Cool, clean water
It's tough fighting the sugar high that comes from drinking soda and other sugary beverages but a new study shows there's an effective cold turkey way of doing so.
A study at Virginia Tech University says replacing one sugary drink per day with a glass of water greatly benefits a person's overall health. It found that swapping one sugary drink per day with water reduces caloric intake and the risk of obesity and other health conditions.
The study said the extra calories present in heavily sweetened beverages such as soda, energy drinks, diet beverages some juices and even sweetened coffee increases the risk of weight gain, obesity, Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
The more sugary beverages a person drinks each day, the more likely he is to eat unhealthy amounts of red and processed meats, refined grains, sweets and starches. On the other hand, water and lower calorie drinks are linked to diets higher in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, fish and poultry.
The effects of replacing a single eight ounce sugar-sweetened drink with an eight ounce serving of water is enough to achieve the shift toward better health, said the study.
"We found that among U.S. adults who consume one serving of sugar-sweetened beverages per day, replacing that drink with water lowered the percent of calories coming from drinks from 17 to 11 percent," said Kiyah Duffey, an adjunct faculty member at Virginia Tech University.
"Even those who consumed more sugary drinks per day could still benefit from water replacement, dropping the amount of calories coming from beverages to less than 25 percent of their daily caloric intake."
She also said regardless of how many servings of sugar-sweetened beverages a person consumes, replacing even just one serving can be of benefit.
For the study, researchers analyzed health data of 19,718 adults collected as part of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey between 2007 and 2012. They found a shift in drinking patterns has a big effect on health.
