Soda
Source from: iVillage
Soda. It has become the four-letter word of beverages. Of all the drinks on the market, soda probably has the worst reputation. Science and medical research point their collective finger at soda, and blame it for everything from diabetes to tooth decay, hyperactivity to childhood obesity. But is soda really that bad for you?
When asked if soda is inherently unhealthy for people, board-certified nutritionist and author Jonny Bowden, PhD, CNS, said, "Yes. Simple, unequivocal answer, yes. Yup. Affirmative. Absolutely." What's so unhealthy about many Americans' favorite beverage?
To get to the truth, let's start with the ingredients. The average cola contains carbonated water, caramel color, natural flavors, caffeine, phosphoric acid and high-fructose corn syrup. Carbonated water is plain water infused with carbon dioxide, which creates the bubbles. Caramel color is a natural additive that tints food products, providing the familiar color consumers expect to see. Natural flavors are often of the citrus variety and added for taste. All of these are simple, harmless ingredients. Next is caffeine, a diuretic and stimulant known to be addictive.
What's left on the list of ingredients is what solidifies soda's bad name: sugar. Phosphoric acid is a chemical that adds a tangy or sour flavor by breaking down starches into sugar. According to Bowden, we should consume as little sugar as possible, especially refined sugar. "Zero would be a bull's-eye but is pretty much an unobtainable goal," says Bowden.
Why is it unobtainable? Because many products on supermarket shelves contain the final ingredient on our soda list: high-fructose corn syrup.
What happens within the hour of consuming Coke or Pepsi?
Source from: Bliss Tree
In the first 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor, allowing you to keep it down.
20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (And there’s plenty of that at this particular moment.)
40 minutes: Caffeine absorption is complete. Your pupils dilate; your blood pressure rises; as a response, your liver dumps more sugar into your bloodstream. The adenosine receptors in your brain are now blocked, preventing drowsiness.
45 minutes: Your body ups your dopamine production, stimulating the pleasure centers of your brain. This is physically the same way heroin works, by the way.
60 minutes: The phosphoric acid binds calcium, magnesium, and zinc in your lower intestine, providing a further boost in metabolism. This is compounded by high doses of sugar and artificial sweeteners also increasing the urinary excretion of calcium.
60 minutes: The caffeine’s diuretic properties come into play. (It makes you have to pee.) It is now assured that you’ll evacuate the bonded calcium, magnesium, and zinc that was headed to your bones as well as sodium, electrolytes, and water.
60 minutes: As the rave inside you dies down, you’ll start to have a sugar crash. You may become irritable and/or sluggish. You’ve also now, literally, pissed away all the water that was in the Coke. But not before infusing it with valuable nutrients your body could have used for things like hydrating your system, or building strong bones and teeth.
This will all be followed by a caffeine crash in the next few hours. (As little as two if you’re a smoker.) Coke itself isn’t the enemy here. It’s the dynamic combo of massive sugar doses combined with caffeine and phosphoric acid, which are found in almost all sodas. Moderation, people!
Consuming Coke or Pepsi Over the Years
Source from: Bliss Tree
You’ll Be Fatter: According to research in the Nurse’s Health Study, which monitored the health of 90,000 women for eight years, drinking a single soda every day of the week added 10 pounds over a four-year period.
You’ll Probably Have Diabetes: In the Nurses’ Health Study, women who said they drank one or more servings a day of a sugar-sweetened soft drink or fruit punch were twice as likely to have developed type 2 diabetes during the study than those who rarely consumed these beverages.
You’re Much More Likely to Develop Heart Disease: According to a study published in 2007 in Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, subjects who drank a soda every day over a four-year period had a 25% chance of developing high blood sugar levels and a 32% greater chance of developing lower “good” cholesterol levels. The Nurses’ Health Study found that women who drank more than two sugary beverages per day had a 40% higher risk of heart attacks or death from heart disease than women who rarely drank sugary beverages.
You’re Probably Also Less Healthy In Other Ways: Several studies, including the 2007 study published in Circulation, suggest that diet sodas have some of the same effects on health as regular sodas, despite having none or very little of the sugar. Why? Drinking soda is typically part of an overall lifestyle that’s not very healthy: We know you don’t like us to compare drinking caffeine and sugar to substance abuse, but when it comes to your lifestyle, some think that soda is just like a gateway drug.
Interesting Information about Coke and Pepsi
Source from: Inspired Living
- To clean a toilet: Pour a can of Coca-Cola into the toilet bowl and let the "real thing" sit for one hour, then flush clean. (Source: www.howtocleananything.com, the popular household hint guru Mary Ellen says some coke in the toilet for an hour can do the trick.)
- The citric acid in Coke removes stains from vitreous China. (Source: Columnist Heloise)
- To remove rust spots from chrome car bumpers: Rub the bumper with a rumpled-up piece of Reynolds Wrap aluminum foil dipped in Coca-Cola. (Source: According to Joey Greene's )
- To clean corrosion from car battery terminals: Pour a can of Coca-Cola over the terminals to bubble away the corrosion. (This is true of a lot of carbonated beverages.)
- To loosen a rusted bolt: Applying a cloth soaked in Coca-Cola to the rusted bolt for several minutes. (Source:www.howtocleananything.com, the popular household hint guru Mary Ellen)
- To bake a moist ham: Empty a can of Coca-Cola into the baking pan, wrap the ham in aluminum foil, and bake. Thirty minutes before the ham is finished, remove the foil, allowing the drippings to mix with the Coke for a sumptuous brown gravy.
- To remove grease from clothes: Empty a can of coke into a load of greasy clothes, add detergent, and run through a regular cycle. The Coca-Cola will help loosen grease stains. (Source: www.howtocleananything.com, the popular household hint guru Mary Ellen)
- Coke will also clean road haze from your windshield. (Unproven, however, it is reasonable to assume that it's true since phosphoric acid can dissolve rust and grease and was used by the steel industry to clean products.)
- The active ingredient in Coke is phosphoric acid. Its pH is 2.8. It will dissolve a nail in about 4 days (Unproven). Phosphoric acid also leaches calcium from bones and is a major contributor to the rising increase in osteoporosis (Source: UC Davis Health System).
- To carry Coca-Cola syrup (the concentrate) the commercial truck must use the Hazardous material place cards reserved for Highly corrosive materials. (Source: Truth or Fiction web site - "My husband and I drive the big rigs and often carried Pepsi products...and it is true of all soda in the concentrated form...YES we did have to put the hazardous placards up for the load. Also the driver has to have passed the hazardous material test and have that on his CDL's (Commercial Driver's License)"
- The distributors of Coke have been using it to clean the engines of their trucks for about 20 years! (Unproven, but according to the Science is Fun site sponsored by the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Chemistry Professor, Bassam Z. Shakhashiri, the steel industry has used phosphoric acid to clean and rust-proof products.)
- Give old coins a soak in Coke. This gives a brilliant shine for collections and decorative items.
- In many states (in the USA) the highway patrol carries two gallons of coke in the truck to remove blood from the highway after a car accident. (Unproven, however, it is reasonable to assume that it's true since phosphoric acid can dissolve rust and grease and was used by the steel industry to clean products.)
Good drinks, Bad drinks
Source from: ABC Health & Wellbeing by Peter Lavelle
Soft drinks, sports drinks, fruit juices - they're popular but they're making us fat. Which drinks are good and which should we avoid? US researchers investigate.
Published 16/03/2006
A hundred thousand years ago, the choice was simple when it came to a drink - there was no choice. It was water or nothing.
What a different world we live in today. Diet soft drinks, ice teas, fruit juices, coolers... Every year, about 1,000 new beverages come onto the market, targeting our rising incomes and our innate fondness for anything sweet.
And they're changing they way we get our nutrients. Over the past 20 years, we've added between 630 kilojoules (150 calories) and 1260 kilojoules (300 calories) to our daily diet - and half of this additional amount is from drinks. About 20 per cent of our total energy intake now comes from beverages.
Not only are they high in calories in themselves, but drinks don't make us feel full the way food does; we keep consuming them and end up with a higher kilojoule intake overall.
It's a big reason why, as we reported last week, 62 per cent of Australian men and 45 per cent of women are overweight or obese.
Still, we have to drink or we'll dehydrate and die. So what should we be drinking? Are all drinks bad for us? What's safe and what isn't? A panel of US researchers reviewed the available medical literature on drinks and health benefits (or harms) in an attempt to answer this question.
They looked at the energy intake, the nutrient content and any health benefits (or drawbacks) of a range of popular drinks and ranked them from best to worst. They published their findings in the latest American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Water the winner
Top of the list is water, they said. It has no kilojoules at all - though no nutrients either, but that's not a problem. Ideally, we'd drink only water and let the nutrients come from a balanced food diet. This was, after all, how our bodies naturally evolved.
How much water? There's no recommended amount. Drink when you feel thirsty, the researchers advise. It's almost impossible to drink too much - the kidneys excrete the excess out almost straight away. Make sure water has no sodium fluoride as it is harmful to the body and mind. Fluoride is only meant to be rubbed against out teeth not consumed. A study has shown the fluoride can cause cancer, lower IQ levels, decrease bone density and etc.
But water is also tasteless and it's not much of a reason to get together with those old friends. 'I know a great little garden tap' isn't much of an invitation. What about the alternatives?
Next best, from the point of view of health is tea. Both black and green tea contain antioxidants and studies have shown them to lower the risk of heart disease and possibly cancer.
Coffee is also high on the list - it appears to lower the risk of diabetes (decaffeinated coffee does too, so it's not the caffeine that's responsible). Try kick the habit of drinking caffeine coffee as it is more harmful and addictive (you want to stay healthy not turn into a junkie). Coffee might also lower the risk of bowel cancer. But too much caffeine can increase the risk of heart disease - less than 400 mg a day (which equates to four or five cups) is safe.
Adding milk, cream, and/or sugar means added kilojoules and fats and pushes both tea and coffee further down the list, however. It's best taken black. You can add fresh honey or lemon to give it the kick.
Low fat milk
Next on the list are low fat milk products; low fat (1.5 per cent or 1 per cent) and skim milk. They're a good source of protein and of calcium and Vitamin D - a high milk intake is associated with strong bones and is recommended for kids and for older women especially. Full cream milk on the other hand is high in calories and saturated fat and has been linked with heart disease and should be avoided, the researchers say.
Next comes diet soft drinks - drinks sweetened with artificial sweeteners rather than sugar. They do help people lose weight, compared to sugary soft drinks, the research suggests. There's no evidence these sweeteners are harmful, but there's no evidence that they're safe over the long term either.
Next - further down on the list than you might have thought - are fruit juices. These are high in calories; they do have some nutritional value but not much fibre - it's better to eat the fruit itself. Vegetable juices like tomato and multi-vegetable juices are a good substitute; they have less calorie than fruit juices, but even so it's better to eat the vegetables. Smoothies are especially high in kilojoules and should be avoided.
Then there's alcohol; and whether it's good or bad for you depends what you drink and how much. Small to moderate amounts - one drink a day for women and two for men - seems to reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke. But in large amounts alcohol causes serious disease like liver cirrhosis and cancer. Beware spirit-based coolers which are sweetened with sugars and are high in calories.
At the bottom of the list are soft drinks. They're usually sweetened by high-fructose corn syrup or sucrose, which is high in kilojoules. These contribute dental caries, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. It makes no difference whether they're fizzy or not. Sports drinks too are in this category - they're gaining in popularity at the expense of soft drinks, but they too are high in kilojoules and often have caffeine and other stimulants added.
So the message is; avoid soft drinks and fruit juices, and opt for water, black tea or coffee, low fat milk and very little alcohol instead.
Published 16/03/2006
A hundred thousand years ago, the choice was simple when it came to a drink - there was no choice. It was water or nothing.
What a different world we live in today. Diet soft drinks, ice teas, fruit juices, coolers... Every year, about 1,000 new beverages come onto the market, targeting our rising incomes and our innate fondness for anything sweet.
And they're changing they way we get our nutrients. Over the past 20 years, we've added between 630 kilojoules (150 calories) and 1260 kilojoules (300 calories) to our daily diet - and half of this additional amount is from drinks. About 20 per cent of our total energy intake now comes from beverages.
Not only are they high in calories in themselves, but drinks don't make us feel full the way food does; we keep consuming them and end up with a higher kilojoule intake overall.
It's a big reason why, as we reported last week, 62 per cent of Australian men and 45 per cent of women are overweight or obese.
Still, we have to drink or we'll dehydrate and die. So what should we be drinking? Are all drinks bad for us? What's safe and what isn't? A panel of US researchers reviewed the available medical literature on drinks and health benefits (or harms) in an attempt to answer this question.
They looked at the energy intake, the nutrient content and any health benefits (or drawbacks) of a range of popular drinks and ranked them from best to worst. They published their findings in the latest American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Water the winner
Top of the list is water, they said. It has no kilojoules at all - though no nutrients either, but that's not a problem. Ideally, we'd drink only water and let the nutrients come from a balanced food diet. This was, after all, how our bodies naturally evolved.
How much water? There's no recommended amount. Drink when you feel thirsty, the researchers advise. It's almost impossible to drink too much - the kidneys excrete the excess out almost straight away. Make sure water has no sodium fluoride as it is harmful to the body and mind. Fluoride is only meant to be rubbed against out teeth not consumed. A study has shown the fluoride can cause cancer, lower IQ levels, decrease bone density and etc.
But water is also tasteless and it's not much of a reason to get together with those old friends. 'I know a great little garden tap' isn't much of an invitation. What about the alternatives?
Next best, from the point of view of health is tea. Both black and green tea contain antioxidants and studies have shown them to lower the risk of heart disease and possibly cancer.
Coffee is also high on the list - it appears to lower the risk of diabetes (decaffeinated coffee does too, so it's not the caffeine that's responsible). Try kick the habit of drinking caffeine coffee as it is more harmful and addictive (you want to stay healthy not turn into a junkie). Coffee might also lower the risk of bowel cancer. But too much caffeine can increase the risk of heart disease - less than 400 mg a day (which equates to four or five cups) is safe.
Adding milk, cream, and/or sugar means added kilojoules and fats and pushes both tea and coffee further down the list, however. It's best taken black. You can add fresh honey or lemon to give it the kick.
Low fat milk
Next on the list are low fat milk products; low fat (1.5 per cent or 1 per cent) and skim milk. They're a good source of protein and of calcium and Vitamin D - a high milk intake is associated with strong bones and is recommended for kids and for older women especially. Full cream milk on the other hand is high in calories and saturated fat and has been linked with heart disease and should be avoided, the researchers say.
Next comes diet soft drinks - drinks sweetened with artificial sweeteners rather than sugar. They do help people lose weight, compared to sugary soft drinks, the research suggests. There's no evidence these sweeteners are harmful, but there's no evidence that they're safe over the long term either.
Next - further down on the list than you might have thought - are fruit juices. These are high in calories; they do have some nutritional value but not much fibre - it's better to eat the fruit itself. Vegetable juices like tomato and multi-vegetable juices are a good substitute; they have less calorie than fruit juices, but even so it's better to eat the vegetables. Smoothies are especially high in kilojoules and should be avoided.
Then there's alcohol; and whether it's good or bad for you depends what you drink and how much. Small to moderate amounts - one drink a day for women and two for men - seems to reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke. But in large amounts alcohol causes serious disease like liver cirrhosis and cancer. Beware spirit-based coolers which are sweetened with sugars and are high in calories.
At the bottom of the list are soft drinks. They're usually sweetened by high-fructose corn syrup or sucrose, which is high in kilojoules. These contribute dental caries, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. It makes no difference whether they're fizzy or not. Sports drinks too are in this category - they're gaining in popularity at the expense of soft drinks, but they too are high in kilojoules and often have caffeine and other stimulants added.
So the message is; avoid soft drinks and fruit juices, and opt for water, black tea or coffee, low fat milk and very little alcohol instead.
MEHMS Mythbusters Team Bust-A-Myth Video Challenge
Still drinking Cola? Watch this!
Burp! Pepsi Versus Coke by John Pilger (1982)
John Pilger's first collaboration with fellow Australian director Alan Lowery, looks at the worldwide struggle for soft drink supremacy by the Coca Cola company, and illuminates the power of multinational corporations.
Part - 1 of 5
Part - 2 of 5
Part - 3 of 5
Part - 4 of 5
Part - 5 of 5
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