FitnessTim wrote: » In moderate amounts, sugar is relatively harmless. So what is a moderate, or safe amount of sugar? The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that an adult consume less than 10% of their calorie intake or about 25 grams. To put it in perspective, below are a few foods and their sugar content: Coke, 12 oz can = 25 grams Yoplait Original Yogurt 6 oz = 26 grams Orange juice raw 12 oz = 31 grams Ragu Marinara Sauce 1/2 cup = 12 grams Fruit Loops 1 cup = 12 grams Wonder Bread small 2 slices = 4 grams Cliff Bar 1 serving = 22 grams Grapes 3.5 oz serving = 15 grams
Can we trust the recommendation of the World Health Organization? Despite it being an internationally respected organization, I won't blindly follow the recommendation of any one group or person. I did some research and purposefully tried to find any evidence the counters the recommendation. While it was easy to find people on discussion boards who will still argue for sugar, I have yet to find a single nutrition authority who will claim that sugar is safe to consume in the quantities that people typically consume.
I'm not going into the science behind why sugar is bad. Just search on the web, "Is sugar bad" and read for yourself. The main problem is that sugar appears to be the main cause of obesity.
I was under the assumption that we needed some sugar in our diets, but I have yet to find any recommendation for a minimum amount. There are people who suffer from hypoglycemia that can experience blood sugar emergencies and need to consume sugar quickly, but as for the average person, I don't know.
To be clear, I don't intend to cut out sugar completely so my interest in minimum amounts is purely academic. I won't go completely sugar-free because, as the WHO recommendation suggest, I believe a moderate amounts of sugar is safe. I will avoid foods with added sugars as much as possible. By tracking in MyFitnessPal, I want to keep my sugar intake between 12 and 25g. Some may consider this extreme but it is the average person's diet that is really extreme. The average person's intake of sugar is double the recommended maximum amount. What is your take on sugar? Is it something you try to restrict or do you just concern yourself with calories.
FitnessTim wrote: » I was under the assumption that we needed some sugar in our diets, but I have yet to find any recommendation for a minimum amount...
4 MARCH 2015 ¦ GENEVA - A new WHO guideline recommends adults and children reduce their daily intake of free sugars to less than 10% of their total energy intake. A further reduction to below 5% or roughly 25 grams (6 teaspoons) per day would provide additional health benefits. Free sugars refer to monosaccharides (such as glucose, fructose) and disaccharides (such as sucrose or table sugar) added to foods and drinks by the manufacturer, cook or consumer, and sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, fruit juices and fruit juice concentrates.
SideSteel wrote: » FitnessTim wrote: » In moderate amounts, sugar is relatively harmless. So what is a moderate, or safe amount of sugar? The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that an adult consume less than 10% of their calorie intake or about 25 grams. To put it in perspective, below are a few foods and their sugar content: Coke, 12 oz can = 25 grams Yoplait Original Yogurt 6 oz = 26 grams Orange juice raw 12 oz = 31 grams Ragu Marinara Sauce 1/2 cup = 12 grams Fruit Loops 1 cup = 12 grams Wonder Bread small 2 slices = 4 grams Cliff Bar 1 serving = 22 grams Grapes 3.5 oz serving = 15 grams The recommendation is not for all sugar, it's for "added sugar". The specific concerns regarding sugar are primarily due to how sugar intake influences total energy intake and how sugar intake can push other needed nutrients off the table if it occupies too great a portion of the diet. Can we trust the recommendation of the World Health Organization? Despite it being an internationally respected organization, I won't blindly follow the recommendation of any one group or person. I did some research and purposefully tried to find any evidence the counters the recommendation. While it was easy to find people on discussion boards who will still argue for sugar, I have yet to find a single nutrition authority who will claim that sugar is safe to consume in the quantities that people typically consume. I think it's wise to research on your own but the big exception here is whether or not you (I mean "you" in a general sense here so I am not directing this statement at you specifically) understand how to differentiate between alarmist blog posts and actual research and if you DO, are you able to look at the collection of available evidence and evaluate where it points rather than looking at a single study. I'm not going into the science behind why sugar is bad. Just search on the web, "Is sugar bad" and read for yourself. The main problem is that sugar appears to be the main cause of obesity. Just searching the web isn't sufficient for reasons stated in my previous paragraph. Sugar is not the "main cause of obesity" but it's certainly a contributing factor. The only thing we can say with relative certainty is that people are consuming too many calories and/or moving too little and it's likely a combination of both given that (at least in the US) calorie intake has risen and activity has dropped. A good question to ask would be "why is that happening?". Sugar is probably a portion of that in that it's easy to overconsume calories if you're eating relatively high amounts of sugar. But you can't really point at a singular factor as being the cause of obesity. It's a multifactorial issue. I was under the assumption that we needed some sugar in our diets, but I have yet to find any recommendation for a minimum amount. There are people who suffer from hypoglycemia that can experience blood sugar emergencies and need to consume sugar quickly, but as for the average person, I don't know. Your body converts carbohydrates to glucose. And when you don't consume carbohydrates or you consume very little carbohydrates you can convert non carbohydrates to glucose through a process called gluconeogenesis. You probably don't need to consume any ADDED sugar in your diet, but this brings about an important point that I believe to be true: Whether or not something is "necessary" shouldn't be a deciding factor on whether or not we should consume it. Carbohydrates are non essential but it's foolish to entirely eliminate them. To be clear, I don't intend to cut out sugar completely so my interest in minimum amounts is purely academic. I won't go completely sugar-free because, as the WHO recommendation suggest, I believe a moderate amounts of sugar is safe. I will avoid foods with added sugars as much as possible. By tracking in MyFitnessPal, I want to keep my sugar intake between 12 and 25g. Some may consider this extreme but it is the average person's diet that is really extreme. The average person's intake of sugar is double the recommended maximum amount. What is your take on sugar? Is it something you try to restrict or do you just concern yourself with calories. I think that "most" people probably would benefit by reducing the added sugar in their diet. When I say "most" people I'm largely referring to people who are not fitness conscious and who are eating a rather poor diet in total. But I also think that sugar is largely demonized in the media as being this cocaine like addictive substance that is going to give you all kinds of diseases, and I think that's taking things too far. Regarding your sugar intake goals, I think that's very low and I would take a guess that your going to have to restrict your diet a great deal, and that's probably not going to be good for long term adherence. I'd also add that you should differentiate between added sugar so that you're not eliminating nutrient dense things like fruit from your diet for fear of sugar.
Sabine_Stroehm wrote: » The WHO guidelines refer primarily to "free" sugars". Not a bad idea at all to take a look at, and limit free sugars. People, in general, get far too much added sugars in their diet, usually at the expense of more nutrient dense foods. So limiting it isn't a bad Idea at all. The WHO says: 4 MARCH 2015 ¦ GENEVA - A new WHO guideline recommends adults and children reduce their daily intake of free sugars to less than 10% of their total energy intake. A further reduction to below 5% or roughly 25 grams (6 teaspoons) per day would provide additional health benefits. Free sugars refer to monosaccharides (such as glucose, fructose) and disaccharides (such as sucrose or table sugar) added to foods and drinks by the manufacturer, cook or consumer, and sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, fruit juices and fruit juice concentrates. Six teaspoons of added sugars a day seems like plenty to me.
kristalasimpson wrote: » Refined sugars are the ones we should avoid wherever we can. They do us no favours. MFP measures all sugar on your diary - natural and refined. They do not separate healthy sugars found in fruit from white sugar you add in you coffee or found in your breads and sauces and really any processed food. The food companies have it down to a science on how much salt, sugar and fat is needed to be added to food and how to make us addicted to it. There is an excellent book on this. Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us by Michael Moss It really if anything opened my mind on what is put in our grocery bought foods and helps me make more informed decisions. I have lost 8 lbs just from modifying what I eat since January thanks to this book. I am not perfect and still slip up, but it is more of an emotional battle for me now.
wizzybeth wrote: » So please, explain how my eating all this sugar is contributing to my obesity, since I've lost 30 lbs in about 3 months time?
FitnessTim wrote: » wizzybeth wrote: » So please, explain how my eating all this sugar is contributing to my obesity, since I've lost 30 lbs in about 3 months time? That's easy to answer. You are amazing. You current level of focus and dedication to your weight loss is why you are losing weight despite consuming more sugar than the recommended amount. Even if you do okay with a high sugar diet, that doesn't mean it will work for others. In addition, even if a person had no problem with a high sugar diet now they may have to cut back later on in life as their metabolism changes. For me, I'd rather get rid of my sugar craving now rather than wait until I am forced to when I'm older. Also, what I said about the WHO recommendation was misleading. Chrysalid's clarification of 10% of calories is the maximum. The 5% is a suggestion for further health benefits. I know we've been warned before about other foods that turned out not to be as bad for us as experts stated. The whole low-fat diet craze is what actually turned me towards a high sugar/ high carb diet. In that case, the low fat diet was based on faulty data. With sugar there has been a lot more research. Still, nothing is certain.
The fundamental cause of obesity and overweight is an energy imbalance between calories consumed and calories expended.
FitnessTim wrote: » In moderate amounts, sugar is relatively harmless. So what is a moderate, or safe amount of sugar? The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that an adult consume less than 10% of their calorie intake or about 25 grams.
Free sugars contribute to the overall energy density of diets. Ensuring energy balance is critical to maintaining healthy body weight and ensuring optimal nutrient intake. There is increasing concern that consumption of free sugars, particularly in the form of sugar-sweetened beverages, may result in both reduced intake of foods containing more nutritionally adequate calories and an increase in total caloric intake, leading to an unhealthy diet, weight gain and increased risk of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs).
lemurcat12 wrote: » Also, if you look at the reasoning, it shouldn't be one size fits all. Someone doing lots of endurance exercise might need more sugar, and the WHO hasn't said that's bad (assuming adequate dental hygiene, of course). It's more about the general population, not someone who is already quite thoughtful about his or her diet.
