SIMPLIFYING SUGAR

Curbing your sweet tooth can have health benefits and so can avoiding some of the sneaky added sources in your diet. Rachael Moeller Gorman

Human beings are primed to seek sweetness. To our ancestors, a sugary taste meant safe, calorie-dense food that their bodies could store as fat for later on, when the honey was gone and fruit was out of season. (Bitter flavors, by contrast, indicated that a plant might be poisonous, and sour ones signaled precious calories had spoiled.) Throughout evolution, our taste buds have been our foodie guides, ushering us toward healthy calories and away from things that could be dangerous.

But sweet, plentiful calories are no longer rare, and the helpful direction of our taste buds has become outdated. Added sugar has snuck into all sorts of sweet and savory foods, from sandwich bread to frozen dinners And we’re eating a whole lot of it: Americans currently get 13 percent of their total calories from ingredients like table sugar, high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), honey, and other added sweeteners That’s about 17 teaspoons’ worth, or 68 grams. Natural sugars found in fruits, vegetables and dairy products are not considered added. Plus, these foods come with other nutrients that make them healthy. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommended limiting added sugars to less than 10 percent of the calories we consume each day, or about 12 teaspoons (48 grams) for a 2,000-calorie diet. But many experts say we should probably eat even less to reduce our risk for health conditions linked to excess sugar consumption, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cavities.

Our collective sweet tooth has made sugar something of a nutritional pariah. A 2021 International food Information Council poll of more than 1,000 Americans found that 72 percent of adults are trying to limit or avoid added sugars in their diet. And according to the research group NPD, the first piece of information people look at on the Nutrition Facts panel is sugar, followed by calories.

That panel could indeed be useful in helping people cut back, which could make a dent in chronic conditions such as heart disease and diabetes.

Disclosing added sugar could also result in an estimated net savings of $31 billion in health care costs over the same period. The reason: People will read labels and choose lower-sugar options, and if demand prompts food companies to cut the amount of sugar in their products, the reduction in disease and health care costs would be even greater. In fact, many manufacturers have already reformulated their products in anticipation of the new labeling requirements. It can be a very powerful tool, because it educates the consumer.