UDSKRIFT 🔗
WEBVTT
1
00:00:00.580 --> 00:00:03.520
Hi, I'm Meryl Horne filling in for Wendy Zuckerman, and
2
00:00:03.560 --> 00:00:08.500
you're listening to Science Versus. This is the show that
3
00:00:08.539 --> 00:00:17.769
pits facts against fructose. Today, we're looking at sugar. Is
4
00:00:17.850 --> 00:00:21.089
it really that bad? Sugar has always been the villain
5
00:00:21.149 --> 00:00:24.050
in our diets, that thing calling out to us that
6
00:00:24.109 --> 00:00:27.350
we know we should resist. And recently, it feels like
7
00:00:27.510 --> 00:00:30.350
everyone's piling on to tell us, don't do it.
8
00:00:31.300 --> 00:00:34.259
Sugar is one of the deadliest things you can eat.
9
00:00:34.640 --> 00:00:36.939
Our bodies are not able to adapt to the amount
10
00:00:36.960 --> 00:00:39.380
of sugar that we're consuming, and it's making us so sick.
11
00:00:40.119 --> 00:00:43.530
Every time you eat sugar, every time, it does permanent
12
00:00:43.590 --> 00:00:44.829
damage to your body.
13
00:00:45.130 --> 00:00:48.670
Sugar is poison, and Americans need to know that. It
14
00:00:48.729 --> 00:00:49.670
is poisoning us.
15
00:00:50.350 --> 00:00:52.850
That last voice you heard was RFK Jr., the Health
16
00:00:52.890 --> 00:00:56.289
and Human Services Secretary in the U.S., and he's recommended
17
00:00:56.369 --> 00:00:59.770
that Americans have zero added sugar in their food. Zero!
18
00:01:01.250 --> 00:01:03.689
And things get even more heated when the topic of
19
00:01:03.710 --> 00:01:06.659
high fructose corn syrup comes up. We hear that this
20
00:01:06.819 --> 00:01:09.480
one is way worse for us than other types of sugar.
21
00:01:09.500 --> 00:01:12.379
High fructose corn syrup. Where do I f * *
22
00:01:12.180 --> 00:01:12.719
* ing start?
23
00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:17.489
Literally cheap garbage with zero nutritional value.
24
00:01:18.250 --> 00:01:21.209
High fructose corn syrup actually has a similar effect to
25
00:01:21.269 --> 00:01:22.170
obesity as.
26
00:01:22.090 --> 00:01:25.659
Fuel to a fire. But then at the same time,
27
00:01:25.760 --> 00:01:29.480
influencers are telling us that there's a loophole here. Just
28
00:01:29.579 --> 00:01:32.370
eat natural sugars. Those are way healthier.
29
00:01:32.829 --> 00:01:36.530
So the best alternative is agave. I love good honey.
30
00:01:36.730 --> 00:01:37.870
I love maple syrup.
31
00:01:37.909 --> 00:01:41.010
The thicker, the darker color, the better. Raw honey has
32
00:01:41.049 --> 00:01:43.189
been shown to have a ton of health benefits in
33
00:01:43.250 --> 00:01:43.890
many studies.
34
00:01:44.280 --> 00:01:46.750
Real maple syrup and why you should be chugging it.
35
00:01:49.170 --> 00:01:51.650
We're going to be chugging the research on all of this.
36
00:01:51.810 --> 00:01:55.280
We'll find out whether sugar really does such terrible things
37
00:01:55.359 --> 00:01:58.239
to our bodies, and if we really can go to
38
00:01:58.280 --> 00:02:00.280
town on stuff like honey and maple syrup.
39
00:02:01.019 --> 00:02:02.379
Because when it comes to sugar.
40
00:02:02.799 --> 00:02:04.159
Where do I f * * * ing start?
41
00:02:04.719 --> 00:02:06.370
Duh, with the science.
42
00:02:09.289 --> 00:02:11.389
Science vs. Sugar is coming up after the break.
43
00:02:18.699 --> 00:02:20.360
It's been a busy week, right?
44
00:02:20.719 --> 00:02:24.710
Sounds like it's time for that takeaway. Deliveroo's on it.
45
00:02:25.020 --> 00:02:29.319
Whether it's extra saucy wings from Nando's, a tasty taco
46
00:02:29.360 --> 00:02:32.539
bowl from Sprout & Co, or maybe even some California
47
00:02:32.620 --> 00:02:37.060
birria from Boojum. We'll deliver in as little as 25 minutes.
48
00:02:37.599 --> 00:02:39.280
Order now. You've earned it.
49
00:02:39.740 --> 00:02:43.939
Deliveroo. That finish line Friday feeling just got even better.
50
00:02:44.460 --> 00:02:47.310
Geographical restrictions, teas and season fees apply. Delivery times vary.
51
00:02:47.340 --> 00:02:48.430
See app or web for info.
52
00:02:52.379 --> 00:02:54.939
Welcome back. Today on the show, we're looking at sugar.
53
00:02:55.280 --> 00:02:58.360
How bad is it really? This is Meryl Horne, and
54
00:02:58.419 --> 00:03:00.490
with me is senior producer Rose Rimler.
55
00:03:00.530 --> 00:03:00.909
Hi, Meryl.
56
00:03:01.319 --> 00:03:01.889
Hey, Rose.
57
00:03:02.849 --> 00:03:06.550
So... You're often the one that covers nutrition topics on
58
00:03:06.610 --> 00:03:09.129
our show. Are you like a little mad at me
59
00:03:09.210 --> 00:03:10.210
for getting in your lane?
60
00:03:10.229 --> 00:03:12.610
No, I don't want to do this.
61
00:03:13.050 --> 00:03:17.030
No? Why don't you want to find out about the
62
00:03:17.050 --> 00:03:18.629
science of sugar? Do you have a sweet tooth?
63
00:03:19.379 --> 00:03:20.120
I do.
64
00:03:21.009 --> 00:03:24.020
Let's see. Every morning, pretty much, most mornings, I put
65
00:03:24.080 --> 00:03:26.939
honey on my yogurt. That's what I have for breakfast.
66
00:03:28.129 --> 00:03:30.030
And also throughout the day, I eat a lot of fruit.
67
00:03:30.150 --> 00:03:32.270
Like I eat fruit at breakfast. I usually have some
68
00:03:32.349 --> 00:03:34.389
fruit after lunch.
69
00:03:35.009 --> 00:03:37.210
Well, I have some good news for you right off
70
00:03:37.229 --> 00:03:37.689
the bat.
71
00:03:37.710 --> 00:03:39.009
Can I keep my fruit?
72
00:03:39.069 --> 00:03:42.949
Yes, fruit is totally okay. That's one thing that some
73
00:03:42.990 --> 00:03:45.770
of the sugar haters get wrong is that sugar overall
74
00:03:45.830 --> 00:03:48.750
is not poison because we know fruit does have a
75
00:03:48.770 --> 00:03:50.949
lot of sugar in it. But it's also one of
76
00:03:50.990 --> 00:03:52.169
the healthiest foods you can eat.
77
00:03:52.430 --> 00:03:54.849
Is that because of like the fiber and the nutrients?
78
00:03:55.000 --> 00:03:56.400
Yeah, the fiber especially.
79
00:03:56.560
Load full transcript
--> 00:03:59.080
There's a lot of like good stuff in fruit, which
80
00:03:59.120 --> 00:04:02.259
makes it healthy to eat overall. So one huge review
81
00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:05.319
found that eating more fruit is linked to a lower
82
00:04:05.360 --> 00:04:08.620
risk of getting heart disease, some types of cancer, type
83
00:04:08.620 --> 00:04:12.409
2 diabetes. So that's one reason why sugar is not
84
00:04:12.650 --> 00:04:16.279
just terrible for us overall. And another one is that
85
00:04:16.459 --> 00:04:18.759
we know that whenever we eat stuff with sugar in it,
86
00:04:18.860 --> 00:04:21.759
our bodies do use some of that for energy, right?
87
00:04:21.839 --> 00:04:25.660
It's this like quick source of energy. And that's why
88
00:04:25.699 --> 00:04:27.959
like you see marathon runners having that.
89
00:04:27.839 --> 00:04:29.740
Like sugar goo stuff.
90
00:04:29.879 --> 00:04:33.189
It can be converted really quickly into energy unlike other
91
00:04:33.910 --> 00:04:34.649
things like fat.
92
00:04:34.829 --> 00:04:36.430
Yeah, like if I was cycling the Tour de France,
93
00:04:36.490 --> 00:04:39.050
I would be like, they could have all the syrup
94
00:04:39.269 --> 00:04:41.040
I wanted, I assume. Yeah. Yeah.
95
00:04:42.019 --> 00:04:43.899
So yeah, there is some good here.
96
00:04:44.500 --> 00:04:48.120
But for the sugar haters, they're not really coming for
97
00:04:48.319 --> 00:04:51.759
your fruit. They're more worried about the sugar that gets
98
00:04:51.920 --> 00:04:55.639
added to stuff like soda, cakes, your ice cream.
99
00:04:55.670 --> 00:04:59.250
Meryl, I think you're underestimating the kookiness of people on
100
00:04:59.269 --> 00:04:59.769
the internet.
101
00:05:00.790 --> 00:05:01.990
They come for the fruit too.
102
00:05:02.009 --> 00:05:05.879
Yeah. Well, they're wrong. Don't let them do that.
103
00:05:06.459 --> 00:05:09.329
But this concept of like added sugars being the thing
104
00:05:09.350 --> 00:05:11.550
you have to worry about, that's familiar to me. And
105
00:05:11.569 --> 00:05:13.670
I think I've seen that for sure online. The whole
106
00:05:13.689 --> 00:05:16.329
like no added sugars. Yeah, that's definitely like a thing
107
00:05:16.370 --> 00:05:16.850
that's out there.
108
00:05:17.009 --> 00:05:19.250
That's the big concern, right? So that's what we're really
109
00:05:19.269 --> 00:05:22.850
going to dive into. Let's look at whether it does
110
00:05:22.930 --> 00:05:26.370
make us gain weight first, since there's this idea that
111
00:05:26.509 --> 00:05:29.189
when we eat sugar, it really like packs on the
112
00:05:29.209 --> 00:05:31.180
pounds compared to eating other stuff.
113
00:05:31.379 --> 00:05:34.439
Oh, like sugar is like Gram for gram, like more
114
00:05:34.500 --> 00:05:36.779
fattening than other nutrients.
115
00:05:37.019 --> 00:05:39.350
And so one of the first studies that shed light
116
00:05:39.430 --> 00:05:41.910
on this was done by Professor Jim Mann at the
117
00:05:41.990 --> 00:05:45.269
University of Otago in New Zealand. He did it like
118
00:05:45.269 --> 00:05:47.870
50 years ago, actually, back in the 70s.
119
00:05:48.290 --> 00:05:50.740
But funnily enough, I can remember that study very clearly.
120
00:05:50.920 --> 00:05:51.420
Oh, really?
121
00:05:51.480 --> 00:05:53.439
Because of the way it turned out.
122
00:05:53.819 --> 00:05:55.639
And so, yeah, it really stuck with him.
123
00:05:57.160 --> 00:06:00.040
Like a Tootsie Roll that you left in your pocket
124
00:06:00.079 --> 00:06:04.399
too long because something totally unexpected ended up happening.
125
00:06:04.699 --> 00:06:05.660
So here's how it went down.
126
00:06:05.680 --> 00:06:06.160
Okay.
127
00:06:06.519 --> 00:06:09.120
The goal of the study was to see what happens
128
00:06:09.220 --> 00:06:14.720
when people replace sugar for other types of calories, like starch,
129
00:06:15.160 --> 00:06:17.959
the stuff that's in bread. So they could see like,
130
00:06:18.139 --> 00:06:20.529
is sugar particularly unhealthy for us?
131
00:06:21.379 --> 00:06:23.050
So here's what they told the volunteers.
132
00:06:23.529 --> 00:06:24.870
We said, look, we.
133
00:06:24.790 --> 00:06:27.649
Want you to replace, give up X amount of sugar
134
00:06:28.069 --> 00:06:30.750
and replace that with starch to see the effect.
135
00:06:30.769 --> 00:06:33.490
So ditch the dessert and have some pasta instead?
136
00:06:33.509 --> 00:06:34.089
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
137
00:06:34.110 --> 00:06:38.709
So we had a dietician, excellent dietician, who worked with
138
00:06:38.750 --> 00:06:40.379
these people on a regular basis.
139
00:06:40.939 --> 00:06:45.060
And highly motivated people. And they said, yeah, we'll do
140
00:06:45.120 --> 00:06:45.720
everything you say.
141
00:06:46.160 --> 00:06:49.060
So my dream of having extra mashed potatoes at the
142
00:06:49.079 --> 00:06:49.600
end of the meal.
143
00:06:49.620 --> 00:06:50.639
Yeah, exactly.
144
00:06:50.779 --> 00:06:52.480
It doesn't sound that bad actually, right?
145
00:06:52.560 --> 00:06:55.920
Like instead of having sugar, you're supposed to basically have
146
00:06:55.959 --> 00:06:56.500
everything else.
147
00:06:56.519 --> 00:06:58.519
You can have starch, you can have protein.
148
00:06:58.879 --> 00:07:01.790
And they wanted them to do it pretty precisely, like
149
00:07:02.170 --> 00:07:05.189
substitute out one for one. Like the calories that you're
150
00:07:05.209 --> 00:07:10.660
going to have for sugar have the pasta instead. But
151
00:07:10.860 --> 00:07:14.790
what ended up happening is that instead of doing that
152
00:07:14.930 --> 00:07:21.149
one-for-one replacement, they ended up eating less overall. So like,
153
00:07:21.970 --> 00:07:25.009
so yeah, instead of having like the exact amount of
154
00:07:25.050 --> 00:07:27.920
calories that they're going to have in sugar, in pasta,
155
00:07:27.980 --> 00:07:30.100
they ended up having less
pasta.
156
00:07:30.379 --> 00:07:33.019
They just couldn't get that much starch down their gullets.
157
00:07:33.399 --> 00:07:37.759
Yeah, yeah. And so they ended up losing weight. And
158
00:07:37.860 --> 00:07:40.639
so Jim couldn't do the thing he was trying to do,
159
00:07:40.680 --> 00:07:43.860
which was see, like, which is worse, calorie for calorie.
160
00:07:44.259 --> 00:07:45.860
Here's what they'd need to do instead.
161
00:07:46.379 --> 00:07:48.850
You've actually got to do it in a controlled environment
162
00:07:48.990 --> 00:07:51.689
where you actually give people all their meals and you
163
00:07:51.730 --> 00:07:54.649
virtually lock them up to make sure that they are
164
00:07:54.769 --> 00:07:57.629
actually not going to change their calorie intake.
165
00:07:57.970 --> 00:07:58.209
Right.
166
00:07:58.290 --> 00:08:01.189
One of these studies, nutrition studies, where you get people
167
00:08:01.209 --> 00:08:02.540
to live in the lab and you give them all
168
00:08:02.560 --> 00:08:02.980
their meals.
169
00:08:03.579 --> 00:08:06.540
Yeah, basically. My favorite. So yeah, he had to wait
170
00:08:06.879 --> 00:08:08.959
for these more careful studies to come along.
171
00:08:09.660 --> 00:08:10.290
And they have.
172
00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:13.610
Wait, so other researchers have done that since Jim?
173
00:08:14.189 --> 00:08:14.930
Yes, yes.
174
00:08:15.189 --> 00:08:15.410
Okay.
175
00:08:15.430 --> 00:08:18.050
Other researchers will do what he was trying to do
176
00:08:18.149 --> 00:08:21.410
kind of properly. So like make sure people aren't actually
177
00:08:21.470 --> 00:08:24.389
changing the total amount of calories that they're eating to
178
00:08:24.439 --> 00:08:27.680
find out if sugar itself causes more weight gain than
179
00:08:27.740 --> 00:08:28.259
other stuff.
180
00:08:28.740 --> 00:08:29.300
Okay.
181
00:08:29.319 --> 00:08:32.220
So several years ago, Jim and his team collected a
182
00:08:32.259 --> 00:08:34.840
bunch of these studies for a meta-analysis. They ended up
183
00:08:34.860 --> 00:08:38.429
looking at 12 of them. So now we can answer
184
00:08:38.470 --> 00:08:39.230
the question, right?
185
00:08:39.850 --> 00:08:40.509
So are you ready?
186
00:08:40.529 --> 00:08:41.289
Yeah.
187
00:08:41.870 --> 00:08:44.850
So what they found is that sugar does not have
188
00:08:45.129 --> 00:08:47.909
some sort of magical power to make you gain weight.
189
00:08:48.990 --> 00:08:51.700
So if you have like people eat the same amount
190
00:08:51.720 --> 00:08:53.639
of calories, some of them are getting sugar, some of
191
00:08:53.679 --> 00:08:56.779
them are getting other stuff, they generally do not gain
192
00:08:56.840 --> 00:09:01.789
more weight with the sugar. I mean, to me, I
193
00:09:01.929 --> 00:09:05.850
was kind of surprised because it does feel like sugar
194
00:09:06.289 --> 00:09:08.980
is bad for our weight and it It is true
195
00:09:09.019 --> 00:09:13.259
that people who have more sugar generally will gain more weight.
196
00:09:13.370 --> 00:09:15.620
And that's because in the real world, when people have
197
00:09:15.639 --> 00:09:19.029
a lot of sugar, they aren't like compensating by eating
198
00:09:19.149 --> 00:09:20.309
less of other stuff.
199
00:09:21.809 --> 00:09:23.509
Maybe because sugar doesn't make.
200
00:09:23.429 --> 00:09:26.909
Us feel as full as other foods do. I mean,
201
00:09:26.929 --> 00:09:29.529
you could see this in Jim's study and... It just
202
00:09:29.580 --> 00:09:33.580
makes intuitive sense. Like, if you imagine having a bottle
203
00:09:33.600 --> 00:09:36.600
of Coke with your lunch, you're not going to be like, oh, like,
204
00:09:36.799 --> 00:09:38.840
I guess I won't be that hungry for a big
205
00:09:38.899 --> 00:09:41.139
lunch anymore because I'm having all this soda. Like, no,
206
00:09:41.159 --> 00:09:42.580
you're going to have just as big of a lunch
207
00:09:42.639 --> 00:09:44.639
as you would have otherwise if you're having water with
208
00:09:44.679 --> 00:09:48.200
your lunch. And so, like, even though it doesn't seem
209
00:09:48.259 --> 00:09:51.519
like sugar is magically good at making us gain weight,
210
00:09:52.039 --> 00:09:54.879
people do tend to just eat more overall when they
211
00:09:54.919 --> 00:09:56.259
have a lot of sugar in their diet.
212
00:09:56.889 --> 00:09:59.169
It's magically good at being delicious and making you want
213
00:09:59.190 --> 00:09:59.950
to eat more.
214
00:10:00.259 --> 00:10:03.200
And more of it. Yeah, that too. And so we
215
00:10:03.240 --> 00:10:06.240
end up gaining weight and that could increase your risk
216
00:10:06.759 --> 00:10:11.470
for some types of cancer, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.
217
00:10:12.350 --> 00:10:15.470
And there's another thing that sugar can do that's not
218
00:10:15.509 --> 00:10:19.149
so good for us. It's bad for our cardiovascular system.
219
00:10:19.610 --> 00:10:22.220
And that actually is true even if you're not eating
220
00:10:22.259 --> 00:10:28.000
more calories overall. Sugar seems to be bad for our blood, basically.
221
00:10:28.019 --> 00:10:31.210
It's not a huge effect, but it's still like a
222
00:10:31.230 --> 00:10:35.919
tick against sugar. And why is it bad for our
223
00:10:36.519 --> 00:10:39.539
cardiovascular system? It's because of the way that sugar can
224
00:10:39.580 --> 00:10:41.539
get converted into fat.
225
00:10:42.019 --> 00:10:43.840
That ends up being bad for us.
226
00:10:44.700 --> 00:10:47.580
We'll actually come back to that a little later. But first,
227
00:10:47.639 --> 00:10:50.960
to complete our roundup of why sugar is bad. So
228
00:10:51.039 --> 00:10:53.419
number one, if we eat more sugar, we tend to
229
00:10:53.440 --> 00:10:57.139
gain weight. Number two, it's bad for our cardiovascular system.
230
00:10:57.720 --> 00:11:00.860
And number three, can you guess, Rose, the other main
231
00:11:00.899 -->
00:11:02.399
reason why sugar is bad for us?
232
00:11:03.480 --> 00:11:04.120
It's bad for your teeth.
233
00:11:04.419 --> 00:11:04.759
Yes.
234
00:11:07.299 --> 00:11:08.679
Sugar gives us cavities.
235
00:11:08.730 --> 00:11:11.769
We've known this since the 1950s when there was a
236
00:11:11.789 --> 00:11:13.909
really terrible experiment Jim told me about.
237
00:11:13.929 --> 00:11:15.169
It was done in Sweden.
238
00:11:15.649 --> 00:11:19.730
Most unethical by modern standards, where they gave people who
239
00:11:19.769 --> 00:11:22.850
lived in mental institutions, they gave them, I think, those
240
00:11:22.870 --> 00:11:25.200
sort of toffee kind of things to chew and other
241
00:11:25.250 --> 00:11:29.220
sweet things, showed that those people in the mental institution
242
00:11:29.240 --> 00:11:32.960
who were given these disgusting sugary sweet things were They
243
00:11:33.000 --> 00:11:34.299
got terrible dental caddies.
244
00:11:35.299 --> 00:11:40.750
Yes, you can't just give people diseases. But yes, okay,
245
00:11:40.779 --> 00:11:43.190
so sugar really does lead to cavities. It's not an
246
00:11:43.230 --> 00:11:44.049
old myth.
247
00:11:44.549 --> 00:11:45.149
No, yeah.
248
00:11:45.450 --> 00:11:48.110
Now we know it's because sugar feeds bacteria that are
249
00:11:48.129 --> 00:11:50.110
in our mouths and that creates cavities or at least
250
00:11:50.129 --> 00:11:54.000
little holes in our teeth. Okay, so here's where we are.
251
00:11:54.470 --> 00:11:58.700
Sugar is not looking great. You know, so far, lots
252
00:11:58.740 --> 00:12:01.539
of the studies we've been talking about are just using
253
00:12:01.639 --> 00:12:05.070
basic table sugar. But there are these claims that some
254
00:12:05.110 --> 00:12:07.730
sugars are better for you than that or worse for
255
00:12:07.769 --> 00:12:11.230
you than that. And so this opens up a whole
256
00:12:11.330 --> 00:12:12.509
can of gummy worms.
257
00:12:13.049 --> 00:12:14.289
That's what we'll look into next.
258
00:12:14.669 --> 00:12:17.389
Oh, did you bring gummy worms to this discussion?
259
00:12:18.929 --> 00:12:19.769
Check your mail.
260
00:12:22.269 --> 00:12:26.429
Look under your seat. So next up, we're going to
261
00:12:26.470 --> 00:12:28.909
tell you whether high fructose corn syrup really is the
262
00:12:28.929 --> 00:12:32.049
big bad wolf, whether honey or maple syrup is the
263
00:12:32.080 --> 00:12:32.700
way to go.
264
00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:34.600
And the answers might surprise you.
265
00:12:35.100 --> 00:12:36.039
That's after the break.
266
00:12:47.440 --> 00:12:50.360
It's been a busy week, right? Sounds like it's time
267
00:12:50.399 --> 00:12:55.129
for that takeaway. Deliveroo's on it. Whether it's extra saucy
268
00:12:55.190 --> 00:12:59.389
wings from Nando's, a tasty taco bowl from Sprout & Co,
269
00:12:59.889 --> 00:13:03.929
or maybe even some California birria from Boojum. We'll deliver
270
00:13:04.029 --> 00:13:05.789
in as little as 25 minutes.
271
00:13:06.350 --> 00:13:08.009
Order now. You've earned it.
272
00:13:08.490 --> 00:13:12.669
Deliveroo. That finish line Friday feeling just got even better.
273
00:13:13.230 --> 00:13:16.049
Geographical restrictions, teas and season fees apply. Delivery times vary.
274
00:13:16.090 --> 00:13:17.149
See app or web for info.
275
00:13:17.899 --> 00:13:20.419
Hey, it's Wendy from Science Versus, and I want to
276
00:13:20.460 --> 00:13:23.779
tell you about a podcast that I love, Science Friday.
277
00:13:23.990 --> 00:13:26.509
They cover all sorts of amazing things in the weird
278
00:13:26.549 --> 00:13:30.590
and wonderful world of science, from how concussions affect our
279
00:13:30.629 --> 00:13:33.690
brain to the inner secrets of a snake with a
280
00:13:33.789 --> 00:13:35.220
spider on its tail. tail.
281
00:13:35.320 --> 00:13:36.659
It's a lot of news that you.
282
00:13:36.580 --> 00:13:38.940
Can use and some that you can't, but you're going
283
00:13:38.960 --> 00:13:43.100
to love anyway. It's hosted by Ira Flato and Flora Lichtman,
284
00:13:43.259 --> 00:13:45.960
who is an old friend of the show and loves
285
00:13:46.059 --> 00:13:48.659
a pun as much as we do. Science Friday is
286
00:13:48.700 --> 00:13:51.279
on every day, wherever you get your podcasts.
287
00:13:54.970 --> 00:13:58.450
Welcome back. Today is Sugar Day at Science Versus. With
288
00:13:58.490 --> 00:13:59.690
me is Rose Rimler.
289
00:13:59.710 --> 00:14:00.149
Hi, Meryl.
290
00:14:00.590 --> 00:14:03.789
Next up, we're going to talk about the favorite punching
291
00:14:03.830 --> 00:14:07.399
bag in the sugar world, high fructose corn syrup, and
292
00:14:07.440 --> 00:14:09.799
the idea that it is way worse for us than
293
00:14:09.860 --> 00:14:12.879
other sugar. So this was in the news recently when
294
00:14:12.919 --> 00:14:17.059
President Trump praised Coca-Cola for using cane sugar in some
295
00:14:17.100 --> 00:14:20.740
of their sodas in the U.S. And the company confirmed
296
00:14:20.759 --> 00:14:23.299
that they're going to do that soon. So, of course,
297
00:14:23.399 --> 00:14:26.470
all the talking heads weighed in on high fructose corn syrup.
298
00:14:26.769 --> 00:14:29.309
A lot of folks, I personally agree with this, find
299
00:14:29.330 --> 00:14:30.929
high fructose corn syrup kind of creepy.
300
00:14:31.149 --> 00:14:34.590
I like cane sugar better because it's more natural. High
301
00:14:34.610 --> 00:14:37.190
fructose corn syrup, it comes from corn, but I don't
302
00:14:37.230 --> 00:14:39.129
think it remembers what a corn looks like.
303
00:14:39.559 --> 00:14:41.820
This is kind of an old one, too, right? I mean,
304
00:14:41.840 --> 00:14:44.879
this was big in the 90s. I remember this being
305
00:14:44.919 --> 00:14:46.259
an issue when I was a little kid.
306
00:14:46.279 --> 00:14:50.820
Yeah. That high fructose corn syrup is like particularly bad
307
00:14:50.860 -->
00:14:51.220
for us.
308
00:14:51.299 --> 00:14:51.679
Yeah.
309
00:14:52.039 --> 00:14:53.039
Maybe it's a California thing.
310
00:14:53.259 --> 00:14:53.610
I don't know.
311
00:14:53.620 --> 00:14:56.190
Did it just reach the East Coast? Because in California,
312
00:14:56.210 --> 00:15:00.009
we've been talking about this since like 1975.
313
00:15:00.039 --> 00:15:03.080
So do you get bad vibes from high fructose corn syrup?
314
00:15:03.480 --> 00:15:06.700
Everybody in California knows that the vibes are really bad.
315
00:15:06.700 --> 00:15:07.990
Of high fructose corn syrup.
316
00:15:08.379 --> 00:15:10.730
But to find out if it's more than just bad vibes,
317
00:15:10.929 --> 00:15:14.370
I called up Dr. Kimber Stanhope. She's a research nutritional
318
00:15:14.389 --> 00:15:18.889
biologist at the University of California, Davis, and her specialty
319
00:15:19.110 --> 00:15:22.379
is sugar. So she's been very popular this past news cycle.
320
00:15:23.019 --> 00:15:26.740
Have you been getting flooded by requests from reporters to
321
00:15:26.779 --> 00:15:27.960
talk about this right now?
322
00:15:27.980 --> 00:15:29.100
Definitely a lot.
323
00:15:29.139 --> 00:15:29.850
You're late.
324
00:15:33.230 --> 00:15:36.309
So there actually is a legit reason why high fructose
325
00:15:36.330 --> 00:15:38.309
corn syrup might be bad for us.
326
00:15:39.120 --> 00:15:40.159
It's because of the fructose.
327
00:15:40.720 --> 00:15:44.580
That's one of the basic sugar building blocks along with glucose.
328
00:15:45.379 --> 00:15:48.330
And at one point, like in the 80s, scientists were
329
00:15:48.350 --> 00:15:51.509
thinking that fructose might actually be better for us than
330
00:15:51.830 --> 00:15:53.049
other stuff like glucose.
331
00:15:53.289 --> 00:15:53.409
Oh.
332
00:15:53.570 --> 00:15:56.669
Because fructose doesn't raise our blood sugar like glucose does.
333
00:15:56.690 --> 00:15:57.710
Oh, okay.
334
00:15:57.750 --> 00:16:00.779
So maybe good, especially if you have diabetes.
335
00:16:00.799 --> 00:16:01.279
Mm-hmm.
336
00:16:01.850 --> 00:16:05.370
But those glory days of fructose didn't last long because
337
00:16:05.509 --> 00:16:09.860
pretty quickly, studies started coming out finding that fructose has
338
00:16:09.919 --> 00:16:13.320
its own set of problems. So one big one is
339
00:16:13.340 --> 00:16:18.120
that it often gets turned into something called triglycerides. and
340
00:16:18.240 --> 00:16:22.230
triglycerides are what fat is made of. So Kimber told me,
341
00:16:22.429 --> 00:16:25.909
imagine you got someone who was willing to donate some
342
00:16:25.929 --> 00:16:28.029
of their body to science, and then.
343
00:16:28.330 --> 00:16:30.690
You took a big chunk of their fat, most of
344
00:16:30.730 --> 00:16:33.279
that fat is triglyceride.
345
00:16:33.919 --> 00:16:36.360
Oh, so it's like the currency of fat in the body.
346
00:16:36.519 --> 00:16:37.840
Right, exactly.
347
00:16:38.200 -->
00:16:40.519
Does it look like anything, like under a microscope?
348
00:16:41.399 --> 00:16:41.750
Pure oil.
349
00:16:41.779 --> 00:16:42.259
So most of.
350
00:16:47.350 --> 00:16:52.389
Okay, your oils at home that you cook with, that
351
00:16:52.590 --> 00:16:55.409
is nearly pure triglyceride.
352
00:16:56.070 --> 00:16:56.210
Oh.
353
00:16:57.250 --> 00:17:00.649
So like in the blood, it forms these droplets.
354
00:17:01.289 --> 00:17:05.640
And over time, though, these droplets can start like stacking
355
00:17:05.799 --> 00:17:07.140
up in our blood vessels.
356
00:17:07.619 --> 00:17:10.839
They almost sort of round out the edges and look
357
00:17:10.880 --> 00:17:12.339
like a layer, you know, bricks.
358
00:17:13.130 --> 00:17:14.630
But free-form bricks.
359
00:17:15.049 --> 00:17:15.849
Like squishy bricks?
360
00:17:16.250 --> 00:17:16.950
Yeah, yeah.
361
00:17:17.609 --> 00:17:21.420
And that layer of squishy bricks narrows the blood vessels,
362
00:17:21.460 --> 00:17:23.180
and that can raise your blood pressure and up the
363
00:17:23.220 --> 00:17:27.240
chance of you getting a stroke. Okay, so the reason
364
00:17:27.279 --> 00:17:29.599
fructose is a bad guy is that it gets turned
365
00:17:29.619 --> 00:17:35.910
into triglycerides. Triglycerides cause these fat bricks that can cause
366
00:17:35.930 --> 00:17:37.049
all these heart disease issues.
367
00:17:37.529 --> 00:17:40.730
That makes sense, but... But wouldn't that happen with any
368
00:17:40.849 --> 00:17:42.549
type of sugar that you eat? Like, why are we
369
00:17:42.569 --> 00:17:45.119
blaming fructose here? Like, would that also happen with glucose
370
00:17:45.180 --> 00:17:45.779
or something like that?
371
00:17:46.180 --> 00:17:48.799
It can. So it can happen with glucose under, like,
372
00:17:48.880 --> 00:17:55.220
certain conditions. But fructose basically gets converted into triglycerides more easily.
373
00:17:55.440 --> 00:17:59.490
It's sort of fructose's evil superpower. And so now some
374
00:17:59.509 --> 00:18:02.730
scientists think that fructose is worse for us than glucose.
375
00:18:02.990 --> 00:18:06.269
But earlier you said that fruit is okay and... Like,
376
00:18:06.670 --> 00:18:08.660
doesn't fruit have a lot of fructose in it?
377
00:18:08.849 --> 00:18:12.799
It does, but the fructose in fruit is okay because
378
00:18:12.859 --> 00:18:16.220
it's bound up inside the fruit. It's like alongside all
379
00:18:16.259 --> 00:18:20.359
that fiber we talked about. But with something like high
380
00:18:20.400 --> 00:18:23.940
fructose corn syrup, the fructose there is just kind of
381
00:18:24.059 --> 00:18:28.559
free floating. And so there's this concern that that's particularly
382
00:18:28.619 --> 00:18:29.660
bad for our bodies.
383
00:18:30.359 --> 00:18:31.480
But is it?
384
00:18:32.000 --> 00:18:32.180
So.
385
00:18:32.710 --> 00:18:35.289
Kimber wanted to know, like, what actually happens when you
386
00:18:35.309 --> 00:18:38.589
give people this stuff and just compare it to table sugar?
387
00:18:39.029 --> 00:18:40.950
So let me tell you about one of the clinical
388
00:18:40.970 --> 00:18:45.430
trials she's done. She got 52 adults, and they actually
389
00:18:45.470 --> 00:18:47.529
had them move into the wing of a hospital for
390
00:18:47.609 --> 00:18:50.390
three days in the beginning of the experiment, where they
391
00:18:50.410 --> 00:18:52.150
could run a battery of tests on them.
392
00:18:52.450 --> 00:18:54.849
We collect blood all day long.
393
00:18:54.890 --> 00:18:57.289
We start at 8 o'clock in the morning, and we
394
00:18:57.329 --> 00:18:59.990
go all the way to 8 o'clock the next day,
395
00:19:00.230 --> 00:19:01.410
at least every hour.
396
00:19:01.430 --> 00:19:01.730
Wow.
397
00:19:02.450 --> 00:19:05.930
And this was to check for stuff like triglycerides and cholesterol.
398
00:19:05.970 --> 00:19:08.970
They also got liver MRIs done since some of those
399
00:19:09.559 --> 00:19:12.279
triglycerides can build up in the liver too, which is
400
00:19:12.500 --> 00:19:16.339
not good. And they basically wanted to get a really
401
00:19:16.380 --> 00:19:20.039
good baseline of where people are at before they started
402
00:19:20.160 --> 00:19:23.759
giving them any sugar. Like everyone had to eat the
403
00:19:23.799 --> 00:19:26.460
same food while they were there, like salad.
404
00:19:27.009 --> 00:19:33.789
The complaints I got About that salad went on and on.
405
00:19:33.930 --> 00:19:38.539
I got so tired of people saying, oh, I can't
406
00:19:38.660 --> 00:19:39.940
eat all this salad.
407
00:19:40.920 --> 00:19:42.880
Like this much.
408
00:19:42.980 --> 00:19:46.769
I mean, it was not an enormous salad.
409
00:19:47.009 --> 00:19:49.970
Was it like iceberg lettuce and really bad bland tomatoes?
410
00:19:50.390 --> 00:19:52.910
Though? She defended it. She was like, no, this was
411
00:19:52.950 --> 00:19:54.500
like a tossed salad.
412
00:19:54.539 --> 00:19:57.240
So it had tomatoes, cucumbers. Oh.
413
00:19:57.960 --> 00:20:00.279
But people did seem to like the next part of
414
00:20:00.319 --> 00:20:03.380
the experiment more. They get to go home now and
415
00:20:03.440 --> 00:20:06.819
they get to drink lots and lots of Kool-Aid. What
416
00:20:06.839 --> 00:20:09.579
was the Kool-Aid flavor? Was it the fruit punch one?
417
00:20:09.759 --> 00:20:11.700
They got to choose.
418
00:20:12.200 --> 00:20:18.539
I actually many times stunned the cashiers coming through with
419
00:20:18.940 --> 00:20:21.619
easily a thousand packets of Kool-Aid.
420
00:20:21.640 --> 00:20:22.299
Oh my gosh.
421
00:20:23.000 --> 00:20:25.079
Oh my gosh, you really like.
422
00:20:24.940 --> 00:20:26.339
Kool-Aid, don't you?
423
00:20:27.380 --> 00:20:30.680
But I usually waited for it to be on sale, but.
424
00:20:32.690 --> 00:20:35.289
And the Kool-Aid they got was sweetened with either table
425
00:20:35.349 --> 00:20:37.049
sugar or
high fructose corn syrup.
426
00:20:37.380 --> 00:20:39.880
So that was the big difference between the two groups
427
00:20:39.920 --> 00:20:41.599
once they went home, was they either drank a lot
428
00:20:41.640 --> 00:20:47.079
of table sugar, sugary Kool-Aid or high fructose corn syrup Kool-Aid.
429
00:20:47.220 --> 00:20:48.359
Yes, exactly.
430
00:20:48.940 --> 00:20:51.539
Okay. Yeah, they had to have it three times a day,
431
00:20:51.920 --> 00:20:53.599
and they didn't know which one they were getting. Okay.
432
00:20:54.539 --> 00:20:57.019
So now after 12 days of that, they go back
433
00:20:57.059 --> 00:20:59.630
to the hospital again so they can redo all those tests.
434
00:21:00.250 --> 00:21:02.690
And now we can finally see how bad the high
435
00:21:02.730 --> 00:21:06.630
fructose corn syrup is. So I asked Kimber, was high
436
00:21:06.670 --> 00:21:11.160
fructose corn syrup any worse for people than normal table sugar? No. No.
437
00:21:11.519 --> 00:21:15.940
There was never a difference, a significant difference between the two.
438
00:21:16.420 --> 00:21:16.759
Whoa.
439
00:21:17.589 --> 00:21:19.930
So what would they have seen if there was a difference?
440
00:21:20.109 --> 00:21:22.569
So they're looking for at the triglycerides and like fat
441
00:21:22.609 --> 00:21:25.369
in the liver. And, you know, you'd expect that if
442
00:21:25.410 --> 00:21:28.450
high fructose corn syrup was worse, you would see more triglycerides,
443
00:21:28.490 --> 00:21:32.000
more liver fat in that group. But instead, you know,
444
00:21:32.039 --> 00:21:34.480
they saw a rise in both groups, but there wasn't
445
00:21:34.579 --> 00:21:36.059
a difference between the two.
446
00:21:36.799 --> 00:21:39.160
So, yeah, I asked if Kimber was surprised.
447
00:21:41.160 --> 00:21:45.750
No, I wasn't surprised at all. The results were actually
448
00:21:45.910 --> 00:21:48.890
pretty much exactly what I would have expected.
449
00:21:49.259 --> 00:21:52.619
She didn't drink the Kool-Aid about high fructose corn syrup? No.
450
00:21:54.500 --> 00:21:54.819
Are you?
451
00:21:54.980 --> 00:21:55.779
I'm surprised.
452
00:21:56.079 --> 00:21:58.420
I don't know. I guess, I mean, I guess I'm,
453
00:21:58.559 --> 00:22:00.009
I mean, I am and I'm not like, I know
454
00:22:00.069 --> 00:22:01.849
that so much of what we are told about nutrition
455
00:22:01.910 --> 00:22:05.809
is BS. So like, I'm not surprised this thing is BS,
456
00:22:05.950 --> 00:22:09.450
but I am like, I do have this in, like
457
00:22:09.470 --> 00:22:12.859
this internal feeling that like, high fructose corn syrup has
458
00:22:12.880 --> 00:22:15.890
got to be pretty bad, right? And that's interesting that
459
00:22:16.130 --> 00:22:19.289
at least on these measures, it was the same as
460
00:22:19.390 --> 00:22:20.430
just plain old sugar.
461
00:22:20.950 --> 00:22:24.650
Yeah, yeah. I was surprised too. I mean, but the reason,
462
00:22:25.170 --> 00:22:28.559
once
you find out like what high fructose corn syrup is,
463
00:22:28.579 --> 00:22:31.849
it makes a lot of sense. So I've been kind
464
00:22:31.890 --> 00:22:36.529
of holding back on you for dramatic effects. But basically,
465
00:22:37.029 --> 00:22:40.910
high fructose corn syrup does not actually have that much
466
00:22:40.950 --> 00:22:43.309
more fructose in it than normal table sugar.
467
00:22:43.789 --> 00:22:44.170
Really?
468
00:22:44.190 --> 00:22:46.009
Yeah, despite the name.
469
00:22:46.609 --> 00:22:47.349
It's just the name.
470
00:22:47.369 --> 00:22:47.710
Yeah.
471
00:22:47.750 --> 00:22:51.269
So basically, both are made out of two things, fructose
472
00:22:51.349 --> 00:22:57.220
and glucose. High fructose corn syrup is often 55% fructose.
473
00:22:57.960 --> 00:22:59.880
Do you want to guess how much fructose is in
474
00:22:59.920 --> 00:23:00.380
table sugar?
475
00:23:00.970 --> 00:23:04.210
Well, you told me it's not that much of a difference.
476
00:23:04.269 --> 00:23:04.509
So 50%?
477
00:23:04.509 --> 00:23:04.869
Yep.
478
00:23:04.950 --> 00:23:05.970
Okay.
479
00:23:06.509 --> 00:23:07.670
It's half and half.
480
00:23:08.529 --> 00:23:08.710
Okay.
481
00:23:08.730 --> 00:23:10.269
So yeah, they're pretty much on par.
482
00:23:10.369 --> 00:23:12.710
So it's slightly high fructose corn syrup.
483
00:23:13.049 --> 00:23:13.569
Yeah.
484
00:23:13.769 --> 00:23:16.170
In this case, it was slightly higher.
485
00:23:16.670 --> 00:23:19.430
And so that's why Kimber also wasn't surprised.
486
00:23:19.529 --> 00:23:23.029
That difference is not enough to show up at least
487
00:23:23.109 --> 00:23:24.349
in a two-week study.
488
00:23:24.410 --> 00:23:27.890
So it's actually, it's not like it doesn't deserve its stigma,
489
00:23:27.930 --> 00:23:28.839
high fructose corn syrup.
490
00:23:28.900 --> 00:23:29.180
No.
491
00:23:29.740 --> 00:23:31.799
Hmm. And others today have backed this up.
492
00:23:32.559 --> 00:23:32.920
It's funny.
493
00:23:32.960 --> 00:23:35.900
You'd think that if this is the case, the people
494
00:23:35.980 --> 00:23:39.019
behind high fructose corn syrup would have rebranded ages ago.
495
00:23:39.039 --> 00:23:39.119
Yeah.
496
00:23:40.160 --> 00:23:42.200
Because if they could just be.
497
00:23:42.140 --> 00:23:44.640
Like, if we just call it something else, then they
498
00:23:44.660 --> 00:23:47.240
wouldn't have had this whole mess, maybe.
499
00:23:47.349 --> 00:23:48.700
They actually tried to, yeah.
500
00:23:48.740 --> 00:23:50.970
There was like a campaign where they tried to change
501
00:23:51.029 --> 00:23:54.509
it to just corn sugar. But the problem is when
502
00:23:54.529 --> 00:23:57.700
they first invented it, You know, they called it high
503
00:23:57.779 --> 00:24:01.700
fructose corn syrup because the thing that came around first
504
00:24:01.759 --> 00:24:05.089
was just corn syrup. And that didn't have any fructose
505
00:24:05.119 --> 00:24:07.869
in it at all. So that was low fructose. That
506
00:24:07.890 --> 00:24:12.349
was basically no fructose. And then they started adding fructose
507
00:24:12.430 --> 00:24:15.970
to it to make it sweeter. And that's why they
508
00:24:15.990 --> 00:24:18.109
called it high fructose corn syrup. It's higher than nothing.
509
00:24:18.589 --> 00:24:21.369
So it's sort of a misnomer. And sometimes it actually
510
00:24:21.410 --> 00:24:25.410
has less fructose in it than table sugar. But I bet, yeah,
511
00:24:25.450 --> 00:24:28.819
I think they're probably regretting their decision pretty strongly now
512
00:24:29.000 --> 00:24:31.839
to call it that because now it's kind of stuck.
513
00:24:31.859 --> 00:24:37.279
So maybe this is ignorant, but table sugar, that's from... Beets?
514
00:24:37.779 --> 00:24:38.960
Cane? Sugar cane?
515
00:24:39.740 --> 00:24:39.960
Both.
516
00:24:39.980 --> 00:24:43.119
Yeah. Those are the two main sources are either beets
517
00:24:43.200 --> 00:24:45.940
or sugar cane. And that in both cases, it's half
518
00:24:45.980 --> 00:24:51.220
and half. So 50% fructose, 50% glucose, which by the way,
519
00:24:51.309 --> 00:24:53.950
means that there's like no real reason to think that
520
00:24:54.069 --> 00:24:57.109
cane sugar is like especially healthy for us when it's
521
00:24:57.329 --> 00:24:59.769
basically the same thing as high fructose corn syrup when
522
00:24:59.789 --> 00:25:02.880
you look at what makes it up. But so does
523
00:25:02.900 --> 00:25:06.549
this change your mind after all your, you know, brainwashing
524
00:25:06.589 --> 00:25:09.710
growing up in California about how terrible high fructose corn
525
00:25:09.730 --> 00:25:11.410
syrup was? Are you going to go put some of
526
00:25:11.450 --> 00:25:15.950
that now on your yogurt?
527
00:25:16.190 --> 00:25:18.930
You know, it's very hard to undo brainwashing, but I
528
00:25:18.930 --> 00:25:22.549
do genuinely. Now my question is like, maybe high fructose
529
00:25:22.569 --> 00:25:26.779
corn syrup isn't worse than other types of sources of sugar, but.
530
00:25:29.700 --> 00:25:30.539
Does that mean they're all bad?
531
00:25:30.579 --> 00:25:31.500
Because like, I.
532
00:25:31.460 --> 00:25:34.210
Think some, you know, hippies like me, we get a
533
00:25:34.230 --> 00:25:37.390
little bit of a... a squeeze of pleasure when we
534
00:25:37.670 --> 00:25:39.960
use agave or honey or something instead of like high
535
00:25:40.500 --> 00:25:43.200
fructose corn syrup. So does that mean like the natural
536
00:25:43.240 --> 00:25:46.759
sugars are, they're just as bad as high fructose corn syrup?
537
00:25:47.059 --> 00:25:49.480
Well, that's what we're going to look at next. So
538
00:25:49.660 --> 00:25:52.650
let's start with agave syrup. You know, you'll see this
539
00:25:52.730 --> 00:25:55.750
in fancy coffee shops. You can get it in your smoothie.
540
00:25:56.410 --> 00:25:59.329
But I couldn't find that much research backing up this
541
00:25:59.430 --> 00:26:04.480
idea that agave deserves this like wellness glow up. So
542
00:26:04.660 --> 00:26:07.400
there's barely any research on it in humans at all.
543
00:26:08.160 --> 00:26:11.380
And when you look at what's in it, it's mostly fructose.
544
00:26:11.880 --> 00:26:17.700
Around 85% of agave syrup is fructose. Oh. Huh.
545
00:26:17.920 --> 00:26:18.180
Okay.
546
00:26:18.480 --> 00:26:21.779
Agave is more fructose than high fructose corn syrup.
547
00:26:21.920 --> 00:26:22.220
Yes.
548
00:26:22.460 --> 00:26:25.980
Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. And, you know, some scientists argue that
549
00:26:26.059 --> 00:26:29.299
fructose might not be that much worse than glucose. But
550
00:26:29.319 --> 00:26:31.549
a lot of studies say that it is. So like
551
00:26:31.809 --> 00:26:34.289
I don't see any good reasons to like go for
552
00:26:34.329 --> 00:26:35.529
agave specifically.
553
00:26:35.549 --> 00:26:36.710
Oh, okay.
554
00:26:36.730 --> 00:26:37.279
All right.
555
00:26:37.660 --> 00:26:39.519
Unless it's been turned into a tequila. Yeah.
556
00:26:45.200 --> 00:26:45.480
All right.
557
00:26:45.559 --> 00:26:48.519
So let's look at maple syrup next. There's some buzz
558
00:26:48.599 --> 00:26:52.430
online about how that one's healthier. And there was a
559
00:26:52.450 --> 00:26:55.670
particular trial that comes up a lot. And at first glance,
560
00:26:55.990 --> 00:26:59.450
it looks like maple syrup is healthier. Like, you know,
561
00:26:59.470 --> 00:27:02.700
when you kind of skim the paper, it looked like
562
00:27:02.720 --> 00:27:06.640
they saw a difference between people who were eating maple
563
00:27:06.680 --> 00:27:10.069
syrup and people who are having table sugar. Like, the
564
00:27:10.109 --> 00:27:13.369
maple syrup group had less fat around their bellies. So
565
00:27:13.690 --> 00:27:15.210
I asked Kimber about that study.
566
00:27:15.730 --> 00:27:18.089
I can't tell you how unimpressed I was.
567
00:27:18.049 --> 00:27:19.430
By that study.
568
00:27:19.829 --> 00:27:20.069
Huh.
569
00:27:20.630 --> 00:27:24.730
So the reason she's unimpressed is that these researchers did
570
00:27:24.869 --> 00:27:28.509
dozens and dozens of tests looking for differences in like
571
00:27:28.630 --> 00:27:31.910
health markers between the group which got the maple syrup
572
00:27:32.009 --> 00:27:35.329
and the group that got the normal table sugar. And
573
00:27:35.430 --> 00:27:39.039
out of those dozens of tests, only three showed a difference.
574
00:27:39.829 --> 00:27:45.049
And they turn that into, wow, maple syrup is healthier.
575
00:27:45.970 --> 00:27:50.859
But any statistician will tell you, no, wait, that's within
576
00:27:50.960 --> 00:27:54.660
the odds of random chance.
577
00:27:55.319 --> 00:27:55.680
Right.
578
00:27:55.759 --> 00:27:57.839
You do that many of any study, and some of
579
00:27:57.880 --> 00:28:00.380
them will happen to turn up positive, especially when their
580
00:28:00.400 --> 00:28:01.960
p-values are like.
581
00:28:01.740 --> 00:28:04.529
0.047 for one of them.
582
00:28:05.230 --> 00:28:09.500
Oh my God, Meryl, I'm so impressed you said that.
583
00:28:09.539 --> 00:28:12.059
You know exactly what I'm talking about.
584
00:28:12.079 --> 00:28:13.799
Yes, exactly.
585
00:28:13.940 --> 00:28:17.789
Yeah. Okay. That's classic. If you run a lot of tests,
586
00:28:17.869 --> 00:28:21.200
some of them could come up showing a positive effect,
587
00:28:21.420 --> 00:28:22.660
even if it's just by chance.
588
00:28:22.779 --> 00:28:23.240
Yeah.
589
00:28:23.480 --> 00:28:26.480
And like they could have done some work to like
590
00:28:26.640 --> 00:28:28.529
correct for the fact that they were running so many tests,
591
00:28:28.650 --> 00:28:30.730
but you don't see them do that in the paper.
592
00:28:31.250 --> 00:28:34.230
And on top of that, the study was also funded
593
00:28:34.390 --> 00:28:36.109
by a maple syrup group in Canada.
594
00:28:36.130 --> 00:28:37.509
Oh, I was going to say, yeah.
595
00:28:37.529 --> 00:28:40.210
I was going to say, it's like the Canadian mafia
596
00:28:40.250 --> 00:28:42.730
was like behind this, the Canadian maple syrup mafia.
597
00:28:42.769 --> 00:28:42.910
Yeah.
598
00:28:43.450 --> 00:28:46.140
I mean, it's basically a group of maple syrup producers.
599
00:28:46.799 --> 00:28:49.359
I did reach out to the authors of the study
600
00:28:49.460 --> 00:28:53.720
about these criticisms and didn't hear back. But yeah, this
601
00:28:53.859 --> 00:28:56.700
was the most impressive study I could find on maple syrup.
602
00:28:56.940 --> 00:28:59.319
So I think it's delicious, but I don't think we
603
00:28:59.339 --> 00:29:00.799
have good evidence that it's healthier.
604
00:29:01.440 --> 00:29:03.119
And then you mentioned honey?
605
00:29:03.400 --> 00:29:05.069
That's my go-to sugar.
606
00:29:05.180 --> 00:29:05.970
Okay, well.
607
00:29:05.990 --> 00:29:09.309
Uh-oh. Don't ruin my breakfast.
608
00:29:09.410 --> 00:29:12.890
It does seem more promising to me, actually. So, like,
609
00:29:12.920 --> 00:29:16.160
there is a big review that came out recently that
610
00:29:16.180 --> 00:29:18.819
looked at all the trials that have been done on honey.
611
00:29:19.059 --> 00:29:21.740
And overall, it looked like there was a benefit with
612
00:29:21.759 --> 00:29:22.119
the honey.
613
00:29:22.319 --> 00:29:26.109
Like, multiple studies saying that people's cholesterol looked better than...
614
00:29:27.039 --> 00:29:30.809
In the sugar, like the table sugar group, for example. Yeah.
615
00:29:30.829 --> 00:29:34.230
And some of the studies found a benefit specifically when
616
00:29:34.250 --> 00:29:39.890
they were giving people so-called raw honey or like unprocessed honey. Oh.
617
00:29:40.819 --> 00:29:41.299
Okay.
618
00:29:41.579 --> 00:29:44.359
But when I talked to Kimber about this, she was
619
00:29:44.400 --> 00:29:46.980
like more positive than she
was with the maple syrup.
620
00:29:47.180 --> 00:29:49.690
But she did see some flaws in those studies too.
621
00:29:49.849 --> 00:29:52.730
Like most of them didn't blind the people in them.
622
00:29:52.849 --> 00:29:56.289
So they knew that they're getting honey and She thought,
623
00:29:56.309 --> 00:29:58.259
you know, maybe if people knew that they were getting
624
00:29:58.299 --> 00:30:01.619
this like supposedly healthy, you know, raw honey, then they'll
625
00:30:01.660 --> 00:30:05.440
do other healthy stuff too. And the review pointed this
626
00:30:05.519 --> 00:30:07.920
out too, saying that at least a dozen of the
627
00:30:07.960 --> 00:30:12.230
studies in their review had this issue. So overall, I
628
00:30:12.289 --> 00:30:16.529
asked Kimber... Bottom line, if you're trying to decide what
629
00:30:16.549 --> 00:30:19.319
to put on your yogurt, should you pick honey over
630
00:30:19.450 --> 00:30:21.500
maple syrup or like brown sugar?
631
00:30:21.740 --> 00:30:29.539
Possibly, yeah, but I would forego it completely and learn
632
00:30:29.599 --> 00:30:31.059
to put fruit on.
633
00:30:31.279 --> 00:30:33.380
But is it, do you think because there's a little
634
00:30:33.400 --> 00:30:36.809
bit of evidence that maybe it's better for like certain things,
635
00:30:36.970 --> 00:30:37.990
it's worthwhile?
636
00:30:38.589 --> 00:30:39.630
Substituting it in?
637
00:30:40.210 --> 00:30:45.230
It is questionable enough that if I was forced to
638
00:30:45.289 --> 00:30:52.950
make the decision between natural, unprocessed honey versus sucrose or
639
00:30:53.230 --> 00:30:57.759
any other form of sugar, I would pick the honey.
640
00:30:57.940 --> 00:31:00.240
If someone had a gun to your head and was like, Kimber,
641
00:31:00.380 --> 00:31:02.259
you must add one of these things to your yogurt,
642
00:31:02.380 --> 00:31:03.400
you would choose the honey.
643
00:31:03.420 --> 00:31:03.680
Exactly.
644
00:31:04.059 --> 00:31:09.019
That's how you'll have to phrase it. So, Rose, how
645
00:31:09.039 --> 00:31:10.579
does that make you feel about your honey?
646
00:31:13.140 --> 00:31:17.440
Well, here's what I would say. By adding some honey
647
00:31:17.470 --> 00:31:22.710
to this slop that I make, the honey makes me
648
00:31:23.289 --> 00:31:26.130
more likely to eat these other things that definitely have
649
00:31:26.150 --> 00:31:28.079
a lot of nutritive value. I have plain Greek yogurt.
650
00:31:30.220 --> 00:31:31.380
Lots of protein in there.
651
00:31:31.579 --> 00:31:34.940
And I do put fruit on it, Kimber. But it's
652
00:31:34.960 --> 00:31:37.279
still kind of sour, depending on the fruit. And I'll
653
00:31:37.299 --> 00:31:39.950
put some nuts or nut butter. I feel like she
654
00:31:39.970 --> 00:31:41.769
gave me a gold star for all that. And if
655
00:31:42.049 --> 00:31:44.269
adding a tablespoon of honey on that gets me to
656
00:31:44.549 --> 00:31:46.470
chow down on that every morning, I feel like it's
657
00:31:46.529 --> 00:31:47.390
probably okay.
658
00:31:48.009 --> 00:31:48.849
But maybe not.
659
00:31:48.930 --> 00:31:49.390
I don't know.
660
00:31:49.410 --> 00:31:52.670
Yeah. I mean, that brings us to this bigger question
661
00:31:52.819 --> 00:31:55.619
of like, overall, should we be feeling guilty about having
662
00:31:55.660 --> 00:31:58.289
some sugar in our lives? Like, Kimber's sort of a
663
00:31:58.309 --> 00:32:01.279
stickler when she says, you know, you really shouldn't have
664
00:32:01.420 --> 00:32:05.490
any added sugar. But other scientists are like, oh, no,
665
00:32:05.650 --> 00:32:07.849
like a little is okay. So like, let's look at
666
00:32:07.869 --> 00:32:11.150
what the World Health Organization says. They focus on something
667
00:32:11.210 --> 00:32:14.769
called free sugar. This is basically the sugar that's added
668
00:32:14.809 --> 00:32:18.549
to stuff. And so they recommend that you don't have
669
00:32:18.609 --> 00:32:22.049
more than 10% of your total calories be made up.
670
00:32:21.990 --> 00:32:22.710
Of this sugar.
671
00:32:23.579 --> 00:32:26.599
And research backs this up. Like one big study I
672
00:32:26.640 --> 00:32:30.019
found looked at how much sugar people ate and then
673
00:32:30.059 --> 00:32:33.759
their risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. And you can
674
00:32:33.900 --> 00:32:36.680
see the risk of death starting to creep up around
675
00:32:36.720 --> 00:32:37.059
this 10% mark.
676
00:32:38.259 --> 00:32:39.140
Oh, risk of death.
677
00:32:39.420 --> 00:32:39.720
Okay.
678
00:32:40.079 --> 00:32:44.819
So 10% of your daily calories is not like that intuitive.
679
00:32:44.839 --> 00:32:48.319
Can you give me something I can really sneak my
680
00:32:48.359 --> 00:32:48.779
teeth into?
681
00:32:48.880 --> 00:32:49.279
Yeah.
682
00:32:49.440 --> 00:32:51.859
So for someone who has 2,000 calories a day, that
683
00:32:51.859 --> 00:32:57.890
10% comes out to 50 grams of sugar. So, for example,
684
00:32:58.130 --> 00:33:01.029
a can of Coke has about 40 grams of sugar
685
00:33:01.069 --> 00:33:03.869
in it. So that would be most of your sugar
686
00:33:03.910 --> 00:33:05.829
budget right there if you had a can of Coke.
687
00:33:06.529 --> 00:33:10.730
Or you could have, like, three chocolate croissants. That's roughly
688
00:33:10.730 --> 00:33:11.930
50 grams of sugar.
689
00:33:11.950 --> 00:33:14.869
Well, because you only put that little nugget of chocolate
690
00:33:14.890 --> 00:33:15.609
in there.
691
00:33:15.650 --> 00:33:17.569
Yeah, it's not actually that much, but that still made
692
00:33:17.589 --> 00:33:21.769
me feel better. You're still eating three croissants.
693
00:33:21.990 --> 00:33:22.650
Yeah.
694
00:33:22.690 --> 00:33:23.589
Some other issues there.
695
00:33:23.630 --> 00:33:23.769
Yeah.
696
00:33:25.869 --> 00:33:28.390
So to me, I was like, oh, that's not too bad.
697
00:33:29.230 --> 00:33:32.579
So I talked about this with Jim
Mann, since he
698
00:33:32.640 --> 00:33:35.799
actually helps the World Health Organization come up with that
699
00:33:35.799 --> 00:33:39.099
10% recommendation. Does that mean I can have like a cupcake? Like,
700
00:33:39.119 --> 00:33:39.839
what does that mean?
701
00:33:40.019 --> 00:33:42.200
Can you have a cupcake? Sure, you can have a cupcake.
702
00:33:42.539 --> 00:33:45.220
But if you have a cupcake, then don't have something else.
703
00:33:45.740 --> 00:33:50.019
I mean, I had this morning with my coffee, I
704
00:33:50.079 --> 00:33:55.000
had some cheesecake. because there's a certain bakery in this
705
00:33:55.180 --> 00:33:59.480
town that makes very good cheesecake. And my daughter happened
706
00:33:59.500 --> 00:34:01.799
to produce some cheesecake from this bakery.
707
00:34:02.759 --> 00:34:03.019
And I.
708
00:34:04.700 --> 00:34:05.900
Absolutely enjoyed it.
709
00:34:06.190 --> 00:34:09.250
But I mean, I've made a mental note before we
710
00:34:09.289 --> 00:34:12.869
had this conversation without even thinking, well, that's my dose
711
00:34:12.909 --> 00:34:16.309
for the day. And I enjoyed it. And it was
712
00:34:16.449 --> 00:34:22.579
really good. And it enhanced my well-being tremendously. but I
713
00:34:22.639 --> 00:34:25.719
certainly would not have a dessert tonight.
714
00:34:25.780 --> 00:34:27.869
But you didn't feel guilty about having that slice?
715
00:34:27.969 --> 00:34:29.610
No, I didn't feel I thoroughly enjoyed it.
716
00:34:31.650 --> 00:34:34.050
Yeah, that's reasonable. I mean, full disclosure, I had a
717
00:34:34.050 --> 00:34:36.329
piece of cake before jumping on this call.
718
00:34:37.730 --> 00:34:39.030
I made a cake over the weekend.
719
00:34:39.050 --> 00:34:39.909
Before I told.
720
00:34:39.809 --> 00:34:41.690
You the science of how bad sugar is.
721
00:34:42.269 --> 00:34:44.070
I just gobbled it down.
722
00:34:44.429 --> 00:34:46.469
Then I had honey on my yogurt. So I'm actually
723
00:34:46.489 --> 00:34:48.659
probably over budget today, but I'm definitely not going to
724
00:34:48.679 --> 00:34:50.219
have any more sweets the rest of the day. So
725
00:34:50.500 --> 00:34:51.239
I like his approach.
726
00:34:51.280 --> 00:34:51.679
Yeah.
727
00:34:52.260 --> 00:34:52.820
Well, thanks, Rose.
728
00:34:52.960 --> 00:34:53.300
Thanks, girl.
729
00:34:57.130 --> 00:34:59.510
So we have 60 citations in this episode.
730
00:34:59.550 --> 00:35:01.329
If you want to look at any of those, read
731
00:35:01.389 --> 00:35:04.130
more about sugar science, then check out our transcripts.
732
00:35:04.250 --> 00:35:05.590
The link is in the show notes.
733
00:35:06.449 --> 00:35:09.329
And the last citation is a special treat, a link
734
00:35:09.349 --> 00:35:12.230
to an episode of Science Versus that was made 10
735
00:35:12.230 --> 00:35:23.099
years ago that was also on sugar. This episode was
736
00:35:23.159 --> 00:35:26.110
produced by me, Meryl Horne, with help from Rose Rimler,
737
00:35:26.150 --> 00:35:29.989
Michelle Dang, and Aketi Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Sorrell.
738
00:35:30.190 --> 00:35:33.650
Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Our executive producer
739
00:35:33.750 --> 00:35:37.409
is Wendy Zuckerman. Fact-checking by Sam Lemenick. Music written by
740
00:35:37.449 --> 00:35:41.639
Peter Leonard, Bobby Lord, So Wiley, Emma Munger, and Bumi Hidaka.
741
00:35:42.159 --> 00:35:44.860
Thanks to all the researchers we spoke to, including Professor
742
00:35:44.940 --> 00:35:50.340
Barry Popkin, Dr. John White, Dr. Nick Fuller, Professor Paul Breslin, Dr.
743
00:35:50.440 --> 00:35:54.150
Richard Johnson, and Dr. Vasanti Malik. Science Versus is a
744
00:35:54.139 --> 00:35:57.510
Spotify Studios original. Listen for free on Spotify or wherever
745
00:35:57.530 --> 00:36:00.309
you get your podcasts. And if you do listen on Spotify,
746
00:36:00.349 --> 00:36:03.250
follow us and tap the bell for episode notifications. We'll
747
00:36:03.269 --> 00:36:03.750
fact you soon.
748
00:36:15.380 --> 00:36:17.019
It's been a busy week, right?
749
00:36:17.380 --> 00:36:21.380
Sounds like it's time for that takeaway. Deliveroo's on it.
750
00:36:21.679 --> 00:36:26.000
Whether it's extra saucy wings from Nando's, a tasty taco
751
00:36:26.019 --> 00:36:29.199
bowl from Sprout & Co, or maybe even some California
752
00:36:29.280 --> 00:36:33.730
birria from Boojum. We'll deliver in as little as 25 minutes.
753
00:36:34.269 --> 00:36:35.949
Order now. You've earned it.
754
00:36:36.409 --> 00:36:36.989
Deliveroo.
755
00:36:37.570 --> 00:36:40.610
That finish line Friday feeling just got even better.
756
00:36:41.150 --> 00:36:43.969
Geographical restrictions, teas and season fees apply. Delivery times vary.
757
00:36:44.010 --> 00:36:45.090
See app or web for info.