Sugar is King!

Sugar is King!

Last week I was pleasantly surprised to read a statement saying dental research had been influenced by the giant sugar industry to find ways of addressing tooth decay by making teeth more resilient to the effects of sugar rather than pointing a finger at sugar being at the heart of the decay issue.  One of the advantages to the internet is having access to a wide assortment of information, some great, some good, some questionable, and some downright laughable.  Being exposed to the whole range of information enables one to explore concepts from more than one perspective rather than only hearing the information that supports the status quo.  I have long suspected the above statement to be true and was very pleased to hear it being supported from within the dental industry.

Can research really be the gold standard of proof?

Research is expensive to fund, and somebody pays for it. Who is going to shell out good money to prove what the company is promoting as health supporting is actually detrimental to your health and their business profits?  Yet if money is allowed to influence scientific research, the very least we can do is read it with an open mind knowing whoever funded it has something to gain from a positive conclusion.   Knowing this, it behooves us to read all research suspiciously knowing it’s expensive advertising.

Perhaps it’s time for us to start thinking independently, questioning what we see, and trying to figure it out for ourselves rather than blindly following experts who give us the solution so we go in search of the problem.

Perhaps it’s time to address the situation that the sugar industry is huge.  Sugar is King!  Or so they use to say in the Caribbean when the sugar industry caused global invasion of these tropical islands.  Sugar was such a desired commodity everyone wanted a piece of the action.  Today sugar is grown elsewhere and it’s not just about putting the white powder on every grocery store shelf in the world, it’s about putting some form of sugar in nearly every other product stocked on those same grocery store shelves.  Sugar is King, and it’s destroying our health in more ways than just cavities.
Oral health is dependent upon many things, good oral hygiene for starters.  However, great oral hygiene and regular dental appointments aren’t the sole solution to good oral health.  Sugar promotes cavities.  It also promotes an unhealthy body through diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and so on, all of which impact oral health.  Humans were designed to obtain their sugar in natural forms, wrapped up with fiber and other health supporting nutrients.  We were designed to eat predominately fruits and vegetables.

I find it almost laughable that the food pyramid places sugar in the top of the pyramid under the heading of use sparingly, yet in the base of the pyramid, all the cereals, pasta, breads, crackers and other processed foods are encouraged as the foundation of our dietary needs, just happen to be the foods that have been laced with added sugar!