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Carbonated beverages are associated with out-of-hospital cardiac arrests of cardiac origin, according to results from the All-Japan Utstein Registry presented for the first time today at ESC Congress. The study in nearly 800,000 patients suggests that limiting consumption of carbonated beverages may be beneficial for health.
"Some epidemiologic studies have shown a positive correlation between the consumption of soft drinks and the incidence of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and stroke, while other reports have demonstrated that the intake of green tea and coffee reduced the risk and mortality of CVD," said principal investigator Professor Keijiro Saku, Dean and professor of cardiology at Fukuoka University in Japan. "Carbonated beverages, or sodas, have frequently been demonstrated to increase the risk of metabolic syndrome and CVD, such as subclinical cardiac remodeling and stroke. However, until now the association between drinking large amounts of carbonated beverages and fatal CVD, or out-of-hospital cardiac arrests (OHCA) of cardiac origin, was unclear."
In other words, put the soda down and back away slowly... Is there a safer way to make our beverages bubbly?
Original Submission
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Dunbal on Thursday September 03 2015, @11:52AM
Fromt TFA:
Expenditures on other beverages, including green tea, black tea, coffee, cocoa, fruit or vegetable juice, fermented milk beverage, milk and mineral water were not significantly associated with OHCAs of cardiac origin.
This makes me wonder if they sufficiently analyzed overall diet. Carbonated beverage "excess" could just be a marker of overall poor dietary choices not the cause of the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 03 2015, @01:33PM
I agree. Frankly soda is huge cocktail of stuff. Several different kinds of acid, sugars, oils, caffeine, phosphorus. Just getting rid of sugar spike alone helps with your diet. For the past 2 days I am leaving them alone (1.5 pounds down but that could just be variation). Hopefully I can stop. I avg 2-4 cans a day when I am into them.
Lost about 15 pounds earlier this year by cutting them out of my diet (5 months). Put it all back on when they are :( Even the diet ones cause a 'sugar spike' by the way they manipulate the other sugars in your body. I cant stand coffee or tea. So water it is for me. Nice side effects are I do not feel really tired all the time and just mildly tired. I also sleep pretty good thru the night now due to low acid reflux.
These things are dessert drinks. We treat them as primary drinks.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Thursday September 03 2015, @03:46PM
I drink only carbonated drinks, and only full-sugar carbonated drinks, and only full-caffeinated carbonated drinks and I'm constantly remarked upon as being "skinny" (I also have no trouble sleeping, never nap during the day, and don't have a problem with alertness or tiredness - over or under). My situation is unchanged for nearly 20 years.
Again, just because YOU can't drink them without putting on weight, why should it affect my choice too?
And, actually, the carbon dioxide dissolves in water to form carbonic acid, so ANY carbonated drink will be acidic. However, as pointed out, your stomach is also highly acidic. Acidity on its own is not a problem, its the strength, volume and frequency, and how it interacts in a particular person. Same as the sugar. (Same with your teeth... any sugar is bad for your teeth but what matters is length of exposure and strength of that exposure. Starch from, say, crisps (potato chips) is a sugar too... and if a bit lodges in your teeth for a few minutes, that's MUCH WORSE for your teeth than downing a whole can of carbonated drink in one go - presuming you don't swill it around your mouth).
However, I'll be buggered if I could work out how 2-4 cans of any carbonated drink contains ANYWHERE NEAR enough to make you put or, sustain, or lose, an extra 15 pounds. That's just insane mathematics, and correlative effects.
Maybe it's more complicated than "This drink is bad" and more like "You have a body not capable of handling X foodstuff". Like gluten-intolerance, etc. - why should that affect the people who can eat normal bread? People are inherently biased against admitting they have a weakness, whether that's mentally, physically or - in this case - probably gastrally.
P.S. Not visited, nor needed to, a dentist in 15 years nor a GP for any general health problem in my life (injury, yes, and things like ingrowing toenails, yes... but pass all the medicals every time). Can't even tell you the last time I took a tablet for anything at all.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by RobotLove on Thursday September 03 2015, @03:53PM
This post is idiocy. Just because you can find an outlier (in this case, yourself) doesn't mean it's a general rule. We have very solid science for what sugar and acid do to a body. Your personal experiences doesn't nullify that.
Have you been in a car accident and been saved by your seat belt? No? Then seat belts should not be required for anyone! Also, I know a man who smoked until he was 90 without ill effect. Clearly smoking is not dangerous.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday September 03 2015, @04:04PM
"Then seat belts should not be required for anyone!"
Actually - that is correct. If the nanny state is looking out for everyone, you can expect that eventually everyone will be dependent on the nanny state.
Seat belt use should be voluntary.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 03 2015, @04:15PM
> Seat belt use should be voluntary.
It is voluntary, just stay off those nanny-state roads and stick to the roads on your private property and you will have no trouble with the law.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by khallow on Thursday September 03 2015, @11:46PM
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Thursday September 03 2015, @07:06PM
Anecdotes about how an individual consumes a certain diet and doesn't incur certain symptoms is of no scientific value. Only populations with measured diets and activities are useful, because there *is* a different in our personal genetics and how we adapt to our environments. You have a point about denial...!
The problem is not the "can of soda" per se. It is usually used as a quantity of calorific value that is relatable to a non-technical audience.
If you are consuming 150 kCals of food more than your body needs, then by definition it will get stored. In mammals this is body fat.
Hence, if you consume "the equivalent" of 140 kCals/day (12oz coke) that is 1lb of fat every 25 days. So 12lbs/year.
The FDA figures for daily calorie consumption are almost complete fiction. If you are overweight, you are eating too much. That's physics, although it can be hard to accept for some.The optimistic FDA published figures have probably lead to the general problem of under-estimating calorie consumption, and over-estimating exercise exertion.
In 100% of cases, changing the ratio of diet/exerise will change your bodyfat composition, assuming there is not a prevailing physiological condition (very rare mitochondria disorders), and if you are physically able.
But sugar and in particular HFCS is poison. This makes it much more difficult to judge calorie value than, say, a piece of fruit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 04 2015, @07:27AM
Perhaps in your part of the world. Over here we invented something called "the toilet", where you can go crap out excessive stuff.
How much of the excessive energy your body stores and how much goes straight to crap depends very much on the individual. That's why some people can eat like three regular people, consider "exercise" a threat on par with "murder", and yet stay skinny.
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Thursday September 03 2015, @01:49PM
Yes I thought that too. When I hear "carbonated" I think "Junk food". A poor article that does not make clear that it is the *sugar* causing the problems... The acid in human stomachs is several orders of magnitude stronger than soda water...
Phosphoric acid (in cola drinks), is probably not great...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 04 2015, @07:30AM
They did, however, make it clear that the study did not show causation, only correlation. So leaving out the part about sugar being the cause is the correct thing to do, as this study did not show that.
(Score: 2) by Gravis on Thursday September 03 2015, @09:03PM
Carbonated beverage "excess" could just be a marker of overall poor dietary choices not the cause of the problem.
anything beyond a few sips a day of "carbonated beverages" is excessive. a 12 oz can of Coke has 800% your daily value of sugar.