Highly consumed, highly addictive, and highly toxic. This substance is the cause of millions of deaths every year. No, it’s not alcohol, but something that is found in almost every household. This drug, is sugar. Too much sugar can lead to obesity, diabetes and even some cancers, but national awareness, plus personal commitment to good health can help.
Because sugar is everywhere in our society today, we don’t often think of it as poisonous or dangerous but in fact, ‘death by sugar’ is not an overstatement. Research indicates that sugar is the primary factor causing not only obesity but also chronic and lethal disease. Dr. Robert Lustig, a neuroendocrinologist at the San Francisco school of medicine states that “Sugar can act like poison in high doses—and the amount in our diets has gone beyond toxic”
Sugar was not a threat until recently. This is because the amount of sugar consumed has risen drastically. In the 17 hundreds, the average consumption of sugar was at only approximately 4 pounds per year. By 1900 that number had risen to a surprising 90 pounds per year and now, the average person consumes about 125-150 pounds of sugar per year, that’s almost half a pound of sugar daily.
One of the main reasons for our
…show more content…
Consuming it in high doses throughout the day without fiber to slow it down is much more than our bodies can handle. The over-eating of sugar can permanently damage the liver, just like too much alcohol. Fructose also fools your metabolism and trick your body into gaining weight and does not supress ghrelin, the hunger hormone, so our bodies don’t know when there is too much sugar being consumed. This can and ultimately result in developing obesity. Obesity is a condition where a person has accumulated so much body fat that it has a negative effect on their health, it can result to many other diseases including high blood pressure, high cholesterol and heart disease, as well as cancer and