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Just to reemphasize my first comment, sugar is an obvious contributing factor to obesity. As to the diseases (type 2 diabetes and fatty liver) in children, the

Just to reemphasize my first comment, sugar is an obvious contributing factor to obesity. As to the diseases (type 2 diabetes and fatty liver) in children, there may be other contributing factors but ask any pediatrician, remove the sugar from the diet and these diseases can be prevented in 100% of cases. So someone such as yourself who ate a ton of sugar in the 70's, you primed your body for obesity, whether or not you were ever obese or simply overweight. What does that mean? Well when you consume glucose and it enters the blood your body releases insulin, insulin enlarges all the cells in the body but especially fat cells, and that significantly alters how your body stores and burns fat. All things being equal if you don't have a caloric surplus your body won't store the excess fat. A caloric surplus that leads to fat storage is about 30 calories per day or about 2 peanut m&ms, so it's not much. That said not knowing anything more about your childhood diet, I do know if your sugar consumption was the same but you were a child today on average you would be consuming 500-600 more calories today than in the 70's. Therefore, you would be more likely to be overweight or even obese today than in the 70's. You don't need to be obese to have fatty liver or type 2 diabetes, but statistically you would be more likely to have those diseases if you were obese. I am not suggesting sugar is the sole factor of obesity or these disease, rather sugar removal would prevent 100% of these diseases in children, otherwise I can't argue against your anecdotal evidence of eating a ton of sugar but only highlight the reality kids today are consuming significantly more sugar on average and significantly more calories on average. See: http://www.cleveland.com/fighting-fat/index.ssf/2010/04/americans_are_consuming_more_calories_than_ever.html http://www.cleveland.com/fighting-fat/index.ssf/2010/04/amer...

lisper 9y ago
I think I'm still not making myself clear. I don't disagree with anything you say. But something changed around the 1970s-1980s time frame that increased the incidence of these diseases from zero to 10%. Whatever it was that changed, I don't think it was that kids were eating less that some critical threshold of sugar and now are eating more than that. Something else changed, and we don't yet know what it is. But it would be worth figuring it out IMO.
- will_brown 9y ago
  As to the fatty liver disease, it's the sugar. And I understand it does not sound reasonable, because humans had been consuming sugar, even in large quantities before 1983, so your conclusion on its face seems reasonable. However, non alcoholic fatty liver disease isn't anything new in humans it's just new in children. It used to take until adulthood to develop the disease and now it's being developed as young as 1-2 years old. From the Liver Foundation, to the Cleveland clinic, to any pediatrician, the conclusion is all the same...it's sugar. And for thousands of years humans have been purposefully over feeding animals for the sole purpose of causing fat livers. From the ancient Egyptians to modern foie gras, humans forcefeed these animals grains (sugars). There have been no mystery variables for thousands of years, feeding animals grains (sugars) leads to fatty livers. As to humans it's the same thing, over consume sugar and you'll eventually develop fatty liver, it just didn't happen until adulthood until consumption of sugar exploded. Still you are right, let's assume it's not sugar but some recently introduced variable, it is worth finding it out, but it's honestly not worth debating at the expense of kids health when we know whether or not there is some mystery variable, all that needs to be modified is sugar consumption and the disease would be eradicated. But IMO yes, kids used to eat less than some critical threshold of sugar, to claim otherwise is telling the Liver Foundation, Cleveland Clinic and American Diabetes Association they are wrong, it's even telling the sugar industry their accounting of sugar consumption is wrong. Humans have always gotten fatty liver from sugar, only the rate has increased and the age has decreased consistent with the increased sugar consumption. It really is on par with tobacco saying lung cancer or OCPD isn't caused by smoking but some other variable, and so we should find that variable rather than change our smoking habits.
  - lisper 9y ago
    > It really is on par with tobacco saying lung cancer or OCPD isn't caused by smoking but some other variable No, it isn't, because the negative health impacts of smoking have always been there. The negative health impacts of sugar have only appeared (or at least dramatically worsened) recently. > From the Liver Foundation, to the Cleveland clinic, to any pediatrician, the conclusion is all the same I'm not a big fan of arguments from authority because authorities often get it wrong. When I was growing up the unequivocal message from the authorities was: fat is bad for you, eat less fat (no more than 30% of calories from fat was the mantra). And people did, replacing the missing fat with carbs. Look how well that worked out.

lisper 9y ago

I think I'm still not making myself clear. I don't disagree with anything you say. But something changed around the 1970s-1980s time frame that increased the incidence of these diseases from zero to 10%. Whatever it was that changed, I don't think it was that kids were eating less that some critical threshold of sugar and now are eating more than that. Something else changed, and we don't yet know what it is. But it would be worth figuring it out IMO.

will_brown 9y ago
As to the fatty liver disease, it's the sugar. And I understand it does not sound reasonable, because humans had been consuming sugar, even in large quantities before 1983, so your conclusion on its face seems reasonable. However, non alcoholic fatty liver disease isn't anything new in humans it's just new in children. It used to take until adulthood to develop the disease and now it's being developed as young as 1-2 years old. From the Liver Foundation, to the Cleveland clinic, to any pediatrician, the conclusion is all the same...it's sugar. And for thousands of years humans have been purposefully over feeding animals for the sole purpose of causing fat livers. From the ancient Egyptians to modern foie gras, humans forcefeed these animals grains (sugars). There have been no mystery variables for thousands of years, feeding animals grains (sugars) leads to fatty livers. As to humans it's the same thing, over consume sugar and you'll eventually develop fatty liver, it just didn't happen until adulthood until consumption of sugar exploded. Still you are right, let's assume it's not sugar but some recently introduced variable, it is worth finding it out, but it's honestly not worth debating at the expense of kids health when we know whether or not there is some mystery variable, all that needs to be modified is sugar consumption and the disease would be eradicated. But IMO yes, kids used to eat less than some critical threshold of sugar, to claim otherwise is telling the Liver Foundation, Cleveland Clinic and American Diabetes Association they are wrong, it's even telling the sugar industry their accounting of sugar consumption is wrong. Humans have always gotten fatty liver from sugar, only the rate has increased and the age has decreased consistent with the increased sugar consumption. It really is on par with tobacco saying lung cancer or OCPD isn't caused by smoking but some other variable, and so we should find that variable rather than change our smoking habits.
- lisper 9y ago
  > It really is on par with tobacco saying lung cancer or OCPD isn't caused by smoking but some other variable No, it isn't, because the negative health impacts of smoking have always been there. The negative health impacts of sugar have only appeared (or at least dramatically worsened) recently. > From the Liver Foundation, to the Cleveland clinic, to any pediatrician, the conclusion is all the same I'm not a big fan of arguments from authority because authorities often get it wrong. When I was growing up the unequivocal message from the authorities was: fat is bad for you, eat less fat (no more than 30% of calories from fat was the mantra). And people did, replacing the missing fat with carbs. Look how well that worked out.