In what has been considered:
"the first detailed analysis comparing how our system responds to glucose and fructose"
researchers at the University of California Davis reported in the
Journal of Clinical Investigation that consuming too much fructose can put you at greater risk of developing heart disease and diabetes than ingesting similar amounts of glucose.
After a 12 week program, the group that consumed 25% of their daily energy requirements via fructose-sweetened drinks showed signs of unhealthy changes in their liver function and fat deposits while the group that consumed 25% of their daily energy requirements via glucose sweetened drinks did not. The fructose drinking group also were not as sensitive to insulin.
Those that consumed fructose-sweetened drinks gained more visceral fat - the fat that embeds itself into the tissues of the heart and liver.
Dr. Walter Willett, chair of the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, notes that studies have shown that long-term consumption of sugared drinks can double the risk of diabetes, with half of that risk due to the excess weight brought on by the calories, and the other half due to the beverages' high sugar content — mostly fructose. "This study provides the best argument yet that we should either decide to consume less sugar-sweetened beverages in general, or that we should conduct more research into the possibility of using other sweeteners that may be more glucose-based," says Matthias Tschoep, an obesity researcher at the Obesity Research Center in the University of Cincinnati, and author of a commentary accompanying the study.
References: Time
