Warnings About Sugar

I don't usually read Good Housekeeping, but I was waiting for my physical therapy appointment the other day, and picked up the magazine.  As I thumbed through it, I noticed a small picture of something that had first been published in their magazine in 1927.  It was a skull and crossbones, with a bag of sugar.  They knew then that too much sugar was not good for you, and here it is, 90+ years later, and we're still having the same conversation.  I guess it takes a long time to get the message out to the public.

We all know the negatives of sugar.  Weight gain, diabetes, heart disease, you name it.  Sugar can be a contributing factor.  In 1927 when Good Housekeeping first told us of the dangers of sugar, the average American was eating 100 pounds of sugar a year.  Can that be right?  It sounds like a lot, and I thought that with artificial sweeteners Americans would be eating less sugar today, but that is not the case.  Americans are eating about 150 pounds of sugar per person today.  I guess that's because some form of sugar is in almost everything we eat, from crackers, to canned veggies, to cereal.  It was not this way years ago.

Corn syrup, another form of sugar, was identified years ago as a culprit in making America fat.  Most manufacturers have reduced or eliminated corn syrup from their products.  (Ocean Spray led the way on this).  Is artificial sweetener a better choice?  There are opinions on both sides.  The real answer is to eliminate as much processed sugar as possible and get back to eating and enjoying real, natural food.