Is High Fructose Corn Syrup Safe? (Irene Rubaum-Keller/Huffington Post)

[eppur_se_muova]

There is much confusion over this ubiquitous substance. When I read the studies that concluded mercury was found in HFCS, I set about purging it from our house. It was everywhere. It was in my son's chocolate milk, catsup, bread, burger and hot dog buns, Gatorade and is even a prominent ingredient in Yoplait yogurt. I expected to find it in candy, but yogurt? It is everywhere.

In his excellent book, The Sugar Fix, Dr. Richard Johnson talks about the dangers of a diet high in fructose. Fructose raises uric acid, which contributes to: high blood pressure, obesity, inflammation in the arteries, heart disease, stroke and kidney disease. He also explains how when we eat fructose, it doesn't signal the brain that we have had enough. In fact, other research has shown that rats given a sugar water solution (glucose being the sugar) will binge on it but not get fat, as they will reduce the amount of rat chow accordingly. However, give these rats a HFCS sweetened water solution and they will gain weight.

When I wrote this blog about Dr Hoebels' work with rats and sugar addiction, it contained just two little sentences about HFCS and how I planned to write more about it coming up soon. Well, those sentences prompted the PR agency for The Corn Refiner's Association to contact me and suggest I have a "briefing" with their expert Dr. John White. Being a writer, and wanting to be fair, I did chat with Dr. White. His doctorate is in biochemistry, and he consults for the Corn Refiner's Association. What Dr. White said didn't surprise me. His job was clearly to convince me that HFCS is safe and makes sense economically.

There is a lot of research out there that tells us that eating too much fructose, in fact sugar in general, is bad for our health. Dr. White didn't dispute this. He did say that the research damning HFCS is using a diet so high in it that it doesn't apply to humans and the amount we tend to consume. He also compared it to the toxicity of water. You know how if you drink too much at one time you can die. Well....

As far as the mercury in HFCS, Dr. White said that research wasn't very accurate and that there is mercury in the air, the water, everywhere. That nasty water again. I asked him what further studies were being done to make sure there was no mercury in the HFCS and he said, "As far as I know there aren't any. This is a dead issue."
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more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/irene-rubaumkeller-/is-high-fructose-corn-syr_b_248021.html

[glowing]

1. The thing that bothers me the most with the HFCS issue is that it is in everything.

Bread, pasta sauce, snack bars.. Its in everything. You cannot escape the shit. So, how is that helpful to the diet of Americans when everything they buy has HFCS in it? All that piling up in everything you eat all day long cannot be good. It would be one thing if you knowingly drank a soda and decided to indulge in the sugar.. But to make your child a pb a Jelly sandwhich.. its in each product. That's not good. How do you escape it except to choose organic; and normally more expensive. I see now that there are juice drinks with non HFCS options because moms are getting pissed at not being able to avoid the crap for their children.

[Pab Sungenis]

3. One reason I've started making a lot of my own food.

I bake my own bread, grind my own peanut butter, and will be putting up some jams and jellies next month, so I'll have all the ingredients I need for that PB&J HFCS free.

I'm finding myself "treating" myself more and more to fresh ingredients, from which I can make almost all the foods I used to buy processed and pre-prepared. I've even baked homemade "Twinkies" for a party. About the only things I don't make myself are dried pasta, fruit juice, milk, and cheese. Well, and meat, but I don't buy pre-made hot dogs, sausage, spam, or other "processed" meats, just cuts fresh or frozen right from the butcher. I still buy soda, too, but one of these days after I invest in a carbonator, I'll kick the can, too.

Best of all, I control all the ingredients. And in the long run it's cheaper, too. Better tasting, better for me, and better on the wallet. Everyone ought to try to go the "homemade" route as best as possible.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. So much wrong with HFCS.

1. See above.

2. Mercury's in it: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=222x66305

3. HFCS is made with GM corn.

The only mystery about HFCS is you're never gonna be sure how you'll die from it.