Drinking two liters or more per week of artificially sweetened beverages, the equivalent of a medium fast-food diet soda a day; raised the risk of an irregular heartbeat called atrial fibrillation by 20% compared with people who drank none, a new study found.
Known as A-fib, atrial fibrillation is an irregular heartbeat often described as a “quiver,” “flutter” or “flip-flop” of the heart.
Drinking a similar number of added-sugar beverages raised the risk of the condition by 10 percent while drinking about 4 ounces of pure unsweetened juices, such as orange or vegetable juice, was associated with an 8 percent lower risk of atrial fibrillation, the study found.
“This is the first study to report an association between no- and low-calorie sweeteners and also sugar-sweetened beverages and increased risk of atrial fibrillation,” said Penny Kris-Etherton, a professor emeritus of nutritional sciences at Pennsylvania State University, in a statement. She was not involved in the new study.
The study could show only an association between sweetened drinks and A-fib, but the relationship remained after accounting for any genetic susceptibility to the condition.
“We still need more research on these beverages to confirm these findings and to fully understand all the health consequences on heart disease and other health conditions,” said Kris-Etherton, who is also an American Heart Association nutrition committee member.
“In the meantime, water is the best choice, and, based on this study, no- and low-calorie sweetened beverages should be limited or avoided,” she added.
Possible ‘additional health risks’
The study, published Tuesday in the journal Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology, analyzed data on nearly 202,000 people participating in a large, biomedical database called the UK Biobank. Followed for an average of 10 years, people in the analysis ranged in age from 37 to 73 years old, and more than half were female.
Higher consumers of artificially sweetened beverages were more likely to be female, younger, weigh more and have a higher prevalence of type 2 diabetes, the study found. Those who drank more sugar-sweetened beverages were more likely to be male, younger, weigh more and have a higher prevalence of heart disease.
People who drank both sugar-sweetened beverages and pure juice were “more likely to have a higher intake of total sugar than those who drank artificially sweetened drinks,” according to the statement.
“Our study’s findings cannot definitively conclude that one beverage poses more health risk than another due to the complexity of our diets and because some people may drink more than one type of beverage,” said lead study author Dr. Ningjian Wang, a professor at the Shanghai Ninth People’s Hospital and Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine in Shanghai, China.
“However, based on these findings, we recommend that people reduce or even avoid artificially sweetened and sugar-sweetened beverages whenever possible,” Wang said in the statement.
“Do not take it for granted that drinking low-sugar and low-calorie artificially sweetened beverages is healthy, it may pose potential health risks,” Wang added.
SOURCE: CNN
