Sugar and Its Effect on Our Bodies

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.

One of the common disease in America caused by the excessive consumption of sugar is obesity. In America, the obesity rates had increased in the last decades and affects different on each person. The effects of sugar on people depends on the race, gender, and age of Americans. According to an

Down the road, added sugar has increased health complications tenfold. According to Quanhe Yang, from the Center of Disease and Control, “ 'death resulting from cardiovascular disease increases exponentially from added sugar consumption.' ”(Hellmich) Atherosclerosis, the most common cause of cardiovascular disease, is caused by correctable problems such as

In the article from USA Today, “Eating Too Much Added Sugars May Be Killing You,” Nanci Hellmich claims added sugars in soda, candy, and many more sweets may be killing you. Hellmich says that added sugar can lead to an increased risk of death caused by heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, and stroke. She supports her claim by referring to a survey recorded by the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey done on 31,000 people, then reflecting on the dietary habits of citizens based on interviews, and finally providing the evidence that most adults consume 10% of their daily calories from added sugar which is very unhealthy and hazardous for people’s health. Hellmich writes it in an informative tone for the public

Comparatively, sugar is not necessarily essential to human survival. It has other draws for humans though, due to the addictive effects that it has, and its ability to sweeten even the blandest foods. Although sugar has been present in diets before hand, “by

Children’s health and wellness expert Dr. Alan Greene discusses this likeness of sugar to a drug in-depth in his Healthline.com article Is Sugar an Addictive Drug. “Evidence is mounting that too much added sugar could lead to true addiction. Added sugar is not the sugar naturally found in foods, but the amped up levels added to many processed foods. Medical addiction changes brain chemistry to cause binging, craving, withdrawal symptoms, and sensitization. Excess added sugar can do just that, through changes in the same pathways as addiction to amphetamines or alcohol. Sugar addiction could be an even harder habit to break, according to recent evidence about how added sugar affects our stress hormones.” Though the quantity and variety of food avaliable to us today is for the most part a good thing, it is having and will continue to have dire consequences for the

Throughout the years America has started to blame sugar for obesity, heart disease, etc. To an extent we can blame sugar. When someone eats too much or eats the processed chemical filled sugar it could have a negative impact on that person's health. For example: “[..] Chemical makeup enters the bloodstream more quickly than plain sugar.” (Richards). Processed sugar enters into the body and bloodstream much faster than natural sugar does. Which causes too much sugar build up in our bloodstream makes the insulin work harder to process it all out. Until the insulin does its job the sugar just floats around in the blood. We as people can blame sugar for all of our issues when a person eats too much sugar. “I do not support unbelievable amount of GMO high fructose corn syrup” (Konie). That is when heart disease and obesity come into play, when you personally consume too much.

After reading the article “The Toxic Truth about Sugar” my thinking and reactions are identical to the description of the results in the article. Keeping the overall view of sugar and its danger to human health and mankind, I consider the authors are completely realistic and fair about ways of controlling and limiting the amount of sugar which processed-food industry adds to its products.

If the world is an engine, sugar is the oil. Everything has sugar, from sodas to fruit. But what if the sugar overload is hurting your body? It's a very controversial topic, but well-researched. Some say it has no long-term effects, but others beg to differ that it can lead to cardiovascular disease, obesity, and diabetes. Sugar has been fueling our lives for so long, so why is it just now gaining so much attention?

The main argument to be made here is that the only kind of sugars we should consume are natural sugars. Too much food these days contain high fructose corn syrup and other additives that our bodies can't handle. Some good natural sugars include ripe fruit and raw honey. Our bodies need natural sugar in order to function properly because, "when our cells don't have enough glucose to do their job they find alternative means by which to get their energy, particularly through fat or even our own body tissue. Always remember to be careful, though, as too much of anything is still bad.

High-Fructose Corn Syrup is one of the many leading sweeteners that found in many sodas and juices. The use of high fructose corn syrup has increased over the decade, which also increased the numbers of obesity and diabetes as well. This sweetener has the same chemical structure of table sugar, making it cheaper to make into cheap products for a profit. Mayo Clinic has stated that too much sugar of all kinds, including high fructose corn syrup leads to excess calories over the average limit of calories consumed and involves weight gain, type 2 diabetics and the risk of heat

164). In fact, a lot of other factors were considered in the rise of obesity,such as age group, education, water-consumption, and more. Although added sugars are a huge part of obesity, researchers have been able to link many other factors to the rise of obesity and as such, added sugars may not be the only factor in reducing obesity for every person.Like obesity, added sugars have a direct link to the increased development of diabetes. The increase of added sugars within chosen society trends, have escalated the prevalence of diabetes within the United States. Researchers believe that, “sugar-sweetened beverages are the primary source of added sugars in the U.S. diet” (Malik, Popkin, Bray, Després, Willett, & Hu, 2010, pg. 2477). In addition to added sugars within sugar-sweetened beverages, any item containing added sugars can lead to an increased risk of developing diabetes.However, “while experimental and observational studies suggest that sugar intake is associated with the development of type 2 diabetes, independent of its role in obesity, it is unclear whether alterations in sugar intake can account for differences in diabetes prevalence among overall populations” (Basu, Yoffe, Hills, & Lustig, 2013, pg. 1). While diabetes does have a direct link tothe increase in added sugars, other factors such as total calories, obesity, age

When you pop open a can of Soda, or a bottle of Lemonade, or even a sports drink do you ever think of the amount of sugar you are drinking? The recommended added sugar intake per day for men is 38 grams and for women 25 grams. Sugar is known as empty calories because they have no essential nutrients in them. This means that there is literally nothing healthy about sugar. In fact Dr. Nancy Appleton came up with 146 reasons why sugar is bad for you. Some of these reasons include increase in risk for disease, depression, or addictiveness.

The intake of sugars is that by taking in carbohydrates as energy. The increase in this is like a drug that can leave the taste buds wanting more to please the natural craving it has created these natural sugars can be used as additives in food processing as well. The higher intake of sugars has been the cause of many chronic diseases leading to the onset of such as diabetes,

Advertisement and commercial industries portray table sugar, and other artificial sweeteners as fuel needed by the body. Though body and body cells need sugar as fuel source. The body mechanism is just like the case of engine, there are bad fuels which can destroy engine. Table sugar is just a bad fuel for the body. Several research studies have arraigned sugar first culprit for the epidemics of complicated health problems such as diabetes, obesity, heart disease and cancer. Worst of it, several research now ranking sugar as addictive substance as drugs.