Consuming sugar and refined carbohydrates can lead to high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity and a host of other health problems. Dr. Weston Price documented the degeneration caused by high sugar diets in his book, “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration”. He would compare the effect of diet on people of the same ethnicity. He made these comparisons all around the world. Generally one group would be more isolated and eat a the same diet their ancestors had for centuries; he would compare the health (mainly dental health and bone structure) to a group of the same ethnicity that ate a more “civilized” diet consisting of much more sugar and refined starch. The physical degeneration of the group eating the high sugar, high refined carbohydrate diet was striking. This was true of every ethnic group Dr. Price studied.
Recent research published in PLoS Genetics (2009;5(3)e1000408) gives a hint to the reason sugar can reduce the length and quality of life. Researchers at the Université de Montreal were able to increase the life span of yeast cell by reducing the amount of sugar it consumed. Yeast cells were used in the study because they age similarly to human cells. Researchers believed that the study took a step in confirming the connection between age-related diseases and sugar consumption.
