Sugars: Breaking Down the Good from the Bad

From the dawn of mankind on planet earth, human beings have had a natural need and attraction to foods with either a natural or added sweetness. And for many generations, that sweet quality was mostly derived from sugars inherent in such foods sources as fruit and vegetables. It is only in the past century that sugar, and its derivatives, have been showing up in many of the processed foods we have added to our diets in significant enough quantities to directly impact the quality of life for many in the developed world.

Glucose

Glucose occurs naturally in many of the carbohydrates we consume. Our digestive system breaks down the glucose from the longer chain of molecules before we can use it in our bodies. Once it is broken down, glucose enters the blood stream and insulin transports it to all the cells in the body in need of immediate energy. Excess glucose is stored in the liver and muscles in the form of glycogen which acts to sustain energy needs between meals and over night. Any excess glucose left in the body after glycogen formation is converted to fat and stored in fat cells in your body.

Fructose

Fructose is essentially fruit sugar which occurs naturally in foods in lower amounts.  Because fructose occurs in smaller amounts, the human body did not develop a system to harness its energy efficiently. As a result, excess fructose which has been added to the modern diet in many processed foods is converted by the liver into fat and stored in your liver. If there is a consistent enough excess of table sugar or high fructose corn syrup in sodas and other artificially sweetened processed food the fat that accumulates in the liver and overtakes it, making it the primary contributor to fatty liver disease. Some high fructose corn syrups have been shown to contain 56% to 92% fructose.

The key point of this comparison is that too much fructose is not desirable. Too much sugar in the blood is toxic to the human body. The insulin in our body is designed to avoid hypoglycemia (high blood sugar) by rapidly transforming excess sugar into fat. Looking at the rise of obesity and diabetes cases in our society it’s not hard to see the connection that unbridled consumption of sugars is having on the quality of life for more and more people.

O’Meagher Farms promotes healthier eating by offering a variety of tasty, all natural foods (which are plant-based) on its website. Please visit us at http://www.omeagherfarms.com.