The Sugar Lobby Threatens Organizations, Buries Science on Health Effects !

We know that consuming too much sugar can lead to heart disease, obesity, diabetes and a raft of other maladies. Yet sugar is the most popular food additive in the United States, added with abandon to nearly every processed food we eat. So why don’t American food policies governing added sugar reflect that?

Enter Big Sugar. According to a new report from the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, industry groups representing companies that sell sweeteners, like the Sugar Association and the Corn Refiners Association (for makers of high fructose corn syrup) have poured millions of dollars into countering science that indicates negative health consequences of eating their products.

For example, when a University of Southern California study from 2013 found that the actual high fructose corn syrup content in sodas “varied significantly” from the sugar content disclosed on soda labels, the Corn Refiners Association considered paying for its own counter research. A consultant suggested that the counter research should only be published if the results aligned with their goal of disputing the USC study:

In the U.K., a draft report released Friday by the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition urged people to cut their sugar intake by half the recommended limit, from 10 percent to 5 percent, to avoid obesity and type 2 diabetes.

Added sugar was responsible for roughly 13 percent of the average American's diet between 2005 and 2010, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Perhaps in a few decades Americans will look back on the nation’s casual overconsumption of sugar much the same way we look back on the glory days of the cigarette, when everyone smoked without a care in the world, and Big Tobacco worked in the background.

Full article here.

Eddie