Reduce sugar intake early so babies are less at risk of diabetes, high blood pressure as adults

Parents who want to reduce the risk of their child growing up with diabetes or heart disease should consider limiting sugar consumption in their first 1,000 days, starting with conception.

A new study published in the journal Science finds that a low-sugar diet in utero and during the first two years of life offers a “meaningful” reduction in chronic disease after birth. and an adult. Those who restricted their sugar intake during the first few years had a 35% lower risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and a 20% lower risk of developing diabetes. blood “Maternal low glucose intake before birth was sufficient to reduce risks, but continued glucose restriction after birth increased the benefits,” according to a news release on the study.

Researchers, from the University of Southern California Los Angeles, Canada’s McGill University and the University of California Berkeley, used a “natural experiment” that was World War II sugar in the United Kingdom and took a long time behind the health effects to reach their level. decisions. They noted that the UK’s sugar rationing ended in 1942 as part of the food rationing, which did not end until September 1953.

Learning about glucose levels

Using up-to-date data from the UK’s largest Biobank, they looked at the effects of early glucose restriction on the health of adults conceived during the food ration. “Importantly, the fragmentation did not involve extreme food shortages in general,” the researchers noted. In general the diet was similar to today’s recommendations. But sugar consumption has almost doubled since the restrictions ended. Some food habits have not changed, which is what creates that natural experiment, scientists said.

“Studying the long-term effects of added sugar on health is difficult,” the USC release quoted corresponding author Tadeja Gracner, a senior economist at the USC Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research, as saying. “It is difficult to find situations in which people are exposed to different nutritional conditions early in life and follow them for 50 to 60 years. The end of the separation gave us a new natural experiment to overcome these problems.”

The researchers took the opportunity to look at the long-term health effects of sugar by comparing people born before and after the UK ended its sugar ratio in September 1953. They said they used “very difficult window” towards the end of the glucose measurement when looking for studies that match the biobank criteria.

Although the lack of sugar in early life reduced the risk, some in the sugar group developed diabetes and hypertension – but later than the other groups. The onset of diabetes was delayed by four years, hypertension by two.

Researchers believe that reducing sugar intake during pregnancy and not exposing babies to it in the first few years will save money, prolong life and improve quality of life later, they say.

According to the release, medical expenses each year for diabetes are about $12,000. And when a young person develops it, it can affect the lifespan even more.

They recognize that sugar is everywhere and it is difficult to avoid it for children, but they also call doing so important. Co-author Paul Gertler of UC Berkeley and the National Bureau of Economic Research referred to sugar in early life as “the new tobacco,” and suggested that food manufacturers should have responsibility to make food for their children in good manners. He said, he is an advocate of taxing sugary foods that “weaken children.”

The researchers say they also intend to look at how early sugar restriction affects education, wealth, chronic inflammation, cognitive function and dementia.

Testimonials are important

As The New York Times reported, “The results add to the growing body of evidence that good nutrition at an early age can affect health later in life.” The article cites a study in the New England Journal of Medicine that focused on obesity, using the records of 300,000 young men, all 19, whose mothers were in the first trimester of pregnancy. of the Dutch famine of 1944-45. The researchers found that they were more likely to be obese at age 19 than men born after the famine. A separate study found that women whose mothers were pregnant during the famine were more likely to weigh more at age 50 than women who were born after the famine.

But the Times noted that hunger studies do not target specific foods or nutrients. A new study is successful in separating sugar.

Gracner told the Times that it’s possible that early exposure to sugar can cause lasting cravings — an idea suggested by the British National Diet and Nutrition Survey, which found that people who were in the womb or babies during the meal were eat less sugar later in life. .