Can sugar-free drinks help you lose weight? Drink like this, or you'll gain weight!

Author: Tian Dawei

Reviewer: Zhang Na, Associate Researcher, Doctoral Supervisor, Peking University School of Public Health

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In the hot summer, apart from air conditioning, nothing seems to be better than a bottle of ice soda to cool down. But when I think about the weight loss vow I just made and look at the drink full of calories, I feel really conflicted.

But fortunately, there are sugar-free drinks that use sweeteners instead of high-calorie sugar, so people can enjoy the sweetness without worrying about drinking too many calories. It is delicious and helps with weight loss!

But can sugar-free drinks really help you lose weight?

No, sugar-free drinks are not that magical.

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Sugar-free beverages

In 1952, the world's first sugar-free beverage, No-Cal, was launched. [1]

However, this drink is actually developed specifically for diabetic patients. It uses the artificial sweetener "cyclamate" instead of real sugar, but it is not a "weight loss" drink for the general public.

The purpose of this drink is to allow diabetics to taste the sweetness they have longed for without the risk of their blood sugar skyrocketing.

However, smart businessmen did not stop there and they soon found a new market for sugar-free beverages.

Because it does not contain sugar, the calories in a bottle of drink are almost negligible. Doesn't this mean that you don't have to worry about gaining weight no matter how much you drink?

So beverage manufacturers seized this business opportunity and began to produce their own sugar-free beverages. Sugar-free beverages became popular all of a sudden, and a number of branded beverages appeared on the market.

Moreover, the merchants also deliberately emphasize that their sugar-free drinks are sweet and low in calories, and drinking such drinks will not make you fat. So far, people have associated sugar-free drinks with positive concepts such as losing weight and keeping in shape.

In fact, according to the "National Food Safety Standard General Rules for Nutrition Labeling of Pre-packaged Foods (GB28050-2011)" issued by my country in 2011, the sugar content of beverages labeled "low sugar" should be less than or equal to 5 grams per 100 milliliters, and the sugar content of beverages labeled "sugar-free" should be less than 0.5 grams per 100 milliliters.

The sugar content of low-sugar beverages is generally less than half of that of ordinary carbonated beverages, while the free sugar content in sugar-free beverages is almost negligible. Compared with sugary beverages, choosing low-sugar or sugar-free beverages helps control the intake of free sugars.

The reality is not pretty

But after a long period of follow-up observation, scientists discovered an interesting phenomenon, or bad news: "People who drink sugar-free drinks are fatter than those who do not drink sugar-free drinks."

For example, one eight-year study found that people who drank diet soda had twice the risk of gaining weight as those who did not drink diet soda.[2]

Another 10-year study also found that people who drank diet drinks had a BMI 0.8 higher, a waist circumference 2.6 cm thicker, and a 36.7% higher chance of abdominal obesity than those who did not drink diet drinks. [3]

How could this happen?

Christopher Gardner, a researcher at Stanford University, explained[4] that drinking diet drinks can make people think: “Since I’m already drinking diet drinks, it doesn’t matter if I eat an extra ice cream in the evening.” This kind of thinking may cause people who drink diet drinks to unconsciously make up for the calories they missed, or even eat more.

But after all, this is due to human greed, and sugar-free drinks refuse to take the blame.

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Sugar-free beverages are not to blame

If you look closely at the data from these studies, you can also find some clues.

In the two papers mentioned above, people who often drank sugar-free drinks were fatter than those who did not drink sugar-free drinks at the beginning of the experiment. These people may have unhealthy eating habits, and drinking sugar-free drinks is a "remedy" they take.

In fact, as long as you can control your desire to eat, replacing sugary drinks with sugar-free drinks can really help you control your weight.

For example, one 18-month study found that children who drank one diet soda per day had a slower increase in BMI than children who drank one sugary drink per day.[5]

A six-month trial also found that replacing sugary drinks with sugar-free drinks was more effective in losing weight. [6]

Can I drink freely?

Twelve diet sodas a day, as long as I can control myself? [7] Um, that’s not good either…

A 2016 study found that long-term and high-volume consumption of aspartame, a sweetener commonly used in diet drinks, may cause changes in the intestinal microbiome of mice, leading to obesity and metabolic diseases. [8]

Of course, this "a lot" means we need to drink 8 bottles (4.24 liters) of sugar-free cola a day. If you drink one or two bottles occasionally, it's fine, but if you drink 12 bottles a day, it's not so good.

In addition, sugar-free drinks may not be as good as imagined.

Sugar-free beverages generally use sugar substitutes, which include sweeteners such as aspartame, cyclamate, acesulfame potassium, etc. The sweetness of these sweeteners is dozens or even hundreds of times that of white sugar.

If you consume large amounts of sweeteners regularly, it may cause harm to the liver and nervous system, especially to the elderly, pregnant women and children.

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in conclusion

If you have a healthy diet, drinking a few sugar-free drinks occasionally can indeed reduce your calorie intake. But if you are already a glutton and want to lose weight by drinking a few bottles of sugar-free drinks, you should wake up. Eat less and move more. This is what you should do.

References:

[1] Encyclopedia of junk food and fast food ,Andrew F. Smith, p.116, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006

[2] Fowler SP, Williams K, Resendez RG, et al. Fueling the obesity epidemic? Artificially sweetened beverage use and long-term weight gain[J]. Obesity, 2008, 16(8): 1894-1900.

[3] Chia CW, Shardell M, Tanaka T, et al. Chronic low-calorie sweetener use and risk of abdominal obesity among older adults: a cohort study[J]. PloS one, 2016, 11(11): e0167241.

[4] https://www.vox.com/2016/11/28/13764656/diet-soda-metabolism-weight-loss-obesity

[5] de Ruyter JC, Olthof MR, Seidell JC, et al. A trial of sugar-free or sugar-sweetened beverages and body weight in children[J]. New England Journal of Medicine, 2012, 367(15): 1397-1406.

[6] Tate DF, Turner-McGrievy G, Lyons E, et al. Replacing caloric beverages with water or dietary beverages for weight loss in adults: main results of the C hoose H ealthy O pt i ons C onsciously E veryday (CHOICE) randomized clinical trial–[J]. The American journal of clinical nutrition, 2012, 95(3): 555-563.

[7] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2017/12/12/trump-reportedly-drinks-12-cans-of-diet-coke-each-day-is-that-healthy/?utm_term=.340b79f97d89

[8] Gul SS, Hamilton ARL, Munoz AR, et al. Inhibition of the gut enzyme intestinal alkaline phosphatase may explain how aspartame promotes glucose intolerance and obesity in mice[J]. Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism, 2016, 42(1): 77-83.

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