Up to 20 % less risk of hypertension and 35 % less risk of diabetes in children who were first 1, 000 days after conception. The researchers examined the impact of early-life sugar restrictions on health outcomes of adults conceived in the United Kingdom just before and after the close of military sugar restriction using modern data from the U.K. Biobank, a database of health histories, biological, lifestyle, and other disease risk factors.
A new study provides powerful new proof of the longstanding health effects of early-life sugars intake. A low-sugar meal in utero and in the first two years of life is significantly lower the risk of chronic diseases in age.
The study, which was published in Science, found that children who were sugar restricted during the first 1,000 days of life had a 35 % lower risk of Type 2 diabetes and had a 20 % lower risk of hypertension than adults. The mother’s initial sugars intake reduced the risks, but continued sugar limitations after beginning increased the rewards.
Taking advantage of an unexpected “natural test” from World War II, scientists at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, McGill University in Montreal, and the University of California, Berkeley, examined how honey restriction during the battle influenced long-term health benefits.
As part of its military food restriction initiative, the United Kingdom put restrictions on glucose distribution in 1942. In September 1953, rationing ended.
The researchers examined the impact of early-life sugar restrictions on health outcomes of adults conceived in the United Kingdom just before and after the end of wartime sugar rationing using contemporary data from the U.K. Biobank, a database of medical histories, genetic, lifestyle, and other disease risk factors.
Tadeja Gracner, senior economist at the USC Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research, says that studying the long-term effects of added sugar on health is difficult. People are randomly exposed to various dietary environments early in life and follow them for 50 to 60 years, according to experts. We had a novel natural experiment to solve these issues after the end of rationing.
Sugar intake during rationing was about 8 teaspoons ( 40 grams ) per day on average. When rationing ended, sugar and sweets consumption skyrocketed to about 16 teaspoons ( 80 grams ) per day.
Notably, rationing did not involve extreme food deprivation overall. The United States Department of Agriculture and the World Health Organization, which advise adults and children under two to consume no more than 12 teaspoons ( 50g ) of added sugar daily, appeared to be following today’s guidelines.
An intriguing natural experiment was born as a result of the immediate and significant increase in sugar consumption but no other foods after rationing ended. Compared to those born shortly after the end of rationing, who were born into a more sugar-rich environment, those who were born before experienced sugar-scarce conditions.
The researchers then identified those who were born in the U.K. Biobank’s data collection process more than 50 years later. The authors were able to compare midlife health outcomes of otherwise comparable birth cohorts using a very tight birth window around the end of sugar rationing.
While surviving the first 1, 000 days of life significantly reduced the risk of diabetes and hypertension, those who were later diagnosed with either of those conditions saw a delay in disease development of four and two years, respectively.
Notably, just being exposed to sugar restrictions in the womb reduced risks, but disease protection increased after the fact that solids were most likely introduced.
The magnitude of this effect is meaningful as it can save costs, extend life expectancy and, perhaps more importantly, quality of life, say the researchers.
In the United States, people with diabetes incur annual medical expenditures of about$ 12, 000 on average. Further, a diabetes diagnosis that occurs sooner results in significantly shorter life expectancy, with each decade reducing life expectancy by three to four years.
These figures, according to the researchers, underscore the value of early treatments that could prevent or delay this disease.
Experts ‘ concerns about children’s long-term health as they consume excessive amounts of added sugars during their early life, a critical period of development, continue to mount. Adjusting child sugar consumption, however, is not easy– added sugar is everywhere, even in baby and toddler foods, and children are bombarded with TV ads for sugary snacks, say the researchers.
According to study co-authors Claire Boone of McGill University and the University of Chicago,” Parents need information about what works,” and this study provides some of the first direct proof that lowering added sugar early in life can significantly improve children’s health over the course of a lifetime.
According to co-author Paul Gertler of UC Berkeley and the National Bureau of Economics Research,” Sugar early in life is the new tobacco, and we should treat it as such” by holding food companies accountable, replacing it with healthier options, and regulating the marketing and taxation of sugary foods geared toward children.
This study is the first of a larger research effort exploring how early-life sugar restrictions affected a broader set of economic and health outcomes in later adulthood, including education, wealth, and chronic inflammation, cognitive function and dementia.
