The largest source of calories for individuals living in industrialized nations is sugar.  Sugar increases insulin levels, promoting fat accumulation and inflammation throughout the body.  Sugar consumption and elevated insulin accelerate the aging process and create an environment conducive to degenerative disease.

The chemistry of sugar is based on the number of carbohydrates and includes monosaccharides, disaccharides and oligosaccharides.   The most important monosaccarides are glucose, dextrose, and fructose.  The primary difference in these deals with the way they are digested and metabolized.  Glucose and dextrose are basically the same form of sugar.  Many sugars can be identified by their characteristic “ose” ending.

Many of these sugars also combine to form complex sugars such as sucrose.  Sucrose, typical table sugar, is a disaccharide (2 sugar forms) that is half glucose and half fructose.  Meanwhile, high fructose corn syrup is 55% fructose and 45% glucose.

Massive Increase in Sugar Consumption

In the year 1700, the average individual consumed about 4 pounds of sugar each year.  In 1800, it was about 18 pounds of sugar per year.  In 1900, the average person ate 90 pounds of sugar per year.  In 2009, the average individual consumed 150 pounds of sugar per year.  Half of our society consumes ½ pound of sugar per day.   Most of this is in unnatural, man-made forms such as sucrose and high fructose corn syrup.

Most forms of sugar (other than fructose based sources) metabolize quickly in the body into a simple glucose form.  This glucose is then funneled into cells by the hormone insulin.  This process is performed very well in our bodies when the cells are kept sensitive to the circulating insulin.

Lifestyle behaviors that lead to chronically elevated blood sugar and insulin levels cause a cellular resistance to insulin.  These behaviors include excessive sugar intake, processed foods and sedentary lifestyle.  Elevated blood sugar and insulin cause excessive free radical damage and inflammation throughout the body.

The Major Problems with Elevated Sugar & Insulin Include:

1. Mal-coordinates the immune system and reduces its functional ability.
2. Dehydrates the cells and depletes the body of critical electrolytes such as potassium, magnesium, calcium, & sodium, leading to cell death and chronic muscle spasms.
3. Depletes the body of chromium, copper,and  zinc, and other trace minerals that help sensitize cells to insulin.  This further accelerates cell membrane insulin resistance
4. Induces cancer cell division and proliferation and inhibits mechanisms that slow down tumor growth and inhibit cancer cell apoptosis (programed cell death)
5. Creates tissue damaging Advanced Glycolytic Enzymes (AGE’s)
6. Depletes the body of anti-oxidants such as glutathione, vitamin C, and vitamin E.
7. Inhibits Human Growth Hormone (HGH) and elevates cortisol levels
8. Inhibits cellular protein synthesis which results in dysfunctional bone, muscle, and joint chemistry.  This accelerates the risk of osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, and chronic muscle and joint pain.
9. Promotes the growth of pathogenic bacteria and parasites such as Candida and other yeast-like organisms.  This also depletes the body of good bacteria and can lead to chronic infections in the gut, respiratory tissue, and sinuses.
10.  Leads to obesity, elevated triglycerides, abnormal LDL:HDL cholesterol levels, elevated arterial inflammatory risk factors.
11.  Opens up the blood brain barrier, depletes the brain of trace mineral stores, and allows toxins and other heavy metals to accumulate in brain tissue
12.  Destroys nerves leading to chronic pain, neuropathies, vision disorders, and accelerated organ dysfunction.

Sources For This Article Include:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dextrose
• http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/04/20/sugar-dangers.aspx
• http://www.naturalnews.com/009333.html

Hansel and Gretel Had It Easy

We have all read, seen or listened to some variation of Hansel & Gretel from the Brothers Grimm. A witch lives in a deep forest luring children with an edible house and sweet treats hoping to fatten them up for her cannibalistic urges. The children turn the tables as befits fairy tale heroes and get out alive.

Well, according to the newest research from Princeton University published officially in Pharmacology, Biochemistry and Behavior1 and for the mass market in Science Daily2, Hansel and Gretel would be even fatter, slower and more lethargic eating today’s sweeteners like high fructose corn syrup because the weight gain from HFCS is far greater than ordinary sucrose. This would put the outcome of tricking the witch into her own oven in doubt.

HFCS is a corn derivative that typically has 55-percent fructose, 42-glucose and 3-percent other larger sugars. It is cheaper than sucrose in the United States where it is easier to grow corn than sugar cane or sugar beets. Sucrose is a naturally occurring blend of equally balanced fructose and glucose. HFCS replaced sucrose in the early 1970s and the rate of obesity as a population percentage has doubled from 15 to 33-percent since then according to CDC figures cited by Science Daily.

The researchers conducted two experiments. One compared male rats eating rat chow and HFCS water to similar rats eating rat chow and sucrose flavored water. The weight gain was described as “much for the rats eating the HFCS water. Thereally interesting fact about this study: the sucrose water was highly concentrated at levels similar to the few sodas sweetened with sucrose still in the US marketplace, but the HFCS water was half the concentration of the typical HFCS soda.

The second study lasting six months looked at high fructose corn syrup versus water. Here the rats ballooned up with 48-percent weight gains over rats just eating food and unsweetened water. The researchers described the high-fructose corn syrup rats as obese.

“These rats aren’t just getting fat; they’re demonstrating characteristics of obesity, including substantial increases in abdominal fat and circulating triglycerides,” researcher Miriam Bocarsly reported. “In humans, these same characteristics are known risk factors for high blood pressure, coronary artery disease, cancer and diabetes.”

The researchers speculated on the reasons why HFCS might be more fattening than sucrose. Apparently, fructose molecules in sucrose are bound to glucose molecules and take longer to hit the bloodstream than the fructose in HFCS, which aren’t bound to anything. The researchers also mentioned that fructose seems to be processed in the liver into fat, while sucrose is metabolized by insulin from the pancreas and is more readily used as an energy source.

“Some people have claimed that high-fructose corn syrup is no different than other sweeteners when it comes to weight gain and obesity, but our results make it clear that this just isn’t true, at least under the conditions of our tests,” says psychology professor Bart Hoebel, who specializes in the neuroscience of appetite, weight and sugar addiction. “When rats are drinking high-fructose corn syrup at levels well below those in soda pop, they’re becoming obese—every single one, across the board. Even when rats are fed a high-fat diet, you don’t see this; they don’t all gain extra weight.”3

The researchers cite previous research articles that show fructose affects hormones like leptin that work with insulin to control satiety, the feeling of being full.

This excerpt from the abstract says it all – “The combined effects of lowered circulating leptin and insulin in individuals who consume diets that are high in dietary fructose could therefore increase the likelihood of weight gain and its associated metabolic sequelae. In addition, fructose, compared with glucose, is preferentially metabolized to lipid in the liver.”4

Not feeling full induces more eating. In the meantime, we can imagine Hansel and Gretel being fed soda and other fructose-laden foods and winding up in the witch’s meat pie. End of story.

Sources for this Article:

1. Bocarsly, ME, et al. “High-fructose corn syrup causes characteristic of obesity in rats:
2. sciencedaily.com viewed 3/30/2010
3. sciencedaily.com viewed 3/30/2010
4. Elliott, SS, et al. “Fructose, weight gain, and the insulin resistance syndrome.” Am J
5. Increased body weight, body fat and triglyceride levels.” Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, 2010; DOI: 10.1016/j.pbb.2010.02.012
6. Clin Nutr. 2002 Nov;76(5):911-22.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is calling for a municipal ban on the sale of sugary drinks of greater than 16 ounces

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has banned smoking in New York City as well as Trans-fats in restaurants. He had forced chain restaurants to put calorie counts on menus, and he got sugary soft drinks out of city and school vending machines.

Now, with his continued efforts to curb obesity and lower the cost of health care in New York, Bloomberg is calling for a municipal ban on the sale of sugary drinks of greater than 16 ounces.

The ban applied defines the drinks to be barred that contain more than 25 calories per 8 ounces. This does not include diet sodas.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg spoke to MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell responding to the many critics of his extremely controversial big ban, “The idea is you tend to eat all of the food in the container. If it’s bigger, you eat more. If somebody put a smaller glass or plate or bowl in front of you, you would eat less.”

Even progressive liberal comedian-pundit John Stewart is clearly not a fan of the proposal.

The ban would outlaw the sale of sugary drinks 16 oz or more in restaurants and vending machines (including those at gas stations), but you would still be able to purchase large bottles at stores. And of course, the six pack will still be an option is well.

I have mixed emotions about this ban. Soda consumption is one of the most significant contributors of a wide range of disease.

(Image courtesy of The Daily Mail)

But personally, I would rather see our government attempt to educate people as opposed to controlling people. Most people are still unaware of not only of how much sugar is in soda, but also, how bad sugar really is for us. And I would also like to see artificially sweetened foods, including diet soda, banned. Also, as far as laws are concerned, I would much prefer restrictions placed on advertising such as those commercials that try to convince us that Sunny Delight is good for your kids, or that high fructose corn syrup is perfectly healthy “in moderation.”

What do you think of New York’s proposed ban on large sodas?

No. It’s not. Agave Nectar is no healthier than refined table sugar.

Agave nectar is mostly fructose. This is why agave has a low glycemic index. Many people believe that since the sugar in fruit is fructose that this means fructose is automatically healthy. It is, in small amounts, with fruit fiber, fruit vitamins, fruit minerals, and all of the other nutrition in fruit. When whole fruits are consumed, the fructose is absorbed more slowly.

With agave nectar there is nothing to slow the absorption. Even if you eat agave with foods rich in fiber, all of the fructose separates and is absorbed quickly. Fructose passes into the bloodstream and is taken to the liver, where it is made into glycogen. Glycogen is a product stored in the liver and released to make glucose when the body needs it. But once the liver is stocked with glycogen (again, it doesn’t take much), the remaining fructose makes insulin resistant fatty acids and triglycerides.

Excessive fructose consumption (and it doesn’t take much) can lead to liver disease, insulin resistance which leads to diabetes, raised LDL cholesterol, elevated triglycerides in the body, and weight gain due to multiple factors. And if that wasn’t enough, fructose does not trigger the release of two hormones (insulin and leptin) in your blood. These hormones tell your body it’s no longer hungry. And excessive fructose elevates uric acid level, which can lead to gout and/or metabolic syndrome including hypertension and glucose intolerance. The increase in fructose consumption in America directly correlates to the rise in diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. While this is mostly attributed to high fructose corn syrup, if agave was the sweetener used in soda, our health as a nation would not be much better off.

If you’re looking for alternative sweeteners to use, check out our Healthy Sugar Alternatives article. But keep this in mind: in nature, sweets are hard to come by, they are seasonal, and they come with fiber and other nutrition. There is no healthy way to consume sweets on a regular basis. If you are trying to eat healthy, instead of looking for the magical sugar that doesn’t have any negative repercussions, learn to develop a healthier palate – a taste for raw fresh vegetables.

Is stevia a good sugar replacement? Yes, up to a point. Sugar addicted people must stop and heal before switching to stevia.
Stevia, a plant-extract originally from Central and South America, has been used as a sweetener for several centuries. It has been described alternately as either 30 or 300 times as sweet as sugar. Stevia has slowly gained popularity as an alternative to sugar; it was initially marketed in the US as a dietary supplement, and only recently as a sweetener. Stevia has slowly gained popularity as an alternative to sugar, even though it wasn’t marketed until recently.

One would think a food or drug is either safe or not, right? As of September 2009, the Food and Drug Administration has given support to two stevia products, Truvia and Purevia, for use as a sweetener in sodas and other drinks. What changed the stance of a government organization that used a 1985 study that described stevia as a mutagenic agent in the liver (possibly carcinogenic)?

Apparently, Coca-Cola and other large manufacturers of drinks and sodas have twisted the arms of some regulators, because as more people grasp Sugar Bad, Stevia Good, Big Soda needs to give the people soda that appears healthy in order to keep up sales. Trust a corporation to turn something potentially helpful in moderation into something you still shouldn’t consume.

No soda is safe to drink. The primary culprit after sugar is phosphoric acid. Phosphoric acid is an industrial solvent used to clean toilets and kill insects. Putting the amount of phosphorus from one soda into your body damages the calcium-phosphorus ratio.

Truvia will eventually be stuffed into the rainbow of packets on the table at our favorite eateries. Presently that rainbow includes white (sugar or sucrose), blue (aspartame), pink (saccharin) and yellow (sucralose). For purely aesthetic reasons how about green for Truvia?

However, don’t eat stevia from these Truvia packs because it will be mixed with dextrose or maltodextrin as the first ingredient (largest amount) in each pack, as is the case with the other colors in the bin. These are sugar derivatives that willadulterate whatever is good and useful about stevia. Mixing good things with bad things only ruins the food value of the beneficial.

So, what is so good about stevia that we actually are cautiously optimistic about the eventual release of small bags of pure stevia powder in the supermarket for use in baking, coffee, grapefruit and lemonade? Well, despite the ignominious beginning to stevia as a sweetener, a study that had been described as being “able to classify distilled water as a mutagen”, enough people have used the product now that there are health studies that show benefits for many diseases.

A study published in 2000 gave stevioside (stevia’s active ingredient) to 60 hypertension patients with a placebo group of 49. Results described as significant for reducing blood pressure supplemented similar animal studies.¹

Stevia’s reputed limited effect on blood glucose naturally led to diabetes studies. A Denmark study took blood glucose readings from 12 type-2 diabetes patients before eating stevia or cornstarch with their meals and a couple of hours later. The stevia group showed blood glucose levels at least 18-percent less than the starch group, leading to the possibility that diabetes patients have finally found the sweetener that will allow them to have their sweet cake and eat it, too.²

But after the FDA has spent many years trying to keep stevia out of the U.S. marketplace, we should ask if there are any side effects. A study conducted by the Burdock Group generally supports the safety of stevia, finding no adverse effects in rats at the massive doses such studies use to determine carcinogenic or mutagen properties of foods.³

And so we give stevia qualified support because while almost no information has surfaced to say that this sweetener hurts people, we realize that the weak link in any health plan is the patient. Many of us are unlikely to moderate our consumption of stevia because we just have to have ice cream, chocolate cake, or soda. Too much of a good thing isn’t good. But, on the range of things that are sweet but not named sugar, stevia is a great start.

1 Chan, P, et al “A Double-Blind Placebo-Controlled Study of the Effectiveness and Tolerability of Oral Stevioside in Human Hypertension” Br J Clin Pharmacol. 2000 September; 50(3): 215–220. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2125.2000.00260.x

2 Gregersen S, et al. “Antihyperglycemic Effects of  Stevioside in Type-2 Diabetic Subjects.” Metabolism 2004 Jan;53(1):73-76

3 Williams LD, Burdock GA “Genotoxicity Studies on a High-Purity Rebauside A Preparation.” Food Chem Toxicol. 2009 Aug;47(8):1831-1836

Is Agave Nectar Better Than Sugar?

Is Agave Nectar Good For You?

Is Agave Nectar Safe For Diabetics?

No! Agave Is Not Healthy!

Agave Nectar is highly concentrated fructose.

Now, many readers may believe that since fructose is fruit sugar, it is “healthy sugar”. It isn’t. Refined fructose is no better than refined glucose.

Consuming fructose naturally from whole foods is different from consuming concentrated agave. In its natural state, fructose is part of a whole food which includes enzymes, fiber, vitamins, and minerals. But refined sugars, sugars that have been stripped of their nutrition through processing, are never healthy.

Refined fructose lowers circulating insulin and leptin levels and raises ghrelin levels after the meal. Since leptin and insulin decrease appetite and ghrelin increases appetite, some researchers suspect that eating large amounts of fructose increases the likelihood of weight gain.

Refined fructose puts an enormous strain on the liver. Dr. Meira Field says, “;…the liver goes bananas and stops everything else to metabolize the fructose.”

Large amounts of fructose in the diet rapidly turn into fatty acids, which are stored as fat or released into the bloodstream as triglycerides. These fatty triglycerides are insulin resistant and cause a host of problems. Overwhelming the liver and producing insulin resistant fatty triglycerides is the road to cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and other diseases.

This is another example of marketing magic. Agave is sold as the healthy alternative to refined sugar. But it is refined sugar. Avoid it like you avoid white table sugar and high fructose corn syrup.

Good alternatives for sugar are stevia, raw honey, date sugar, or sugar cane juice. To understand more about sugar, please read Healthy Sugar Alternatives.

Just say the words gonads, testosterone or any of the unprintable slang associated with testicles, sex, and male virility and you’ll get a laugh or at least amused looks. Now, say those words again, but in a context that says, “You’re going to lose that capability, son,” and watch what happens. The collective scream you hear is shrill enough to replace the air raid sirens America abandoned in the 1980s.

New research so fresh that it hasn’t yet appeared in a journal article says flat out that eating sugar reduces testosterone levels in the blood by up to 25 percent across the board. The researchers found 74 men at Massachusetts General Hospital with a range of tolerances to glucose (42 normal blood sugar, 23 impaired glucose tolerance “prediabetic” and 9 actually with Type-2 Diabetes) and gave them 75g of a glucose solution. In many cases, the effect lasted at least 2 hours after ingestion and affected all types of men in the study. Of 66 men listed as having normal testosterone levels in a fasting state before the test, 10 developed a hypogonadal (low testosterone) state at some point during the two hours of the test.ⁱ

The actual intent of the research funded by the National Institutes of Health and the American Diabetes Association was to refine testing methods for low testosterone levels. Current methodology says to test the man in the morning on two different days and get an average reading to see if the man is truly hypogondal or if the low testosterone will pick up later. So far, no one has said that a man should fast before taking the blood test—until now.

The link between sugar, insulin, obesity, diabetes, the metabolic syndrome and testosterone levels had been touched on in other research that has come out recently. Only these researchers worked backwards relative to this new study; they took people with known elements of the metabolic syndrome (diabetes, obesity, and heart disease) and tested their testosterone levels. Many subjects had low testosterone.

In recent research conducted in Berlin, the conclusion read in part “Lower total testosterone and sex-hormone-binding-globulin (SHBG) predict a higher incidence of the metabolic syndrome…Administration of testosterone to hypogondal men reverses the unfavorable risk profile for the development of diabetes and atherosclerosis.”ⁱⁱ

In Finland where similar research is regularly conducted the researchers came up with this gem: “Low total testosterone and SHBG levels independently predict development of the metabolic syndrome and diabetes in middle-aged men. Thus, hypoandrogenism (hypogondal) is an early marker for disturbances in insulin and glucose metabolism that may progress to the metabolic syndrome or frank diabetes.” ⁱⁱⁱ

It seems that these previous studies were waiting for someone else to have a “The Emperor Seems Naked” moment and try out the inverse of their results in which you give sugar to mostly healthy people and see what happens. No longer should low testosterone be considered just a symptom of the metabolic syndrome, but as what both are…a result of too much sugar in our diet.

We at Nancy Appleton Books have already touched on sugar causing the metabolic syndrome in previous articles like 140 Reasons Why Sugar Ruins Your Health. In it we make simple declarative statements about many of sugar’s ill effects:

• Sugar can increase fasting levels of glucose.iv
• Sugar can cause hypoglycemia.viii
• Sugar can lead to obesity.v
• Sugar can cause heart disease.vii
• Sugar can cause metabolic
• syndrome.viii

One way sugar lowers testosterone is through its effect on the adrenal glands.ix
Sugar taxes the adrenal glands and these glands interrelate with the sex hormone glands (testes and ovaries) that produce testosterone and estrogen.^x

These ailments listed above are elements of and highly associated with the metabolic syndrome, which we have linked to the excessive intake of sugar. The research in Massachusetts says that sugar causes low testosterone. Similar research around the world says that low testosterone is highly associated with the various elements of the metabolic syndrome. So how many times do we have to enjoy the circular logic before we simply say that sugar causes both the low testosterone and the ailments in the metabolic syndrome? Put more simply, sugar kills in a multitude of ways and this one affects men where they really live, in the bedroom.

Related Reading:

• Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases
• Hypothyroidism – Natural Remedies, Causes, and How To Heal the Thyroid
• How I Lost Over 150 Pounds, and How My Life Changed
• Is Your Gut Health Making You Fat?
• Healthy Sugar Alternatives & More