18 votes

Recent French research indicates that certain food emulsifiers may increase the risk of type 2 diabetes

Posted by boxer_dogs_dance
Tags: france, diabetes.type 2, food.processed, additives, emulsifiers, studies.cohort, research, national research institute for agriculture food and environment, source.scitechdaily
https://scitechdaily.com/common-food-additive-found-in-ice-cream-chocolate-and-bread-linked-to-diabetes/

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Title
Common Food Additive Found in Ice Cream, Chocolate, and Bread Linked to Diabetes
Published
Jun 9 2024
Word count
1059 words

7 comments

  1. [3]
    first-must-burn
    Link
    The additives in question are emulsifiers. Suggest this get added to the title as it is less click baity that way. While relationships are there in the data, detail about the conclusions is important:

    The additives in question are emulsifiers. Suggest this get added to the title as it is less click baity that way.

    While relationships are there in the data, detail about the conclusions is important:

    This study constitutes an initial exploration of these relationships, and further investigations are now needed to establish causal links.

    9 votes
  2. [2]
    Fostire
    Link
    The study itself: https://doi.org/10.1016/S2213-8587(24)00086-X

    The study itself: https://doi.org/10.1016/S2213-8587(24)00086-X

    9 votes
    1. SteeeveTheSteve
      Link Parent
      Wow, the consumption a day from that study is quite a bit over the amount they say increases risk of diabetes and these were healthier people. Wonder what the average is for those who mainly eat...

      Wow, the consumption a day from that study is quite a bit over the amount they say increases risk of diabetes and these were healthier people. Wonder what the average is for those who mainly eat highly processed food? Could bacteria get use to it?

      Andrew Gewirtz, PhD, a microbiologist at Georgia State University, said emulsifiers have long been considered safe for consumption because many of them pass through the body unabsorbed. It was “presumed that therefore they can't possibly do anything negative,” he said. This view began to shift as we recognized the importance of gut microbiota for health. Now the fact that emulsifiers could reach the gut almost unchanged made them “prime suspects involved in perturbing the microbiota,” Gewirtz said. - https://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20240412/emulsifiers-in-food-may-bring-health-dangers

      The article & study kind of skip the backstory unless I missed it, this bit from another article helped sum the issue up nicely.

      Now it makes more sense, how many other additives and GRAS ingredients have been called safe without noting their affects on gut bacteria just because they were studied before we really paid attention? We really need to remember to go back and re-evaluate what we call safe as new information is discovered.

      4 votes
  3. mezze
    Link
    I’m not a health expert, but it would seem that these emulsifiers are found in many processed foods which themselves would be correlated with overweight and obesity, and thus T2D. Furthermore, T2D...

    I’m not a health expert, but it would seem that these emulsifiers are found in many processed foods which themselves would be correlated with overweight and obesity, and thus T2D.

    Furthermore, T2D is a disease of over fatness, that is your fat cells are already replete with caloric energy and your normal insulin levels are no longer effective at shuttling away fatty acids into the adipocytes. And this is all regardless of “weight” as some people can churn out more fat cells as needed to soak up the caloric energy, but other populations can develop T2D just being twenty pounds overweight as they can’t easily make new adipocytes.

    6 votes
  4. cdb
    Link
    The effect sizes looked pretty small, with most under 10% and the highest at 15%. Looks like the 95% confidence interval for that 15% (tripotassium phosphate) is from 2-31% with p=0.023, which to...

    The effect sizes looked pretty small, with most under 10% and the highest at 15%. Looks like the 95% confidence interval for that 15% (tripotassium phosphate) is from 2-31% with p=0.023, which to me is a pretty large range given how close it gets to the baseline and an ok but not so definitive p-value.

    Makes me wonder to what extent these effects are really just an artifact of how we can't truly statistically remove the effects of other factors due to noisy measurements and such. This study is based on self-reported data, and food composition was calculated based on reference to a database, both of which could have systematic bias from reality. I just don't see how we can really glean that much from this study other than potentially motivating further research.

    I'm not a fan of the concluding statement either. "Further research is needed to prompt re-evaluation of regulations governing the use of additive emulsifiers in the food industry for better consumer protection." I just don't see how you can start talking about re-evaluating regulations when you say that further research is needed.

    4 votes