Fructose Weight Gain Impact Same As Other Carbohydrates

Why? Because a Calorie by any other name still contains the same amount of energy.

Fructose does not make you gain more weight than other types of carbohydrates, Canadian researchers reported in the Annals of Internal Medicine. They found that a little extra fructose added to foods did not trigger weight gain, as long as the participants reduced the equivalent total calories from other carbs. In other words, fructose calories are no more fattening than the same number of calories in other carbohydrate foods.

The authors explained that fructose's contribution to excess bodyweight in Western societies is often mentioned, but no studies have clearly shown a connection. John L. Sievenpiper, MD, PhD., and team set out to determine what effect fructose might have on people's weight in controlled eating trials.

They gathered data on 41 controlled feeding trials which had lasted for at least seven days. 31 of them, involving 637 participants, compared the effect of free fructose and non-fructose carbohydrates in isocaloric trials. Isocaloric means with similar total calories. 10 studies, involving 119 participants were hypercaloric trials (high calories). They excluded trials that evaluated high-fructose corn syrup (42% to 55% free fructose).

They found that in the isocaloric trials, fructose made no overall difference to body weight, when compared to non-fructose carbohydrates. However, high calorie fructose diets did lead to increases in body weight.

The pity is that this research was done at all in order to prove an irrefutable truth.