High Fructose Corn Syrup
The use of high fructose corn syrup has been on the rise in recent years. This is because of government subsidies for corn and the rising prices of foreign sugar. Basically HFCS is cheaper for food manufacturers to buy and use in their foods as apposed to sugar. Using HFCS also lengthens the shelf life of the foods as well. So food companies are saving money but are our bodies paying the price?
Yes indeed! Again I can’t say enough about food that is not natural. Eating food that is not natural is trouble. When you put a man made substance into your body you don’t know what will happen.
The people behind HFCS really push the fact that it is just like sugar and won’t make you gain weight. The ads have been everywhere.
There is a lot of debate right now about whether HFCS is really worse than sugar for our bodies. There was a recent study published this spring (2010) from Princeton that looked at mice. One group of mice was fed water with sugar while the other group was fed water with HFCS. They both consumed the same amount of calories but the mice that drank the water with HFCS gained more weight. Not only did they gain more weight but the weight was primarily abdominal fat. Abdominal fat is the worst kind for your body and can lead to disease. The other significant finding was that they also had more fat circulating in their blood called triglycerides.
Another study at Duke University found that increased consumption of HFCS was associated with scarring of the liver or fibrosis.
Food manufacturers are putting HFCS in everything. Why are they doing that? They know we have a sweet tooth and sweet things are addicting. If the food manufacturers put cheap HFCS in their food they know you will be coming back for more. Second is HFCS is in almost everything you are eating. If you read the page on sugar you know that sugar not only causes health problems but weight gain as well. So what if HFCS is not worse than sugar. We know it is at least the same as sugar. Why do we need sugar in everything we eat?
Food manufacturers are now scrambling to take HFCS out of their foods. Interesting. I say stay away.