It may help the medicine go down... but is it hurting your health?

A new report claims sugar is a toxin and not just because of those empty calories that cause weight gain. Scientists from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), who took a new look at the mounting scientific evidence on sugar, say that at the levels consumed by most people, sugar can change metabolic rates, raise blood pressure, critically alter the signalling of hormones and causes significant liver damage.

These health hazards mirror the effects of drinking too much alcohol (distilled sugar), and the scientists suggest that measures used to reduce alcohol and tobacco consumption, such as taxation and controlled access, might be useful in helping to reduce sugar consumption too.

“As long as the public thinks that sugar is just ‘empty calories’, we have no chance in solving this,” warns the report’s lead author Dr Robert Lustig, a UCSF childhood obesity expert.

Sugar is a carbohydrate that’s found naturally in most foods, but is also added to many foods such as sweets, cakes and some fizzy and juice drinks. Studies suggest the nation is already eating too much of this added sugar. Indeed, the Department of Health’s National Diet and Nutrition Survey up to 2010 found that, on average, all children and adults exceeded the recommended amount of added sugar in their diets.

Sugar is viewed by some as a key cause of the obesity pandemic, but it’s not just the obese who may be at risk from sugar’s toxicity, says Dr Lustig, pointing out that normal weight people could benefit from sugar reduction as well.

He insists that while there are good calories and bad calories, good fats and bad fats, “sugar is toxic beyond its calories” when it’s consumed to excess and that virtually every country in the world, including the UK, is now over the “toxic threshold”.

Study co-author Laura Schmidt, a health policy professor at UCSF, said: “We’re not talking prohibition, we’re not advocating a major imposition of the Government into people’s lives. “We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient, thereby moving people away from the concentrated dose. What we want is to actually increase people’s choices by making foods that aren’t loaded with sugar comparatively easier and cheaper to get.”

Dr Lustig and his co-authors say policies similar to those used to reduce alcohol and tobacco consumption, such as taxation, plus tightening licensing requirements on vending machines and snack bars that sell high-sugar products, could help to reduce sugar consumption. However, Dr Mary Harrington of Sugar Nutrition UK, the research and information organisation funded by the UK’s sugar manufacturers, stresses the UCSF report contains no new evidence.

Expert committees, including respected bodies such as the World Health Organisation and the European Food Safety Authority, have not linked sugar with any non-communicable diseases. “All major expert reports in recent years have agreed that sugar is not a significant cause of obesity, diabetes, coronary heart disease, or cancer,” she says.

“The simple conclusion is that you can eat sugar as part of a healthy balanced diet. No foods should be considered as good or bad, as they all have an important role to play.”