The toxic sugar

 I just read a long article on sugar and its effect on our body. Is sugar toxic?

The article is a bit long and somewhat hard to follow for a non-body-expert as me. But I still read the whole thing and was struck by a few things.

The author of the article, Gary Taubes, is the same guy that has written the book Why We Get Fat. I take it he is the U.S. equivalent of the Swedish "kostdoktorn" Andreas Eenfeldt, author of the book Matrevolutionen. At least his argumentation on sugars follow the same path as Eenfeldt. They both believe that sugars (and carbohydrates all together in the case of Eenfeldt) cause diabetes, heart diseases and possibly also cancer. Taubes speculates that our sugar diet is directly linked to increased amount of breast cancer...

My first reaction to this article was the following:

First of all, I do not understand how come sugar is NOT considered to be the cause of diabetes?!? I remember that diabetes used to be referred to as "sugar sickness" back in the 80's. Nowadays I rarely hear anyone talk about sugar sickness anymore, everybody talks about diabetes...

Secondly, how can it be so hard to find out the REAL harm of sugar and fructose syrup in our diet? Cholesterol, and animal fat with it, was practically worldwide blacklisted over one night back in 1982. If it was up to me I would ban all high fructose corn syrup and sugar-filled industry products all together right away. Just tuck all those sugarfilled products under the cashier disk together with the tobacco - obviously there is not enough space under the cashier, as the majority of the stuff in the grocery store contains these ingredients...but place an 100% tax on the articles and hide them away in a state owned store like Finnish licor shop Alko.... Then we can see what happens to our bodies after that....Apart from half of the population going around with severe headaches and shaking bodies for a few weeks, predicatble reaction for all those hardcore sugar junkies out there.... Believe me, I have done carb-detox a few times, I know what I talk about... sugar is addictive, and I would not at all be surprised if it is poisoness as well...

Once again I feel we are doing the right thing in switching towards the Wise Choice Diet in our family. I just need the inspiration to stay faithful to this lifstyle. After a few weeks of sugar free (and wheat free) diet for all family members, I clearly see the short term benefits, especially avoiding mood swings. What if long term benefits are something larger than life? As summer vacation is about to start and we are about to step out of our daily routines, I hope we still can avoid sugars all together in our diet... without being considered the freaks of the century.

PD: I an still to watch the Youtube session of Mr. Lustig, referred to in the NYTimes article. But its 90 minutes long, so I'll do it another day. So long and goodnight!