Is Sugar Toxic? Options

[gigem99]

I don't watch a whole lot of TV - but I do usually watch 60 Minutes on CBS. They ran a segment tonite about 'Is Sugar Toxic?'. The main guy they were interviewing was a pediatric endo, who of course claims sugar is very toxic, and is causing a ton of problems in this country.

I don't doubt that - but what really startled me was a statistic they came up with. They said the average American consumes 130 lbs. of sugar a year! Now if my arithmetic is right (and I'm sure it is), that works out to more than 161 g. of sugar/HFCS alone per day!!

My gosh, can that conceivably be right? Now, I don't do a real low-carb deal, but I generally average around 100 g of carbs/day, of which only a small fraction is sugar.

Now, I realize that we're all different from the general population, but I'm curious about those of you who live in households where you're the only PWD. Does the rest of your family/housemates really consume that much sugar?

Tom

[aggie168]

No, not in my family. However, I just look up a 20oz of Coke has 65g of sugar. I suppose it is possible as I do see some co-worker take in more than one a day. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[karen]

Nope, and the 'toxic stuff' we do eat come from trees and the ground. I have never actually measured the glucose, fructose, galactose, sucrose, maltose and lactose grams on our plates. ALL of them are sugar forms, and none of them are "toxic". They can certainly be unhealthy if folks overeat them. Luckily we have television to tell us what is good for us, otherwise how would we know. I get my health and diet advice from CBS for sure. And if they don't drill it into my feeble mind, then I can go to the D forums and get the real truth, and some recipes for fudge!

Thanks for doing the cyphering on that gig, Tom. I think it is surely possible that there are folks who consume that much, and lots of them don't get diabetes, cancer or fat from it. The bigger question is why? And may I add YAY for them! Oh, and as long as they are airing real facts...I would also like to see a definition of the average American!!

This post has been edited by karen: Apr 2 2012, 02:41 AM

[Liz]

When I'm with my sister's family I'm amazed at how much crap her two teenagers eat, and even more at how much they drink. My nephew can go through two quarts of iced tea or soda in no time. My niece likes to drink juice based drinks, but whether it's from fruit or not it's still all sugar. While it definitely isn't healthy I don't know if it's toxic. They both live on frozen/packaged foods and those all contain plenty of added sugar (among other things). My niece does eat more "real" food than my nephew, including some vegetables, but my nephew's diet is terrible. My sister was diagnosed with Type 1 last year and she has changed her eating habits (less junk food) but the rest of the family hasn't. My sister does cook meals but the kids don't always want to eat it.

My sister is and always has been skinny and my niece is a clone of her. My brother-in-law is obese and while my nephew isn't fat, I can definitely see it happening in the not too distant future. There is Type 2 diabetes in my brother-in-law's side of the family.

[holka72]

I didn't catch 60 minutes but my husband did - he said that when the companies where mandated by the government to reduce the amount of fat in food they added sugar - cause without the fat the taste was missing so why not add sugar.

would love to see everyone become aware of how much sugar is in the food that is available - I know prior to my diagnosis I ate a ton of sugar..

[tedm]

I didn't catch 60 minutes but my husband did - he said that when the companies where mandated by the government to reduce the amount of fat in food they added sugar - cause without the fat the taste was missing so why not add sugar.

would love to see everyone become aware of how much sugar is in the food that is available - I know prior to my diagnosis I ate a ton of sugar..

I am personally of the opinion that this is the cause of a lot of health problems. Most of us pumpers know that fat slows down absorption of carbs, reducing BG spikes. So now we have food with more simple carbs and very little fat to moderate the BG spike. In a non-diabetic, this will cause an insulin spike from the pancreas, followed by a glucagon spike to counter the left over insulin. Contrast that to "normal" food with more fat and less carbs, where the BG rise is much shallower, allowing the pancreas to better follow with its insulin release and much less left over insulin.

Another example of unintended consequences. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/Violent.gif)

[karl12]

Thanks tedm for sharing your knowledge in regards with the topic. This was useful for me.

[JohnG]

The number is probably based on sugar commodity's and I would suspect there is some shrinkage so our average is probably less. I have a kid that drives for me
and he is also a disk jockey on a Christin radio station, he eats a big box of 10 Pop-Tarts every day when he drives, only 150g of sugar but it's 340g of carbs.