Fructose Is Harmful To The Body

Recently, scientists, nutritionists and doctors are increasingly repeating that excess fructose damages the liver in the same way as alcohol. At the beginning of the season of vegetables and fruits , let's try to understand what are the main sources of fructose , in what quantity it can be consumed without harm to health, and how its excess affects the body .

The world has changed significantly over the past 100 years. And this is connected not only with the development of science and technology, but also with global changes in our diet. A few years ago, milk could turn sour in a couple of days even in the refrigerator, and flour had bugs and had to be sifted. What is wrong with modern food that neither bugs nor bacteria want it?

The fact is that 20 years ago, the chemical industry came to the aid of the food industry. Year after year, our food became more and more modified, refined. And, it would seem, it was done with a noble purpose: the food turned out to be more nutritious and tasty, and did not spoil so quickly. But our body began to meet with products that it does not know more and more often. The problem is that we were created by nature and over thousands of years we have adapted to the natural food that she is able to give.

And now man has to somehow process and dispose of the new, chemically transformed food. And, unfortunately, very often at the same time, as a result, his delicately adjusted life support mechanisms begin to malfunction and break down.

This also happened with the active addition of artificially obtained crystallized fructose . They learned to make it chemically from starch, which, in turn, is produced from corn, as well as from sucrose under the action of hydrochloric or sulfuric acid (it is like a sugar molecule , which consists of glucose and fructose ), as well as insulin, which is secreted from the root chicory Fructose practically does not stimulate the secretion of insulin and can penetrate into the cell without its participation (that is why it began to be used for diabetics). And its glycemic index is much lower than that of glucose. So why not consume it for those who want to lose weight and are overweight and obese?

What happened as a result of using fructose as a sugar substitute

Today, almost every third American is diagnosed with so-called non-alcoholic steatohepatitis. Simply put, fatty inflammation of the liver , which can lead to its destruction. Such changes in this internal organ resemble a picture similar to that observed in long-term alcohol intoxication. Especially often this disease began to be found in patients with diabetes and obesity. When medical scientists sounded the alarm and began to find out the cause, it turned out that fructose was to blame for everything . Yes, exactly that safe sugar substitute .

Why does fructose have such a negative effect on the body ? Actually, the problem is not so much fructose itself , but its quantity. Even at the beginning of the 19th century, before it was discovered, an average person consumed only 15 g of fructose per day with fruits , berries and vegetables , and today its amount can reach 100 g or more. By the way, it is not so easy to dispose of the body 's fructose . Unlike glucose, which can be used by any cell of our body , fructose can be processed only by liver cells . And they do it together with other work, of which they have a lot, after all the liver is the main filter, the task of which is to protect the blood from any extra substances, toxins and poisons.

What happens when there is an excess of fructose in the body

With an excessive amount of fructose in the body , the activity of the CPT1A enzyme is suppressed, and the mitochondria of liver cells (the main energy stations) begin to work differently: fat is not burned, but accumulated. At the same time, inflammation develops in the cells, and then their destruction occurs with the formation of connective tissue. Thus, fatty hepatitis turns into hepatosis. As a result , the liver fails. At the same time, by-products such as triglycerides and uric acid are formed, the excess of which leads to the development of atherosclerosis and gout. And the fact that insulin is not produced at the same time plays a bad role, since appetite regulation is turned off and a person can easily overeat foods that contain fructose instead of sugar .