I came across this short but important statement a few months ago in Muscle and Body magazine and it blew me away: "Health experts from the University of San Francisco are suggesting that sugar be classified and controlled in the same way as alcohol and tobacco. Do you think sugar is as harmful to public health as cigarettes?" I finally heard someone else asking similar questions that I have been asking my high school 'Nutrition and Fitness' class over the past 5 years. Even though our class discussions and debates result in more questions than we answer, you can see the wheels turning in the teenagers' minds as we try to determine who is at fault.
Then I tell them that I can't point the finger at other parents too strongly without remembering the Happy Meals and breakfast sandwiches that I bought my children when they were little. We all have to learn at some point and now I know, but more importantly, now my children know and tell me how gross that 'Happy' food really is. (Google: "180 Day Happy Meal")
Back to sugar.
Not enough people want to ask or answer the question "is it harmful?" The answer should be obvious but like a child reluctantly putting up their hand in class to answer the teacher's question we are not confident that we really know or want to know. For those who have studied the correlation in the obesity rate and sugar intake in the U.S. the answer is a big slap in the face. Like alcohol and tobacco, it can be deadly. At the current levels that we are letting our children ingest, we have created our own epidemic that will likely shorten the life span of our children by decades.
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