This is unsubstantiated info from a newsletter I receive so I'm posting it here in the "general" rather than research forums:

Sugar threatens more than thin waistlines. It has also been associated with several conditions and diseases, including type 2 diabetes, arthritis, acne, heart disease, depression, thrush/yeast infections, and cancer.

According to brain scans, sugar is as addictive as cocaine.

Two hundred years ago, the average American ate only 2 pounds of sugar a year. In 1970, Americans ate 123 pounds of sugar per year. Today the average American consumes almost 152 pounds of sugar in one year. This is equal to 3 pounds (or 6 cups) of sugar consumed in one week.

We are the exceptions I guess -- so somebody must be eating more than 152lb to make up for my almost zero share.

Bob

lol, yup someone else is making up for me , and my family !!

Actually this number ,152, is almost at the quantity published in DANDR many years ago. Have seen the 170's as a published amount in the between years. Not that the 20 lb difference has made a difference.

I've said it--we've all said it--over and over: the number of foods that have unnecessary added sugar in them is absurd. That's where so much of this is coming from. Salad dressing, ketchup, meatballs. It's virtually impossible to buy mayonnaise without sugar in it. A lot of people don't even realize that so much of what they're eating has sugar in it. Not to mention the sugar in the "non-sugar" cereal at breakfast with a vat of OJ on the side.

When I was a kid, my step-Mom used to make amazing apple pie. She was known for it. Some of our friends used to request it, if they were coming for dinner. It had zero sugar in it. Maybe sometimes a sprinkle (like a tablespoon or two) if the apples were especially sour. She learned to make it this way because her dad and sister were T1 diabetics. But really this is how people used to make pie until maybe the 1950s when we really started adding 1/2 cup or a cup of sugar. Cooked fruit has a ton of natural sweetness, but our tastebuds are so broken, we don't know that any more.

I've avoided sugar for so long I have a much lower tolerance. Heavy cream sweetens my coffee, stevia sweetens my chocolate, and berries sweeten my yogurt.

Even diet coke tastes too sweet..... needs cutting with lots of ice cubes.


And when making apple pie------ no added sugar to the apples. Just spices. Just as CG said, tastes just fine.

Gary's book is a great read. Goodreads synopsis below:

The Case Against Sugar, Gary Taubes

From the best-selling author of Why We Get Fat, a groundbreaking, eye-opening expose that makes the convincing case that sugar is the tobacco of the new millennium: backed by powerful lobbies, entrenched in our lives, and making us very sick.

Among Americans, diabetes is more prevalent today than ever; obesity is at epidemic proportions; nearly 10% of children are thought to have nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. And sugar is at the root of these, and other, critical society-wide, health-related problems. With his signature command of both science and straight talk, Gary Taubes delves into Americans' history with sugar: its uses as a preservative, as an additive in cigarettes, the contemporary overuse of high-fructose corn syrup. He explains what research has shown about our addiction to sweets. He clarifies the arguments against sugar, corrects misconceptions about the relationship between sugar and weight loss; and provides the perspective necessary to make informed decisions about sugar as individuals and as a society.

Considering Bob's original post, I believe this is a fairly accurate representation of the sugar and derivatives consumed in the US and in many of the prosperous countries in the world. One needs only to look at the health statistics that show the incredible rise over the years in diseases related to metabolic syndrome while during the very same period the reduction in cost and availability along with the massive increase in sugar consumption. Given recent research and the experiences of those who have cut all sugars and other forms of carbs to regain health and eliminate metabolic-related disease and unhealthy symptoms, it would not be a stretch to posit a cause and effect. It's incredible how obesity is so prevalent today where in the early half of the 20th century, it was rare.

If you put someone from the 1940s into a time machine and dropped them into Mobile, Alabama (not criticizing, it could be any city) in 2019, they would be shocked and believe they were in a fantasy world given the differences in body sizes and shapes of most people. Many people who believe they are fit today would have been considered overweight 70 years ago. It has happened so gradually, we are now accepting obesity and diseases like T2D as normal and a lifelong affliction. Physicians use pharmaceuticals to treat the symptoms, but increased sugar consumption literally has a larger than life influence on all this. Couple this dynamic with the fact that sugar and sugar-sweetened carbs are addictive and require one to consume more and more, it's not hard to see the world has a sugar problem.

The shocking thing is that this isn't a hard conclusion to make; yet, major changes would jeopardize large businesses and agricultural subsidies and remove cheap foods sources to feed the world. The trends in food consumption have caused many other markets to spring up like pharma and healthcare focused on treating the symptoms of bad diets. Large policy debates have begun and loom for the future as we careen toward the knee-jerk solution of a plant-based approach to feed the world which does nothing to consider the unhealthy dietary consequences.

DANDR chonicled the rise of sugar in each society to the increase of heart attacks etc. a few short decades later.

When considering health care costs, in the long run sugar is probably not cheap food.

When Castro took over Cuba, the sugar companies relocated to Florida. Florida has the right kind of climate, but not the right soil and other growing conditions.

Here in Florida, "Big Sugar" runs the state government to the near-death of the Everglades. I have witness a 99% decrease in wildlife in my lifetime due to the water demands and polluted output from the 3 Big Sugar companies.

Mrazek pond has about 40 acres visible from the road. In the 1970s, when the mosquito fish hatched one could stand on the shore and look out. There would be more feathers than water showing, it was noisy, it stunk of birds (a good stink IMHO), and there were plenty who couldn't even get in until another bird left. There must have been more than 2,000 birds in there, herons, egrets, woodstorks, spoonbills, limpkins, stilts, avocets and so on.

In 2019 I've never seen more than a dozen birds at a time in there.

It's a pity.

So for me, it's not only the health care cost, but the environmental cost.

Bob

Yikes!

I wonder if this is only talking about sugar (for example, not counting hfcs.....like the no sugar added cool whip uses hfcs instead of sugar ). I am guessing it is the case, because I think we consume a whole lot more than 29lbs per year compared to the 70's......

Hear ya!!

Saw a program last week about a huge inland lake in Ukraine that was a source of free fish keeping a whole fleet in business plus the fisheries. It is empty-- with a few ships grounded. All the water supporting the lake was redirected to new cotton fields.

We are just trashing this earth.

The part that amazes me is how they not only keep the truth from the public to keep us shorn of our money; they keep the truth from themselves as well.

It's their parents with dementia and their children with Type II diabetes. They are taking statins!

We are the Dietary Resistance.

Well, I don't, but even though I don't eat it, I'm buying sugar again. My hummingbirds insist!

Mine, too! When sugar goes on sale for Xmas baking, I'm going to need to buy a new bag. But the hummers are worth it for their entertainment value. I have the feeder outside the front window & it's fun to watch them. They try to drive each other off - the dominant one even sits on top of it.

But I buy a 4-lb bag once every year or two; compared to the 50-lb bags I used to buy it's just a drop in the bucket!

I always feel a bit odd buying sugar for the hummers, but I know that they can handle it, while I cannot. We've had some hanging around through the winter the last few years, so I feel it is especially important to keep their feeders full.