The Los Angeles Times 
(7/30, Hernandez) “Booster Shots” blog reported that, according to research published online July 13 in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, “Americans are cutting back on the amount of added sugar they’re eating…– from about 3.5 ounces a day in 2000 (25 teaspoons, or 375 calories) to 2.7 ounces a day in 2008 (19 teaspoons, or 285 calories).” After tracking “more than 42,000 Americans over the age of two who were part of the National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey, a program sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,” researchers found that “the calories Americans got from added sugars each day went down from an average of 18% of daily calories in 2000 to about 15% in 2008.”
Researchers Say US Sugar Consumption Guidelines Should Be Reconsidered. Medscape (7/29, Fox, Hart) reported that, according to a study to appear in the Oct. issue of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, “adults who consumed 25% of their daily calories as fructose or high-fructose corn syrup beverages (a percentage within current government guidelines) for two weeks experienced increases in serum levels of cholesterol and triglycerides.” After having “48 overweight and normal-weight adults (age, 18-40 years; body mass index, 18-35 kg/m2) consume beverages that contained fructose, high-fructose corn syrup, or glucose at the 25% upper limit for calorie intake for two weeks,” researchers suggested that the government “reconsider its recommendations that include a maximal upper limit of 25% of total energy requirements from added sugar.”
LATimes Criticizes Administration, Food Industry Over Sugar Guidelines. The Los Angeles Times (8/1) editorializes, “When the government proposes guidelines for children’s foods that would consider unsweetened 2% fat yogurt unhealthful but not a bowl of cereal with eight grams of added sugar, it’s micromanaging diets in unhelpful ways.” Similarly, “when the food manufacturers’ response is a proposal that would allow Lucky Charms cereal to receive the government’s blessing with its existing 10 grams of sugar per serving, it’s evidence that the industry isn’t all that concerned about children’s health.” Government experts are “in the process of finalizing voluntary guidelines for the advertising and marketing of foods to children.” While the initial guidelines they proposed were “overly prescriptive,” the food industry’s “response inspires little confidence.” The Times says that eliminating “subsidies for the ingredients most commonly found in cheap junk food — especially corn, which is used to make the cheap sweetener high-fructose corn syrup,” would be a “more effective” tactic.
