Sodas are fast becoming the ultimate crime for dieters. So much so that Coca Cola has been forced to develop a new drink which targets more health conscious drinkers. But what’s all the fuss about? Aren’t diet sodas already targeting those people? And is the new drink any better?
Regular sodas are now recognised to have dangerously high levels of sugar. Recent studies have tended to agree that sugar is addictive, and foods with high sugar content can lead to overeating, energy slumps, obesity and diabetes.
We’ve known for a while that sugary drinks would rot our teeth, and so there’s been a market for diet sodas for some time already. But it turns out that diet drinks may not be such a good substitute after all. The University of Texas published a study in 2011 that followed 475 people over 10 years. They found that people who drank diet sodas still had a 70% increase in waist circumference compared with those who didn’t drink soda.
The sweeteners themselves have also been linked to diabetes, and it was shown last year that diet soda drinkers suffer the same long term health problems as normal soda drinkers – weight gain, diabetes, cardiovascular disease. If there are fewer calories, then surely swapping regular for diet while keeping everything else the same should guarantee you lose weight?
The problem is that people don’t keep everything else the same. It’s too easy to think you’ve saved calories, and allow yourself a treat somewhere else. But probably the bigger effect comes from confusing your body. You’ve drunk something very sweet, so your body expects a sugar rush. But there’s no sugar, so it doesn’t happen. Then your body craves sugar, and you feel compelled to eat something else to get that rush.
On top of that, artificial sweeteners trigger insulin, which sends your body into fat storage mode and causes weight gain. And while it’s not a proved causal link, soda drinkers display a greater tendency towards depression, and the effect is stronger in diet soda drinkers than regular ones.
So the diet soda revolution hasn’t really panned out. But that’s not sending people back to regular sodas. It’s a trend that is mirroring our reduction in salt intake – initially slow to follow advice, we’ve now seen a 15% reduction in salt consumption over the last decade. Similarly, UK surveys report that we are now drinking fewer carbonated drinks than just six months ago.
The message is getting through, and so it’s getting through to the soda companies by way of reduced sales. And that’s why Coca Cola is releasing its new green label drink. It comes with a third less calories compared to the regular drink, by using a natural sweetener called stevia. That may allay the fears associated with artificial sweeteners, but it still means 89 calories in a single can. And it still contains 22g of sugar per can, which is hardly low.
By putting a green label on it, and calling it Life, Coca Cola are trying to brand it a healthy alternative at a time when soda is seriously in the crossfire on health grounds. But it’s not the answer. Sure, in small amounts, as long as you watch what you eat and drink, there’s no harm in enjoying a little soda every now and then. But if you’re trying to cut down, a simpler and better alternative is just to drink water. That has no artificial sweeteners and no sugar either. You can always add a slice of fruit to give it some flavour, and use sparkling water if you like the fizz.
As always, then, the advice is to read the label. The marketing says one thing, but the label tells a different story.
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