Study: Global Diet Is Getting Sweeter
The global diet is getting sweeter, and without intervention, these trends will continue, according to data from a recent analysis.
Previous research has made the adverse effects of added sugars on cardiometabolic health clear, but despite this, 74% of available products in the US food supply contain caloric or low-calorie sweeteners, or both, researchers explained. Further, 68% of all packaged foods purchased by a nationally representative sample of US households in 2013 contained caloric sweeteners.
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To further examine this issue, researchers analyzed data from global trends in the sales of sugar-sweetened beverages and found that the rates of calories sold per person per day and volume sold per person per day are rising, particularly in North America, Latin America, Australasia, and Western Europe.
“We believe that action is needed to tackle the high levels and continuing growth in sales of such beverages worldwide,” they wrote.
Researchers cautioned that although many governments are taking action to reduce consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages, including taxation, reduction of availability in schools, and public awareness campaigns, that these efforts should be viewed as a “learning process” and improved over time. They note the lack of consensus on whether low-calorie sweeteners and fruit juices are “healthy substitutes” for sugar-sweetened beverages as a key challenge for policy makers.
“We believe that in the absence of intervention, the rest of the world will move towards this pervasiveness of added sugars in the food supply,” they concluded.
—Michael Potts
Reference:
Popkin BM, Hawkes C. Sweetening of the global diet, particularly beverages: patterns, trends, and policy responses. Lancet. December 1, 2015 [epub ahead of print]. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S2213-8587(15)00419-2.