Wow…I am amazed! The British Dietetic Association (BDA) really have confirmed what I always thought of them.  I will try to keep this shorter than my usual rant but this is the original article (or ‘fact’ sheet as they call it) they wrote  about sugar-click here.

In case you didn’t read it here are the take away points (followed by my opinion!) that they so eloquently educate the nation with:

1) sugar isn’t bad for you, it’s an important source of carbohydrates. Also, it adds flavour and texture to food.

WHAT?  there is a huge amount of evidence to suggest sugar most definitely IS bad for you.  Just look around you!  Just look at the stats of sugar consumption over the last 30-40years and the massively  correlated obesity epidemic.  Doesn’t take that much research to find absolutely loads of data, articles, reviews, journals and books telling us that sugar is a killer.  Plus, if you reduce peoples sugar intake, they will lose weight and improve pretty much every health marker you can measure. And, you feel a lot better!!!

2) There is no direct health problems associated with sugar apart from tooth decay.

Urm…maybe they need to come out of their bubbles and do a little more reading…there is more and more research now on the dangers of sugar, the toxic effect of sugar, the links to diabetes, metabolic syndrome (a precursor to diabetes), insulin resistance and even some cancers now.  Although no-one wants it, tooth decay is the last thing we need to worry about about when it comes healths problems and sugar…!

(I may write about these three huge health subjects over the next few weeks as I promised you I wasn’t going to rant too much today).

3) Sugar doesn’t cause type 2 diabetes.

Technically, they could get away with this one by virtue of the fact that a direct causational link between sugar and diabetes has not been established (only a matter of time in my opinion though). BUT for nearly 100 years there have been links, studies and reviews concluding that sugar does have a direct impact on diabetes.  For example, Fredrick Banting (Nobel prize winner for discovering insulin) observed that diabetes was rare in populations who didn’t consume sugar and high in populations that did – THIS WAS IN 1923!

Also,  Haven Emerson, director of the institute of public health at Columbia University, showed that diabetes deaths in New York City had increased as much as 15-fold in 60 years (FROM 1865)  and that deaths increased as much as 4-fold in some U.S. cities between 1900 and 1920 alone.  This, amazingly coincides with a doubling of sugar consumption.

So, if we look back, there is only 90 years of research to trawl through, linking sugar with diabetes…! Not much then!

In my opinion it is the major cause of diabetes both indirectly (through making us overweight) and directly (by increasing insulin).

4) low calorie sweeteners aren’t bad for you

I beg to differ…! Dr Robert Walton looked at 166 studies related to aspartame (just one common sweetener).  Interestingly 74 of those studies were funded by Nutrasweet(who make aspartame), the rest were independently funded. 100% of the 74 studies funded by Nutrasweet concluded aspartame to be safe (surprise, surprise!).  Of the remaining studies 92% found significant health problems with aspartame! I could go on but suffice to say the evidence is overwhelming.  If you want to read more on this then DR HJ Roberts has written a 1000 page book on the health problems associated with sweetners called ASPARTAME DISEASE.   I might send a copy to the BDA?!

5) Sugar is not addictive

Yes it is (in my opinion)!  Again, a fairly well researched subject (a Princeton university study being one of the most widely known – although not to the BDA evidently!) with recent evidence showing that it is addictive in many levels – physiological, psychological & neurological.  Some  studies also show that it works on the same pathways as some class A drugs and when given a choice, rats (due to the brain alterations) actually preferred sugar as opposed to one the most addictive drugs in the world.

Plus, forget research for a second and just think about people on a daily basis.  There are plenty of sugar addicts around us.  You try stopping people getting a sugar fix when they have a craving…people will go to some lengths to get it if they have been denied it for a while.  Addictive behaviour…?

So there you have it,  a quite unbelievable article written by people who are supposed to helping the population.  I think it would be a good idea to do a research study on a member from this organisation and give them as much sugar as they want for a few years (or even just the amount they say if ‘safe’ which is a massive 15 teaspoons a day) and measure their  diabetes risk factors, insulin resistance levels, metabolic syndrome risk, fatty deposits in the liver, blood fat levels, cancer risk, psychological health, brain chemistry and neurological health.  What do you think?  Obviously, we would have to get the Sugar Association to fund it to make sure the results came out without any bias….!!!!!

I certainly wouldn’t volunteer as I will be consuming as little sugar as possible…