Even more bad news about diet soft drinks....

Today's post: Thursday, 4-10-2008

I’ve posted before that there is evidence that diet soft drinks are actually no better & may be even worse for you than drinking regular soft drinks. (And, regular soft drinks in any regular consumption are proven to make you fat and sick.)

Recently I got two emails in my inbox from my health sources that help make it extremely clear that this IS so & help explain why it happens.

The first is from Dr Mark Harmon. He also said he posted it on his blog so I’ve listed the URL for that. I’ve edited it a bit to make it shorter & easier to find the key points.

Do artificial sweeteners make you fat? Date: 4/3/2008

From: drhyman@ultrawellness.com & http://www.ultrawellness.com/blog

“There's no doubt about it. Artificial sweeteners cause obesity.

I always thought it was funny to see a very large person order a Big Mac, large fries -- and top it off with a Diet Coke. I also found it peculiar that I rarely saw thin people drinking diet sodas.

So I began to wonder if there could be a link between diet beverages or artificial sweeteners and obesity.

…. I discovered a number of different research findings that pointed to this very phenomenon.

Any sweet taste will signal your body that calories are on the way and trigger a whole set of hormonal and metabolic responses to get ready for those calories.

When you trick your body and feed it non-nutritive or non-caloric sweeteners, like
aspartame, acesulfame, saccharin, sucralose, or even natural sweeteners like stevia, it gets confused. And research supports this.

An exciting new study in the Journal of Behavioral Neuroscience has shown conclusively that using artificial sweeteners not only does not prevent weight gain, but induces a whole set of physiologic and hormonal responses that actually make you gain weight.

The researchers proved this by giving two different groups of rats some yogurt. One batch of yogurt was sweetened with sugar. The other was sweetened with saccharin.

They found that three major things happened over very short period of time in the rats that were fed artificially sweetened yogurt.

First, the researchers found that the total food eaten over 14 days dramatically increased in the artificial sweetener group -- meaning that the artificial sweetener stimulated their appetite and made them eat more.

Second, these rats gained a lot more weight and their body fat increased significantly.

And third (and this is very concerning) was the change in core body temperature of the rats fed the artificial sweeteners. Their core body temperature decreased, meaning their metabolism slowed down.

So not only did the rats eat more, gain more weight, and have more body fat, but they
actually lowered their core body temperature and slowed their metabolism.”

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Notice the double leverage they found in this study. The rats fed the artificial sweetener ate more AND had their metabolism slow down.

That means even people who manage to override their body’s desire to eat more when they drink diet soft drinks-- OR eat so called “light” food & drink products that are sweetened with artificial sweeteners, they are likely to get fatter or lose less fat than they had hoped because their metabolism slows down.

In case you missed my point, I’ll make it really clear. If you don’t want to be fat & heavy, do NOT drink diet soft drinks or eat or drink any “Light” food products made with artificial sweeteners. They will sabotage you & help you to stay fat instead.

(Drinking no sodas at all & doing progressive strength training at least two nonconsecutive days a week has the opposite effect from drinking diet soft drinks. You reliably take in less calories than before if you have been drinking regular soft drinks. And, your metabolism speeds up both for several hours after you exercise and from the lean muscle mass you gain gradually from the exercise.)

Then, on 4-8-2008, I got this email from Dr Al Sears see: www.alsearsmd.com

“Avoid sodas…even if they are diet.

Sodas will make you fat. And they lead to other health problems. That “innocent” low-cal diet soda is really danger in a can.

A new study published in Circulation tracked the diets of men and women for nine years. Those who drank just one can of diet soda a day increased their risk of metabolic syndrome by 34%.

….Regular soda isn’t any better. Another study found that regular soda consumption is also associated with the metabolic syndrome.

Why should this alarm you? Metabolic syndrome is a collection of symptoms that lead to diabetes, heart disease and other chronic diseases like cancer.

If you’re like the average American you drink an estimated 56 gallons of soft drinks each year.

You may have metabolic syndrome and not even know it. In fact, the American Heart Association estimates that over 50 million Americans have metabolic syndrome.

Do you have any of these symptoms?

• Excessive fat tissue in and around the abdomen

• High levels of bad LDL cholesterol, low levels of good HDL cholesterol, and high triglycerides.

• High blood pressure

• Insulin resistance or glucose intolerance (the body can’t properly use insulin or blood sugar)

Each one of these symptoms can cause a whole host of health problems on its own….”

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Dr Sears is putting it gently. EVERY SINGLE ONE of those effects is causative or predictive of heart attack, stroke, & all other cardiovascular diseases.

And, you sharply increase your risk of these by drinking EVEN ONE diet soft drink a day.

Ouch !!

Are you at a loss as to what to drink if you don’t drink soft drinks?

Water does work to quench your thirst & is usually available even at fast food places.

A few glasses of fruit juice a week has been found to help prevent Alzheimers. And, there are many flavors of real fruit juice many of which have extra health benefits: orange, cherry, grape, blueberry, etc. They all have some vitamin C. And, you can add chilled club soda to chilled fruit juice if you like the carbonation in soft drinks.

If you want a caffeine boost, try coffee. Or, if you also want a treat & love chocolate, drinking extra strong unsweetened cocoa as a hot chocolate drink works & has incredible health benefits if you add no milk. And, if you want less of a caffeine rush but need a bit of a lift, tea & green tea work -- & have super health benefits if you add no milk to them.

Lastly, if you sometimes add some real sugar to your hot chocolate or coffee or tea -- but not every time, they are still massively better for your health than soft drinks.