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Soda May Age You as Much as Smoking

time.com

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Re: Soda May Age You as Much as Smoking

#3

Post by mikeyouse »

The key results from the paper:

    After adjustment for sociodemographic and health-related
    characteristics, sugar-sweetened soda consumption was 
    associated with shorter telomeres (b = –0.010; 95% 
    confidence interval [CI] = −0.020, −0.001; P = .04).
    Consumption of 100% fruit juice was marginally associated
    with longer telomeres (b = 0.016; 95% CI = −0.000, 0.033;
    P = .05). No significant associations were observed between
    consumption of diet sodas or noncarbonated SSBs and 
    telomere length.
Shortened telomeres are one way to measure genetic 'age'. So they saw 'aging' with sugar-sweetened soda, the opposite with fruit juice, and no significant difference with diet sodas or non-carbonated sugary sodas.

The study was pretty substantial with ~5,300 participants with no history of cardiovascular disease or diabetes. It's nice to have another datapoint against some of the bro-sciencey "Fruit juice has as much sugar as soda" arguments.

Late Edit:

Here's a pretty good summary of telomere aging:

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/chromosomes/telomeres...

Re: Soda May Age You as Much as Smoking

#5

Post by stealthlogic »

bengarvey wrote: post #2

Just in case anyone was wondering about diet soda... "Only the sugary, bubbly stuff showed this effect. Epel didn’t see any association between telomere length and diet soda intake. "

There are studies that link Diet Soda to other vascular risks. http://www.miami.edu/index.php/news/releases/study_finds_pos...

There are also studies emerging which link artificial sweeteners to Diabetes. http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/sep/17/artificial-sw...

Re: Soda May Age You as Much as Smoking

#7

Post by brandonl222 »

squozzer wrote: post #4

It's funny but one never hears about the ill effects of carrots. "They" only study stuff that's already assumed to be bad for you. Ever wonder why?

Probably because mass consumption of carrots isn't a top public health issue? If consumption of carrots rivaled that of soda I'd be willing to bet there would be more studies on it just the same as there are studies on various other foods such as red meat, egg cholesterol, fish oil, etc.

Re: Soda May Age You as Much as Smoking

#9

Post by geoka9 »

It's hard for me to understand the whole soda phenomenon in Canada and the US. Is it as addictive as cigarettes? Does it make you crave for more? Or it simply tastes so good that you can't get enough of it? Why not eat a bunch of apples instead (if you don't care about the amount of sugar you consume)? Wouldn't they taste better?
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