A cold Pepsi or Coke might pair perfectly with a bowl of buttery popcorn or a bag of salty chips, but the negative health effects could dry up people’s thirst for soda pop.
Health officials are encouraging people to avoid drinking soda pop as overconsumption can lead to obesity, Type 2 diabetes and compromise oral health.
“Your teeth are being bathed in sugar and acid,” said Keri Moore, a chronic disease prevention specialist for the Snohomish Health District.
There is a direct relationship between guzzling sugary drinks and an increase in the risk of being overweight or obese, according to the Fewer Sugary Drinks website, which challenges the community to opt for healthier beverages such as water.
“We’re in the middle of an obesity crisis,” said Dr. Jack Stephens, an Everett Clinic pediatrician. “If you want to design a food to make that worse, soda pop would be it.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture urges people to drink water instead of sugary drinks, such as pop, to avoid consuming empty calories. Choosing water, coupled with eating smaller portions, helps people lead healthier lifestyles.
Stephens understands why people reach for this sweet treat because it’s cheap and readily available and, unlike food that signals when you’re full, soda makes it easy to overload on calories. There are eight fast food restaurants within one mile of his Everett office, Stephens said. These restaurants appeal to our society’s push for fast-paced service and big portions for cheaper prices, he said.
“You can get full without getting out of your car,” he said. “They’ve made it easy to do the wrong thing. You’re swimming against the current if you’re making a change to get healthy.”
Even diet soda isn’t a healthier choice. The sweeteners stimulate one’s appetite, pushing people to eat more than they should.
“It’s the poster child of empty calories; it’s just sugar,” he said.
Pop is essentially liquid candy, Moore said.
“It can certainly be a treat but not an everyday beverage,” she said.
Earlier this year, the Snohomish Health District supported the YMCA of Seattle’s “No Soda Sundays.” Moore said the health district is interested in bringing a similar campaign to Snohomish County residents as early as 2012 after officials look at the year’s priorities and staffing levels.
Moore encourages parents to teach their children to get into the habit of reaching for water to quench their thirst and to make it harder to reach for a can by not keeping it in the house. Drinking 100 percent fruit juice and diluting fruit juice with water can help wean people off of soda.
“I’m not saying parents can’t enjoy it – in moderation, it’s fine,” she said. “Just realize it’s a lot of empty calories and a treat.”
Even cutting down on how much pop one drinks per day is a healthier option, Moore said, noting she knows of people who consume six to 12 cans per day.
“If they go from six to one can per day, that’s an improvement,” she said.
Not-so-sweet statistics
The consumer advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest, which runs the Life’s Sweeter with Fewer Sugary Drinks challenge, highlights some of the reasons to cut back on soda pop:
• Sugary drinks are the largest single source of calories in the American diet and account for half of all added sugars Americans consume.
• A 20-ounce cola contains about 16 teaspoons of sugar. That’s more than double what the American Heart Association recommends for adult women per day and more than one and a half times its healthy limit for men.
• Each additional sugary drink consumed per day increases the likelihood that a child will become obese by about 60 percent.
• Sugary drinks provide empty calories and rarely any nutritional benefit.
• Since the mid-1990s, Americans have been consuming more calories from sugary drinks than from milk.
Source: www.fewersugarydrinks.org
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