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Jari Hiltunen

Manager, Information Technology/ Organizational Development/ Gra, AB Enzymes

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Is Fructose (table sugar as well) poisonous?

Professor Robert Lustig has quite a few videos at Youtube (searchword Sugar, The Bitter Truth as an example) and he have published plentifull of information how poisonous frutcose is. Most interesting finding is a leptine resistense, which is a "Darvinian explanation" for the obesity. And fact that fructose causes fatty liver (metabolic disorder) as well. Take a look into his powepoint at http://www.slideshare.net/ancestralhealth/ahs-slidesrobert-lustig or article at The Atlantic http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/02/the-most-unhappy-of-pleasures-this-is-your-brain-on-sugar/253341/ (for finnish speaking I have draft document here http://tinyurl.com/d69xwux) and if you think professor Lustig is right, how come food manufacturers keeps adding fructose almost into every food?

Topics: Carbon hydrates Fat Fructose Ghrelin Insulin resistence Leptin Leptin resistence sugar
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  • Carnell Tate

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    May 5 2012: Science has recently proven that sugar, in most cases, is more addicting than cocainet. So why do food manufacturers keep adding fructose to their foods? The answer is simple: Follow the money baby!

  • Adam Druit

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    May 4 2012: Wait, was it actually suggested that sugar is as poisonous as alcohol? I'm sorry, but this just isn't true. Correct, eating excessive amounts of sugar over decades of one's life can lead to increased risk of a variety of diseases. So can salt, or almost any vitamin the body needs to survive.

    However, there are a few important distinctions. First- sugar does serve a recognizable, useful purpose for humans: it provides quick access to energy.

    Second, especially as it relates to alcohol and other drugs, the effective dose/lethal dose of sugar is tiny compared to other substances.
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    Jim Moonan 30+

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    Apr 13 2012: It all comes down to three things:
    1. Education
    2. Self-discipline
    3. Support
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    Colleen Steen 500+

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    Apr 13 2012: Interesting and very relevant question Jari, at least to me, at this moment.
    I just returned from Boston, where I spent the last 4 days with my brother, who had lung cancer surgery, and spent post-op in ICU.

    During the stay in Boston, there were several informational/educational meetings for patients and families of patients, given by the thoracic dept. at Brigham and Women's hosp., which is a leader in cancer research. One session was facilitated by Dr. David Sugarbaker, world reknown expert on lung cancer and in particular, Mesothelioma. During the presentation, he stated..."refined sugar feeds cancer cells...if you do nothing else...cut out refined sugar".

    You ask..."how come food manufacturers keeps adding fructose almost into every food?"
    My guess is because it's addicting, and causes people to buy more of those kinds of foods?
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    Jari Hiltunen

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    Apr 13 2012: Anne: you should watch those presentations. Then you understand, that fructose is as poisonous as alcohol, but also as addictive as many narcotics. Therefore, it is not person's responsibility if brains tells you to eat more than you need (practically speaking your leptine does not work or your dopamine need elevating with sugar).

    In other hand, if sugar is not poisonous, then alcohol is not poisonous either. Both brokes liver cell mitochondrio, and causes fatty liver. What word should I use than "poison"?

    Krisztian: with your logic manufacturers should add cannabis to bread, just because people will want it. It most certainly makes life happier :)

    Once again, what is wrong with professor Lustig's statements? Why should I believe he is wrong? I see quite a few studies at Pubmed.com about fructose being not good. Are them "pseudoscientific" all? For example, related to Mediator drug (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12155639), science proved Mediator is safe to use, but in practise it wasn't. Thinking whole process, I presume we still live in similar science atmosphere where Nicolaus Copernicus lived when he tried to bring up his idea about heliocentric model. Took some 400 years before other scientists believed "yes, he was right".

    Why we keep saying fats are reason for obesity, when reports shows that fat consumption has dropped more than 10% in past 25 years, but obesity (and related sicknesses like Alzaimer, diabetes II etc) has tripled in the same time?

    What I do not understand here?
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      Krisztián Pintér 200+

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      TED Translator
      Apr 13 2012: "it is not person's responsibility if brains tells you to eat more than you need"

      ugh, oh, wait. what? you say that we are not responsible for our actions, because our brain tell us to do things? what kind of denial of responsibility is that? can we also say that we cheat, steal or kill because of our brain told us so?

      certainly i'm in command of my hand. i either take that product fro the shelf or not. nobody else than me makes this decision, and i clearly can not take it. if i do, it is my choice, whatever influences were there.
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        Salim Solaiman 50+

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        Apr 13 2012: So far denial of self responsibility of humankind was around GOD & SATAN concept.....now we got moleculer biology concept .....which pretends to be science !!!

        Which means I can sexually abuse a girl / woman then my lawyer in court can come up with solid and valid argument that it was not a crime done by ME but my testerone surge.....amazing really !!!
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          Julija L. 30+

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          TED Translator
          Apr 13 2012: Hey, he was about some kind of addiction, what is much more likely to be less controlling of yourself, plus, it is not a crime, plus, sugar in most attractive forms is all around us and it is a hard mission for many people not to overdose it in their simple daily meals.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          Apr 13 2012: julija, a hard mission is exactly what it sounds: a hard mission. just as hard as for a poor person not to steal. or an angry person not to hit. maybe it is not fair to have hard tasks, but that's what we got. the last thing we need is to look for a scapegoat.
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          Julija L. 30+

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          TED Translator
          Apr 13 2012: I meant that an absolutely average person who does not care of something like amount of sugar, who does not have overweight problems yet, who finds more interesting businesses than studying 'the eating' overdoses it.
          The main point here is that it may cause an addiction. Then, the idea of simple controlling of yourself does not work.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          Apr 13 2012: absolutely average person hears every day about how important healthy diet is. not caring is not an excuse. if you don't care about a danger, you are in trouble.
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    Anne Dagen 10+

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    Apr 12 2012: If sugar was poisonous there would be evidence in the form of deaths. People can eat sugar without dying or suffering illness so it is clearly not poisonous in itself.Pseudoscientific studies are far too willing to blame food substances when the real problem is overconsumption.
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      Jari Hiltunen

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      Apr 13 2012: Anne .. I do not agree to this "People can eat sugar without dying or suffering illness so it is clearly not poisonous in itself" ... sugar consumption short term is not poisonous (or give me idea which is better word than poisonous), but long term it is poisonous (due to fuctose, not glucose part of sugar)... if we trust professor Lustig. Overconsumption is interesting question: you should ask why people are overeating? Is that natural and can they really control it? Or is it our brains, as Lustig states, which makes us eat too much?

      About pseudoscience: is science always reactive and pseudoscience pro-active? Lets take an simple example: we invent new ingredient named "badtastegood", which we would like to add to almost every food. Science goes thru standardized process to approve new ingredient "badtastegood" and we start consuming ingredient. At the same time some Lustig-like person says "that will lead to schizophrenia because "badtastegood" damage our neuroreseptors long term". Person is not able to prove fact by science, so we call it pseudoscience. After few years we find that most of us are in fact schizophrenic, and those "stupid idiots" whom trusted pseudoscientist, are normal.

      Should we roll back to food we have used to eat past 200 000 years, where to our genetics is adjusted to? And then take steps towards modern food culture step by step, waiting at least two generations between steps (epigenetics)?
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        Anne Dagen 10+

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        Apr 13 2012: There are 2 very different issues. Sugar is a naturally occuring substance which has been part of the human diet, particularly as fruit sugar, for years. The human race has survived, which would not be the case if sugars were poisonous. Long term overconsumption is a very different matter, that has to do with excess rather than the underlying substance.

        Why do people overconsume? There are many reasons. Some substances are in themselves addictive, so create a need for increasing consumption. Some substances masquerade as similar tasting substances whcih are more nutritious. Because those substances provide the appropriate taste sensation without the nutrition, they create a demand for increased consumption. Boredom is another cause of overconsumption.

        There are some interesting examples of overconsumption among social groups which move in a short space of time from a hunter-gatherer existence to a modern lifestyle. The original lifestyle was one of scarcity, where it was a good idea to consume what was available since there was no certainty about when food would next be available. Take that mindset into a world of plenty and it leads to all the diseases associated with overconsumption. In these examples the problem is not genetic adaption, but the change in food availability.

        As regards science, the Latin root of the word means knowledge, and I think that is misleading. Science builds models, which are valid until there are observations which do not fit the model. A lot of scientific models are inadequate because the research is done in order to validate predetermined assumptions, and conclusions are often skewed to fit the desired results. Little, if any, of today's scientific research is designed to capture observations first and then build the model.
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    Krisztián Pintér 200+

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    TED Translator
    Apr 11 2012: because people buy their products. why would manufacturers not provide something people want?
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