Dean Schillinger is a primary-care physician at San Francisco General Hospital. He first came to the city in 1990 at the peak of the AIDS epidemic. 鈥淎t that point, one out of every two patients we admitted was a young man dying of AIDS,鈥 he says.
Today, that same ward is filled with diabetes patients.
鈥淚 feel like we are with diabetes where we were in 1990 with the AIDS epidemic,鈥 Schillinger said. 鈥淭he ward is overwhelmed with diabetes 鈥 they鈥檙e getting their limbs amputated, they鈥檙e on dialysis. And these are young people. They are suffering the ravages of diabetes in the prime of their lives. We鈥檙e at the point where we need a public health response to it.鈥
Schillinger and other researchers at the University of California at San Francisco are setting up a project called , to spell out the health dangers of too much added sugar in our diets. The project aimed at consumers includes a user-friendly Web site and materials such as television commercials that public health officials can use for outreach. Health departments from San Francisco to New York City have agreed to participate.
Although there are no federal guidelines that recommend a limit on sugar consumption, the American Heart Association (AHA) urges cutting back dramatically. The average American consumes the equivalent of in added sugar. The men should reduce that to no more than nine teaspoons and women should consume less than six teaspoons. The similar limits.
Laura Schmidt, a professor of health policy at UCSF鈥檚 medical school, is also part of the Sugar Science team. 鈥淩ight now, the reality is that our consumption of sugar is out of whack,鈥 she says, 鈥渁nd until we bring things back into balance, we need to focus on helping people understand what the consequences are.鈥
Schmidt is quick to point to the food environment as a driver of the increase in obesity over the past generation. 鈥淭he only major change in the diet that explains the obesity epidemic is this steep rise in added sugar consumption that started in the 1980s,鈥 she says.
That sugar isn鈥檛 just making us fat, she says, 鈥渋t鈥檚 making us sick.鈥
The Sugar Association, however, says that some of the information presented by Sugar Science conflicts with a 2002 Institute of Medicine report and conclusions by the European Food Safety Authority in 2010. Andy Briscoe, president and chief executive of the association, notes that federal data shows that the per capita consumption of natural sugar, which comes from sugar cane or sugar beets and is called sucrose, is 34 percent lower than it was 40 years ago. He adds that sugar critics often lump together the consumption of sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup, which is used extensively in sugar-sweetened beverages, such as soda, sports drinks and energy drinks.
鈥淣atural sugar in moderation can be part of a balanced, healthful diet and lifestyle 鈥 and has been safely used by our grandmothers and their grandmothers for decades,鈥 he said in a statement.
John Bode, president and chief executive of the Corn Refiners Association, said in a statement, 鈥淭he focus on any one particular food or ingredient is a disservice to consumers and distracts from the broader need for balanced diet and exercise.鈥
Although Schmidt says the Sugar Science team, which includes researchers from the University of California at Davis and Emory University, is not 鈥渁nti-sugar,鈥 she says that it looked at all the evidence, including the reports cited by the Sugar Alliance. Schmidt says more recent reports from the AHA and the WHO reflect the newest health findings. Sugar Science is funded by a grant from the , a Houston-based philanthropic organization.
Schillinger concurs, saying Sugar Science has no political agenda and wants to generate 鈥渃redible science, what we understand and don鈥檛 understand about sugar.鈥
It鈥檚 about knowing how much sugar is too much, researchers say.
But knowing how much sugar you鈥檙e eating can be challenging. Some key facts on the Sugar Science Web site are these:
鈥 Added sugar is hiding in 74 percent of packaged foods, including some products that are considered healthful and may not be viewed as sweet, such as yogurt, pasta sauce and salad dressing. ( would include a separate line for added sugars.)
鈥 Overloading on fructose, a common type of added sugar, can damage your liver 鈥 just like too much alcohol.
鈥 One 12-ounce can of soda a day can increase your risk of dying of heart disease by one-third. That same soda can have as many as nine teaspoons of sugar. (Sugar is listed by grams on nutrition labels; .)
The site also includes tips for cutting down on sugar. The easiest way to do so, the researchers say, is to stop drinking sugar-sweetened beverages.
More than in the American diet comes from sugary drinks. The Sugar Science researchers also recommend reading nutrition labels. Although there are 61 names for sugar on ingredient labels, the UCSF team says that 鈥渋f the chemical name has an 鈥榦se鈥 at the end 鈥 as in dextrose, fructose, lactose 鈥 it鈥檚 likely to be added sugar.鈥
Lisa Aliferis is editor of . This article, which was done in collaboration with , is part of a partnership that includes , and Kaiser Health News.