A Short Message About High Fructose Corn Syrup

By Marcie Barnes

It's everywhere - and it's not good for you. Just take a look at the ingredient labels of some seemingly innocent foods: bread, catchup, spaghetti sauce, cereals you add sugar to such as Special K - it's there.

I was perusing the wikipedia article about HFCS and found something I have heard many times before: "There is a striking correlation between the rise of obesity in the US and the use of HFCS for sweetening beverages and foods." As we've also seen diabetes rates skyrocket, it's interesting to read this article from the medical community about the correlation between HFCS and diabetes.

What's also interesting is the fact that "The preference for high fructose corn syrup over cane sugar amongst the vast majority of American food and beverage manufacturers is largely due to U.S. import quotas and tariffs on sugar. These tariffs significantly increase the domestic U.S. price for sugar, forcing Americans to pay more than twice the world price for sugar." - So, the rest of the world gets soda and other US products with regular sugar. Nice.

It is possible to avoid HFCS, though: I have never personally seen an organic product containing it and I find as a whole the sugar content on the organic counterparts to a lot of typical items is lower. And I would choose sugar over artificial sweeteners any day. The best course of action is to start drinking water and reduce your dependency on sweet foods and drinks. I don't miss them very much at all since I have "phased" them out!