High Fructose Corn Syrup
Researchers at Princeton University have found that rats fed high fructose corn syrup gain significantly more weight than rats fed table sugar. They also gain weight around the middle and develop the known risk factors for high blood pressure, coronary artery disease, cancer and diabetes.
Often in this kind of research the poor rats are stuffed with vast quantities of the product under in investigation. However in this case, the concentration of HFCS was HALF that in typical fizzy drinks.
See http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/
Manufacturers have long said that HFCS is basically the same as table sugar. However, it does have some differences. Both are made up of glucose and fructose, but in HFCS there is a slightly higher proportion of fructose, and the fructose is more readily available to the body.
Which brings us to the next question - is fructose the problem? Fructose often gets a good press compared to glucose because it has a relatively low GI and less effect on insulin response. Plus, it’s found in fruit so surely must be healthy?
Recent research suggests that fructose (originating mainly from table sugar and HFCS) can cause insulin resistance and obesity. This book explains the research: http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1594866651/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link
Although fuctose occurs naturally in fruit, we would only have consumed small quantities of this in the past and it would have made sense to fatten up for the long winter period when little food was available. However, now we consume fructose in huge quantities all year round and I haven’t noticed any winter famines recently round here.
HFCS is in virtually all processed foods, including many “diet” and “low fat” products. You may know my opinion about these. I suspect future generations will be absolutely horrified at the way the food companies have got away with pushing “low fat” products as “healthy” - when in reality they are often full of sugar, HFCS and artificial sweeteners and are causing huge problems. I wonder how many deaths have been caused by the government’s wrong advice to cut down fat, when they should have been advising us to cut down sugar and HFCS? The information is out there but there is no political motivation to say “Oops, sorry, we were wrong all along. Our advice has given you diabetes and heart disease and made you fat”
The good news is that if fructose is the cuplrit, starches are not - because they break down to glucose rather then fructose. So, bread, pasta, rice, etc would be OK.
And natural fats are fine of course! So, why not go and enjoy a nice piece of butttered toast? (Check your bread for HFCS though! I bought a bread maker…)
(By the way, if you’re still not convinced about fats, have a look at this article which appeared in Scientific American recently: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=carbs-against-cardio )
