Some Facts and My Opinion of High Fructose Corn Syrup

586 WordsFeb 24, 20182 Pages
I hope all is well with you. Thank you for asking my opinion about high fructose corn syrup. Rest assure I do not want you to be concerned, I will try to explain it as much as I can. Let me start by explaining to you what high fructose syrup means in comparison to regular sugar. HFCS is composed of a mix of glucose and fructose (Beil). This same chemical components are also found in “regular” table sugar. Table sugar also has another name called sucrose. It has a linear ring structure with three to seven carbon atoms (Phelan 854). To make it easier on you to understand, we eat sugar it breaks down in our stomach as glucose and fructose (Busken 112-113). If the breakdown of HFCS and sugar is compared you will find that HFCS gives the better opportunity of using in food (Busken 112-113). The digestion of sugar is 50/50, while the breakdown of HFCS is 42% fructose and 55% glucose (Busken 112-113). The remaining 3% are chains of saccharides (Busken 112-113). Now looking into the graph that you sent me I do not think that high fructose corn syrup is the main cause of obesity. Through my understanding of the readings I have read that interacting with a substance does not necessarily mean that it is the cause of it. Throughout the years Americans have developed a bigger appetite and specifically a sweet tooth (Beil). The graph demonstrates that between 1975-2000 the high fructose corn syrup intake rose frequently. In between the same years, obesity has rise and fallen multiple
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