Soft Drinks Linked to Metabolic Syndrome Risk
BOSTON -- Soft drinks, whether diet or regular, are associated with substantially increased risk of metabolic syndrome among middle-age adults, according to a large community-based study.
BOSTON, July 23 -- Soft drinks, whether diet or regular, are associated with substantially increased metabolic syndrome risk among middle-age adults, according to a large community-based study.
Men and women who drank more than one soda daily had a 48% adjusted higher prevalence and 44% higher roughly eight-year adjusted incidence of the cluster of heart disease risk factors than those who drank less, reported Ramachandran S. Vasan, M.D., of Boston University, and colleagues, online in Circulation, Journal of the American Heart Association.
These results from an analysis of the Framingham Heart Study extend previous findings that soft drink consumption contributes to obesity and insulin resistance in children and hypertension in adults.
The surprising lack of difference in risk between artificially-sweetened and regular drinks implied that soda intake may be a marker for overall eating habits that contribute to risk, commented Richard Stein, M.D., of New York University, acting as an American Heart Association spokesperson.
"Heart disease is not a single-cause disease; clearly it's a lifestyle disease," he said, adding, "I think the answer is to look at all the diet factors and if you are getting enough exercise."
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