Fructose is no Glucose
High Fructose Corn Syrup, which was invented and marketed only a few decades ago in the 1970s, has been added to many packaged/processed foods and drinks, including breakfast cereals and soft drinks. Especially after people were told that fat was the enemy around the same period, food manufacturers looked for a cheap alternative to make food tasty. Fructose is not glucose, and we have never consumed as much of it as we do today. Adding the push for plant-based diets, fruits, juices, and smoothies, you can see how much we have been exposed to this harmful sugar.
(Google definition of fructose: Fructose, or fruit sugar, is a simple ketonic monosaccharide found in many plants, where it is often bonded to glucose to form the disaccharide sucrose)
Here are a few examples of studies in human and animals connecting excessive fructose consumption to obesity, diabetes, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), IBD (Crohn’s disease, ulcerative collides, etc.) and many cancers:
1) Fructose, it’s “Alcohol Without the Buzz” – “Most people compare fructose with its isomer glucose, which is so essential for life that your liver will produce it when it is in short supply via the process of gluconeogenesis. Although fructose is an energy source, its actions on the body more closely resemble ethanol (grain alcohol), another nonessential energy source. This paper compares the metabolic actions of fructose with those of glucose and ethanol to make the point that fructose is “alcohol without the buzz.”
2) Small intestine metabolizes fructose and converts it to other components including glucose. Excess fructose overwhelms the small intestine and allows it to seeped through to liver and colon unmetabolized, damaging them and other organs (hence NAFLD & Chron’s, UC).
3) Fructose feeds cancer cells during their early stage of growth; many studies on this both in humans and mice, just Google “Fructose and cancer.”
4) IBD and fructose intake – “dietary Fructose Alters the Composition, Localization, and Metabolism of Gut Microbiota in Association With Worsening Colitis”
5) Long-term fructose consumption negatively affects the normal aging process.
Additional Information
Image from: David Wyant@wyadvd
- Posted in: Health Topics
sageblog 
I could not resist commenting. Very well written!
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