Dangerous Effects of Soda on Your Heart

There are people who are really addicted to drinking soda and some to diet soda in an effort to cut calories. I know people who can drink more than 1 diet soda per hour, that is about 8-10 diet sodas per day. Is that healthy? You may ask. After all if you drink that much diet soda you are not getting calories. You probably would think you are just drinking water with some color and some artificial sweetener.

However, personally, I don't think drinking that much soda is healthy and scientific evidence is piling up in regard to the potentially dangerous effects of soda to your heart. First, there is the fact that despite we are drinking more diet soda and consuming more diet products we are getting more and more overweight and obese. More specifically, studies are showing that drinking diet soda increase the likelihood of being overweight or obese. Being overweight or obese increase the risks of having or developing cardiovascular diseases, strokes, and heart attacks. Additionally, there is evidence that having soda drinks does not satisfy your craving for sweets since it affects the ability of your brain to regulate caloric intake. So you may be drinking diet soda and getting extra sugars and carbs eating other carb and sugar -rich foods.

Recent research is showing that drinking more than one soda per day (diet or regular) increases the risk of developing metabolic syndrome by 40%. Metabolic syndrome is a diffuse and poorly understood disease that increases risks factor related to you heart and heart diseases.

In addition to all the previous mentioned studies on the effects of diet sodas on your heart health there others concern regarding the healthfulness of the habit of drinking to much soda even if it is diet soda. Sodas (whether diet or regular) contain phosphoric acid as food additive. This additive is put there to decrease the pH of the carbonated drink and preserve it from spoilage. All god up to this point. However, the phosphorus from the phosphate is implicated in the metabolism of calcium. Too much phosphorus may lead to extracting too much calcium from bones. This may lead to an increased risk of osteoporosis if you drink too much sodas.

You may ask, what about those new "natural" sweeteners as Splenda? Well, there is little research done on this new sweetener. But, Dr. Janet Hull reveals scientific evidence that strongly suggest that sucralose (Splenda) may be harmful to your body.