Food police alert!
Researchers at the University of California San Francisco say in a just-published op-ed piece that sugar is so harmful that it should be regulated just like tobacco and alcohol. “A growing body of scientific evidence,” they write, " is showing that fructose can trigger processes that lead to liver toxicity and a host of other chronic diseases. A little is not a problem, but a lot kills – slowly.”
The authors also cited the effect of sugar on child obesity, and suggested that kids under 17 shouldn’t be able to get the sweet stuff legally.
A global surfeit of sugar, they say, is contributing to 35 million deaths annually from non-communicable diseases like diabetes, heart disease and cancer. Robert Lustig, MD, one of the authors, said, “As long as the public thinks that sugar is just ‘empty calories,’ we have no chance in solving this…Sugar is toxic beyond its calories.”
The researchers -- Lustig, Laura Schmidt, Ph.D. and Claire Brindis -- DPH published the piece in the journal “Nature.” As might be expected, the news triggered an outpouring of Internet posters who wanted their Milky Ways, darn it, without any government interference.
Apparently anticipating that reaction, Schmidt said in a statement,“We’re not talking prohibition. We’re not advocating a major imposition of the government into people’s lives. We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient.”
