Planning on Losing Weight With Diet Drinks? Think Again!

The research in this area proved to be the most astounding to me. People, myself included, have been switching to diet soft drinks as an alternative to the sugar sweetened products discussed above. We all know that regular soft drinks can contribute to weight gain and to diabetes, although maybe like me we didn't realize how much. We thought zero calorie diet drinks were the sensible alternative.

Recent research says this just isn't so. A new study shows people who drink diet soft drinks don't lose weight and in fact gain weight.

The findings come from an eight years of data collected by Sharon P. Fowler MPH, and colleagues at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. Fowler reported the data to the annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association in San Diego. In an interview with WebMD, Fowler was quoted as saying, "What didn't surprise us was that total soft drink use was linked to overweight and obesity. What was surprising was when we looked at people drinking only diet soft drinks; their risk of obesity was even higher."

"There was a 41% increase in risk of being overweight for every can or bottle of diet soft drink a person consumes each day," Fowler says.

Fowler's team looked at seven to eight years of data on 1,550 Mexican-American and non-Hispanic white Americans aged 25 to 64. Of the 622 study participants who were of normal weight at the beginning of the study about a third became overweight or obese.

For regular soft-drink users the risk of becoming overweight or obese was:

26% for up to ½ can each day
30.4% for ½ to 1 can each day
32.8% for 1 to 2 cans per day
47.2% for more than 2 cans per day

For diet-soft drink users the risk or becoming overweight or obese was:

36.5% for up to ½ can per day
37.5% for ½ to 1 can per day
54.5% for 1 to 2 cans per day
57.1% for more than 2 cans per day

For each can of diet soft-drink consumed each day, a person's risk or obesity went up 41%.

Fowler is quick to point out that the findings are not a "smoking gun" that diet soda makes you fat; but that something linked to drinking diet soda makes you gain weight.

Studies conducted at Purdue University suggests that the mind is not fooled by the artificial sweeteners. The tongue is temporarily satisfied by the sweet taste of diet soft drinks but the mind isn't fooled and still craves calories for energy. Other studies suggest that a person that consumes an artificially sweetened beverage before a meal will eat more high calorie foods than those that do not.

The number of Americans consuming sugar free products increased from less than 70 million in 1987 to more than 160 million in 2000. During the same period, the consumption of regular soft drinks increased by more than 15 gallons per capita annually.

Despite the superficial logic that consuming less calories will result in weight loss, the evidence is clear that artificial sweeteners can cause a reverse effect and actually cause you to gain weight. In fact nearly ten years ago studies were already revealing that artificial sweeteners can:

-- Stimulate your appetite
-- Increase carbohydrate cravings
-- Stimulate fat storage and weight gain.

According to an article in Technology Review, "aspartame may actually stimulate appetite and bring on a craving for carbohydrates".

The American Cancer Society in 1986 documented the fact that persons who used artificial sweeteners gained more weight than those who avoid them.

Whatever the reason or reasons the numbers are interesting. Another interesting number, Monsanto's profit from the NutraSweet Division was $993 million in 1990. It's no wonder nobody is to concerned with publishing definitive information on this subject.

My website Living to be Younger provides information on natural ways to manage weight and improve quality of life. Why take the risk with chemicals and toxins if we don't need to?

I felt this information was important enough to provide a free excerpt of this chapter of my book, "Living To Be Younger". People need to know the facts about what their consuming and the impact on their health.

We simply are not getting good information, and the result of that lack of knowledge is becoming more and more evident.