Giving up diet soft drinks is a significant and highly recommended move for weight loss and body fat reduction. Diet drinks are insidious body fat makers that may contribute significantly to the high levels of obesity in modern times. The low caloric value of diet drinks is a powerful magnet that attracts dieters to these fat-inducing soft drinks. The adverse effects of the diet soft drinks is due to the presence of artificial sweeteners.
Artificial Sweeteners
Artificial sweeteners promote body fat and obesity. They are worse than ordinary sugar in body fat-induction. The low caloric values of artificial sweeteners do not lead to body fat. loss. They lead to obesity, instead. One explanation for this fat-inducing effect is that artificial sweeteners promote body fat indirectly by disrupting the appetite control mechanism, causing you to consume more food.
Weight Gain
Data from numerous studies in animals and humans support the contention that body fat is promoted by foods and drinks containing artificial sweeteners. In a study by King and colleagues (see reference 3), three groups of rats were used to determine the effect of artificial sweeteners on food consumption. The control group was given food and tap water adlibitum. The second group was given the same type of rat food and glucose-sweetened water adlibitum. The last group was given the same type of food and artificial sweetener-sweetened water adlibitum. The artificial sweetener-feed group consumed more food than the other groups, and were therefore, more prone to obesity.
Obesogens
Artificial sweeteners are obesogens. Obesogens promote obesity (see reference 4,5). Obesogens are environmental chemicals such as atrazine and bisphnol A. Compared to most foods, artificial sweeteners and other obesogens promote body fat at very low concentrations.
When the effects of these body fat-inducing agents are analyzed and interpreted in terms of their nutritional attributes, errors and confusion can arise. This is particularly true with artificial sweeteners. Caloric value is one of the nutritional attributes that is often profiled when discussing the body fat-inducing effect of artificial sweeteners. Some dieters are further encouraged to consume artificial sweeteners for body fat reduction based on the biologically irrelevant logic that these calorie-free food additives are consumed in small quantities and they could not possibly do much harm.
Low Caloric Value
The assumption that there is a direct correlation between the caloric value of artificial sweeteners and body fat gain is a mistake that can lead to obesity. Low caloric value of artificial sweeteners and diet drinks do not mean body fat loss. The confused argument of low calorie and weight loss ignores the point that no good study supports the conclusion that you can lose more body weight with artificial sweeteners compared to ordinary sugar. A valid focus for this contentious dietary issue must be directed on the actual gain or loss of body fat in the presence of artificial sweeteners, not on the caloric value.
References
- "Physiol. Behav."; A Role for Sweet Taste: Calorie Predictive Relations in Energy Regulation by Rats; Swithers, S. E.et al.; April 2010.
- "Behav. Neurobiosci."; General and Persistent Effects of High Intensity Sweeteners on Body Weight Gain and Calorie Compensation in Rats; Swithers, S. E.et al.; August 2009.
- "Physiol. Behav"; Effect of Sweetness and Energy in Drinks on Food Intake Following Exercise: King, N. A.. et al.;; August 1999.
- "Environmental Health Perspectives"; The Estrogenic Effect of Bisphenol-A Disrupts the Pancreatic ß-Cell Function in vivo and Induces Insulin Resistance; Alonso-Magdalena, P, S et al.; January 2006.
- "PLoS ONE"; Chronic Exposure to the Herbicide, Atrazine, Causes Mitochondrial Dysfunction and Insulin Resistance; Lim S, Ahn SY, Song IC et al.: April 2009.
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