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DEPRESSION LINKED TO SODA & SUGAR
The study, which was released on Tuesday and will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's annual meeting in March, involved 263,925 people between the ages of 50 and 71. Researchers tracked their consumption of beverages like soda, tea, coffee, and other soft drinks from 1995 to 1996 and then, 10 years later, asked them if they had been diagnosed with depression since the year 2000. More than 11,300 of them had.
Participants who drank more than four servings of soda per day were 30 percent more likely to develop depression than participants who did not drink soda at all. People who stuck with fruit punch had a 38 percent higher risk than people who didn't drink sweetened drinks.
And all that extra sugar isn't the only problem: The research showed that low-calorie diet sodas, diet iced teas, and diet fruit punches were linked to a slightly higher risk of depression than the high-calorie stuff. Researchers say that the artificial sweetener aspartame may be to blame.
"Our findings are preliminary, and the underlying biological mechanisms are not known," said Chen.
The study, which was released on Tuesday and will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's annual meeting in March, involved 263,925 people between the ages of 50 and 71. Researchers tracked their consumption of beverages like soda, tea, coffee, and other soft drinks from 1995 to 1996 and then, 10 years later, asked them if they had been diagnosed with depression since the year 2000. More than 11,300 of them had.
Participants who drank more than four servings of soda per day were 30 percent more likely to develop depression than participants who did not drink soda at all. People who stuck with fruit punch had a 38 percent higher risk than people who didn't drink sweetened drinks.
And all that extra sugar isn't the only problem: The research showed that low-calorie diet sodas, diet iced teas, and diet fruit punches were linked to a slightly higher risk of depression than the high-calorie stuff. Researchers say that the artificial sweetener aspartame may be to blame.
"Our findings are preliminary, and the underlying biological mechanisms are not known," said Chen.