Atlantic Article Questions “Regulating Sugar Like Alcohol”
Recapitulating the neuroendocrinologist Robert Lustig’s arguments for regulating sugar based on its alleged ubiquity, toxicity, addictiveness and “negative impact on society,” a recent article in The Atlantic considers whether the sweetener meets these four criteria for government intervention. According to staff writer Megan Garber, Lustig in a June 29, 2013, interview at the Aspen Ideas Festival pointed to research linking sugar to increased liver fat, insulin resistance and other ailments as evidence that regulation is overdue. But Garber notes that only “sugar’s utter ubiquity” is beyond argument, raising questions about what it would mean to regulate the substance “like alcohol.”
“[I]f Lustig gets his way—if people do come to see sugar as substance that can be abused—public awareness might offer its own kind of regulation,” writes Garber. “Sugar, Lustig put it, is ‘great for your wallet, but crappy for your health.’ The companies that profit from its sales might not, at the moment have an incentive to change their ways; the more the public learns about sugar’s effects, though, the more we might limit our intakes of the stuff. Voluntarily.” See The Atlantic, June 29, 2013.
