Why soft drinks ARE a proven fattener...

Today's Post: Tuesday, 9-6-2011


In an article from the Chicago Tribune posted on Weds, 8-31 last week, they posted the findings in a study released that day by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The finding was that more than half of Americans drink enough soft drinks to cause obesity and other health problems

They also said that this problem is worst among minorities, the poor and the young. That’s huge because it threatens even higher health care costs as these young people begin to develop the diseases that people used to get when over 50 or 60 while they are still less than 50 or even 40 year sold.

What these people don’t know IS harming their health and making them fat.

They virtually all think that regular soft drinks, diet soft drinks, and snacks such as French fries and potato chips are normal and are safe to consume even in large regular amounts.

In fact, they are neither.

A bit over 100 years ago no one consumed such foods or drinks or only in very tiny and infrequent amounts or for millions of years before that. So, these “nonfoods” are NOT normal and people do not have bodies evolved process them at well.

Then when you consider the ingredients in them, you see they are NOT that safe to consume often.

The soft drinks are made with ingredients such as high fructose corn syrup, some of which was tested as containing mercury, and artificial sweeteners and colorings and other chemicals some of which are listed carcinogens.

And the snacks often eaten with soft drinks still contain trans fats or cheap vegetable oils or refined grains, both high in pro-inflammatory omega 6.

These foods have been found in other studies to cause obesity if they are consumed over a 20 year period. But that study way UNDER-stated the problem! The average American now consumes about twice as much as the health professionals in that study. This means they gain closer to 35 pounds of fat by drinking soft drinks and eating snacks over 20 years not the 17 pounds that study found.

Simply never consuming these foods and drinks again or limiting them to once a month or less, can produce near effortless fat loss.

That’s because they make you hungrier or don’t turn down your hunger when you consume them. (Diet soft drinks have no calories but DO make you hungrier for the sugar you didn’t get and cause insulin release which fattens you soon after you drink them.)

So you can lose pounds you gained this way with virtually no increase in real hunger.

If you truly understand how harmful soft drinks and such snacks are and stop consuming them at all…. And if you eat and drink real foods instead you can have effortless, hunger free, and effective fat loss.

The soft drink industry has successfully lobbied so far against regulation or the added taxes this warrants.

Also on Weds, 8-31, the advocacy group, Center for Science in the Public Interest, announced a campaign for reducing sugary beverage consumption, called “Life’s Sweeter With Fewer Sugary Drinks

Their goal is to “decrease consumption of soda and sugary drinks by about two-thirds.

But they say their bottom line goal is to reduce the “risks of overweight and obesity, which promote diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and many other health problems.

Reducing the consumption of soda and other sugary drinks “would be a major public health victory and would help reduce health care costs for all levels of government,” CSPI said in a statement.

So how do they hope to get Americans to put down their soda cans? Through education, media and awareness campaigns at every level.

CSPI wants to take the "battle against sugary drinks from health experts to civic organizations, youth groups, civil rights groups, and others,” said CSPI executive director Michael F. Jacobson.

“The enormous health and economic benefits that would result from drinking less ‘liquid candy’ will be supported by a broad cross-section of America. Not since the anti-tobacco campaigns has there been a product so worthy of a national health campaign.”

And, the Los Angeles County Health Department says it will launch a campaign with the slogan "You wouldn't eat 22 packets of sugar. So why would you drink it?"

Then in Boston, soft drinks and their sales recently were removed from city property and at least one hospital. In 2004, soft drinks were eliminated in all their Public Schools. This helped cause a drop in soft drink consumption among local public school students which was not seen elsewhere in the country.

"In Boston we are launching an extensive media campaign to target parents of young children….”said Dr. Barbara Ferrer, Executive Director of the Boston Public Health Commission.

She also said that: "We want (to) let parents in particular know that sugar sweetened beverages are not a healthy option for themselves and their children."

CSPI says that it and its partners around the country will make an extra effort to reach low-income and minority groups who both consume more sugary beverages and suffer disproportionately from obesity related disease.

"The general effort is to reposition soft drinks and other sugary beverages," said Jacobson during a conference call Wednesday. "Kids have grown up with them as parts of Happy Meals at McDonalds, in the refrigerator and at Disney World.

CSPI’s Jacobsen also said. “…we want to reposition them (soft drinks) as an occasional treat. So when a kid asks for a soda, for example, friends and neighbors might think it's strange because it’s just not good for your health."

The more effective strategy which has been tested to work would be to tax all soft drinks both regular and diet at least 10 cents an ounce at today’s prices.

A study found that in families where they bought junky snacks and soft drinks, making real and nutritious foods cost less caused them to buy more junky snacks and soft drinks.

But when junky snacks and soft drinks were made to cost more as such a tax would do, the families bought more real foods.

Since such a tax would gain a state or community more benefits from lower health care costs than it would cost consumers, taxing such health harmful things as soft drinks is that very rare bird. It’s tax that actually would improve the local economy everywhere it is implemented!

Once people know how fattening and harmful soft drinks and junky snacks really are, I think they will support such taxes.

Meanwhile, this information can provide hunger free fat loss for anyone who is ingesting this stuff now and who simply stops completely.

Then they not only will be less fat, their future medical care costs will drop sharply.