Sugar its like a poison

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Sugar its like a poison

Postby mikesbytes » Sat Sep 05, 2015 8:22 pm

Have a watch of the program on sugar on SBS on Demand. Outlines the big issues that society is having due to excess sugar consumption

http://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video/50 ... he-new-fat
If the R-1 rule is broken, what happens to N+1?

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Duck! » Sat Sep 05, 2015 8:27 pm

The key word there is "excess".
I had a thought, but it got run over as it crossed my mind.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby gsxrboy » Sat Sep 05, 2015 8:27 pm

Sugar is delicious

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby HappyHumber » Sat Sep 05, 2015 9:02 pm

Too much life eventually kills ya too.
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sat Sep 05, 2015 10:07 pm

Thanks for posting it Mike. I saw it but didn't post it earlier as, although compelling, I thought at the time it was too single faceted. Infotainment mainly. Plenty of researchers claiming that their thing is the one. You could easily do the same about fat. The rate of fat intake has matched the rate of obesity increase as well. Increases in processed foods, animal products and lack of exercise are some others. There is even a video in the Diet Thread claiming a link to most modern health problems from lack of sunshine/vit-D. Probably a combination of all of them. It's a first world problem.

One take away message should be that sugar and fruit are different. There are sugars in fruit, but sugar is a processed food and fruit generally isn't. Sugar has high energy density and fruit is low.
http://nutritionfacts.org/video/if-fruc ... out-fruit/

http://nutritionfacts.org/video/how-muc ... -too-much/

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Mulger bill » Sun Sep 06, 2015 12:55 pm

HappyHumber wrote:Too much life eventually kills ya too.
This.
...whatever the road rules, self-preservation is the absolute priority for a cyclist when mixing it with motorised traffic.
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby mikesbytes » Sun Sep 06, 2015 1:28 pm

The thing with sugar is that manufactured foods are pumped full of it. Its cheap and its tasty.

A while back I cut back on foods based on their sugar content and there was quite a noticeable improvement in my health
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby HappyHumber » Sun Sep 06, 2015 2:50 pm

Yeah, I do agree it's the new tobacco. Awareness is good.... moderation is good.

But I must admit to being a bit jaded about all the various schools of thought WRT to diet. "I did this, it worked for me!" etc etc as if one perspective always fits all. The amount of BS swirling around has numbed me; for all of the corn kernels of truth that pop up in it from time to time.
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby matagi » Sun Sep 06, 2015 2:53 pm

I eat almost no processed food so my sugar intake is limited to the small amount I might add during the cooking process and what occurs naturally in whatever I am cooking. However, a few months ago, I cut back drastically on the amount of bread, pasta and rice I was eating and that produced a noticeable change in weight.

I think an excess of sugar or simple carbs is equally bad for you but I think it is only in the context of a modern lifestyle - where we are generally less active than our forebears.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 3:03 pm

Mulger bill wrote:
HappyHumber wrote:Too much life eventually kills ya too.
This.
I suppose the next question would be, how many "good" years do you want? I've heard that a good diet can add 8 years* to the average lifespan. If this is true then you may be adding 5 more good years before you have significant problems that makes your life less than optimal.
However, if the answer is "As long as my current diet lets me." then don't let me stand in your way.

* Please don't press on the specifics of this lifespan difference, because I don't know if I could find the data easily now. But we are talking about a lot more than 1 or 2 years for a change to the currently known optimal diet for humans (WFPB of fat=10:prot=10:carb=80).
Last edited by Nobody on Sun Sep 06, 2015 6:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 3:46 pm

mikesbytes wrote:The thing with sugar is that manufactured foods are pumped full of it. Its cheap and its tasty.

A while back I cut back on foods based on their sugar content and there was quite a noticeable improvement in my health
If you want to take it a step further, try reducing your fat intake from the usual 30 to 40% of energy intake, down to 10%. Easier said than done, but optimal for health. My typical diet is about 12% fat which is just 33g of fat a day.

The manufactured foods I eat usually only have one ingredient.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 4:35 pm

HappyHumber wrote:Yeah, I do agree it's the new tobacco. Awareness is good.... moderation is good.
Diet in general is the new tobacco as it now kills more Americans than tobacco. "Moderation in all things" originally was made popular by the tobacco industry. Esselstyn is trying to change that message to moderation kills. Some would argue moderation is fine if you want the "normal" chronic illnesses in moderation too. I find it's easier to cut out damaging things completely if possible, rather than try to just moderate them.
HappyHumber wrote:But I must admit to being a bit jaded about all the various schools of thought WRT to diet. "I did this, it worked for me!" etc etc as if one perspective always fits all. The amount of BS swirling around has numbed me; for all of the corn kernels of truth that pop up in it from time to time.
Misinformation and doubt campaigns are tools of both the tobacco and food industries. They have been shown to use the same people for this purpose. On top of this, you have many people (not surprisingly) placing money above other people's health in writing books which don't agree with the current body of science in relation to diet, health and longevity. Atkins/low-carb and paleo come to mind. The misinformation has become ubiquitous to the degree that even telling the truth has become controversial these days. It doesn't appear to matter to most if you can back it up with science.

The easiest way to hide a tree is in a forest. With education and effort, it's still possible to find the correct tree though.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 5:10 pm

matagi wrote:However, a few months ago, I cut back drastically on the amount of bread, pasta and rice I was eating and that produced a noticeable change in weight.
Bread is a given as it's a high energy density processed four and that's before you put other stuff on it.
Pasta is not so bad, especially if wholemeal. Wholemeal pasta only has 124 Cals/100g. This may be a guilty_by_association problem like potatoes.
Rice is even lower in energy density than wholemeal pasta. It seems to be guilty by association too. Many thin Asians eat a lot of rice daily. People on Kempner's Rice Diet in the '40s lost a lot of weight and reversed chronic illnesses on mainly white rice and fruit. That was before modern medication, so most have never heard of Kempner. If the meds were never invented, he would probably be world famous as the originator of a diet plan that would have saved millions from their first world problems.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby mikesbytes » Sun Sep 06, 2015 7:02 pm

Nobody wrote:The manufactured foods I eat usually only have one ingredient.
Which one(s) is that?
If the R-1 rule is broken, what happens to N+1?

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 8:18 pm

mikesbytes wrote:
Nobody wrote:The manufactured foods I eat usually only have one ingredient.
Which one(s) is that?
Eg:
Leggo's no added salt tomato paste with just concentrated tomatoes.
San Remo wholmeal spirals with just wholemeal durum wheat semolina.
Coles linseed meal with just linseed.
Aldi's Damora Thin Rice Cakes with just brown rice.

Plenty of products out there with one to a few ingredients. I usually avoid all sugars, oils and salt. Oils are often hard to avoid as it goes in just about everything in small amounts. Even most dried fruit has oil added. Many alternative milks like soy & rice usually have it too.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby matagi » Sun Sep 06, 2015 8:33 pm

The Sugar Conspiracy is about to start on SBS.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Sun Sep 06, 2015 11:57 pm

Thanks. No real surprises in that program for me.

I agree with their primary message of sugars are bad, but there is more to the story than what Lustig and Taubes have shown. They are pro animal products and fat. They are considered low-carbers by many plant based eaters and so are still considered part of the dietary education problem.
http://plantpositive.com/1-the-journali ... -taubes-1/

But what really matters is what the body of scientific evidence says. And it says the following are bad for your health:

Sugars - Causes obesity and liver disease as per the programs and previous links I posted.

All animal products including dairy, fish and eggs - Saturated fat causing heart disease and obesity from insulin spikes caused by even lean meat.

Oils & other processed fats - Cause heart disease. Highest energy density with nearly no nutritional value, so contributes to obesity.

Processed flours like bread - Energy dense and spike insulin, so contribute to obesity.

Salt - As an appetite modifier similar to sugar, so is considered a contributor to obesity. Raises blood pressure. But there are recent studies contradicting each other as to the health detriment of the varied levels of salt intake. More in recent posts of the Diet Thread.

If you want to see the studies for yourself, Nutrition Facts is a good place to start. All the videos have linked cited studies.
http://nutritionfacts.org/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Last edited by Nobody on Mon Sep 07, 2015 8:59 am, edited 3 times in total.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby matagi » Mon Sep 07, 2015 7:25 am

Apparently 10 teaspoons of added sugar per day is "safe and healthy" according to Prof Jennie Brand Miller. Umm no, it isn't.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby mikesbytes » Mon Sep 07, 2015 8:15 am

matagi wrote:Apparently 10 teaspoons of added sugar per day is "safe and healthy" according to Prof Jennie Brand Miller. Umm no, it isn't.
This is where the various experts disagree, as to where the limit the sugar intake. Personally I'm not looking at counting the sugar content but more so when I shop, I'm keeping a cap on manufactured foods and reading the nutritional info on those manufactured products I do buy.

And I'm not seeing it as a Sugar vs Fat or whatever
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nobody » Mon Sep 07, 2015 8:50 am

DR/Harley is also an advocate of added sugar.

Sugar is similar to oil in that if you add them to fruit or veg, the plant nutrients protect you from the damaging effect of them to some degree. But that doesn't make them healthy. The Mediterranean diet is a good example of this. This video shows that it's not the oil and fish that make it healthier, but only the veg and nuts. So it's healthier despite the oil, fish and wine. But that's not what you generally hear on commercial media.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby zill » Mon Sep 07, 2015 9:41 am

Excessive sugar is bad no doubt about that. But too much of anything is bad for you.

Problem with sugar is that it's addictive. The easiest way is to tax high sugar products like how cigarettes are taxed. E.g. tax it so that it would cost $50 or even $100 per chocolate bar and $1000 for a whole mud cake. This would surely make everyone in Australia healthier in only a matter of months. However, not sure how the politics would go with this idea.

In the mean time, my solution is not to avoid sugar because it is just too addictive to avoid (and will just binge on it if deprived for a day or two) but to add "healthy" sugar such as apple sauce and Sustagen (with a combined total of 200 calories) into my daily oates. That is still LOTS of sugar but it seems I don't desire other sugary foods for the day after this amount of sugar. So overall, my calorie budget is kept in check. It's a good thing that my body still has an upper limit on the amount of sugar I can take for the day before getting sick. I admire people who have a very low upper limit and unsurprisingly they are very skinny.

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nikolai » Mon Sep 07, 2015 10:17 am

zill wrote:The easiest way is to tax high sugar products like how cigarettes are taxed. E.g. tax it so that it would cost $50 or even $100 per chocolate bar and $1000 for a whole mud cake. This would surely make everyone in Australia healthier in only a matter of months. However, not sure how the politics would go with this idea.
This is mad. For so many reasons. It (prohibitions, partial, as in "tax'em to the bone", or total, as in "buy or have it on you when we catch you, and we'll lock you up") never worked, never will. Wake up. Look at the drugs market/industry, at the history of alcohol prohibitions in different countries, "black" tobacco markets in Europe, and so on. If you can't put 2 and 2 together...

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby zill » Mon Sep 07, 2015 10:30 am

Nikolai wrote:
zill wrote:The easiest way is to tax high sugar products like how cigarettes are taxed. E.g. tax it so that it would cost $50 or even $100 per chocolate bar and $1000 for a whole mud cake. This would surely make everyone in Australia healthier in only a matter of months. However, not sure how the politics would go with this idea.
This is mad. For so many reasons. It (prohibitions, partial, as in "tax'em to the bone", or total, as in "buy or have it on you when we catch you, and we'll lock you up") never worked, never will. Wake up. Look at the drugs market/industry, at the history of alcohol prohibitions in different countries, "black" tobacco markets in Europe, and so on. If you can't put 2 and 2 together...
But taxes on cigarettes seem to work in Australia? I'm not a smoker but there doesn't seem to be people complaining about it here.

The only worry I have would be black markets popping up as a result of this tax.

However, this tax (ideally) would really put in reality that sugary processed foods are a treat and only as a treat and only on special occasions like birthdays!

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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby mikesbytes » Mon Sep 07, 2015 2:54 pm

It's difficult to determine how to use taxation to improve nutritional choices as its not cut and dry like smoking

To a small extent we already have it, as GST isn't applied to base foods
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Re: Sugar its like a poison

Postby Nikolai » Mon Sep 07, 2015 8:52 pm

zill wrote:However, this tax (ideally) would really put in reality that sugary processed foods are a treat and only as a treat and only on special occasions like birthdays!
As I said above, the approach itself (taxing) is wrong on so many levels it's hard to figure out where to begin...

Well, I guess the main objection should be mentioned at least, and it's a fatal one: it shouldn't be none of your, or mine, nor anybody else's, business to worry about what others are eating, drinking or even injecting. It is their bodies and they should be free to do with them as they please. As an aside, this is one of the arguments used to legalize murder of unborn babies: my body, do whatever I want with it. Obviously, it's stupid to expect consistency from government bureaucrats.

At any rate, let's get back to sugar...

If you want $1,000 mud cakes, may I ask you why are you penalizing me because of some people, perhaps, eat too many of them? In fact, I don't touch them, find them disgusting, but my kids like them and I buy them from time to time for one reason or another. Why should I, lean and in good form, pay $1,000 for a cake? Can you please explain?

Next, what do you think will happen when you raise prices beyond ridiculous? Few things, and these are inevitable... People will stop buying and, as a consequence, businesses will have to shut down, jobs will disappear. People who were employing others, and people who were employed, will be lining up for welfare. Some of them will enter other job markets, perhaps increasing oversupply of labour. So far so good.

Next, the "black" market will pop up: people will start making cakes at home and selling them to others at prices they can afford, for cash of course. Great if you can make cakes, not so great if you're a tax collector.

And I can go on and on...

Thing is though, trying to tax chocolate and cakes to stop obesity is like trying to fix potholes to stop car crashes - it's stupid. Per chance, it could be true that one car crash in ten thousand is caused by a pothole, but, surely, fixing all potholes in Australia isn't going to stop car crashes. So is with chocolate - you can ban it or make it stupidly expensive, but it ain't gonna stop obesity. This applies to alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, and anything you can think of. The problem is not with the price or availability of chocolate, the problem is with the people who want stuff. Yeah sure, tax the cigarettes, but actually what happens when you do that, in real life, is a smoking parent, or two, is now can't afford a decent lunch for his/her kids, stuffing their lunch box with cheap, carbohydrate rich, processed rubbish, getting them addicted to crap early on. Great job, problem solved, no one smokes here anymore.

I mean, if anyone thinks that you can prohibit something, or make it expensive, and people will roll over and stop consuming whatever you're trying to regulate, I don't know, don't want to be rude, but you need to pause and think...

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