Consuming high fructose corn syrup seems to be as bad for your health as ingesting glucose as fructose, according to a new study from researchers in the University of California, Davis. The study reports health risks related to the type of sugar consumed, but also reveals novel risks when sugars have been combined, which has important consequences for dietary advice.
When it comes to health risks, fructose is clearly the bad guy. This is because the vast majority of fructose swallowed ends up in the liver.
But lead investigator Kimber Stanhope, a researcher with the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, says the new data shows that we shouldn’t let glucose off the hook.
“It turns out that the combination of fructose and glucose found in high fructose corn syrup appears to be worse than fructose alone for some heart disease risk factors,” said Stanhope. “When we planned this study, we didn’t expect to find this.”
Research has revealed that fructose compared with sugar raises risk factors for heart disease and diabetes. This resulted in a premise that the glucose from the high fructose corn syrup is benign. Participants consumed drinks containing sugar, sugar, higher fructose corn syrup, or an aspartame control, and researchers examined their blood for known risk factors for cardiovascular disease and diabetes.
The researchers expected risk factors would be highest for fructose and lowest for sugar, with high fructose corn syrup someplace in between. This is exactly what they saw for a number of the risk variables. However, for many others, for example, risk factors many scientists think are the most predictive for cardiovascular disease, the increases were best for high fructose corn syrup due to an interaction of glucose and fructose.
The results of the current study indicate that dietary guidelines and consumer choices should not be based on the premise that all adverse effects from dietary sugars are due to fructose content.
“Our study shows that nutrition is more than looking at individual food components,” said first author Bettina Hieronimus with the Department of Child Nutrition at the Max-Rubner Institut in Karlsruhe, Germany. “To understand the way our food affects our bodies, we need to study diets as a whole.”
“Our study shows that nourishment is more than looking at individual Food parts,” said first author Bettina Hieronimus together with the Department of Child Nutrition in the Max-Rubner Institut in Karlsruhe, Germany. “To know the way our food affects our bodies, we need to study diets as a whole.”
Source: https://www.ucdavis.edu/