestyle.

 

An endomorph can spend all day on a treadmill and accomplish next to nothing; but give them heavy weights and they will lose weight a bit quicker. An ectomorph that lifts weight might benefit but put them in a proper aerobics program and fat melts away rather quickly. 

 

Diet is secondary to somatotype. There is some support that endomorphs are better low carb/high fat; transversely ectomorphs can have carbs what seems endlessly. Figuring out the diet and exercise plan with somatotype in mind is just something to check first.

 

It was the combination of those two factors that led to my asking the researcher these questions.

 

Now those are the two extremes, most fall in between the two poles, so checking for these aspects can help better than the cookie cutter approach that so many are taught.