Wow, can you believe that now there are commercials promoting high fructose corn syrup? One of the worst things you can put into your body and they are saying "it's fine in moderation." If I drank/ate things with high fructose corn syrup, even in moderation, every day, I would not only be heavier than I am now, but I know I would suffer health problems as a result -very bad heartburn coming to mind immediately. Plus, I would be cranky and would have major carb cravings.

Yeah, high fructose corn syrup is ok. Right.

I know even before I started this WOE I got rid of all that crap and then when the commercial came out my family was trying to convince me it was ok to buy it again!!! No way never again that crap is banned in other countries or so I hear!!!

Kimbar69, that shows how manipulative commercials are - your family bought into it immediately and then tried to convince you it's ok to consume it! That's pretty scary, isn't it?

They're desperate. Did you hear they recently discovered significant amounts of mercury in products that contain HFCS?

Yeah well I am ready for them to get rid of the crap it makes me so mad to take my kids to the store and everything they try to put in my cart has it!!! Drives me nuts!! Big PEEVE of mine!!

Wow, capmikee, that's scary! I wonder how it is that there's so much mercury in HFCS products?!?

The fact that they say "It's fine in moderation" should send up a bright red flag.
I find that hilarious.

Yeah sure, fine in moderation.... but that's kind of hard to do when it's found in almost every damn thing.

I will be really mad if they put that stuff in bacon.

They use it in the processing - getting sugar out of corn is a highly industrial event.

Even arsenic is ok in moderation. Just don't go over 120 mg!

Did you notice the tiny tiny print at the bottom of the screen toward the end?
Paid for by the Corn Refiners Association.

lpioch, oh geez, I didn't notice that - of course it's paid for by them!

An acquaintance of mine feeds her very small children junk food with HFCS and told me the other day that it wasn't bad for you because it was made from corn. I think I just sat there with my mouth open for a minute not even sure how to respond to such ignorance.

Straight Talk About High-Fructose Corn Syrup: What it is and What it Ain’t. - Research Review, by Lyle McDonald

White JS. Straight talk about high-fructose corn syrup: what it is and what it ain’t. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Dec;88(6):1716S-1721S.

Abstract

High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is a fructose-glucose liquid sweetener alternative to sucrose (common table sugar) first introduced to the food and beverage industry in the 1970s. It is not meaningfully different in composition or metabolism from other fructose-glucose sweeteners like sucrose, honey, and fruit juice concentrates. HFCS was widely embraced by food formulators, and its use grew between the mid-1970s and mid-1990s, principally as a replacement for sucrose. This was primarily because of its sweetness comparable with that of sucrose, improved stability and functionality, and ease of use. Although HFCS use today is nearly equivalent to sucrose use in the United States, we live in a decidedly sucrose-sweetened world: >90% of the nutritive sweetener used worldwide is sucrose. Here I review the history, composition, availability, and characteristics of HFCS in a factual manner to clarify common misunderstandings that have been a source of confusion to health professionals and the general public alike. In particular, I evaluate the strength of the popular hypothesis that HFCS is uniquely responsible for obesity. Although examples of pure fructose causing metabolic upset at high concentrations abound, especially when fed as the sole carbohydrate source, there is no evidence that the common fructose-glucose sweeteners do the same. Thus, studies using extreme carbohydrate diets may be useful for probing biochemical pathways, but they have no relevance to the human diet or to current consumption. I conclude that the HFCS-obesity hypothesis is supported neither in the United States nor worldwide.

My Comments

I think it’s just human nature, people seem to have a need to find a single enemy that is the cause of all woes under the sun. The one that causes obesity, diabetes, and all manners of health problems. Nutritionally, I’ve watched the enemy change over the years. In the 80’s it was dietary fat, which was blamed for all the problems of humanity. During the 90’s, things started to shift and carbohydrates became the enemy. About the same time, trans-fatty acids became the one thing that people MUST NOT EAT or they would seemingly drop dead nearly instantly.

And now, as we enter 2009, if there is a single nutrient that is blamed for everything that is wrong in the world, it is high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Much of this started with a 2004 paper by Bray where he correlated changes in HFCS intake with changes in obesity, suggesting that it was the increase in HFCS intake that was driving obesity. This was taken, as usual, far out of context into the popular realm of magazines, newspapers and tv soundbites.

Nowhere is this more prevalent than in the athletic/bodybuilding and fat loss arena where people are simply losing their ever-loving minds over anything with HFCS. Any food that dare list high-fructose corn syrup on its label (even if the total quantity is obviously miniscule) is immediately deemed to be evil, a destroyer of not only one’s physique but a corrupter of children, a direct line to Satan himself. Ok, maybe I’m exaggerating but not by much.

This paper addresses this idea, by looking at the hypothesis that somehow HFCS is uniquely obesity or health-problem causing beyond simply being a source of calories. The author states that several assumptions must be found to be true to accept this idea as fact. They are:

* HFCS and sucrose are significantly different
* HFCS must be uniquely obesity-promoting
* HFCS must be predictive of US obesity
* HFCS must be predictive of global obesity
* Eliminating HFCS from the food supply must significantly reduce obesity

I won’t detail in full every one of his arguments; the punch line of course is that none of these actually turn out to be true. Yes, HFCS and foods containing them often contribute a large number of calories to the diet and clearly that alone causes problems; but there is nothing special about HFCS to warrant the fear about it that many seem to have developed.

For the rest of the article, read here-
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/re...rch-review.html

Re:White JS. Straight talk about high-fructose corn syrup: what it is and what it ain’t. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Dec;88(6):1716S-1721S.
The author is a consultant to the food and beverage industry in nutritive sweeteners, including HFCS and sucrose. His professional associations, past and present, include individual food industry companies as well as such organizations as the American Chemical Society, American Council on Science and Health, Calorie Control Council, Corn Refiners Association, Institute of Food Technologists, and International Life Sciences Institute.