Corn Syrup and its Association to Obesity

Doh... You mean if I don't eat so much I won't get fat? That's it?

How can that be? I will have no one or anything to blame but myself. I need a lawyer.

(Much sarcasm if you didn't get it. )

The factor of excessive consumption lies in the fact that corn syrup is so wide-spread in industrial production of food, it is nearly exclusive as substitute for plain sugar.

Lookup the presence and amount of corn syrup in countless industrial food products, if only to assess the degree of excessive consumption involved.

Industrial makers of food, have no incentive to replace this syrup because it is highly concentrated, very cheap substitute for plain sugar, having the "added bonus" of blocking the user's signal in the brain, telling them they are no longer hungry, having enough food intake at any given meal in question.

A vicious circle serving for self-perpetuation ?

This can be a pretty sensitive discussion point. Let's give it a try, see how many people I can stir up with this:

I'm mid 50's, 6'-2" tall and about 200 pounds. I wrestled at 185 pounds in high school. My diet is, I think, generally healthy. Not too many Fritos, snack cupcakes, cans of soda pop, or ice cream bars in my daily routine. Mostly fresh fruits and vegetables, but I'm not afraid to eat some canned corn or peas once in a while. I eat red meat, fish, fried chicken, baked taters with butter and sour cream... a varied diet of common food, most items are not really touted as low fat.

I have a co-worker, mid 40's, about 5'-10" and 350 pounds. This fellow drinks more soda pop at work in a week than I drink in a year. I've seen him eat an entire bag of potato chips in a single sitting.

Lifestyle... choice... habit...

Consume more calories than you burn = obesity.

This topic has been discussed for years. Following the disaster of 'New Coke', the Coca Cola company started using high fructose corn syrup to sweeten Coke, rather than sugar. Coke purists hated the change (and buy Coke made with sugar, when they can find it; sugar is still used to make it at some of their international bottling plants).

Saying this sweetener is connected to obesity is nothing new; there is probably some truth to it.

BUT -- Is that your purpose here? To scold us about the foods we should (or should not) eat and drink: http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/84785/Cooked-Food-Can-Induce-Cancer

Frankly, I'm tired of having self-appointed experts telling me what I should or should not do.

Ooops, struck a nerve there eh?

??? Not sure what you mean. I seldom drink that stuff -- and I'm not overweight; actually fairly slender. (If that's what you were implying.) Nor do I smoke. I drink only moderately. -- But it's my choice if I do or don't, and it's my choice to be informed of the dangers to my health, or to not be.

Seems like every blog or news place you look at on the internet there is some food nazi (like Mayor Doomsburg in NYC) telling people what they're allowed to drink or eat; and even passing laws about it. It's none of his damn business.

Disappointed to see a food nanny show up here on CR4.

Old saying: God save me from those who want to save me.

My statement was triggered by the fact you seem to take an informative conversational post so personally.......In any case I have to agree there is no shortage of people who are convinced they know what's "safe" to consume, and what's harmful, and seem to ignore the source and handling, which is at least as important....imo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foodborne_illness

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/29285754/ns/health-food_safety/t/food-poisoning-strikes-americans-year/#.UZ6QK4f2aSo

I agree with SE. If you're so upset, why are you here? If you are in control you can leave.

I think they were just explaining why drinking 2 gallons of sugar water every day is bad for your health.

Well I cannot comment because I choose to buy and eat healthy foods, and I cannot think of any food or drink I consume which has corn syrup in it (yes I check all the ingredient labels of what I eat).

Eat healthy, problem solved one person at a time.

Just barbecue it before you eat it.

Maybe they should change the portion size, when i went from the Japanese burger joint to the one on the american base, the size difference of the portions and drinks was startling and it was cheaper too.

An individual's health and well-being affects the whole society. We justify and enforce seatbelt, motorcycle helmut and drug laws but openly allow other neglective or abusive behavior to one's own body? Suicide is illegal when done quickly, so why not also when done slowly?

Thank you!

In this highly individualistic culture we live in, people get indignant when asked to consider how one's behavior affects the society as a whole. It's a balancing act, not just looking at one's reflection in the mirror.

Read the Book (Wheat Belly by Dr. William Davis MD. or his other book Lose the Wheat/Lose the weight) and then tell me how to lose the weight. After reading the book you can make up your own mind on what is bad for you.

Research the Essential Fatty Acids. Learn the effects of imbalnced nutrition caused by the effect of excessive Omega-6. Learn what the Omega fatty acids are - and you will have your answers.

I understand that this can fall into the category of "food police" and other derogatory comments, but until we educate ourselves, the rest is just opinion.

The information can be independently researched or these links are a good start.

www.uswellnessmeats.com/health.html

www.eatwild.com

http://www.texasgrassfedbeef.com/nutrition_information.htm

Using artificial chemicals are huge uncontrolled experiments. The initiator mostly does not know the outcome. Nor do you, neither do I, at the beginning.

Among sane people, that alone would be plenty of reason, not to do it.

But, why to opt for calm sanity, when arguing (less than halfbaked stuff) is available?!?

------------------------------------------------------------------

The actual biochemistry of HFC is instructive, why (while congress mandated it for reasons of their own) it does not work, nor will it ever work in a human body.

In the meantime, use your curiosity, and innate learning ability here. Facts are stubborn things. Neither a bearing's galling, nor HFC's conundrum can be handled with one-liners.

Am I critical? You bet I am!

I apologize for a belated post, but I'm quite behind on my CR4 thread headline emails, since the Memorial Day weekend. That might be a good thing, since comments here seem to have subsided, and my posts can seem disruptive, and/or off-topic, in that I sometimes branch out to whatever strikes me as interesting when following links from my surfing.

I began by looking for some brief history of HFC. The one I picked may or may not be the best, but it is this one.

When common activities of a large number of people are labeled "bad" -- either for the individual (ex.: drinking soda pop) or society at large (affecting the carbon cycle) it is like stirring up a hornet's nest. One article I found about the relationship between drinking soda pop and obesity, shows a similarity to other controversial subjects, like global warming. Proof seems hard to define. And some of the "data," which seems pretty straight forward, gets tapped danced around, using semantics, etc. (It depends on what the meaning of is IS.) I might suggest that if one likes drinking soda, one might be a bit predisposed to find flaws in research showing it to be detrimental. Any of us can have reason clouded if personal habits that produce a "pleasure" reaction in the brain are deemed harmful.

Also, there may be a more "systemic" way to view the obesity problem. Leptin and its association with obesity, via interfering with signalling, is now a more popularly known topic for research. But HFC is one of several influences interrupting leptin signalling. It seems that "inflammation" (and the article, unfortunately, doesn't define it before proceeding,) is another component of interfering with leptin in the body. Not defining inflammation is unfortunate because the term can be applied to many diseased conditions, with specific observed conditions. The Wiki article about it demonstrates this. (Note section 7.3 headed "Systemic inflammation and obesity," at the beginning of the article entry.) I also find it interesting that the article refers to leptin "resistance" because Type II diabetes refers to insulin "resistance." Coincidence?

In another article, reference is made to heating HCF producing toxic chemicals hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF). (Heating/cooking food does usually change its constituents, some for worse, some for better; just depends. See thread on CR4 about cooking food and its relation to cancer.)

Because health issues manifest in so many ways (diseased conditions), we tend to want to think each one has a specific cause and remedy. While many do -- like infectious diseases -- many health "problems," such as degenerative diseases, might go away, or be delayed, with the simple regime of not eating processed foods. They contain so many chemicals that we wouldn't ingest (and don't occur naturally in the body) when eating non-processed foods. And how many of them may contribute to a collective "systemic inflammation" response in our body? AND... if we don't fully understand what that response is and how it works... then? The only real proof needed may be in not eating the pudding and observing the results.

Recent books and articles have argued that processed foods can be just as addictive as opiates. Here's one person's tip for dealing with that. (I'm not endorsing the web site or any blogs there. I just found it interesting as a helping factor to limit or eliminate processed foods. Whether, practically speaking, it works, I don't know. I'm skeptical. But I'll give it a try it the next time I reach for that bag of chips and picante sauce.)

Sorry for the number of links. It is a complex subject and I include links I find informative, interesting and pertinent, and which aid in completeness and context. (Well, most of them, anyway.) It doesn't help that my mind is very susceptible to tangential thinking. I, now, also apologize for not sticking strictly to the topic of HFC. Obesity, as a key word, is in the thread title, too.

You are really wandering off into fascinating tangents. For the fundamentals they are not relevant. When the fundamentals are violated, the remainder is academic. Mayor Mike was right, sort of, for a change.

The basic is high school chemistry. At low concentration chemical processes run according a control. When a threshold is exceeded, spontaneous reactions result in definitely unwanted products. Some of them difficult to break down. Some of them damaging your kidney, etc. in the process.

Such damage can be shown on your red blood cells with a blood test.

The damage is caused by sugar concentration, especially HFC.

So mayor Mike was right, even if any explanation got lost in translation, as he went at it in his inimitable fashion.

--------------------------------------------------------

This is a reply to #22.

I am willing to get into conversation about I know something. Other than that, as the saying goes: it is your decision, nobody else's.

Yes, fascinating, to me at least. But inflammation is, as mentioned in the linked article, not so tangential, being implicated in obesity, due to interfering with leptin signalling (and/or resistance). Sugar concentration is the basic. The research into leptin signalling or interference as related to obesity, is beginning to detail part of the underlying processes triggered/affected by that concentration.

Regarding Mayor Bloomberg being ridiculed so much for his limitation on soft drink size, he actually wanted to tax soft drinks and Pepsi threatened to leave the state. The power to affect soft drink size was apparently not known to him until the Pepsi's threat sent him looking for other ways to affect the link between soft drinks (basically sugar content, as you say) and obesity. He discovered the obscure power of the Mayor's office to regulate cup sizes for soft drinks (as well as others, maybe). More properly his concern was about the epidemic of Type II diabetes, (and its cost to the NYC hospital system) which has increased alarmingly, especially among young people.

We seem to have all the correlated facts, however when I grew up, I had a lot of apetite, and not so much activity as some other children. This was about the time when television was a thing I liked to watch. Now kids are interested in electronic gadgets and games, and spend way more time indoors. Control of type II diabetes even seems to be related to (1) physical activity level, (2) proper spacing out of carb intake to keep an even glycemic index (which also tends to assist in weight loss, BTW.) One could make a the case that it is the pre-occupation (or obsession) that one has that leads to excessive consumption of HFC drinks, and the weight gain simply is a manifestation of not burning more calories than are being consumed.