New Study Says HFCS is Lipogenic – Who Knew?
I’m being sarcastic, of course.
It was just a few short weeks ago that members of the Corn Refiners Association were high-fiving each other over a statement by the American Medical Association:
WASHINGTON, DC – The Corn Refiners Association today applauded a decision by the American Medical Association (AMA) that concluded “high fructose corn syrup does not contribute to obesity more than other caloric sweeteners.” The decision was issued June 17 in Chicago at the annual meeting of AMA’s House of Delegates, the organizations principal policy-making body.
“This science-based decision by the nation’s leading medical body reaffirms that no single food or ingredient is the sole cause of obesity. Rather, too many calories and too little exercise is a primary cause,” said Audrae Erickson, president, Corn Refiners Association.
New research continues to confirm that high fructose corn syrup is no different from other sweeteners, according to Erickson. HFCS, like table sugar and honey, is natural. It is made from corn, a natural grain product.
Well, some new science sez otherwise:
DALLAS — July 24, 2008 — One of the reasons people on low-carbohydrate diets may lose weight is that they reduce their intake of fructose, a type of sugar that can be made into body fat quickly, according to a researcher at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
“Our study shows for the first time the surprising speed with which humans make body fat from fructose,” Dr. Parks said. Fructose, glucose and sucrose, which is a mixture of fructose and glucose, are all forms of sugar but are metabolized differently.
“All three can be made into triglycerides, a form of body fat; however, once you start the process of fat synthesis from fructose, it’s hard to slow it down,” she said.
…The researchers found that lipogenesis, the process by which sugars are turned into body fat, increased significantly when as little as half the glucose was replaced with fructose. Fructose given at breakfast also changed the way the body handled the food eaten at lunch. After fructose consumption, the liver increased the storage of lunch fats that might have been used for other purposes.
“The message from this study is powerful because body fat synthesis was measured immediately after the sweet drinks were consumed,” Dr. Parks said. “The carbohydrates came into the body as sugars, the liver took the molecules apart like tinker toys, and put them back together to build fats. All this happened within four hours after the fructose drink. As a result, when the next meal was eaten, the lunch fat was more likely to be stored than burned.
“This is an underestimate of the effect of fructose because these individuals consumed the drinks while fasting and because the subjects were healthy, lean and could presumably process the fructose pretty quickly. Fat synthesis from sugars may be worse in people who are overweight or obese because this process may be already revved up.”
This doesn’t mean that all fructose must be avoided: fruit, for example contributes fiber and valuable nutrients, and only a limited amount of fructose (although fructose is considered “fruit sugar,” in reality, fruit contains a mixture of sugars). It does, however, mean that not all sugars are alike, and that foods containing a large amount of added sugars have the potential to “tilt” your metabolism towards fat gains beyond what the calories might predict.
