What’s in your (kids) snack? Part 1 - The Snack “De”volution
We’ve talked about Sugar quite a bit in previous blog posts - from How Much? to Natural vs. Added sources and even Alternatives. But in a new 2021 book, Metabolical by Dr. Robert Lustig, best selling author of Fat Chance, the pediatric endocrinologist explains the science even further, and unravels the link between sugar laden, processed foods to current childhood diseases once relegated primarily to adults.
In an interview for Levels Health, Lustig comments that since starting his practice in the 1980’s, kids snacks have gone from “bananas to choices like Gatorade, Go-Gurt and [packaged] granola bars.” Further, he criticizes the consumer packaged goods industry for hiding sugar as an ingredient, listing it under one (or multiple) of 262 different names and indicates that this “combination of sugar plus artificial flavors and colors to enhance sugar’s effects,” is at the root of the processed food problem.
All of these sugar sources add up, meaning kids are getting way more than daily recommended allowances without parents even realizing it. And the effects are more than just a run of the mill “sugar high,” in our next post, we’ll look at the science of how giving kids sugar might be the equivalent of giving them alcohol.
In an interview for Levels Health, Lustig comments that since starting his practice in the 1980’s, kids snacks have gone from “bananas to choices like Gatorade, Go-Gurt and [packaged] granola bars.” Further, he criticizes the consumer packaged goods industry for hiding sugar as an ingredient, listing it under one (or multiple) of 262 different names and indicates that this “combination of sugar plus artificial flavors and colors to enhance sugar’s effects,” is at the root of the processed food problem.
All of these sugar sources add up, meaning kids are getting way more than daily recommended allowances without parents even realizing it. And the effects are more than just a run of the mill “sugar high,” in our next post, we’ll look at the science of how giving kids sugar might be the equivalent of giving them alcohol.
