For most people, alcohol isn’t addictive in the same way that smoking or sugar is. If you eat stuff with a lot of sugar it makes things without sugar actually taste worse. Whereas drinking alcohol doesn’t make water taste worse or whatever.
Also alcohol only kills 80k or so Americans per year, way less than smoking or sugar.
If you're referring to the CDC figure, then I doubt you're making an apples-to-apples comparison. That figure's based on the deaths that are easily attributable to serious alcohol over-consumption, like cirrhosis or car wrecks. It doesn't include things like increased cancer or heart disease risk.
Whereas the oft-quoted figures for smoking and sugar are pretty much all about things like increased cancer or heart disease risk.
I'm not sure what the numbers would be like if you _did_ include those diseases in the alcohol death figures, but I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up somewhere between smoking and sugar.
Fair enough, even if it kills 5% of Americans instead of 3.6% though, I doubt that more advertising restrictions would make much difference. I’d much rather reinstate the ban on DTC prescription drug ads.
Is there any reliable source to back up the claim that sugar is more addictive than alcohol?
I am suspicious about this claim because there are plenty of people and families ruined directly as a result of alcoholism. I don’t think sugar addiction is causing nearly as much trouble as alcoholism, despite being a more widely consumed and easily available substance.
The number of "Obese People" far outweighs the number of chronic alcoholics... we are talking about almost 1/3rd of the population being obese (i.e. not just a bit fat, or chubby, just straight out obese).
Is obesity a sign of sugar addiction? I don’t think so. People addicted to substances like alcohol and heroin will go out of their way to obtain these substances breaking laws and ruining others’ lives if necessary. While obese people are just... obese, not crazy nor dangerous. Their mind don’t get wired by sugar to put sugar in front of decency and laws.
Not to mention sugar is not the only cause of obesity anyway. Sedentary lifestyle, hormones, gut bacteria, and the portion sizes in the US are all likely causes.
> While obese people are just... obese, not crazy nor dangerous.
If you could wave a magic wand, wouldn't most obese people prefer a healthy weight? In aggregate, we can add up individual decisions and call the average "human nature." The actions of society have forced individuals to live with bodies that don't function as well as they could, so it makes sense for us to do something about the problem.
How well do we understand the causes of the obesity epidemic? Is sugar responsible for, say, 10% or 90% of the total? If we wish to progress toward a low-sugar future, then it would be good to have an estimate of how much good it would do.
I’d question if this is purely the result of a sugar addiction. This is a very American figure, other countries have less problems, even though sugar is widely available.
Obesity has a variety of contributing factors, (lack of) access to actual healthy food, lack of physical exercise, high calorie intake (certainly aided by sugar), ...
31 BMI is highly unhealthy, i know it was mine 2 years ago. You don't look "obese", but when fat start to show on your cheeks, you have to stop eating that much sugar immediatly. I'm less than 30 and i my ankle/knees are hurting like i was 40. I couldn't run, and running is still really, really hard on my ankles (after 40 minute i start to feel lot of pain). Even walking too much (more than ~7/8 kilometers) hurts. It's not beause you don't "look" obese than you are not. And i have freaking hearth issue (it's not genetic, none of my grandparent ever had heart issues, and most of my great-grandparent lived to 100 yo or near that.
I still have 26.8 BMI and i'm aiming 23-24 as i'm not a very muscular guy.
I'll have to agree though, alcoolism is worst than low obesity. Etanol is as bad as fructose for the liver, and worst for everything else too.
Sugar isn't the cause of obesity though. I think people that try to blame it all on sugar are simply looking for a scapegoat. It's easier to actually over eat on fat than on sugar because of a higher caloric density. Carbs are just cheaper so they get added to everything as bulk.
Just a sidenote, sugar addiction starts way earlier fe. 6-7 year old kids are much more likely to eat too much sugar. Alcohol kicks in quite later and likely causes more damage to people around the subject, I agree with that.
I think you are underestimating the costs of alcohol on society by reducing it to "just" a death count. I won't deny that sugar consumption is a public health crisis.
But on the other hand, consuming sugar mainly only harms yourself. People that consume sugar (usually) don't go kill innocent people or tear apart their family or cause all sorts of permanent physical and mental issues in children.
Is the next step forbidding dangerous hobbies like mountain climbing? Maybe taking more than one job to support a large family or accumulate college funds for one's children--"you're not getting enough sleep, which increases health care costs that we pay for."
Yes, if people need to work multiple jobs that is an indication of a huge societal problem. The workers in those jobs are being abused by the society and collectively we should fix it.
We should change the law to make sure that every job pays a living wage, so that people are not forced to work 60+ hours per week at irregular hours plus commute time etc. just to survive. We should increase social support for families and children. We should strive to reduce the cost of housing, transportation, healthcare, and education.
Our society is rich enough to dramatically increase public funding for primary and secondary education and adequately train and support career teachers, dramatically increase funding for social workers, mental health professionals, etc.
> and adequately train and support career teachers
I always love the 'teachers' pay discussions and argument. While there are many teachers that are dedicated and do a great job there are also many who go into it for the (at one point not sure if it's true everywhere still) guaranteed retirement money and summers off. Also if a career doesn't pay enough for whatever lifestyle you want or place you want to live perhaps you can give thought to either relocating somewhere else or before you pick that career (for whatever reason) what the pay and benefits are for your choice. For sure not everyone is in a position to do this but my guess is most don't even give that thought. Meaning for example they decide to become a teacher in a very expensive place (NYC let's say) and then even at $90k per year can't afford to lead a decent life style. They could probably move 60 miles west from NYC (to say rural Pennsylvania) and earn less and have a better life. But then they wouldn't be in NYC, right? And they've decided
they have to be there. As any immigrant who has left their family and the familiarity of a foreign country would tell you sometimes you have to relocate somewhere else if it's not good where you are.
> so that people are not forced to work 60+ hours per week at irregular hours plus commute time etc
You'd have to look at the total picture of how they are spending their money though.
> forbidding dangerous hobbies like mountain climbing?
Well not that it would ever happen but why should I pay for someone's dangerous and/or foolish risky activity? (Rescue, health care and so on). People often act as if there is a large pot of money sitting around to cover any and all mistakes and life choices someone makes.
Sure. But there are 300,000 obesity-related deaths per year. Obesity- and sugar-related issues are less likely to result in ER-type scenarios, but are nevertheless pervasive.
> Also alcohol only kills 80k or so Americans per year
Important to point out that the negative health impact of any 'vice' (and you can consider sugar a vice given this discussion) go way beyond just 'death'. There are so many negative impacts that are significant vs. just 'how many people die'. For example health care costs and related health problems (which result in economic impact as well as costs for everyone).
Not to mention there are social limitations to alcohol consumption. Eg. you wouldn't normally drink whisky on the bus or at work (unless you happen to be a character from "Mad Men"), but there aren't many times nor places where eating a chocolate bar is frowned upon.
> If you eat stuff with a lot of sugar it makes things without sugar actually taste worse.
You can still eat less sugary stuff in general (which is what most people do). Changing your taste is not addiction, it's a reasonable shift in preferences.
> only kills 80k or so Americans per year
Society may care more about alcohol addiction because it tends to affect people other than the alcohol consumer.
the second is not a good source. The title is misleading as the article itself says experts don't agree.
I don't think it's clear what is an "addiction", as addiction is part of how humans (and all brains) work. reinforcement of reward is necessary for normal function. The most discrete sign of addiction would be the molecular switch DeltaFosB which is manifest in behavioral and drug addictions. However, for things like sugar things are more nuanced.
The two are also hard to compare side-to-side because alcohol addiction is like 50-70% genetic, and the effects tend affect other people more severely while sugar basically harms the person who eats it.
That's the genetic fallacy. They link to a number of other sources from that article with supporting information such as a Connecticut College study and a Princeton University study. I would deem university sources "good" (although you're still subject to cherry-picking and the like)
Also alcohol only kills 80k or so Americans per year, way less than smoking or sugar.