
A Former Dentist Uncovering Sugar's Rotten Secrets - breitling
http://www.psmag.com/health-and-behavior/the-former-dentist-uncovering-sugars-rotten-secrets
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tcj_phx
> If sugar industry efforts skewed research about sugar’s harmful health
> effects, then national and international guidelines about sugar consumption
> are, in fact, based on flawed science.

Ancel Keys' holy-war against saturated fat was based on flawed science.

> Until recently, federal organizations such as the Department of Agriculture
> and the Food and Drug Administration had never officially recommended caps
> on the amount of sugar a person should eat, even though caps for nutrients
> such as fat and sodium have existed for more than 20 years.

In the last year or two, research papers have been published that acquit
saturated fat and sodium of the charges against them. But there's so much
inertia in the propaganda campaigns that it might be another generation before
'the experts' figure out how to give good advice.

> “because profit-maximizing behavior leads [big corporations] to be out
> pushing products which end up causing disease.”

This point is nicely-stated, but is not pointed at the best targets offered by
the food industry.

edit: Key's -> Keys'

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xchip
Thanks for the summary.

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poelzi
It is very important to distinguish between fructose and glucose sugars.
Fructose is actually much more poisonous then glucose is. It seems metabolized
mostly like alcohol. Now, with the high fructose corn syrup everywhere, makes
the situation not better.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM)

EDIT: fructose is not so problematic if it's still embedded in fibers like in
fruit. Bacteria then eat most of it, before it is absorbed.

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anon4
Yeah, the language mix-up is making it hard to tell people. We "know" that the
brain eats sugar and that sugar is a simple form of energy. Unfortunately this
applies to glucose specifically, not to any sugar-class molecule and not to
the white crystalline powder called table sugar. Glucose is ok for you.
Practically every tissue in your body can use it right away. Fructose is, as
you said, metabolised in the liver, and is practically toxic. Table sugar and
HFCS are both 50-50 fructose-glucose and biologically equivalent.

~~~
sjwright
Table sugar is sucrose, which is a molecular combination of fructose and
glucose.

HFCS is, as I understand it, just a bunch of fructose and glucose mixed
together.

Does that make them biologically equivalent? I've always been curious about
that. I recall reading a claim that the body's need to split the sucrose
molecule makes it lower impact than if it were pre-split.

~~~
teslabox
Many producers' batches of HFCS used to be contaminated with mercury [1].
Thanks to the efforts of a lone FDA whistleblower, industry no longer uses
mercury to make this substance. But high fructose corn syrup may still be
contaminated with starch - chains of glucose - thereby giving HFCS a much
higher calorie count than is on the label.

Sugar is fine if your liver is healthy. It keeps me from wasting away.

[1] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/01...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601831.html)

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jkot
> _Sugar causes cavity_

This is bit of smoke screen and obscures the real problem. Sugar alters
metabolism, and in larger quantities is practically poisonous.

