Sugar from sweets and fruit. Which is more dangerous?

From the content of the article

To lower your blood sugar, it’s important to pay attention to your diet while exercising regularly. This helps avoid blood sugar spikes and builds.

For the diabetic person and not only, it is important to avoid food products that contain a lot of sugar. But experts point out that the sugar in fruit is completely different from the sugar in processed foods. For example, fruits contain sugars known as fructose and glucose.

What is sucrose?

When these sugars are combined, the result is sucrose, commonly known as table sugar or white sugar, he writes britannica.com. Sucrose occurs naturally in almost all plants, but is especially abundant in sugar cane, sugar beets, maple sap, dates, and honey.

Sucrose is produced commercially, mostly from sugar cane and sugar beet, for use as an industrial sweetener added to foods and beverages. Processed sugar is concentrated and refined, thus being exposed to various factors, including reagents and chemical reactions that remove colorants and facilitate crystallization.

Although sucrose is found in most plants, it does not occur in very high concentrations, with sugarcane and beets being exceptions. Therefore, sugars such as fructose, glucose and sucrose are generally not highly concentrated in fresh fruit. For example, a medium-sized apple contains about 19 grams of sugar.

Soft drinks and sweets, the most dangerous

In contrast, soft drinks and sweets are high in processed sugar. A chocolate bar contains, on average, about 35 grams of sugar, while a soft drink can have up to 39 grams of sugar, according to the source cited by antena3.ro.

Additionally, while fruit contains many other nutrients, such as vitamin C and fiber, sweets lack these healthy components. The relatively low sugar levels, combined with the fiber and other nutrients in the fruit, help prevent sudden spikes in blood sugar, which is important for people with diabetes to know.

How do you know if your sugar level is high?

To find out if your blood sugar level is high, it is important to measure your blood sugar level – in this sense, your glucose level is considered high when a concentration of more than 100 mg/dL is detected.

Photo source: doctorulzilei.ro archive

Diabetes is usually considered established when the glucose concentration is above 126 mg/dL on at least two different doses or above 200 mg/dL on a single dose.

In addition to the fasting glucose test, the doctor may order other tests such as an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT), postprandial blood glucose, or glycated hemoglobin, which provide information about glucose levels over the past three months.

To confirm a possible increase in blood sugar, the doctor also evaluates the signs and symptoms that the person may have that indicate possible hyperglycemia: excessive thirst, increased need to urinate, headache, numbness in the hands or legs and drowsiness.

Source: www.doctorulzilei.ro