The rise of sugar phobia: Is it really that bad for us?

A NEW film about the dangers of sugar raises some interesting questions about our diet. But is our fixation with this single nutrient doing us more harm than good?

OVER the past few years, SUGAR has dominated the headlines. But is sugar really a dietary villain that should be kept out of vulnerable hands?

I recently previewed an Australian documentary That Sugar Film, by filmmaker Damon Gameau who documented a 60 day experiment by eating a high sugar diet of 40 teaspoons a day — slightly more than the average Australian (30 teaspoons).

The catch is that he does this without consuming typical foods we know are high in sugar, such as soft drinks, chocolate or lollies. Rather, he only eats foods that most people would perceive or often marketed as “healthy”. Think low-fat yoghurts, smoothies, cereals, muesli bars, sports drinks and fruit juice — all of which are full of hidden sugar.

That Sugar Film

Alarmingly, upon completion of the experiment Damon gained 8.5 kilos, grew 11cm around his mid-drift and showed signs of fatty liver disease, type 2 diabetes and heart disease risks. Damon claims these shocking results came from eating no fat and less calories (I’ll get to that later) than before commencing the experiment, which assured him that the calories from sugar behave differently to any other food. Damon is now convinced that sugar, particularly the fructose component of sugar, is the villain behind most of today’s preventable chronic illnesses.

While there’s some value to the story in that it raises a great deal of awareness to a “hidden” substance that now finds itself in around 80% of processed foods, my concern is that the increasing speculation and bickering over sugar and its effects on our health, both physically and mentally does not lead to the same battle we had with fat over the past two decades. In other words, our fixation on a single nutrient can be doing us more harm than good.

That Sugar Film

One particular segment of the documentary, starring Hugh Jackman, featured the history behind the influx of sugar into our food supply and to no surprise made mention of Ancel Keys — the first scientist to advocate for “low fat” eating to prevent heart disease.

For those unfamiliar with this story, the results of Keys’ findings lead to decades of dietary advice that a high intake of animal foods (e.g. meat, butter, cheese; a dietary pattern abbreviated as “high fat”) had higher rates of heart disease; compared to a diet based on plants (e.g. foods more naturally low-fat, highly nutritious, such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and leaner cuts of meats; abbreviated “low fat”).

In many ways, this sensible advice still holds true, but it’s unfortunate that this message was misinterpreted and twisted, giving impetus for new marketing opportunities to developed product lines in which fats were replaced by sugar and other simple carbohydrates or substitutes, leading us to believe that these types of manufactured “low-fat” foods were the healthier choices — something Keys never advised nor supported. Food was no longer ‘real food’, it became highly processed and lathered with health claims, which generally is a good indication that the food has been manipulated in some way.

So where are we now? We blame carbs.

THAT SUGAR FILM 1.jpg

Getting back to the calories: Damon claims the amount of energy he consumed remained the same despite eating more sugar. Although I wasn’t allowed access to Damon’s food diary over the course of the experiment, I do remain dubious that Damon’s weight gain was likely due to the unique property of fructose and not the calories. You simply can’t gain weight unless you eat more calories than you burn. Besides keeping food diaries is often associated with under reporting.

The fact is, in many parts of the world, including Australia, around half of the total carbohydrate consumed each day is from sugars, and the other half is from starches and maltodextrins. The international guidelines recommend we consume no more than 10 per cent of an individual’s calories from sugar — the equivalent of 12 “level” teaspoons a day for the average adult. However, with this goal in mind, we need to be careful that you don’t ditch the naturally-occurring sugars found in fruit, vegetables, and dairy, ideally in their natural state as these foods also bring a whole host of other nutritional goodness. Instead you want to limit the amount of sugars that are added to foods or beverages during processing or preparation.

Label watch

But here’s when things can get a little tricky. Unfortunately, you can’t tell easily by looking at the nutrition label of a food if it contains added sugars. The line for “sugars” includes both added and natural sugars. Naturally occurring sugars are found in milk (lactose) and fruit (fructose). Any product that contains milk (such as yoghurt, milk or cream) or fruit (fresh, dried) contains some natural sugars.

Check the ingredients list which start with the biggest ingredient first, so if sugar is near the top of the list, you know the food is likely to be high in added sugars. Most importantly, watch out for other words that are used to describe added sugars, such as sucrose, glucose, fructose, maltose, maple syrup, agave and corn syrup, to name a few (FYI: there are over 50 words to disguise sugar).

Bottom line

Yes, we eat too much sugar but sugar is just ONE of our problems, not the only problem. Focusing on sugar alone makes it easy to overlook other culprits behind our expanding waistline.

Kathleen Alleaume is a Nutrition and Exercise Scientist an author of What’s Eating You? @therightbalance