You see it online a lot
About diet drinks being worse than sugar sweetened drinks.
And this has become something more with WHO saying that sweeteners are not recommended for weight loss.
Now, here’s what we know:
1️⃣ Studies are quite limited on how effective sweeteners and diet products are long term for health as they are often confounded by the fact lots of people who use them are doing so to help with weight loss / diabetes / blood pressure etc so you could say
People who use sweeteners are more likely to have diabetes
Or you could say
People with diabetes are more likely to use sweeteners to help them reduce calories and lose weight
2️⃣ Some studies actually show diet drinks to be more effective than water for weight loss as people felt satisfied and were not “missing out”
3️⃣ ask the question: what’s the alternative? If having a diet drink lowers your calories and helps you stick to a nutrition plan to be in a calorie deficit where you lose body fat? Research shows you may improve your metabolic health (be it cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar levels)
4️⃣ the devil is in the dose – like anything, the devil is probably in the dose. If you have too much water, this can have negative effects on your minerals. In fact, tomatoes contain methanol. My point? Everything has a risk. One thing to consider is that since the sugar tax, sweeteners are being used more in products. Therefore without actually knowing you may have increased your intake.
As ever, it comes down from to meeting you where you’re at.
For me and my interpretation of the whole research paradigm:
Swapping a sugary drink for a diet drink is a positive step.
👉The research on sugary drinks shows zero positives
(Other than being a great way to treat a hypo)
And on the topic of hypos, despite people stressing about blood sugar levels and diet drinks being bad
Isn’t it interesting they don’t recommend diet drinks to treat a hypo (low blood sugar)?
Well, it’s because it won’t increase your blood sugar levels enough.
👉 one last thing, having a very “sweet” diet overall (be it sweeteners or sugar) is probably not great.
Why?
Well could this make things like vegetables and fruit not be so appealing?
Which we know are key for health and keeping you full up
Matt “diet?” Fruci