Soft Drinks Are Bad For Your Health! 0
According to Dr. Maoshing Ni, a doctor of Chinese medicine and author of “Secrets of Longevity”, soft drinks (a.k.a. pop, soda, cola, etc.) are some of the worst beverages you could be drinking for your health. In his blog post dated October 30, 2009, Dr. Ni asserts that while soft drinks contain little to no vitamins or other essential health nutrients for the body, it is what they do contain that poses health problems: caffeine, carbonation, simple sugars — and even worse, sugar substitutes — as well as food additives such as artificial coloring, flavoring, and preservatives. Research has found that the key aforementioned ingredients in soft drinks are responsible for health problems that include tooth decay, nutritional depletion, obesity, type-2 diabetes, and heart disease, especially in children when consumed in high quantities.
Let’s take a look a each of the “problem” ingredients in soft drinks in turn:
Caffeine- caffeine can deplete calcium levels and also cause stress, a racing mind and insomnia
We’ve all heard that caffeine is bad for us, but why? According to Dr. Ni, the caffeine usually present in soft drinks can deplete the body’s calcium levels, and stimulate the central nervous system and contribute to stress, a racing mind, and insomnia. Since caffeine is usually present in most soft drinks, it is wise, if you choose to drink a soft drink beverage, to select one that is caffeine-free, or low in caffeine.
Carbonation- carbonation depletes calcium and leads to osteoporosis
Beverages with bubbles contain phosphoric acid, which can severely deplete the blood calcium levels; calcium is a key component of the bone matrix. With less concentration of calcium over a long time, it can lower deposition rates so that bone mass and density suffer. This means that drinking sodas and carbonated water increases your risk of osteoporosis.
Simple Sugars – The sugar is soft drinks isn’t so sweet
Most soft drinks contain a high amount of simple sugars. The USDA recommendation of sugar consumption for a 2,000-calorie diet is a daily allotment of 10 teaspoons of added sugars. Many soft drinks contain more than this amount! Just why is too much sugar so unhealthy? To start, let’s talk about what happens when sugar enters your body. When you drink sodas packed with simple sugars, the pancreas is called upon to produce and release insulin, a hormone that empties the sugar in your blood stream into all the tissues and cells for usage. The result of overindulging in simple sugar is raised insulin levels. Raised blood insulin levels beyond the norm can lead to depression of the immune system, which in turn weakens your ability to fight disease. In addition, most of the excess sugar you consume ends up being stored as fat in your body, which results in weight gain and elevates risk for heart disease and cancer. One study found that when subjects were given refined sugar, their white blood cell count decreased significantly for several hours afterwards. Another study discovered that rats fed a high-sugar diet had a substantially elevated rate of breast cancer when compared to rats on a regular diet.
Sugar Substitutes / Artificial Sweetners- Are “sugar-free” or “diet” sodas a better choice?
The simple answer is NO! Diet soda is filled with artificial sweeteners such as aspartame, sucralose, or saccharin. These artificial sweeteners pose a threat to your health. Saccharin, for instance, have been found to be carcinogenic, and studies have found that they can produce bladder cancer in rats. One study also discovered that drinking one or more soft drinks a day led to a 30% greater chance of weight gain around the belly. Aspartame, commonly known as nutrasweet, is a chemical that stimulates the brain to think the food is sweet. It breaks down into acpartic acid, phenylalanine, and methanol at a temperature of 86 degrees. (Remember, your stomach is somewhere around 98 degrees.) An article put out by the University of Texas found that aspartame has been linked to obesity. The process of stimulating the brain causes more cravings for sweets and leads to carbohydrate loading. The simple conclusion here is it doesn’t matter whether you drink diet or regular soda – they are both bad for you
Food additives – what good are they?
Food additives such as artificial coloring, flavoring, and preservatives just don’t provide any nutrient value.
Alternatives to Soda and other Sugary Energy Drinks
With the plethora of sugary drinks on the market which include soft drinks (sodas), juices and “energy drinks”, it is difficult to find what what may be good for us when its easy to get overwhelmed with so much choice. One good option, however, is Head Start, an all-natural energy drink marketed under the AmeriSciences brand. It is a great alternative to sugary soft drinks because it doesn’t have any of the “bad” ingredients that sodas have. And Head Start is not a soda at all, but is powder that can be mixed with water to make a refreshing and healthful citrus flavored “pick me up”. The energy provided from Head Start comes from fructose, an all-natural form of fruit sugar which is better for you than processed sucrose. In addition, Head Start contains only a small amount of caffeine, about the same amount that you would find in green tea. Head Start is sold primarily through independent online distributors such as New York-based www.BeautifulandWell.com.
Source: ”What Soft Drinks are Doing to Your Body”, by Dr. Maoshing Ni, October 30, 2009.
