HFCS does not — repeat, not — stand for Healthiest Food You Can Swallow
Some bad news for high fructose corn syrup and its fans
When we last left our friends at the Corn Refiners Association, manufacturers of high fructose corn syrup, they were loudly proclaiming the findings of an article in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition which determined that there was “no scientific support for the hypothesis that high fructose corn syrup is causally linked to obesity in the United States . . . any more or less than other caloric sweeteners” and “is in fact indistinguishable from sucrose in its metabolic effects.”
In other words, the effect of the high fructose stuff on the human body is essentially the same as that of simple granulated white sugar. There are two points to be made here.
Point Number One: If “We’re No Worse for You than Pure Sugar” is your idea of a major positive selling point, you obviously have a product with precious little to be said on its behalf. “Infinitely Safer Than Leaping into a Fire” also has a nice ring to it; why not issue a press release extolling that fact?
Actually, that might have been the good news. Read on . . .
Point Number Two: It turns out that high fructose corn syrup may in fact be worse for you than sugar after all. According to a University of Colorado study just presented, the introduction of HFCS 20 years ago coincided not just with the start of a two-decade rise in national obesity, but also with a “dramatic rise in the prevalence of hypertension,” AKA high blood pressure.
Specifically, the study of over 4,500 adults found that consuming more than 74 grams of fructose per day increases the risk of serious hypertension by as much as 87 percent. The researchers’ conclusion was unambiguous: “high fructose intake in the form of added sugars is significantly and independently associated with higher blood pressure levels in the US adult population with no previous history of hypertension.”
On top of this comes word from researchers at U.C. Davis that, because it is more easily converted into fat by the liver than other sugars, high levels of fructose consumption raise one’s risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
To review, HFCS is bad for your blood pressure, your weight, your heart and your health. Let’s see plain old granulated sugar top that.
(By Robert S. Wieder for CalorieLab Calorie Counter News)
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