High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has had a bit of a PR crisis in recent years, resulting in a decline in use. You’ll often hear how it’s more unhealthy than sugar and that food companies use it to cut costs at the expense of consumers’ health. The statement is partly true, as HFCS is an economical substitute for sugar, driven even more by subsidies on corn crops. However, the idea of it being more harmful than regular sugar may not hold much water. The present consensus is that it has pretty much the same nutritional value.
Much of HFCS’s murky reputation can be attributed to fructose — a natural sugar that, along with glucose, is found in regular table sugar. Corn syrup is mostly glucose and is fortified by increasing the proportion of fructose to increase sweetness since fructose is sweeter than glucose. Fructose has been linked to liver disease and other negative health outcomes like inflammation and fibrosis (via the International Journal of Molecular Sciences), making its presence a red flag. The type of HFCS most often used contains about 55% fructose while regular table sugar itself is 50% fructose, making the difference in fructose content between the two sweeteners almost negligible. Thus, the danger posed by most HFCS-containing foods is the same as that of any high-sugar processed food.
The only true detrimental outcome seems to be that the easy availability and low cost of HFCS have proliferated the use of sweeteners even more. We’re now confronted with sugary foods from breakfast cereal (but don’t fall for the myth that all breakfast cereals are sugary) to the unhealthy Chinese restaurant favorite, lemon chicken.
Read more: 12 Foods You Probably Never Knew Were Bad For Blood Sugar
Diet Makes The Real Difference In Health Outcomes
Bowl of white table sugar – Digitalxpress/Getty Images
Both HFCS and table sugar contain a mix of fructose and glucose and are, therefore, very similar in nutritional value as long as they have similar fructose levels. Some versions of HFCS have higher proportions of fructose and can, therefore, be more harmful. However, they are not as common.
Generally, most sugary foods that contain fructose also contain other sugars and are heavy on calories, which makes it complicated to determine just how harmful fructose, and by extension, HFCS is compared to other sugars. The more significant determinant of health outcomes is the amount of sugary foods consumed, and therein lies the real danger of HFCS. Because of its low cost, HFCS seems to have promoted the use of sweeteners in much of the packaged food and drink industry. The presence of sugars in so many of our daily foods results in a diet high in sugars and calories. Luckily, hacks like repurposing leftover Halloween candy to make a trail mix can help keep sugar intake in check.
Ultimately, the reason many believe HFCS to be worse than sugar is that the former gets saddled with all the baggage resulting from the harmful effects of consuming too much sugar and too many calories. Diabetes, obesity, and liver illness are a few of the negative effects of a sugary diet, but they can be caused by both HFCS and regular sugar. HFCS may have indirectly led to more sugar in our foods, but if you had to choose between a product with sugar versus HFCS, picking sugar wouldn’t necessarily be the healthier choice.
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