In today’s modern world, more and more people are becoming conscious about their health. But in this process, most of the people are trapped in the world of myths about many things related to our health. One of such highly debatable topic of concern is the effect of sugar on our body. Is sugar the real devil? Should we totally cut the sugar consumption from our diet? It’s a big question.
Many researchers came to the conclusion that a person who intakes a high amount of sugar daily is more prone to acquire Type-2 Diabetes and other health hazard related to heart and kidneys. Hence, the general public considers sugar as the ultimate health enemy. But is sugar really bad for health? Well it’s not. A certain amount of glucose and fructose ( form of sugar or carbohydrate) is an essential part of the diet and is required daily by the body for its normal functioning. Earlier the form of sugar available to the people was pure and contains high nutritional value because it was prepared directly from the fruits. So people of that era were not conscious about the intake of sugar but now, the scenario is totally different. Nowadays, the sugar available to us most of the time is the Added sugar. Added sugar contains less nutritional values and high intake of this type of sugar is not recommended by health experts. Added sugar is the favourite of the food manufacturers as they use it to increase the flavour of the food items and also to extend their shelf life. And here comes the problem, as all the items we eat in our every day life contains added sugar, be it the regular table sugar that we add in all the beverages or the cold drinks, fruit juices, candies, ice-creams, cakes , cookies etc. And intake of these added sugar which we consume either intentionally or unintentionally every day increase our risk of acquiring the above mentioned diseases.
Sugar is composed of two components glucose and fructose. Glucose is easy to break down by the body and can be metabolized by any cell and is a great source of energy but fructose is a complex form of carbohydrate and is difficult to break down. The added sugar is made of High-fructose corn syrup, which is high in fructose content. Hence, it is advised to reduce the amount of these added sugar intake by us. But that doesn’t means to cut the sugar from our diet complete. According to scientists and other health experts, 50gm or approximately 12spoons of sugar is recommended for daily consumption. So, if we know our body type and consume sugar in a moderate amount then it will definitely prove to be a boon and not a bane.
