A recent study published in Nature by Robert Lustig, MD, Laura Schmidt, PhD, MSW, MPH, and Claire Brindis, DPH, and colleges at the University of California, San Francisco, reveals that sugar is as dangerous when over-consumed as tobacco or alcohol, and should be used in moderation.
The authors say that sugar is contributing to the global obesity rates, which account for 35 million deaths a year world-wide from health problems, such as heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.
Currently, 75% of health care money is spent on diseases related to obesity and the problems that result from these diseases. Obesity problems and diseases that come from obesity are now more prevalent in the world than infectious diseases.
The team of scientists of endocrinology, sociology, and public health from UCSF began to look at the vast amount of evidence linking sugar to health problems.
The researchers say sugar is not just “empty calories“, rather, it has the ability to raise blood pressure, change metabolism, increase weight, and mix the signals of hormones, as well as causing damage to the liver, and is rapidly increasing health problems in the world. It can be noted that these problems are very similar to those caused by too much alcohol consumption.
The intake of sugar in the last 50 years has tripled, and is now thought to be the number 1 cause of the obesity problem spreading all over the world. However, Lustig, Schmidt, and Brindis said that 40 percent of the people with diabetes, heart disease, and cancer are not obese. Therefore, it is proven that sugar does much more than make people gain weight.
Written By Christine Kearney