Pure, White and Deadly is a 1972 book by John Yudkin, a British nutritionist and former Chair of Nutrition at Queen Elizabeth College, London.[1] Published in New York, it was the first publication by a scientist to anticipate the adverse health effects, especially in relation to obesity and heart disease, of the public's increased sugar consumption. At the time of publication, Yudkin sat on the advisory panel of the British Department of Health's Committee on the Medical Aspects of Food and Nutrition Policy (COMA).[2] He stated his intention in writing the book in the last paragraph of the first chapter: "I hope that when you have read this book I shall have convinced you that sugar is really dangerous."[3]
The book and author suffered a barrage of criticism at the time, particularly from the sugar industry, processed-food manufacturers, and Ancel Keys, an American physiologist who argued in favour of restricting dietary fat, not sugar, and who sought to ridicule Yudkin's work.[2] In later years, Yudkin's observations came to be accepted.[note 1][2][4][5][6] A 2002 cover story about sugar by Gary Taubes in The New York Times Magazine, "What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie?", attracted attention,[7] and the following year a World Health Organization report recommended that added sugars provide no more than 6–10% of total dietary intake.[8] In 2009 a lecture on the health effects of sugar by Robert Lustig, an American pediatric endocrinologist, went viral.[9] The subsequent interest led to the rediscovery of Yudkin's book and the rehabilitation of his reputation.[2][10]
Two further editions of the book were published, the second after Yudkin's death in 1995. An expanded version appeared in 1986, revised by Yudkin himself, to include much additional research evidence. In 2012 the book was re-published by Penguin Books with a new introduction by Robert Lustig to reflect the changed nutritional context that the book had helped to create.[2]
The book was first published in 1972 in New York by the publisher Peter H. Wyden under the title Sweet and Dangerous, and a few weeks later in London by Davis-Poynter as Pure, White and Deadly: The Problem of Sugar. Pure, White and Deadly was used for subsequent editions and is the title by which the book became known.[11]
At the time of publication, it was generally accepted that the alarming recent increase in the incidence of coronary heart disease (CHD) was due to the excessive consumption of animal fat.[12] Yudkin believed that this view was wrong and that, instead, an important cause of CHD was the excessive consumption of sugar (i.e. sucrose). More generally, he argued, excessive sucrose consumption provokes a metabolic disturbance that has several undesirable results.
The author makes the initial case that sucrose is a dangerous food by emphasising the contrast between starch and sucrose. Both of these are carbohydrates, but starch occurs as a bulk constituent of cereals (such as rice, wheat and maize), legumes and a few root crops like potatoes, while sucrose is present in large quantities in sugar cane, sugar beet and ripe fruits. It used to be thought[timeframe?] that sucrose and starch are metabolised in similar ways, and so are interchangeable from the nutritional point of view, but more recent evidence[timeframe?] had shown that their metabolism is significantly different. The need for carbohydrate as a component of the diet can be entirely satisfied by starch (often in the form of bread or pasta), which is broken down in the body to glucose. On the other hand sucrose, which is broken down to equal quantities of glucose and fructose, is not an essential dietary component even in small amounts.[13] Evolutionary history suggests that our pre-Neolithic ancestors ate a diet that consisted largely of meat, with some nuts, berries, leaves and root vegetables, and we can presume that a taste for sweet fruit developed because it directed people to a rich source of vitamin C, an essential nutrient.
The development of agriculture during the Neolithic Revolution (from c.10,000 BCE) led to a large increase in the consumption of starch, to which humanity adapted well. By contrast, it is only since the early 19th century that greatly improved methods of cultivation of sugar cane and sugar beet, and improved technology of refining, led to sucrose becoming readily available and remarkably cheap. Yudkin refers to these developments as the separation of palatability from nutritional value.[14] As a result the quantity consumed has increased about 50-fold in the past 150 years, with sucrose increasingly used not only in the home and in cafés but also by the manufacturers of soft drinks and as a sweetening agent for many pre-prepared foods. The human species has not had time to adapt to this extremely rapid change. Three problems result. First, unlike glucose, which is metabolised throughout the body, the fructose produced from the breakdown of sucrose is metabolised almost exclusively in the liver, where much of it is converted to fat. Secondly, since it is not uncommon for people to take as much as 30% of their daily caloric intake as sucrose, this consumption crowds out more desirable foods and can sometimes lead to deficiencies of certain nutrients. Thirdly, since many people find sucrose appetising, it is often taken in excess of caloric requirements, thus leading to obesity.
The author then turns to the evidence that the consumption of sucrose is associated with certain specific disorders other than obesity. Some of this evidence is epidemiological and some experimental. Both types have limitations, which the author discusses in a chapter called Can you prove it?,[15] but both are strongly indicative of an involvement of sucrose in the aetiology both of CHD and of what used to be called maturity-onset diabetes (type 2 diabetes).
The epidemiological evidence that sucrose contributes to CHD had started to accumulate in 1957; in that year Yudkin showed that a comparison of data from several countries indicated an association between coronary mortality and the consumption of sucrose, and that the association with sucrose consumption was stronger than with fat consumption. Subsequent studies from South Africa and Israel found that sub-populations that had historically consumed only small quantities of sucrose had much less CHD than those who consumed large quantities, but that as their sucrose consumption increased so too did their incidence of CHD. Experimental evidence from animal studies showed that consumption of a sugar-rich diet leads to biochemical changes that are associated with CHD, such as an increase in blood triglyceride, an increase in platelet stickiness, and an accumulation of fat in the liver. Results similar to some of these were found in human subjects.
Epidemiological evidence similarly pointed to excess sugar consumption as a contributory factor in the development of type 2 diabetes. As before, the evidence relied on a comparison between different countries in the incidence of type 2 diabetes and the consumption of sucrose, and also on within-country differences between sub-populations that consumed less or more sucrose. Moreover, in developed countries, the increase in sucrose consumption that had occurred over the past several decades appeared to run parallel to the increase in the incidence of type 2 diabetes. Experiments with rats showed that the feeding of sucrose led to impaired glucose tolerance (results with human subjects were more equivocal). The author mentions several other conditions that he believed were caused by or exacerbated by the consumption of sucrose: dyspepsia (indigestion), dental caries, seborrhoeic dermatitis, changes in the refractive index of the eye, and various forms of cancer. With the exception of dental caries, none of these conditions showed as strong a link with sucrose consumption as CHD and type 2 diabetes did.
How does the consumption of sucrose lead to these deleterious effects? For dental caries the answer is clear: it is converted to dextran, which is extremely adhesive and promotes the growth of acid-producing bacteria. For the general metabolic effects that lead to CHD and/or to type 2 diabetes, the author suggests that alterations either in the rate of production of insulin or in the body’s sensitivity to it may be one of the early effects of excessive sucrose consumption. This suggestion foreshadows the subsequent widespread recognition of insulin resistance and the metabolic syndrome, and the condition known as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). NAFLD is believed to result from the accumulation of fat in the liver—often as a consequence of excess dietary sucrose.
A chapter called Sugar should be banned suggests that sooner or later legislation will be needed to prevent people from consuming so much sucrose (this time foreshadowing the UK’s Soft Drinks Industry Levy or "sugar tax"). Yudkin concludes his book with some examples of the ways in which organisations connected with the sugar industry, and with the manufacturers of processed foods that use sugar, sought to interfere with his research or with its publication.
1986 edition
Fourteen years after the first publication of Pure, White and Deadly, Yudkin decided that the book was out of date in important respects, and in 1986 he published a new edition to incorporate more recent experimental results. The 1986 edition has many more references, and a much fuller index. In Chapter 12 of the new edition (Can you prove it?) he wrote about several experiments with human subjects in which fat intake had been manipulated by the reduction of animal fat; the results had not supported the fat hypothesis. Chapter 14 (Eat sugar and see what happens) described further experiments from Yudkin’s department at Queen Elizabeth College, both with experimental animals and with human volunteers fed on diets rich in sugar. Chapter 17 (A host of diseases) introduced a new section on disease of the liver.
The inclusion of these additional results is one reason why the new edition (published by Viking in 1986 and by Penguin in 1988) is substantially longer than its predecessor. In addition, the author rearranged and expanded a good deal of the material in chapters 3, 4 and 5 of the 1972 edition, so that these three chapters (which largely concerned the chemistry of sucrose, methods for its production, and the difference between white and brown sugar) now became seven. In the last chapter, Yudkin gave many additional examples of the ways in which his research and the publication of his results had been impeded by the sugar industry and by organisations influenced by it.
2012 edition
The 2012 edition was published by Penguin under the title Pure, White and Deadly: How Sugar Is Killing Us and What We Can Do to Stop It. Yudkin's text is identical to that of the 1986 edition. In addition the new edition has an introduction by Robert Lustig, who had, independently of Yudkin, discovered some of the deleterious effects of sucrose, particularly in the aetiology of obesity in childhood. This edition of Pure, White and Deadly has been translated into German and Korean.
Reception
After half a century, it has become clear that Pure, White and Deadly was a transformative book, both because it re-shaped the scientific understanding of sugar and because it stimulated practical action for sugar reduction. The initial reception was very different. For decades after the book's initial publication in 1972, despite its sales and translations (into Finnish,[16] German,[17] Hungarian,[18] Italian,[19] Japanese and Swedish),[citation needed] Yudkin's arguments were rejected not just by the food industry but also by most of his scientific peers. Because of the lengthy delay caused by opponents (described below under Rejection), and the further time involved as others slowly began to appreciate the significance of sugar (described under Transition), sugar emerged as the principal nutrient of global concern only in the early years of the 21st century.
Rejection
When Pure, White and Deadly was first published, Yudkin was a member of the panel on diet and cardiovascular disease of the Committee on the Medical Aspects of Food Policy (COMA), then the principal scientific advisory body on nutrition for the UK government. It seemed an ideal opportunity to translate science into policy. In the event, Yudkin's colleagues on the panel did not accept his arguments, so he wrote a brief “note of reservation” for the final report[20] suggesting they had paid too much attention to fat and too little to sucrose.
That a COMA panel had for the first time been asked to consider cardiovascular disease was itself a sign of the changes with which Pure, White and Deadly was concerned. As wartime privations receded and industrialised nations prospered, diets changed and the focus of nutrition changed too – from deficiency diseases to problems of excess, what Yudkin called the “diseases of civilisation”.
In many countries, governments and medical organisations began publishing dietary recommendations. Some included sugar among their concerns, but without specific reference to Pure, White and Deadly, or to Yudkin at all. Fat remained the principal issue. A review of 100 international nutrition reports up to 1991[21] found that 70 included quantitative targets for fat and only 23 for sugar.
In the UK, the 1984 update of the COMA report on diet and cardiovascular disease[22] did not mention Pure, White and Deadly or Yudkin. And despite the much expanded 1986 edition of the book with new evidence, the separate COMA panel on “Dietary Sugars and Human Disease” in 1989[23] explicitly dismissed any links between sugar and obesity, type 2 diabetes or heart disease.
The first WHO report on “Diet, Nutrition and the Prevention of Chronic Diseases”[24] in 1990 acknowledged sugar's role in the causation of dental caries, but not in obesity or CVD. Keys was referenced but not Yudkin. Similarly, the 1994 version of the COMA report on cardiovascular disease[25] lists 414 references, but does not include Pure, White and Deadly among them.
Transition
For the general public, the most significant development was the increasing popularity of low-carbohydrate diets from the mid-1990s onwards. These created a generalised sense that there was something harmful about sugar and that people should eat less of it.
Low-carbohydrate diets at that time were most strongly associated with Robert Atkins, himself a cardiologist who also suffered rejection by his medical peers. But many others produced variations on the theme, most notably Arthur Agatston, Barry Sears, Michael and Mary Dan Eades, Leslie Kenton, Patrick Holford and Jennie Brand-Miller. The trend continues in the 21st century in varied forms, including ketogenic and paleolithic diets. Yudkin received little acknowledgement for this development, even though he had published five books on weight loss, all emphasising sugar restriction, from 1958 to 1990, before any of the other popular low-carbohydrate diets were written. (See separate Wikipedia entry on John Yudkin for a bibliography).
There was a similar lack of recognition in the scientific community. As we have seen, from the first edition of Pure, White and Deadly onwards Yudkin drew attention to the “metabolic disturbance” caused by excessive sugar intake, i.e. its effect on the production of insulin or on people’s sensitivity to it. But it was Gerald Reaven, another academic medical specialist, whose work stimulated research on and clinical attention to insulin, who later became known as the “father of insulin resistance”.[26] Reaven also linked this condition to broader health consequences, including heart disease, in what was known in those early days as “Syndrome X” (now more formally designated as the metabolic syndrome).
Also food health advocacy NGOs became more visible during the 1990s, raising awareness of dietary problems. Some were particularly active on sugar – notably the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) in the US and Action and Information on Sugars (AIS) in the UK, now succeeded by the more prominent Action on Sugar (AoS). But even these groups made little public reference to Pure, White and Deadly or to Yudkin.
Throughout this period, both print and broadcast media gave increasing coverage to sugar. But the single most influential article was a cover story on the sugar v fat debate by Gary Taubes in The New York Times Magazine in 2002.[7] His work also encouraged other journalists, including cookery writers, to publish articles on sugar. Today, articles, columns and programmes on sugar have become ubiquitous and are too numerous to count. The Wikipedia article on John Yudkin includes references to several articles on ‘’Pure, White and Deadly’’ in both the medical press and the lay press down to the year 2016. A more recent example, Fat didn’t have a lobby, appeared in December 2017 in Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin.
The developing case against sugar was also manifest in the 2003 version of WHO's "Diet, Nutrition and the Prevention of Chronic Diseases", which recognised that there were good reasons for restricting sugar intakes to less than 10% of total calories, not just because of dental caries, but “on nutritional grounds alone”. These grounds specifically included obesity.[8] The subsequent controversy with the food industry over the global strategy to achieve this target was a turning point for some companies, who recognised that sugar and sweet products were now irremovably on the nutrition agenda.
The real breakthrough came in 2009 with the lecture “Sugar: the Bitter Truth”, by the paediatric endocrinologist Robert Lustig, broadcast on YouTube and viewed almost eight million times.[27] Lustig's contribution was significant in several ways. First, it drew widespread public attention to the serious scientific case against sugar. It also broadened the nutritional concerns about sugar beyond obesity to all the diseases in the metabolic syndrome. Finally, it recognised the role that Yudkin had played in this long history, and hence was a major inspiration for the re-publication of Pure, White and Deadly in 2012, for which Lustig wrote an introduction. While he came to his clinical understanding of sugar independently, Lustig was more generous than any previous scientific workers in acknowledging his debt to Yudkin. Lustig ends his introduction to Pure, White and Deadly: “I’m proud to be a Yudkin disciple, to contribute to resurrecting his work and his reputation, and to assist in the advancement of his legacy and public health message. Every scientist stands on the shoulders of giants. For a man of relatively diminutive stature and build, Dr John Yudkin was indeed a giant.”
Affirmation
Two major books have taken up the theme developed by Yudkin: Fat Chance by Robert Lustig (Hudson Street Press, 2013) and The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes (Alfred A. Knopf, 2017). These two books have added momentum to Yudkin’s call in Pure, White and Deadly for a substantial reduction in the consumption of sugar.
In recent years, most major multinational food and drink manufacturers have begun implementing “health and wellness” programmes which, amongst other actions, review and reformulate their product portfolios (thousands of products) to reduce sugar. Nestlé, Unilever, Danone, General Mills, Kellogg's, Mars, Kraft Heinz, Mondelez and others have such plans, as well as, most significantly, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo.
The results are variable across companies, markets and product categories, and often criticised as inadequate or too slow. But significant reformulations in foods normally take many years. They have to be done gradually and imperceptibly, so as not to shock people's expectations and so as to carry established customers with them. For example, Heinz UK, an early responder to nutritional concerns, has been cutting sugar gradually across its range since 1986 and is still doing so. Sugar reduction in mass market foods is a transformative process that will take a long time.
Government plans and policies on sugar are also changing. Earlier, the consensus target for sugar consumption was 10% of calories.[21] In 2015, Yudkin's home country, the UK, set a goal of 5% of dietary energy,[28] and WHO made this a “conditional recommendation” for all countries.[29]
Explicit anti-sugar policies are being set in place. The most obvious manifestation has been taxes on “sugar-sweetened beverages”. At the time of writing, some 59 countries have adopted some form of charge on sweetened drinks.[30] This is still a minority among nation states, but the number is growing.
Their effectiveness varies. In many cases the charges are small, the data on sales and consumption are imperfect, and consequently the effects are disputed. The most powerful to date is again in the UK, with the Soft Drinks Industry Levy. It was structured with the intention not of suppressing consumption but of stimulating reformulation. So it took the form of a “levy” on manufacturers, not an excise tax at retail level. It was effective: most mass market drinks have reduced their sugar content to evade the levy.[31]
The UK has also begun a programme to reduce the sugar content in popular sweetened foods (biscuits, breakfast cereals, cakes, chocolate, ice cream, pastries, puddings, sugar confectionery, sweet spreads and yoghurts).[32] It is too early to tell if this will be effective – many lower sugar products are still being developed and, in foods more than in drinks, reformulation is a long process. And it remains to be seen how many items will be commercially successful, which is a prerequisite for the success of reformulation as a public health strategy.
Ironically, the most significant measure of Yudkin's increasing influence has come from the sugar industry itself. In 1964, aware of his arguments even before Pure, White and Deadly was published, the two big UK sugar producers (AB Sugar and Tate & Lyle) set up the Sugar Bureau (later Sugar Nutrition) to provide scientific counter-arguments on the health effects of sugar. In 2016, recognising that the public argument had been lost, they closed it down.[33]
Influence
Although excessive sugar consumption is recognised as a major health issue, it is likely to remain a problem for decades ahead. The prevalence of obesity remains high in most developed countries. It is also rising in many developing societies, even those with widespread deficiencies, where it produces the “double burden” of malnutrition. As yet, “not one single country has managed to turn around its obesity epidemic in all age groups”.[34][35] The burden of illness has shifted, in rich and poor countries alike, towards “non-communicable diseases”, including those of the metabolic syndrome associated with sugar.
From a global perspective, sugar consumption is also rising, through growth in Asia and Africa, with India as the world's largest consumer in absolute amounts.[36] It may not be falling even in the UK, despite all the government's efforts. Estimating real intakes is difficult, because diet surveys are flawed by “under-reporting”.[37]
Unsurprisingly, sugar production is rising in parallel, not only through more cane and beet, but also because of increased production of high fructose corn syrup/“isoglucose”, made from other starchy crops, like maize and wheat. Indeed, for all the attention to new policies to control demand for sugar, agricultural and trade policies continue to stimulate its production.[38] Nonetheless, the reformulation programmes of governments and companies should, over the longer term, gradually reduce consumption.
One consequence of the emphasis on reformulation has been to stimulate the development of new food ingredients that may be used in place of sugar, especially in the technically more difficult changes to foods. These go well beyond the familiar “artificial” sweeteners to include new “natural” sweeteners, superior polyols, better dextrins, improved oligo/poly-saccharides, sweet proteins, flavour enhancers, modifiers of taste receptors, and even new forms of sugar itself. As a result, new mass-market products with much reduced sugar contents, or even sugarfree, may become widespread.
Notes
↑ George A. Bray (Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology, 2010): "The worldwide consumption of sucrose, and thus fructose, has risen logarithmically since 1800. Many concerns about the health hazards of calorie-sweetened beverages, including soft drinks and fruit drinks and the fructose they provide, have been voiced over the past 10 years. These concerns are related to higher energy intake, risk of obesity, risk of diabetes, risk of cardiovascular disease, risk of gout in men, and risk of metabolic syndrome. Fructose appears to be responsible for most of the metabolic risks, including high production of lipids, increased thermogenesis, and higher blood pressure associated with sugar or high fructose corn syrup. Some claim that sugar is natural, but natural does not assure safety."[1]
Related Research Articles
A carbohydrate is a biomolecule consisting of carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and oxygen (O) atoms, usually with a hydrogen–oxygen atom ratio of 2:1 and thus with the empirical formula Cm(H2O)n, which does not mean the H has covalent bonds with O. However, not all carbohydrates conform to this precise stoichiometric definition, nor are all chemicals that do conform to this definition automatically classified as carbohydrates.
In nutrition, biology, and chemistry, fat usually means any ester of fatty acids, or a mixture of such compounds, most commonly those that occur in living beings or in food.
Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double sugars, are molecules made of two bonded monosaccharides; common examples are sucrose, lactose, and maltose. White sugar is a refined form of sucrose. In the body, compound sugars are hydrolysed into simple sugars.
Fructose, or fruit sugar, is a ketonic simple sugar found in many plants, where it is often bonded to glucose to form the disaccharide sucrose. It is one of the three dietary monosaccharides, along with glucose and galactose, that are absorbed by the gut directly into the blood of the portal vein during digestion. The liver then converts both fructose and galactose into glucose, so that dissolved glucose, known as blood sugar, is the only monosaccharide present in circulating blood.
Metabolic syndrome is a clustering of at least three of the following five medical conditions: abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, high blood sugar, high serum triglycerides, and low serum high-density lipoprotein (HDL).
Abdominal obesity, also known as central obesity and truncal obesity, is the human condition of an excessive concentration of visceral fat around the stomach and abdomen to such an extent that it is likely to harm its bearer's health. Abdominal obesity has been strongly linked to cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer's disease, and other metabolic and vascular diseases.
The French paradox is an apparently paradoxical epidemiological observation that French people have a relatively low incidence of coronary heart disease (CHD), while having a diet relatively rich in saturated fats, in apparent contradiction to the widely held belief that the high consumption of such fats is a risk factor for CHD. The paradox is that if the thesis linking saturated fats to CHD is valid, the French ought to have a higher rate of CHD than comparable countries where the per capita consumption of such fats is lower.
Low-carbohydrate diets restrict carbohydrate consumption relative to the average diet. Foods high in carbohydrates are limited, and replaced with foods containing a higher percentage of fat and protein, as well as low carbohydrate foods.
A healthy diet is a diet that maintains or improves overall health. A healthy diet provides the body with essential nutrition: fluid, macronutrients such as protein, micronutrients such as vitamins, and adequate fibre and food energy.
Nutritional genomics, also known as nutrigenomics, is a science studying the relationship between human genome, human nutrition and health. People in the field work toward developing an understanding of how the whole body responds to a food via systems biology, as well as single gene/single food compound relationships. Nutritional genomics or Nutrigenomics is the relation between food and inherited genes, it was first expressed in 2001.
Isomaltulose is a disaccharide carbohydrate composed of glucose and fructose. It is naturally present in honey and sugarcane extracts and is also produced industrially from table sugar (sucrose) and used as a sugar alternative.
A diabetic diet is a diet that is used by people with diabetes mellitus or high blood sugar to minimize symptoms and dangerous complications of long-term elevations in blood sugar.
The Western pattern diet is a modern dietary pattern that is generally characterized by high intakes of pre-packaged foods, refined grains, red meat, processed meat, high-sugar drinks, candy and sweets, fried foods, industrially produced animal products, butter and other high-fat dairy products, eggs, potatoes, corn, and low intakes of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, pasture-raised animal products, fish, nuts, and seeds.
John Yudkin FRSC was a British physiologist and nutritionist, and the founding Professor of the Department of Nutrition at Queen Elizabeth College, London.
Weight management refers to behaviors, techniques, and physiological processes that contribute to a person's ability to attain and maintain a healthy weight. Most weight management techniques encompass long-term lifestyle strategies that promote healthy eating and daily physical activity. Moreover, weight management involves developing meaningful ways to track weight over time and to identify the ideal body weights for different individuals.
The Seven Countries Study is an epidemiological longitudinal study directed by Ancel Keys at what is today the University of Minnesota Laboratory of Physiological Hygiene & Exercise Science (LPHES). Begun in 1956 with a yearly grant of US$200,000 from the U.S. Public Health Service, the study was first published in 1978 and then followed up on its subjects every five years thereafter.
Robert H. Lustig is an American pediatric endocrinologist. He is professor emeritus of pediatrics in the division of endocrinology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), where he specialized in neuroendocrinology and childhood obesity. He is also director of UCSF's WATCH program, and president and co-founder of the non-profit Institute for Responsible Nutrition.
Added sugars or free sugars are sugar carbohydrates added to food and beverages at some point before their consumption. These include added carbohydrates, and more broadly, sugars naturally present in honey, syrup, fruit juices and fruit juice concentrates. They can take multiple chemical forms, including sucrose, glucose (dextrose), and fructose.
Sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) are any beverage with added sugar. They have been described as "liquid candy". Consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages have been linked to weight gain and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease mortality. According to the CDC, consumption of sweetened beverages is also associated with unhealthy behaviors like smoking, not getting enough sleep and exercise, and eating fast food often and not enough fruits regularly.
Frank B. Hu is a Chinese American nutrition and diabetes researcher. He is Chair of the Department of Nutrition and the Fredrick J. Stare Professor of Nutrition and Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Professor of Medicine at the Harvard Medical School.
1 2 Cannon, Geoffrey (1992). Experts Agree: an Analysis of One Hundred Authoritative Scientific Reports on Food, Nutrition and Public Health Published Throughout the World in Thirty Years, Between 1961 and 1991. Consumers' Association, London
↑ Committee on Medical Aspects of Food Policy (1984), Panel on Diet in Relation to Cardiovascular Disease. Diet and Cardiovascular Disease. London: Department of Health and Social Security. Report on Health and Social Subjects 28
↑ Committee on Medical Aspects of Food Policy (1989), Panel on Dietary Sugars. Dietary Sugars and Human Disease. London: Department of Health. Report on Health and Social Subjects 37
↑ Diet, Nutrition and the Prevention of Chronic Diseases (1990). Report of a WHO Study Group. WHO Technical Report Series 797. World Health Organization, Geneva
↑ Committee on Medical Aspects of Food Policy (1994), Report of Cardiovascular Review Group. Nutritional Aspects of Cardiovascular Disease. London: Department of Health. Report on Health and Social Subjects 46
↑ Roehr, Bob (13 March 2018). “Gerald “Jerry” M Reaven: the 'father of insulin resistance'”. British Medical Journal 2018; 360:k1174
↑ Lustig, Robert H. (July 2009). Sugar: The Bitter Truth on YouTube. University of California Television
↑ Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (2015). Carbohydrates and Health. The Stationery Office, London
↑ World Health Organization (2015). Guideline: Sugars Intake for Adults and Children, WHO, Geneva
↑ Baker, Philip; Backholer, Kathryn; Huse, Oliver; Webster, Jacqui; Allemandi, Lorena; Engesveen, Kaia; and Nishida, Chizuru; "Government actions on packaged foods and drinks high in fats, sugars and salt" in Development Initiatives 2018, 2018 Global Nutrition Review, Bristol, UK, Development Initiatives. "The number of '59 countries' was collated by WHO from WHO Country Capacity Survey 2017, WHO Global Nutrition Policy Review 2016–2017, WHO GINA, World Cancer Research Fund International NOURISHING database'."
↑ HM Government (2016). Childhood Obesity: A Plan for Action
↑ Gore-Langton, Louis (9 November 2016). Sugar Nutrition UK: Born 1964, Died 2016. Food Navigator. William Reed Business Media, Crawley, UK
↑ Chan, Margaret, Director-General of the World Health Organization (10 June 2013). Opening address at the 8th Global Conference on Health Promotion, Helsinki, Finland
↑ ”No country is on track to achieve the adult obesity target, for neither men nor women”. Development Initiatives (2018), 2018 Global Nutrition Report. Bristol, UK, Development Initiatives
↑ Statista (2019) Sugar consumption worldwide in 2017/2018, by leading country in million metric tons
↑ The literature on under-reporting is voluminous. For a recent UK example, see Bailey, Rowena (15 February 2018). “Evaluating Calorie Intake”. Data Science Campus. Office of National Statistics website.
↑ Richardson, Ben and Winkler, Jack (2019) Sugar reduction in post-Brexit UK: A supply-side agenda FRC Food Brexit Briefing, Food Research Collaboration, Centre for Food Policy, City University, London.
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