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Sugar lobby paid scientists to blur sugar's role in heart disease (2016)
- kevin_thibedeau 9y agoAnd what would that role be?
- teslabox 9y ago> Influential research that downplayed the role of sugar in heart disease in the 1960s was paid for by the sugar industry, according to a report released on Monday. With backing from a sugar lobby, scientists promoted dietary fat as the cause of coronary heart disease instead of sugar, according to a historical document review published in JAMA Internal Medicine. Is this article implying that trans fats have been cleared of the charges against them [0]? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans_fat#Coronary_artery_disease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans_fat#Coronary_artery_dise... I think naturally-saturated fats have mostly been vindicated of the charges leveled against them in the 1950's and 1960's, but the medical guild hasn't updated their message.
- pascalxus 9y agoNo trans fat are extremely dangerous and should never be eaten in any large quantity. FDA trans fat ban: Proposal makes clear no amount is safe: http://www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-dd-fda-trans-fats-20131107-story.html http://www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-dd-fda-trans-fats-2... Saturated fats are a bit more complicated. There's a little bit of Sat fats in everything, even vegetables and fruits ~0.5-2%. A certain amount is okay, up to about 5-6% of your diet can be sat fats. but you don't want to go more than that, or you risk increasing your LDL. Some people can handle more, some can't, this will vary from person to person. But, if you get back from a blood test and it says your LDL is too high, you'll need to cut back on Sats.
- RobertRoberts 9y agoAnyone remember Susan Powder in the 90s screaming about how fat was making you fat? Go checkout the documentary Fed Up, it discusses the massive shift to low-fat-high-sugar foods being the norm in our grocery stores. And we wonder why we have such massive preventable disease problems in the US. (and we are exporting obesity and diabetes around the world now) Next time you are at the store, check your labels. Almost everything has sugar in it. There are a dozen names for white sugar now, so check them out.
- snowpanda 9y ago61 Names for Sugar -------------------- Agave nectar Barbados sugar Barley malt Barley malt syrup Beet sugar Brown sugar Buttered syrup Cane juice Cane juice crystals Cane sugar Caramel Carob syrup Castor sugar Coconut palm sugar Coconut sugar Confectioner's sugar Corn sweetener Corn syrup Corn syrup solids Date sugar Dehydrated cane juice Demerara sugar Dextrin Dextrose Evaporated cane juice Free-flowing brown sugars Fructose Fruit juice Fruit juice concentrate Glucose Glucose solids Golden sugar Golden syrup Grape sugar HFCS (High-Fructose Corn Syrup) Honey Icing sugar Invert sugar Malt syrup Maltodextrin Maltol Maltose Mannose Maple syrup Molasses Muscovado Palm sugar Panocha Powdered sugar Raw sugar Refiner's syrup Rice syrup Saccharose Sorghum Syrup Sucrose Sugar (granulated) Sweet Sorghum Syrup Treacle Turbinado sugar Yellow sugar ------------------ http://sugarscience.ucsf.edu/hidden-in-plain-sight/ http://sugarscience.ucsf.edu/hidden-in-plain-sight/
- ShabbosGoy 9y agoA related anecdote: when I was a child I visited Italy with my family, and I was astonished at how differently pasta sauce tasted in Italy. I found out much later that the reason was due to the insane amounts of sugar that are in store bought pasta sauces in the US. The sugar is meant to compensate for the low quality, unripened tomatoes that go into cheap pasta sauce brands. To this day, I refuse to use canned pasta sauce. I’d rather make my own.
- lostlogin 9y agoI wonder if low quality tomatoes have less natural sugar than properly ripened ones, and as such contain less natural sugar? It is insane how much sugar is in some tomato sauces (40% on the last one I checked) but maybe it’s not quite as executive as the label makes it appear.
- rand_r 9y ago“Sugar”, like “drugs”, is too general a term to use in a discussion on health. Glucose and fructose, both forms of sugar, are metabolized differently and have different health effects.
- adamnemecek 9y agoSure but the effects aren't all that different.
- benaadams 9y agoVery different; glucose is metabolized by all cells in the body; fructose only by the liver. Fructose isn't good for you (or sucrose 50% fructose, high fructose corn syrup 42%-65% fructose etc) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM But its sweeter than glucose; and has side-effects like switching of appetite suppression and prolonged exposure does similar damage to the liver as alcohol. Glucose doesn't do that.
- rand_r 9y agoThey actually are quite different. Glucose is directly usable by every cell in your body, whereas fructose has to be processed by the liver. There are no adverse health effects from taking pure glucose. Here is a good video explaining it in more detail: https://youtu.be/dBnniua6-oM https://youtu.be/dBnniua6-oM
- cup-of-tea 9y ago> There are no adverse health effects from taking pure glucose. Most people shouldn't be taking glucose. People should get their energy from food so that they get the nutrients and fibre with it. For most people taking glucose means either you'll get too much energy (and get fat) or not enough nutrients from real food. On top of that it causes a strong insulin response which will decrease insulin sensitivity.
- cup-of-tea 9y ago"Sugar" usually means sucrose which contains both glucose and fructose. They do have very different effects and fructose is much worse. But in the majority of products you find both together. Glucose (aka dextrose) is much less sweet and used in things like energy drinks. Fructose on its own is more sweet than sucrose and used in "naturally light" products (same sweetness, few calories, no artificial sweeteners). But in an average intake you're going to find glucose and fructose in roughly equal amounts, I think.
- Sephr 9y agoThe corruption is so bad that the sugar industry may have had a hand in writing the import/export laws for Canada. High-fat foods like Soylent are illegal to import there.
- jnwatson 9y agoSoylent the “food” isn’t illegal. Soylent the “meal replacement” is. One of their competitors, KetoChow gets around this by tongue-in-cheek requiring that their Canadian customer add a cup of maple syrup before consuming.
- Sephr 9y agoCorrect, I am referring to Soylent as-is, with its current marketing copy. The company should not have to suggest unhealthy preparations to get around unjust import laws.
- merricksb 9y agoSame report discussed in this post 2 months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15759562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15759562
- partycoder 9y agoScience in most cases represents a local maximum... the frontier of our understanding. But having a limited understanding is different from willfully presenting false information. The latter is unethical and should have consequences, especially when the result is loss of life. Consequences not limited to: admitting that the information is false, loss of license, jail, etc.
- PeterStuer 9y agoWhen I first visited the US about 30 years ago, I was often surprised about how different things like burgers or pizza tasted from here in Europe. It was like eating candy all the time. These days even over here there's sugar in almost everything you can buy. Side note, not related directly: I was also surprised how in some of those 'health' image supermarkets, the fruits like strawberries looked so perfect, but just had no flavor and tasted just watery. Back here fruits often didn't look so 'television commercial quality', but exploded with flavors. Again, these days even here you have to go out of your way to find e.g. a decent tomato or grow your own.
- cup-of-tea 9y agoIt's very interesting to take apart some typical American fast food like McDonalds or Subway and taste it bit by bit, cleansing your pallet as you go. The bread is literally as sweet as an iced bun or something. Most of the individual components are tasteless with only things like sauces and pickles providing flavour. I've noticed the same thing in supermarket sandwiches and things in the UK. The one place I haven't noticed it is France. You can buy a sandwich from a railway station or something there and it will actually taste good.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- icelancer 9y ago> a decent tomato This is unfortunately an issue worldwide. Fresh tomatoes are a giant pain in the ass to grow. Flavor varies significantly. Getting decent ones here in the Pacific Northwest is basically a crapshoot at best.
- draugadrotten 9y ago"The problem with today's tomato crops is that the fruit is too large. Growers are focusing on size, but as the international team of researchers has discovered, the bigger the tomato, the less sugar it has and the less intensive its aroma." http://www.dw.com/en/what-makes-tomatoes-tasty/a-37292102 http://www.dw.com/en/what-makes-tomatoes-tasty/a-37292102
- jlebrech 9y agosure, sugar is BAD. but this is the meat industry's last diversion before they get scrutinised.
- mixmastamyk 9y agoThere’s a good doc on Netflix called “Sugar Coated,” that compares the industry to big tobacco.
- speby 9y agoNothing to see here ... move along please. Any industry, anywhere, anytime, that has even the slightest threat to their existence from bad news coming from scientific data being published to the mainstream will always have industry players and their respective lobbying groups making various attempts to block, downplay, twist, blur, and other manipulate the storyline. Why? It's simple... if sugar were determined to be a "sinful ingredient" to the health of the masses, the sugar industry would be ruined. We've seen it over and over again in so many industries (not the least of which is tobacco) that its almost expected and in fact, if you merely attempt to look for these kinds of player actions in any industry, you will absolutely find them.