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Avoid fructose - don't eat fruit - to avoid diabetes
There are many good reasons to avoid the fruit sugar, fructose, but all you
need is one: type 2 diabetes. And even worse than fruit itself that ubiquitous additive to so many processed foods and drinks — high fructose corn syrup.
A recent study highlighted diabetes and all the other key reasons why it's
a healthy idea to avoid this truly awful component of processed foods
and soft drinks.
US researchers at the University of California, Davis
(UCD), presented a new fructose study at the American Diabetes
Association 67th Annual Scientific Sessions in Chicago. It was a follow up to a similar study published 5 years earlier
The 2002 UCD study reported on animal testing that showed how fructose
consumption contributed to insulin resistance, high blood pressure, and
elevated triglyceride levels - three of the core symptoms of metabolic
syndrome. Other metabolic syndrome symptoms include excessive abdominal
fat, high C-reactive protein level, and low HDL cholesterol. Three or
more of these symptoms put a patient at high risk of developing type 2
diabetes and heart disease.
In the conclusions to their 2002 study, the UCD team noted that a high
intake of fructose might increase body weight and encourage insulin
resistance. Five years later, a study of human subjects confirms those
conclusions.
STUDY PROFILE
The UCD researchers began by giving a series of tests to assess heart disease risk in 23 overweight adults, aged 43 to 70.
- For two weeks, each subject ate a strict diet that consisted of 30% fat, and% complex carbohydrates
- After the first phase was complete, subjects were allowed to eat whatever they liked for eight weeks, along with three sweetened beverages each day that supplied a quarter of their energy intake - about half the group drank a glucose beverage while the other half drank a fructose beverage
- After the second phase was complete, subjects returned to the 30/55 diet while continuing with their daily drinks
- Throughout the study, further checks of heart disease indicators occurred at two, eight, and 10 weeks
Results showed that just two weeks after subjects began drinking sweetened drinks, triglyceride levels were up in the fructose group, but had actually dropped in the glucose group. Over the entire range of the study, LDL cholesterol increased and insulin sensitivity decreased in the fructose group but didn't change in the glucose group. In addition, fructose subjects gained about three pounds overall, but no weight gain was reported in the glucose group.
A fructose by any other name...
UCD researcher, Dr Peter J. Havel (who participated in both the 2002
and 2007 studies),said that most people get added
sugars in their diet from daily beverages. As this is a lifelong habit, it far exceeds the two weeks in which fructose proved to be so harmful in the trial.
So what exactly do soft drinks contain?
Checking the ingredients of your soft drink, sports tea, vitamin water,
power drink, etc., you might wonder what the difference is between
fructose, high fructose corn syrup, and crystalline fructose. Is one
better than the other? Well...put it this way: If only part of your
house is on fire, your house is still on fire.
The average high fructose corn syrup is made up of about 50 percent
fructose. But according to the Sugar Association (sugar.org), increased
fructose content of HFCS is becoming more common. Some of these syrups
contain more than 90 percent fructose.
And then there's crystalline fructose that's present in many "health"
drinks and vitamin-enhanced beverages. But does the process of
crystallizing magically transform fructose into something healthy?
No. According to the Fructose Information
Center (fructose.org), crystalline fructose is nearly 100%
fructose. And just to make it even less appealing, it contains traces
of lead, chloride, and arsenic. Yum! And keep in mind this information
comes from an association that ADVOCATES fructose use and consumption.
All of this is very bad news for those who are fructose intolerant and
don't even know it. They may suffer from chronic problems such as
irritable bowel syndrome without making the connection between their
condition and their fructose intake.
References
1. Elliott SS, Keim NL, Stern JS, Teff K, Havel PJ. Fructose, weight gain, and the insulin resistance syndrome. Am J Clin Nutr. 2002 Nov;76(5):911-22. Links
2. Stanhope KL, Havel PJ. Fructose consumption: potential mechanisms for its effects to increase visceral adiposity and induce dyslipidemia and insulin resistance. Curr Opin Lipidol 2008; 19(1): 16-24.
Last updated 4 March 2008
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