You can thank the ongoing protection of domestic sugar growers for most of this change. However, since 1970, HFCS has replaced sugar by a nearly one-for-one basis.
One thing that I found that I have no answer for is how few Asians were overweight. Are there any answers for this observation?
Americans are overweight because they consume more calories than they burn. Their choices of food may be poor but it's the quantity of calories that's the root of the problem. Some folks like to blame it on carbs but if you ever looked at what the old time farm families ate (high carb diet) and then considered how hard they worked, you realize that the formula for becoming overweight is pretty simple. When you look at photos of Americans in the early 20th century, you'll find that there weren't that many fat people. We ate high starch diets but worked like hell. For the most part the only fat people were the boozers.
Asians also consume a diet high in carbs. They just don't eat as much as we do. When I lived in Japan, we'd go out for sushi and, after just five or six pieces, my Japanese friends would be finished and ready to move on. I was just getting started and would find myself at a noodle shop or McDonald's later that night. They just don't eat as much as we do.
Specifically, that “unlike glucose, fructose does not stimulate insulin secretion or enhance leptin production.”
This is junk science. Since your liver easily converts fructose into glucose, that glucose will stimulate insulin, leptin and ghrelin once it enters the blood. See my post above on satiation.
They postulate that dietary fructose may be contributing to American obesity issues because “insulin and leptin act as key afferent signals in the regulation of food intake and body weight.”
Then how can they blame this on HFCS and not sugar when both are made up of glucose and fructose? Since this is a fact, why do they demonize HFCS and not sucrose? If you blame one for something bad you must also implicate the other.
In other words, this study proposes that because fructose doesn’t trip our sense of satiety as sugar would, we are, perhaps, eating more sugars to compensate, and upping overall caloric intake in the process.
Huh? Sugar (sucrose) is 50% fructose. Since HFCS and sucrose are made up of the same ingredients (fructose and glucose), in almost identical proportions, this has to be nonsense.
Further, they extrapolate that because HFCS is usually higher in fructose than table sugar, HFCS can be correlated with parallel increases in obesity.
There are two forms of HFCS used today. One, that's used mostly in baked goods and most other applications outside of beverages, is only 42% fructose. That's 8% less fructose than sucrose. Of course, this research has to ignore the fact that the body converts all fructose to glucose. The other formulation, used mostly in soft drinks, is 55% fructose and 45% glucose. There is no way that minor difference in quantities is responsible for anything other than contributing to the overactive imaginations of some bogus researchers.
I predict that the use of HFCS as a fuel source in the production of methanol will drive the price upward as it competes for its use in the food industry
They use HFCS as a fuel source?
With the recent dietary revelations maybe it would be wise if we can divert some of that HFCS to methanol production after all.
Dietary revelations? What, that people are eating too much and not exercising enough? No revelation there. People who believe that HFCS is responsible for obesity don't grasp even the basics of nutrition. They'll believe just about anything if it sounds technical and gives them something to blame. Again, not exactly a revelation.
Thanks, that's what I thought.
I misstated. I don't know why I wrote that HFCS could be used for the production of methanol. I meant to write ethanol. I do know the difference.
Table sugar is primarily sucrose, which is a dissacharide. The fructose in HFCS as well as glucose are monosaccharides.
Let's take table sugar first. When table sugar (sucrose)is taken in the body, it is changed to 50% glucose and 50% fructose in the small intestines. The glucose component is the energy maker in the living cell. It is this component that triggers the release of insulin and affects the satiety mechanism (see below). It is the fructose component that causes all of the trouble with sucrose. Instead of being converted to glucose which the body uses, it is removed by the liver. This causes the liver to kick more fat out into the bloodstream. It also, as I said before, does not cause the pancreas to release insulin the way it normally does. Glucose causes fat cells to release leptin that makes you feel full so you eat less. Glucose prevents the stomach from releasing ghrelin that makes you hungry. On the other hand, fructose does not cause fat cells to release leptin and does not suppress ghrelin. This means that fructose increases hunger to make you eat more. Besides affecting the satiety mechanism, it also converts to fat more than any other sugar. This may be one of the reasons Americans continue to get fatter.
Many web sites say that the common sucrose/glucose concentration of HFCS in soft drinks of around 55% sucrose and 45% glucose. I did a search to find the concentration of a few soft drinks. Here is what I found:
Pepsi Cola in a given 100 ml has .17 grams of glucose, .58 grams of fructose, and .81 grams of sucrose. Let's say the .81 grams of the sucrose component is biologically, .405 grams each of fructose and glucose. This makes Pepsi actually .575 grams (36.8%) glucose and .985 grams (63.2%) fructose.
Sprite in a given 100 ml has .20 grams of glucose, .60 grams of fructose and .68 grams of sucrose. Biologically, this is .54 grams (36.5%) glucose and .94 grams (63.5%) fructose.
I am not sure if there is a difference in when the fructose is released into the blood when the sucrose in these soft drinks goes through the digestive breakdown process. It is obvious that the fructose component should from the HFCS should enter the blood sooner than the fructose derived from the sucrose component. Does that make sense?