[HN Gopher] Britain's postwar sugar craze confirms harms of swee...
___________________________________________________________________
Britain's postwar sugar craze confirms harms of sweet diets in
early life
Author : rbanffy
Score : 169 points
Date : 2024-11-02 16:56 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.science.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org)
| waihtis wrote:
| Yeah, well modern diets also have a wildly imbalanced omega 3-6
| ratio, which causes chronic inflammation which in turn is a
| central driver of diabetes. Funny how they just disregard it and
| try to pinpoint everything to a single variable.
| christophilus wrote:
| You're not wrong. Sugar isn't the only thing that changed after
| rations were lifted. Caloric intake in general went way up.
| Environmental changes came about. Processed foods became
| mainstream. I just don't know how you can pinpoint one thing
| and choose it as the chief villain.
| waihtis wrote:
| Indeed. Its the same idiocy as was/is with cholesterole
| eastbound wrote:
| Honestly, when I see the young generation in US, it seems
| it's kind of a given than young males must bulk up, under
| penalty of not being instagrammable enough to find a
| girlfriend. That sentence may sound terribly superficial...
|
| but it's a reality for a lot of young men.
|
| Long story short, bulking up is at odds with ecology, and
| we ask youngsters to do both.
| ipaddr wrote:
| The kids these days are beanpoles and lack muscle mass.
| Far cry from the 80s.
| kergonath wrote:
| > Long story short, bulking up is at odds with ecology,
| and we ask youngsters to do both.
|
| How so? I would think that better nutrition and more
| physical activity is not at odds with being
| environmentally conscious, quite the contrary.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I suggest you read the study in detail. I originally had a
| similar thought as you, but then seeing how the researchers
| were able to tease out specific effects based on minor
| differences in birth timing relative to the end of sugar
| rationing was strong evidence.
| willy_k wrote:
| I don't see how those are mutually exclusive, they said
| sugar isn't the only thing, not that it doesn't have a
| significant effect.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Because look at their argument:
|
| > Environmental changes came about. Processed foods
| became mainstream.
|
| Those are definitely true, but those happened over time.
| The lifting of the sugar restrictions happened
| immediately at one date, and what is interesting is that
| you see such vastly, statistically significant
| differences in later diabetes and hypertension rates in
| babies that were born so close together (within a couple
| years), the main difference being their amount of sugar
| intake in very early childhood.
|
| It's not like they just looked at "pre-war" vs. "post-
| war" babies.
| willy_k wrote:
| Yes, but sugar having a substantial effect as observed
| does not rule out fat type also having some effect,
| perhaps as a modulator or synergistic process, such as
| sugar being the main driver but the body being less
| capable of coping with sugar when most of what it gets is
| dead food high in linoliec acid.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > sugar having a substantial effect as observed does not
| rule out fat type also having some effect
|
| Nobody is arguing that it isn't or couldn't. The study
| does a pretty good job, IMO, of pinpointing sugar intake
| as an infant as having substantial, significant impact on
| diabetes and hypertension rates in adulthood. It is not
| saying that it is the only possible causal factor.
| meiraleal wrote:
| Sugar raising blood sugar seems like a quite obvious effect but
| some people argue against it.
|
| Edit: it doesn't need much to be smarter than you, waihtis
| 462436347 wrote:
| Exercise temporarily raises your heart rate and systolic
| blood pressure, yet avid exercisers have lower RHRs and SBPs;
| how do you know it isn't the same with carbohydrates,
| provided fat (especially saturated) is restricted?
| omikun wrote:
| Ask an endocrinologist. Robert Lustig has written
| extensively on the subject. This stuff has already been
| figured out. Here's one of his famous talks on sugar: https
| ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmC4Rm5cpOI&pp=ygUNcm9iZXJ0I...
| EasyMark wrote:
| That is irrefutable. Eat 4 eggs fried in butter and then
| measure blood sugar an hour later vs eating the same amount
| of sugar by weight on separate days, on an empty (12 hour
| fast).
| midtake wrote:
| Good luck convincing anyone of that without being called a
| crackpot, a disinformation bot, or worse. At this point in my
| life, I keep such knowledge to myself and leave everyone else
| to the peril of their own incomplete understanding.
| oliwarner wrote:
| Rigorous scientific study is more effective than luck.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Rigorous scientific study in the nutrition field is
| extremely hard to do.
|
| Most studies rely on self-reported data, and people aren't
| very reliable in confessing what they ate and in what
| quantity. We are also a long-lived species and many effects
| take decades to manifest. Differences in environment (e.g.
| water impurities), genetics and gut microbiome confound the
| issue further.
| kergonath wrote:
| To avoid any doubt: there is no scientific basis for
| "imbalanced omega 3-6 ratio, which causes chronic inflammation
| which in turn is a central driver of diabetes". There is no
| indication that omega-6 in human diet cause inflammation (we
| don't eat that much of them, and they are readily metabolised).
| And as a matter of fact, diabetes is more strongly correlated
| with sugar than any kind of fat.
|
| Actually, the only people I have seen claiming this are
| conspiracy theorists who jumped on a new boogeyman.
| EasyMark wrote:
| It's highly likely not one thing. We've moved to trash foods,
| more sugar, worse fats, etc, plus we're more inactive than ever
| and being constantly bombarded by stress 24/7 from news and the
| internet and consumerist mentality.
| sss111 wrote:
| India saw a similar thing with the sugar craze once the economy
| opened up in the 1990s-- although the diabetes rate has only gone
| up 2% in three decades.
| FirmwareBurner wrote:
| Similar in Eastern Europe after the fall of USSR when western
| snacks came on the market and we fell pray to advertising after
| decades of isolation: _" Those sugary western snacks can't be
| bad for you since they come from the developed west and rich
| westerners eat them"_. Oh boy, if we only knew back then what
| we know today. Probably why a lot of millennials today don't
| look very healthy.
| llm_trw wrote:
| I imagine it has more to do with the smoking and drinking
| rates than sugar. I very clearly remember an aunt of mine
| losing her mind in the 90s about me drinking coke, while
| smoking when she was pregnant.
| Tade0 wrote:
| I'm from the region and to me it was always about "ooh, this
| is real chocolate, not _Compound chocolate_ ".
|
| Even as recently as a decade ago local producers would be
| using vegetable oils and less sugar so as to keep costs down.
| I remember being surprised how much sugar there was in plain
| cookies in Italy. British sweets I cannot touch to this day
| because they're commonly packed with salt as well as sugar.
| Same goes for American products - Reese's cupcakes are my
| holiday season guilty pleasure which inevitably gets me sick
| every time. They're _violently_ flavourful.
|
| On the flip side when I visited Ukraine in 2006 I noted that
| the local pralines had barely any sugar.
|
| The Swiss and Germans seem to understand sweets on a deeper
| level than the rest. Notable exception is Lindt, which roasts
| the cocoa beans to seven hells for consistency, achieving a
| consistently sour-bitter aftertaste in its products.
| jajko wrote:
| > India ranks second after China in the global diabetes
| epidemic with 77 million people with diabetes (google)
|
| Maybe it went up by 2% only, but it depends what were the
| actual numbers to start with. I've spent 6 months backpacking
| all over that country and although food is top notch, the
| sweets are ridiculously bad, often just distilled sugar with
| some (rather good) flavoring like safron.
|
| I guess when you scorch all your taste buds since early age
| with all those chillies (its quite common to just eat raw
| chillies as a side dish to already crazy spicy foods on levels
| that most westerners going to their local indian restaurants
| will never experience), then to get _any_ sensation from sweets
| they have to go over board.
| roncesvalles wrote:
| The culture around sweets in India is different than from the
| West. You're supposed to eat one little square piece of a
| sweet or a couple of gulab jamun balls and that's it. Indians
| don't sit with a big plate of Indian sweets like it's the
| "dessert" course of their meal.
|
| That's why Western sweets are less sweet. You don't just eat
| a single one-inch cube of cheesecake, you eat a whole plate-
| sized portion of it which is like ten such cubes. Naturally
| it can't be as sweet as an Indian sweet.
|
| Even growing up my parents said you're supposed to eat 1
| Skittle and put the packet away (no joke). The fact that
| people in the West snack on a whole packet of Skittles was a
| culture shock.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Just looking around in India, I don't believe the 2% figure.
| Maybe it's not officially diagnosed, or the source for the
| figures is not accurate.
|
| In the 1990s, an overweight (not even obese) person was a rare
| sight. People were actually be surprised to see a non skinny
| person.
|
| Nowadays, overweight and even obese people are everywhere you
| look. And type 2 diabetes is strongly correlated with being
| overweight.
| b800h wrote:
| This isn't what the paper actually says, of course. Science by
| press release again.
| Thorrez wrote:
| Here's a quote from the abstract of the paper:
|
| > Using an event study design with UK Biobank data comparing
| adults conceived just before or after rationing ended, we found
| that early-life rationing reduced diabetes and hypertension
| risk by about 35% and 20%, respectively, and delayed disease
| onset by 4 and 2 years. Protection was evident with in-utero
| exposure and increased with postnatal sugar restriction,
| especially after six months when solid foods likely began.
|
| Which part of the title isn't supported by the paper?
| fidotron wrote:
| These things still don't establish actual causation.
|
| For example, someone susceptible to later developing diabetes may
| consume unusually high quantities of sugar when available as a
| means to deal with some other insufficiency. (Guess where that
| idea comes from). The problem is not the sugar per se, but the
| fact that different people respond to the same consumed items
| completely differently, something that is very inconvenient for
| those that want to treat everyone the same way.
| dataflow wrote:
| > The problem is not the sugar per se, but the fact that
| different people respond to the same consumed items completely
| differently, something that is very inconvenient for those that
| want to treat everyone the same way.
|
| Haven't diabetes rates been steadily rising until today though?
| How does one explain that away as "people respond differently
| to sugar"?
| fidotron wrote:
| I know this from the simple fact that I respond completely
| differently to sugar than almost everyone else I know, except
| gout sufferers.
|
| The question is why people are guzzling so much sugar in the
| first place. The answer is they are malnourished. Post war
| britain was a particularly bad case they deliberately paper
| over, but my parents grew up with rationing and never snapped
| out of it, like many others, which led to many of my
| generation also being subjected to that diet. It simply fills
| you up but provides people with my metabolism with no energy
| at all.
| dataflow wrote:
| I'm not disputing that people respond differently to sugar.
| I'm asking how that explains the diabetes epidemic becoming
| more and more widespread as time goes on.
| fidotron wrote:
| Because you have a blind spot over people responding
| differently, as indicated by your original question.
|
| If you look at the history of celiac disease the cause
| wasn't recognized until a hospital of people were reduced
| to eating sawdust/dried up tulips, only to find a group
| of patients actually improved when this happened since
| they were no longer being actively poisoned. You are not
| alone in your blind spot, but it is amazing the
| enthusiasm with which it is promoted by those that should
| have worked this out years ago.
| dataflow wrote:
| Sorry for being dense (or having a "blind spot" I guess),
| but I still don't comprehend how this answers my
| question.
| fidotron wrote:
| To go back to what I said which you were responding to
|
| > the fact that different people respond to the same
| consumed items completely differently
|
| You are making this more specific than it is to be just
| about sugar and diabetes.
|
| My, non radical, assertion is that different metabolisms
| lead people to process the same things in fundamentally
| different ways. Some of these clearly lead to diabetes
| (and gout etc).
|
| The underlying problem is consuming x or y in isolation
| could be ok for everyone but in some people x and y are
| dangerous. Given the mix of what we consume this rapidly
| becomes a combinatorial headache (especially if factoring
| in gut bacteria) so there is some sympathy for
| researchers in this area, but the tendency to confuse
| cause and effect is way too common.
| dataflow wrote:
| So this is what I'm hung up on:
|
| > The problem is not the sugar per se, but the fact that
| different people respond to the same consumed items
| completely
|
| You stated _as a fact_ that sugar itself is _not_ the
| problem, and you point to other causes (earlier,
| differing metabolic responses among people; now, a
| different substance being a confounding factor) as the
| explanation. But these just seem to be hand-waving
| conjectures about how something else _could_ be the
| problem, not anything factually indicating that sugar
| itself isn 't.
|
| Furthermore, the fact that some people respond
| differently to sugar _would not itself imply that sugar
| itself is not the problem_ , which is what's been
| throwing me off about your discussions. There are plenty
| of illnesses that some people are resistant or even
| immune to. There are also plenty of cases where some
| people initially tolerate a substance but then eventually
| -- even after many years -- suddenly start showing severe
| reactions to it, simply as a result of excess
| consumption. The fact that people don't have the same
| uniform responses to the same substances doesn't
| necessarily mean the substances aren't the problem.
|
| This is why I'm saying I can't follow your logic. Your
| conclusion that sugar itself isn't the problem _might_
| still be correct; I don 't know. I'm just saying I don't
| see how your explanations imply that conclusion.
| waihtis wrote:
| Because people eat different types of diets and consume, for
| example, different ratios of omega fatty acids - which in
| turn can cause chronic inflammation and diabetes
| dataflow wrote:
| I'm not disputing that people respond differently to sugar.
| I'm asking how that explains the diabetes epidemic becoming
| more and more widespread as time goes on.
| waihtis wrote:
| I see. Diabetes is downstream from chronic inflammation,
| so something is causing us to be inflammated at scale and
| that is why diabetes is becoming more commonplace. So
| differing response to sugar is one factor of N possible
| affecting variables
| kergonath wrote:
| > The problem is not the sugar per se, but the fact that
| different people respond to the same consumed items completely
| differently, something that is very inconvenient for those that
| want to treat everyone the same way
|
| First, the fact that people react differently does not mean
| that it is not a public health issue. Some people can drink
| absurd amounts of alcohol and still be functional afterwards.
| It's still not a good idea to drink more than a small dose of
| alcohol regularly.
|
| Then, there are dangerous and lethal thresholds for all
| substances, even for seemingly-tolerant people. The fact that
| most symptoms take decades to develop does not help.
|
| Add the fact that we don't know why some people are more
| tolerant and we cannot predict it. Sugar _is_ a problem, at the
| individual level and even more so because of the burden on
| society because of public health issues. I am happy to give a
| gold star to sugar-tolerant people who remain fit and live a
| long life despite eating tons of the stuff. I am very happy for
| you. But you are not a proof that sugar is not bad.
| fidotron wrote:
| > Add the fact that we don't know why some people are more
| tolerant and we cannot predict it
|
| Now this is what should be being researched.
|
| The public health problem with that is you might come to a
| conclusion where it is harder to blame the patient. The
| "sugar is bad mmmkay" serves a convenient purpose when
| providing people with something to moralize about.
| kergonath wrote:
| > Now this is what should be being researched.
|
| Indeed. Not only that, but it as well. And believe me, it
| is being researched.
|
| > The public health problem with that is you might come to
| a conclusion where it is harder to blame the patient.
|
| How is that a problem? Public health is not about blaming
| anyone, it's about improving individuals' health and
| diminishing the burden of illnesses on society overall.
|
| > The "sugar is bad mmmkay" serves a convenient purpose
| when providing people with something to moralize about.
|
| A lot of things are bad. Sugar, like most things, is benign
| in small quantities but at this point its downsides are
| quite well documented. It is also quite addictive. There is
| nothing moral or immoral about this. I don't really blame
| people who consume too much of it, but at the society's
| level we should do something about it. And other things, we
| have more than one problem.
| omikun wrote:
| > These things still don't establish actual causation. Nope, it
| says there's a connection.
|
| >The problem is not the sugar per se, but the fact that
| different people respond to the same consumed items completely
| differently That's true, but most people respond to sugar the
| same way. When talking about a population, the people that
| don't respond to over consumption of sugar with diabetes is a
| rounding error.
| 462436347 wrote:
| US sugar consumption declined from 2000-2020 to 1970s levels,
| while its T2D prevalence only increased:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38094768
|
| And if sugar is so metabolically harmful, where are the RCTs
| showing this? All I've seen is that outside of a caloric surplus,
| it isn't especially metabolically harmful, and ironically, even
| outside of a surplus, saturated fat is much worse:
|
| https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/41/8/1732/36380/Sa...
|
| https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00394-015-1108-6
|
| Meanwhile tribes of hunter-gatherers in Africa get 15-80% of
| their daily calories from honey during certain seasons; why
| aren't they obese and diabetic?
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00472...
| nightski wrote:
| Readers here probably aren't hunter gatherers in Africa though.
| If you live sedentary lifestyle with an abundance of food you
| may need to take a different approach to nutrition. Sure it
| would be ideal if we were all hyper athletes, but the reality
| is that probably isn't going to happen and I am not sure it's
| even better holistically.
| schmidtleonard wrote:
| The reason to do RCTs and establish causality isn't to
| generate excuses for a sugar diet, it's to head off bullshit
| alternatives that don't fix the problem but advertise like
| they do.
| 462436347 wrote:
| What's your point? The article implied that sugar magically
| causes obesity and diabetes, all calories being equal, when
| the weight of the evidence supports neither assertion, and
| ironically implicates saturated fat as being worse, showing
| an ability to cause an increase in visceral fat and worsened
| insulin sensitivity (measured with oral glucose tolerance
| tests), even in weight-stable subjects.
|
| > different approach to nutrition
|
| The "different approach" HNers gravitate towards is eating
| bacon and butter (i.e., keto/low-carb) and denying all of the
| evidence linking these foods to CVD, probably because fat and
| sodium are so addictive, much more so than sugar:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42028432
| 123yawaworht456 wrote:
| >US sugar consumption declined from 2000-2020 to 1970s levels,
| while its T2D prevalence only increased
|
| obesity did not decline
|
| >And if sugar is so metabolically harmful, where are the RCTs
| showing this? All I've seen is that outside of a caloric
| surplus, it isn't especially metabolically harmful
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructose#Potential_health_effe...
|
| >Meanwhile tribes of hunter-gatherers in Africa get 15-80% of
| their daily calories from honey during certain seasons; why
| aren't they obese and diabetic?
|
| if you are are physically active and don't overeat, you can eat
| whatever the fuck you want and never get obese. if you are not
| obese, you will (most likely) never develop T2D
| erik_seaberg wrote:
| Just one cheeseburger is three miles of running. Not only is
| it very easy to shop and overeat, your body continually
| encourages it. The only way out is determination _not_ to eat
| whatever you want.
| EasyMark wrote:
| Resting metabolism uses a -lot- of calories. You can have
| that hamburger, just don't have two, no jogging necessary.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| > just don't have two
|
| I find this is the difficult part. I find it much easier
| to not eat hyper-palatable foods at all than to eat "just
| a little".
|
| Sure, I probably won't eat two hamburgers in a sitting,
| but eating one greatly reduces the calories I can eat
| during the other meals of the day if I don't want to
| slowly gain weight.
| meiraleal wrote:
| Having two buggers and jogging is much healthier than
| eating one and be sedentary
| thrw42A8N wrote:
| It's not so simple... I eat whatever I want and struggle to
| get my weight over 80 kg, which would be a healthy weight
| for my height.
| kulahan wrote:
| Nobody is implying it's so simple that you can "eat
| whatever you want" and be at a healthy weight. This is
| true if you're underweight as well. If you're trying to
| gain weight, you need to eat more than you want.
| kulahan wrote:
| I run 3 miles a few times a week and it's something near
| 500-600 calories. I'd say maybe 4 miles depending on the
| type of burger we're discussing
| Scoundreller wrote:
| McDonalds cheeseburger is 300cals in USA (and 290 in
| Canada):
|
| https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-
| us/product/cheeseburger.html
|
| https://www.mcdonalds.com/ca/en-
| ca/product/cheeseburger.html
| omikun wrote:
| Try eating mostly honey and roots and see how much you can over
| consume. The problem in US is the variety of food and how
| engineered they are to be hyper palatable. Snacks are designed
| to pump sugar into the blood stream, with just enough salt,
| fat, or carbonation (in drinks) to mask just how much sugar is
| in everything. That's the reason why warm flat soda tastes
| disgustingly sweet.
|
| It's not just sugar, but the amount of it, and how fast it is
| consumed, and how and when do we expend energy (walking after
| meals directly consume blood glucose b/c calve muscles don't
| have a glycogen store) impacts fat buildup and T2D. Check out
| books by Robert Lustig on the subject.
| 462436347 wrote:
| > The problem in US is the variety of food and how engineered
| they are to be hyper palatable
|
| The best study done to date on hyperpalatable foods found
| that fat and sodium were the most common drivers of
| hyperpalatability:
|
| https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/oby.22639
|
| > The HPF criteria identified 62% (4,795/7,757) of foods in
| the FNDDS that met criteria for at least one cluster. Most
| HPF items (70%; 3,351/4,795) met criteria for the FSOD
| cluster. Twenty-five percent of items (1,176/4,795) met
| criteria for the FS cluster, and 16% (747/4,795) met criteria
| for the CSOD cluster. The clusters were largely distinct from
| each other, and < 10% of all HPF items met criteria for more
| than one cluster.
|
| (CSOD, carbohydrates and sodium; FS, fat and simple sugars;
| FSOD, fat and sodium; HPF, hyper-palatable foods.)
|
| > Check out books by Robert Lustig on the subject
|
| Lustig is a crackpot who relies on animal studies and
| mechanistic speculation, because the highest-quality RCTs
| (like the ones I cited) don't support his theory.
| tgaj wrote:
| >The best study done to date on hyperpalatable foods found
| that fat and sodium were the most common drivers of
| hyperpalatability...
|
| No, that was not the conclusion from this study and it's
| absolutely not true. The only goal of this study was to
| "..develop a quantitative definition of HPF".
| throwawaycities wrote:
| > US sugar consumption declined from 2000-2020 to 1970s levels,
| while its T2D prevalence only increased
|
| Seems like you are cherry picking data and ignoring other data
| from the chart - sure the total sugars from 2000-2020 are down
| slightly while what's being labeled as "corn sweeteners" or
| HFCS is up 3x.
|
| Since you mention diabetes it's probably worth noting from
| 1970-1985 "corn sweeteners" more than 3x and before 1985 T2D
| was called adult onset diabetes considered an adult disease and
| 1983 was the first case of pediatric nonalcoholic fatty liver
| disease.
|
| > Meanwhile tribes of hunter-gatherers in Africa get 15-80% of
| their daily calories from honey during certain seasons;
|
| The chart shows honey is a nominal source of sugar for
| Americans. There are other facts about honey, like its low
| glycemic index compared to other forms so it doesn't raise
| blood sugar levels as dramatically as regular sugar and
| especially HFCS.
|
| The fact is the US government just lumps all forms of sugar
| together and labels it all genetically as sugar...ignores there
| are different forms of sugar, each processed by our bodies
| differently and having different metabolic impacts and harms.
|
| People will spend the next 100 if not 1000 years arguing if
| sugar is responsible for metabolic diseases like T2D and
| nonalcoholic fatty liver disease - yet it's settled now that
| T2D & NAFLD are both 100% preventable diseases and in some
| cases T2D can be reversed by minimizing sugars/carbs and
| increasing fats so your mitochondria is primarily using ketones
| rather than glucose.
| AI_beffr wrote:
| yup. seed oils also play a role
| manmal wrote:
| Do you mean oils that have turned rancid before they are
| consumed? I don't really get the hate seed oils are
| getting. In studies they seem to have shown no ill effects.
| They do certainly use oils in studies that are not rancid,
| while your average supermarket oil might be (?).
| fellowmartian wrote:
| The problem is linoleic acid and our overconsumption of
| it. It seems to cause way more oxidative stress during
| metabolism, to which the brain is more sensitive. Plus it
| also seems to adversely affect metabolism of other kinds
| of fats. And it plasticizes during cooking.
| iamacyborg wrote:
| What media do you consume to believe nonsense like this?
| 462436347 wrote:
| > Seems like you are cherry picking data and ignoring other
| data from the chart - sure the total sugars from 2000-2020
| are down slightly while what's being labeled as "corn
| sweeteners" or HFCS is up 3x
|
| HFCS consumption is still higher than it was in 1970, but it
| has _declined_ since 2000, and its decline has driven the
| overall decline in sugar consumption, yet obesity and
| diabetes incidence have only _increased_.
|
| > some cases T2D can be reversed by minimizing sugars/carbs
| and increasing fats so your mitochondria is primarily using
| ketones rather than glucose.
|
| "Reversed" means you can eat carbohydrates normally again. If
| anything, high-fat, low-carb diets seem to worsen actual
| insulin sensitivity, which carbohydrate restriction just
| masks (even then, not always, as many on keto find when they
| check their BG):
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5291812/
|
| Severely restricting carbohydrate enough to get an
| artificially low HbA1c or fasting BG and claiming you
| "reversed" diabetes is like claiming you "reversed" your
| lactose intolerance by never drinking milk. But actual
| weight-loss (however you achieve it) _does_ improve real
| insulin sensitivity, but low-carb isn 't magic when it comes
| to that either.
| throwawaycities wrote:
| >HFCS consumption is still higher than it was in 1970, but
| it has declined since 2000, and its decline has driven the
| overall decline in sugar consumption, yet obesity and
| diabetes incidence have only increased.
|
| Because metabolic diseases are progressive chronic
| conditions. That's why T2D & fatty liver were historically
| adult diseases, it's not because throughout history people
| gradually increased sugar consumption as they got older and
| got the diseases, rather the metabolic damage progressed.
| In short when you are over consuming sugar for 20 years and
| see obesity, T2D and fatty liver disease increase you don't
| necessarily expect to see it decrease even if sugar use
| slightly decreases...if you want to decrease or eliminate
| T2D/fatty liver disease then eliminate the sugar.
|
| >"Reversed" means you can eat carbohydrates normally again.
|
| That's not what "reversing diabetes" means, it means
| getting off insulin because you manage your BG through diet
| and lifestyle.
|
| >Severely restricting carbohydrate enough to get an
| artificially low HbA1c or fasting BG and claiming you
| "reversed" diabetes is like claiming you "reversed" your
| lactose intolerance by never drinking milk.
|
| It's just not a good metaphor because your definition of
| "reverse" is returning to eating carbs normally was wrong.
| Lactose intolerance is an acute reaction related to
| inability to produce an enzyme to breakdown and digest
| lactose - it's managed not treated with medication, though
| some may take the enzyme lactase. Further, taking lactase
| because you're lactose intolerant and want to eat some ice
| cream tonight is in no way comparable to having T2D and the
| need to take insulin.
| PittleyDunkin wrote:
| > The fact is the US government just lumps all forms of sugar
| together and labels it all genetically as sugar...ignores
| there are different forms of sugar, each processed by our
| bodies differently and having different metabolic impacts and
| harms.
|
| At the same time, these differences can be overstated. E.g.
| look at how "added sugar" is distinct from other
| carbohydrates but no "total sugar" metric on nutritional
| boxes on food products.
| Etheryte wrote:
| Just for context, total sugar is the only thing shown on
| European food labels. Makes it somewhat annoying the other
| way around, it's hard to figure out if it's just the sugars
| the ingredients contained or if it's stuffed with extra. I
| prefer this worry over the other option though. In a
| perfect world we would have both.
| truculent wrote:
| > Early-life sugar could drive later-life disease in various
| ways, Gracner says. Exposure in the womb might affect fetal
| development in a way that predisposes someone to metabolic
| diseases. Infants eating a sugary diet might also develop a
| taste for sweet foods, causing them to eat more sugar as adults
| --an outcome for which her team has some preliminary evidence.
|
| If there's a significant lag between early-life exposure and
| disease outcomes, then it seems reasonable that the effects of
| the 2000-2020 drop won't be seen for some time.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > And if sugar is so metabolically harmful, where are the RCTs
| showing this?
|
| Look at the details of this study. The reason there are no RCTs
| is, at least for what this study looked at regarding very early
| childhood, they are impossible because they would be highly
| unethical. You can't take two groups of babies and randomly
| assign them to control group vs high-sugar group and test for
| the outcomes.
|
| What this study is arguing is that the lifting of sugar
| rationing acted as a "best possible" form of a natural RCT as
| babies born relative to that lifting date had vastly different
| levels of sugar consumption in the first 1000 days. Note you
| see these types of "natural cohort" studies in a bunch of
| areas. E.g. it's not ethical to say group a is the "high levels
| of lead" group and group b is the control, but by looking at
| neighboring states that restricted leaded gasoline at different
| times you can try to tease out cause and effect.
|
| I see tons of comments here arguing "how can they say it's just
| sugar!" I had a similar initial reaction, but I see very few
| comments that are arguing about the specifics of the study
| itself, and I'd argue the study is quite interesting and, at
| least from my layman's perspective, well done.
| callmeal wrote:
| >15-80% of their daily calories from honey during certain
| seasons; why aren't they obese and diabetic?
|
| Maybe because it's "during certain seasons" and not the whole
| year around?
| ipython wrote:
| If sugar is not part of the problem, why did the sugar
| companies pay to suppress studies and promote fat as harmful?
| No company is going to spend money to suppress results that
| would show their products in a positive light...
|
| https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074...
| PittleyDunkin wrote:
| > US sugar consumption declined from 2000-2020 to 1970s levels
|
| I think this is added sugar only. It wouldn't surprise me if
| actual sugar consumption reduction were tempered compared to
| the linked graph. Hell, actual sugar consumption may have even
| increased. It's certainly far easier to get (fairly high-sugar)
| juice now than when I was a child.
| mmsc wrote:
| Are there any studies about the harm of a craze in non-sweet
| diets? While I would generally agree with this "confirmation"
| based on my understanding of diabetes, I wonder if it's actually
| _sugar_ that is the problem here.
|
| For example, what about the massive amount of caffeine in soda,
| chocolate, and other "sweet diet" food? Or, what about just
| general over-consumption of food in postwar regardless of what it
| is (which is much more a societal issue than anything else)
| omikun wrote:
| plenty of studies on caffeine. Chocolate usually comes with
| loads of sugar unless you mean sugar alternatives? That
| wouldn't apply to just post war UK though. Also, it's hard to
| over consume non-sugar so that's not a lot of overlap. Remember
| carbs break down to sugar as well.
| ajdude wrote:
| Discussion (39 points | 1 day ago | 64 comments)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42019398
| patrickhogan1 wrote:
| Brain needs glucose.
| smilliken wrote:
| The brain also runs well on ketones which are more energy dense
| and remove the oxygen bottleneck. It's easier to deliver a
| consistent level of ketones than glucose, avoiding spikes and
| crashes.
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| Roald Dahl saw that coming:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_and_the_Chocolate_Fact...
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