http://paulsjourneytolife.blogspot.com/2012/11/day-330-sugar-suppresses-our-immune.html
My chemistry teacher made a quick comment about how when one consumes sugar, it paralyses the immune system for x amount of time. This was fascinating to hear, because diabetics are known to have a weak immune system - so I've done some reading and this is the best site that I've found for it at the moment - http://www.drjomd.com/highways/nutrition/sugar/sugar-suppresses-the-immune-system/
It is quite fascinating to see how the immune system reacts to the consumption of sugar. It states that in 1973 an experiment was held wherein the participants each consumed 100g or either sucrose, fructose, honey or orange juice after fasting for 36-60 hours. The results found that after 1 and 2 hours of the consumption of the form of sugar the immune system was operating at a 56% capacity rate in comparison to the control which was the fasting state.
The one thing that was found that did not paralyze or suppress the immune system when consumed was a starch or a complex carbohydrate such as a bread or wheat products due to the breaking down of the starch into glucose - as opposed to fructose or sucrose - this mostly likely seems because the body creates glucose from the liver when needed so to the body glucose is a `natural` substance.
So then, if sucrose, fructose, honey, and juice are found to suppress and/or paralyze the immune system we must consider all the products that we consume that have these types of sugars within them and how much sugar we actually consume on a daily basis. Sugar is not only within the candies and sweets that we eat - it is primarily in much of the processed products that are produced and sold on the shelves of stores today. It is in our peanut butters, it is in our bacon, in our cereals, in our crackers, in our chips, in our granola bars, in our juice boxes, in our yogurts, in our lunches that we make for our children, in our breads - it is in, from what I've seen 80-90% of the food that we consume that is processed. The only things that we can be certain of the do not have added sugar are the fruits and vegetables that we consume - artificial sweeteners are another demon on their own.
Literally - daily we are suppressing our immune systems through the foods that we consume and are bought by us - we participate in accepting this life for ourselves because we continue to buy the products that are loaded with sugar and fail to consider what we are ingesting and putting into the body thus we have a responsibility within this - and we are not victims, we are not innocent in this, we are only ignorant, dumb, and blind by continuing to accept this in our lives.
What is also fascinating within this is the fact that the FDA is an acronym for Food and Drug Administration in which many board members of the FDA have been former CEO's, Presidents etc of the industry leaders in candy bars and corporations that are known for their sugary products, also the board members are former CEO's etc of pharmaceutical companies in which their interests are clearly biased towards said companies, in regards to profit and survivability in the capitalistic system. One can conclude then that the hands of the FDA are in our pockets in regards to `bleeding us dry` of our monetary resources through the propagation of sugar within our foods, and the dependency on pharmaceuticals that the consumption of sugar will create.
The suppression of our immune system will create a lack of ability from our white blood cells to effective consume the bacteria/viruses within our blood streams in which this world is becoming more rampant with in which we will become `sicker
This study came out in 1973 - so the pleading of ignorance is far gone for both us, the consumer, and the corporations - I am not saying the we, the consumers should have known the scientific data that sugar suppresses our immune system, but we are quite aware of the effects of sugar on our bodies and are quite aware that sugar is damaging to our bodies, yet we continue to consume outrageous amounts of sugar a day - I know because I used to consume outrageous amounts of sugar a day, which brings up the question of my immune system in/as being a diabetic and whether or not the consumption of sugar prior to being diagnosed with diabetes permanently damaged my immune system. I mean to consider that a single sugary pop has 11 teaspoons of sugar in it is an alarming consideration of what 100g of sucrose will do to the immune system - let alone the plethora of other products containing sugar we consume on a daily basis.
We have a responsibility unto ourselves and the generations that will come after us to make sure that we give the best life possible to our children in which we are currently not doing - take a look at all the products geared towards children and the amount of sugar that each product contains, let alone holidays such as Halloween, Christmas, Valentines day etc where there are specific candies and sugary products sold and consumed in a mass quantity during those time - we have a responsibility here in this life to no longer accept what/how we've been living so that the generations to come will have a life of dignity.