Everyone knows that soda and diet soda aren’t that good for you but one every so often- how bad could that be? Well, while that might be the attitude Dr. Harlan Krumholz, cardiologist and the Harold H. Hines, Jr. Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology used to have, he’s since changed his tune. Turns out, new research (something my sweetie has been saying for a long time) has found that non-sugar sweeteners (which make drinks “diet”) and many low-calorie foods are doing more harm than good. (Take sucralose- its sweetness affects a different part of our brain than sugar.)
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While diet drinks and lower calorie foods initially seem like a good idea, they actually set people up for weight gain and metabolic abnormalities.
“The study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal searched the literature for randomly controlled studies involving non-nutritive sweeteners. They found a mere seven trials, with a total of only 1,003 people, that evaluated consumption of the substances for more than six months.” 1
Essentially, the studies they did find failed to demonstrate that sweeteners helped people lose weight.
“The researchers also looked at 30 observational studies, those that did not involve changing people’s diets, but merely cataloging the diet and determining changes over time. They found that people who consumed these sweeteners were more likely to have increases in weight and waistline, and a higher incidence of obesity, hypertension, metabolic syndrome, Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular events.” 1
Dr. Krumholz went on to discover that colleagues at his very own institution argued against sweeteners like this in 2015 because they showed an impact on “hormone secretion, cognitive processes, and gut microbiota” something they concluded would likely impede weight control intentions.
Possibly the most profound part of Dr. Krumholzs’ discovery was finally understanding that one cannot simply trust that companies are making and marketing good food for us AND that it’s important to read labels and understand ingredients:
“It is reasonable to ask why these substances were not evaluated as drugs in the first place. Millions of people are exposed to them every day, and yet their long-term effect is uncertain. Could they be actually causing the health problems they were intended to prevent? I don’t know the answer at this point, but it seems to me that the burden of proof is on the manufacturers to show benefit and demonstrate safety through clinical trials.
If, in the end, we discover that large-scale consumption of diet drinks and foods helped fuel the obesity epidemic, it would be more than ironic. It would be tragic.” 1
We could not agree more.
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While I’m glad this doctor is starting to look at nutrition, this attitude highlights the fact that physicians do not receive enough education on nutrition and that, by in large, they do not treat the body in a holistic sense (something we all know). However, at least one more doctor has woken up. It’s a small victory but we will take it.
