Is It Adequate Or Harmful In The Sugar Industry?

I grew up playing the game “Candyland”, and I dreamed of finding the golden ticket and living in Willie Wonka’s factory. I was also given a Gatorade after every sporting event I ever played in so what could be so bad about sugar? Sugar, real and artificial, can be found in almost every product we consume and although sugar is a simple carbohydrate that the body uses for energy, its impact on our body is far from simple. The consumption of sugar has been linked to a host of chronic health problems, including obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. The addictive nature of sugar is also a significant problem that leads to the other detrimental effects listed above. Sugar has also been useful to help preserve goods, fuel fermentation, balance acidity, and add flavor to other foods. Whether it’s cereal, spaghetti sauce, or yogurt, sugar is everywhere and has become unavoidable in our daily diets. As Americans, we have become accustomed to the sweet addictive taste of sugar, and our dependence on excessive amounts of sugar in its different forms has become alarming to many health experts. In analyzing preference and dependency with sugar, I will trace the addictive nature and major risks sugar has placed on society.

The past fifty years has seen a spike in the consumption of sugar, that number totaling a tripling increase. However, sugar is not the only risk factor here, alcohol and tobacco can also be attributed with the spike, albeit not as prevalent as sugar. The biggest question that Lustig et al. poses to its’ readers is this: “What aspects of the Western diet should be the focus of intervention”? (par. 3) The current USDA has been deemed “boogeymen” of diets, as well as the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). Lustig et al. all believe that our attention should be turned towards “added sugar”, which is a sweetener that has fructose in it. Perhaps the biggest controversy from the past fifty years has been none other than a severe culprit that experts know as high fructose corn syrup or HFCS.

Sugary beverages suggest a poor dietary quality; they are loaded with added sugars and attribute to the body’s energy density. “A 20-year study on 120,000 men and women found that people who increased their sugary drink consumption by one 12-ounce serving per day gained more weight over time—about 4 pounds per year” (19). Through increasing the daily intake in trivial increments, the body substantially results in an increased BMI (body mass index) and an increased body fat percentage score. Another study conducted at Harvard found that a 60 percent increase occurs in children for each 12-ounce they additionally drink daily. (________) The growing correlation between obesity and sugar has led to further studies, and statistical data. Researchers have revealed that in total, “half the people in the U.S. consume sugary drinks; 1 in 4 get at least 200 calories from such drinks; and 5% get at least 567 calories.” It was additionally found that one-fourth of Americans are consuming more than 135 grams of sugar per day from soda and other sweetened beverages, which compares to people of the past who only had 10 grams of fructose a day (_____). Such a high daily intake of sugar and calories illustrates the risk that arises when people consume too much sugar; that is, sugary drinks result in weight issues and medical consequences.

Sugar is everywhere in our lives. When you eat, sugar is in the food such as hamburger, sandwiches, pizza, bread, etc. When you drink, sugar is in the beverage like soda, juice, coffee and even milk. Furthermore, sugar exists in snacks such as cookies, cupcakes, biscuits and so on. I cannot list everything with sugar here. Actually, when we eat, we eat sugar. Unfortunately, sugar is now considering a toxic to our bodies. It causes diseases like obesity, diabetes, heart attack and cancer, etc. As sugar threatens the public health, government is considering curb sugar consumption by taxes on sugar; restrictions placed on food production and even age requirements on purchasing sugary foods. For this research project, I decided to pursue the question, Should sugar be regulated? This question deserves to be examined because we need to make some change for life to reduce sugar intake but at the same time it’s controversial that whether the government should intervene and regulate sugar. I wonder how the government will take appropriate measures to regulate sugar as well as improve public health.

In our daily life, we all have tasted sugar probably more than you think. Sugar is something we enjoy without having much concern, in fact this can be problematic. With the amount of sugar we take in, it can affect our health in the future. Therefore, the US government should create strict sugar regulations, in order to prevent future health problems of its citizens. The regulation can hopefully help prevent the increasing rate of diabetes, more risk of liver issues, and reduce people’s sugar addiction. Most people are unaware of these problems and it’s up to the US to make a change in people's health with a strict sugar regulation.

Recently, people have become worried about the health issues associated with consuming sugary drinks, especially soda. The rate of people being diagnosed with type-2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease has been going up primarily because of beverages with added sugar (Cited in Crawford, 2016). Several studies have found that soda is linked to over 180,000 deaths per year (Cited in Crawford, 2016). An article by the Huffington Post (2011) said that an average American drinks about 44.7 gallons of carbonated beverages a year, which adds up to over 350 pounds of soda. Comparatively, in 2005 an average American drank only 0.5 gallons, making soft drinks the most consumed beverage in America (n/a, 2011). The way the government is trying to fix

We Americans buy food without acknowledging how it made, where it came from, or even what nutrients it might or might not have. Many food corporations try to produce more for a lesser cost. Cow for example, aren’t supposed to eat corn, but factory farmers feed it to them to fatten them up faster, so this makes a cow's meat a lot more fattening than a cow who is fed grass(“Big Fat America”). Fattier meat means more calories, which means excessive weight gain. It also causes excessive weight gain and disease in cows because cows are not meant to eat corn. Corn have been genetically modified to make it able to be put in everything. Moodie-Mills offer a persuasive counter argument: corn is in everything such as salad dressing even bread. Trying to start a diet or a change in food choices

It’s in the food, the beverages, almost everything sweet. It has not only influenced Americans’ lifestyle, but is responsible for acute and chronic health problems that plague America as a whole. The consumption of added sugars has skyrocketed in the last few decades and has literally become a part of our lives, responsible for our deadly addiction, before you know it, you may become another suspect of this killer. In Nanci Hellmich, of USA Today, “Eating too much added sugar may be killing you”, Hellmich attributes sugar is not only causing us to become fat, but also is slowing killing us from within. Sugar is killing people because it is responsible for increasing the risk of health complications, growing prominence, and America’s obesity epidemic.

In an article written by Julie Corliss, medical writer at Harvard Health Publications, she addresses Americans unhealthy sugar intake, “Added sugars make up at least 10% of the calories the average American eats in a day. But about one in 10 people get a whopping one-quarter or more of their calories from added sugar” (Corliss). Sugar not only leads to weight gain, but also increases the chance of suffering from heart disease. Moving away from artificial and processed foods will help Americans lose weight and start towards a healthy lifestyle. If the body is consistently treated poorly, this will reflect in the mirror and on the scale.

The central theme of the book is presented to us in the form of a wake-up call. America needs a jolt back to the basics. We are presented with data and statistics that seem fairly redundant at first glance, but then you look at the fact that in the 1980s Coca Cola began to use high fructose corn syrup in their beverages; as a way to sweeten them. During those same years, American obesity rates peaked and have struggled to come down ever since. (Moss 107)

Tobacco, alcohol and poor diet are the main risk factors associated with cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and respiratory disease that kills approximately 35 million per year. Out of the three risk factors, an inadequate diet was found to the culprit of more diseases than smoking and liquor consumption combined. In Aseem Malhorta’s (2014) article “Sugar is now enemy number one in the western diet”, he claims that added sugar should be regulated as it is a health hazard that has caused the increasing prevalence of diabetes and obesity. Malhorta only focuses on sugar being the main causative agent in causing negative health outcomes, he fails to address the fact that there are many other confounding factors associated with each disease

The Federal government has remained silent on the subject of food labeling since passing the Labeling and Education Act of 1990, which introduced the now-familiar nutrition label and serving size information found on the majority of packaged foods. That legislation, however, purposefully excluded businesses selling ready-to-eat food.

When most people think about sugar, their first thoughts are not: heart disease, addiction, or slow and painful death; yet, unfortunately, these conditions are very real consequences of the unregulated and excessive consumption of sugar. In Nature’s article, “The Toxic Truth About Sugar” (2012), Robert Lustig, pediatric endocrinologist; Laura Schmidt, Professor of Health Policy at UCSF; and Claire Brindis, Professor of Pediatrics and Health Policy at UCSF, evaluate the world’s ever-increasing and toxic struggle with the substance sugar – also discussing counter measures to promote healthier diets amongst American’s and other societies. Lustig and his colleagues develop their argument using statistical evidence as they address the global impact of sugar, refuting minor oppositions, before dissecting each harmful aspect of the substance – even comparing it to substances more known for their toxicity. Eventually, presenting readers with possible routes of regulation, the authors firmly suggest government intervention in the production and sale of sugary foods. Although the argument is well executed, I remain unconvinced that government intervention is actually necessary.

Only 4% of calories in a person's daily diet is from sodas. The author also states an obvious factor in this discussion, “If we start putting warning labels on our drinks, what will we put warning labels on next?” Almost everything we consume has sugar in it. So if soda is first, maybe next is ice cream, the cookies, maybe even donuts. Everything is a risk, waking up this morning was a risk, some more risky than others but were thought to be equal correct? So if soda has to have a warning label shouldn't every other thing that has sugar in it have warning labels? It is just unreasonable to start this whole loop hole. We don’t need labels and even if we do start putting labels on everything do you really think it is going to improve

engineered) food is required to be labeled but sadly the United States is not one of those 64