Hello the first ones!
Welcome to my first actual blog post (not
counting the introduction blog post). Everyone reading this now will be the
first people to have read my blog, congratulations and thanks for taking the
interest!
So, today I just wanted to talk about
something I spent some time Googling and finding official and reliable sources
of information about.
As you all know, Coca Cola has released a
new flavour in Europe (is it elsewhere too, feel free to let me know in the
comment box!) called Cola Life, it is a green coloured sticker/can and has
plant-like patterns on it to further strengthen its supposedly natural origins.
I was very curious about it and bought a can at the gas station on the way home
last week to try it. To my great disappointment it tasted pretty horrible due
to a strong chemical sweetness flavour. So this got me curious, with all these
different brands of Cola out there, I started to wonder what is the actual
differences between them in terms of ingredients and health disadvantages/benefits.
Fortunately, this was very easy to find out. Cola has all their ingredients
listed the same on their website as on their cans so this meant I did not even
have to go and buy one of each of the main flavours of Cola. Then a quick
Google and I found my answers quite easily.
Before discussing the differences though, I
should point out I did not just use Wikipedia. It is a pretty reliable source
but it is always better to start with Wikipedia and expand outwards to seek
official sources online. Ideally official Government or NGO websites,
alternatively you can use the scholar functions in Google to only search
published journals (this does not mean they are true, but a published
study-based journal means that all the content in these journals have gone
through a strict research procedure and methodology and as such are a thousand
times more reliable than just some random website on Google). If you use
Wikipedia in conjunction with the above, you will have your ground well covered
for finding reliable information. It is also important to look at both sides of
the information as well, but more on this later.
Getting to it…
I have looked at the three main flavours
currently in Europe from Cola; normal Cola (red sticker/can) – Cola Light
(silver sticker/can) – Cola Zero (black sticker/can) – Cola Life (green
sticker/can).
First up, normal Cola (red can)
The official ingredients are: Carbonated
water, sugar, colour (caramel E150d), phosphoric acid, natural flavourings
including caffeine
Breakdown of ingredients and health impacts:
Basically it comes down to being carbonated
water with lots of white sugar, roughly 10% of the entire content of the can is
sugar. As a result, the drink can be quite fattening if consumed every day.
Especially depending on what else you consume. The World Health Organization
(the WHO) recommends a maximum of 37 grams of sugar per day for men and 25
grams for women. This means if you drink one can of cola in the day (330 ml)
that will already be 33 grams of sugar right there in just one can and I do not
know many people who drink just one can of Cola
when they drink Cola.
The next key ingredient is E150d – it is
important to note that just because it is an “E” does not mean it is a chemical
or even unhealthy for you. Some E ingredients are even healthy for you. It all
depends on the exact number and letters in the E code. In this case E150d is
simply a type of burnt sugar, otherwise known as caramelised sugar. In this
case they super heat it to the point of burning but cooked under pressure and
with added acids and alkalies to prevent it from simply becoming a burnt liquid
that cannot be consumed. It is the E150d that gives the Cola its dark brown
colour, it also has an impact on the flavour and without any sugar added would
taste very bitter (due to the fact it is basically overcooked caramelised
sugar). As with anything there is controversy surrounding E150d, according to a
study quoted by Wikipedia; http://www.cspinet.org/new/201206261.html,
there are amounts of carcinogens in Cola that are consumed worldwide that can
lead to cancer. This comes directly from the process of creating the caramel
colouring.
Phosphoric acid; not much to say here,
while one would not think so, food-safe phosphoric acid is nothing to worry
about at all. We have natural acids in our stomachs already and food-safe acids
do not bother the human body at all.
Natural flavourings and caffeine and
natural aromas – nothing much to worry about here unless you have issues with
caffeine.
Summary of health side-effects:
The worst health impact of normal Cola is
directly to your sugar intake and thus also your weight. I do not need to
mention the negative impacts of consuming too much sugar as I am sure all of you
already are aware of these (e.g. diabetes, etc…) Personally, I only concern
about the sugar in take on my weight. As I notice if I drink too many sodas in
a month, my weight definitely suffers quite substantially, even though that I
am still a very healthy and fit guy, if I were to drink sodas frequently every
month, I would no longer be a healthy and fit guy quite quickly.
Because E150d is in all Cola drinks, there
is not much more to say about it. If you drink Cola you are going to consume
E150d. Is this a good thing? Probably not. Will you get cancer from it? Depends
on what studies you believe.
Secondly, Diet Cola (silver can):
Ingredients: Carbonated water, colour
(caramel E150d), sweeteners (aspartame, acesulfame K), natural flavourings
including caffeine, phosphoric acid, citric acid. Contains a source of
phenylalanine.
Breakdown of ingredients and health impacts:
The biggest change here is that instead of
being water with lots of sugar, Diet Cola is instead water with lots of
chemical sweeteners. The rest is actually identical.
So what are the sweeteners they have used
to replace natural white sugar? For Diet Cola this consists of two different
sweeteners; aspartame and acesulfame K. I will start with aspartame as this has
created a lot of controversy. According to the official NHS website (National
Health Service – the UK public health care provider) aspartame is actually
safe. This is based on a review study http://www.nhs.uk/livewell/goodfood/pages/the-truth-about-aspartame.aspx
done by the European Food Safety Authority in 2013. What does this mean? They
re-examined previous studies and evidence to then come to the same conclusion
again that aspartame has no proven health impacts.
Without any studies that can prove its
actual impact, I cannot really say much about it. All I can say is that I am
still not fully convinced as there were studies in the past that proved that
aspartame is not safe and that the studies done by the food safety
organizations in Europe and America were not done correctly. However, this all
comes down to who you are willing to believe - random scientists working
privately or random scientists working for the government. That all being said,
I still am not convinced that aspartame is safe and all that the government
studies can conclude is that there is currently not yet a proven health impact.
The potential health impacts still not proven but heavily discussed are that
aspartame causes obesity and cancer.
Interesting to note is that aspartame ,
when ingested and broken down by your digestive system, breaks down into
different components: phenylalanine, aspartic acid and methanol. Phenylalanine
can cause issues with some people who have a rare disorder that prevents their
body from breaking down the phenylalanine.
Funny thing here is that it is turned into methanol, I could not find
anything further about this but I wondered, does this mean you can get drunk
from drinking Diet cola?
Acesulfame K (acesulfame potassium) is a
chemical sweetener that is roughly 200 times sweeter than sugar. Cola uses it
in Diet cola to offset the bitter aftertaste of aspartame. Just as with
aspartame there is a lot of controversy due to conflicting studies. The US
Center for Science in Public Interest does not think the current studies on
acesulfame K are sufficient to disprove that it cannot cause cancer. While the
EU and US food health safety organizations claim that this is not true and that
acesulfame is fully safe to consume.
Summary of health side-effects:
My entire life I have had problems when I
drink or consume something with a chemical additive, be it MSG used in many
Asian restaurants or be it Diet Cola. I still do not know why this is, but it
is known that different people’s bodies react differently to different things.
As a result, my body simply reacts poorly to chemical food additives. The
reason for this we may never know, at least not in our lifetime. Perhaps once
human biological studies have developed far enough they will be able to answer
this question.
I do not see this as a bad thing though as
it warns me what to avoid consuming. As such, I cannot drink Diet Cola even if
I wanted to (which I do not want to either). The strong chemical sweeteners
give me an equally strong headache and even changes my behaviour. I become
jittery and annoying to the people around me.
My recommendation, if you have diet
problems you should not be drinking soda drinks as they have no nutritional
value and Diet Cola has some strong chemical sweeteners. While they have no
proven health impacts (yet), there is really no reason to consume these kind of
chemicals. If anything, history has shown us what people in the past thought
was safe and consumed just because it was not proven unsafe yet, was always a bad
idea. Think of smoking… If you just use logical thinking, even with smoking
before the studies came out that proved its health impacts, you will always
deduce that bringing such chemicals into your body is never a good idea.
Cola Zero (black can):
Ingredients: Carbonated water, colour
(caramel E150d), phosphoric acid, sweeteners (aspartame, acesulfame K), natural
flavourings including caffeine, acidity regulator (sodium citrate).
Not very different from Diet Cola, the main difference here is that sodium citrate replaces the citric acid. What does this mean really besides a slight difference in taste? According to what I could find there is no actual health impact difference. So Zero versus Diet is just a flavour change.
Cola Life (green can):
Ingredients: Carbonated water, sugar,
colour (caramel E150d), natural flavourings including caffeine, phosphoric
acid, sweetener (steviol glycosides).
Breakdown of ingredients and health impacts:
So wow, what an interesting mix of
ingredients. This is basically a new approach to the traditional red can Cola.
This goes back to the basics of sugar and water, but with something new added
to it namely a new type of sweetener. As a result, the quantity of normal white
sugar in the drink is substantially reduced and replaced by this new sweetener.
Cola Life introduces something called steviol glycosides. This is a purified
extract from the stevia plant and are fully approved for usage in the US and EU
as a food additive. This new sweetener is roughly 300 times stronger than
sugar.
You may be wondering, well then why does it
still have sugar on the ingredients. Well, stevia extracts are very sweet but
leave a bitter aftertaste. As such, you need another sweetener or a natural
sweetener still to offset the bitter aftertaste. Thus in Cola Life you still
have normal sugar in the drink to offset the bitter aftertaste.
Important here is that stevia extracts have
no negative health impacts and is even calorie-free. Interesting here is that
according to the NHS again, stevia extracts have been used for years in Asia
and South America and Cola Life is one of the first to be using it in the west
(if not the first).
So does this mean that Cola Life is a great
replacement for Diet and Zero Cola? Well, not really. While yes, it is great to
drink as the only bad compound it has is the E150d. Beyond this everything is
fine to consume and indeed all the ingredients are of natural origin. So no
chemical additives or fake sweeteners. But this is a tricky issue as then comes
the question is whether or not steviol glycosides are actually still natural.
The reason is that they first have a natural plant but then must process the
plant in order to extract the purified liquids from this plant. Interestingly
enough NHS does not consider it a natural ingredient as they make it clear to
mention that it is marketed as a natural sweetener.
In addition, there still is your run of the
mill white sugar in Cola at a surprisingly high amount. Roughly 6 percent of
the liquid is still white sugar and thus it is still easy to go over your daily
allowed intake of sugar. Going back to the normal can of Cola, if you drink one
can of Cola Life (330 ml) this will be roughly 20 grams of sugar. Thus one can
of Cola Life has 13 grams of sugar less than normal Cola. However, it is
important to note that this still is a lot of sugar and brings you very close
to the daily maximum after just one can! Also, these 20 grams of sugar are
still fattening and thus you cannot diet while drinking Cola Life.
That all being said, Cola Life is at least
a step in the right direction and I do applaud Coca Cola for trying to find
better alternatives than chemical sweeteners like aspartame and acesulfame K
I just remain wondering if the bitterness was really that bad that they still needed so much sugar.
I just remain wondering if the bitterness was really that bad that they still needed so much sugar.
Conclusions and general advice:
So what does all the above mean? Well I
will just highlight the key points below for each drink.
Cola:
High in sugar and calories, but fully
natural and no chemical additives
Diet Cola:
No sugars and very few calories but high in
chemical additives
Just a flavour difference from Cola Zero
Cola Zero:
No sugars and very low in calories but high
in chemical additives
Just a flavour difference from Diet Cola
Cola Life:
Medium amount of calories, a lot lower than
that of normal Cola
All ingredients are natural or of natural
origin
No chemical additives that have negative
side-effects or are risky to drink
Arguably the healthiest Cola to drink as it
is has no chemicals but also has a less fattening impact and less sugars than
normal Cola
In conclusion, really if you must drink a
Coca Cola, stick with either the normal red Cola or Cola Life. Sure normal Cola
is fattening and has much sugar, but at least you are not consuming potentially
unsafe chemicals. If you are concerned with your calorie intake and refuse to
quit drinking sodas, then go for Cola Life. You will still gain weight from it
if drunk in excess but the impact is substantially less than that of normal
Cola and at the same time it has none of those potentially unsafe chemicals.
My solution?
Personally I live by a strict way of life
in terms of liquid intake. In my daily life and most months all I drink is
water. Does not matter if it is filtered tap water (depending on the country
you live in) or if it is bottled water, the key is just to drink water. It is
very rare for me to drink anything else than water. Water will ensure you do not
gain weight and at the same time you will consume crucial minerals, bacteria
and many other good stuff that your body requires on a daily basis. As such,
just from consuming these natural elements you will quickly find your health,
mood and weight improve. Sodas regardless of what variation you drink is just
not healthy even if it claims 0 calories. The chemicals are not good for your
body and by drinking Cola you will likely not be drinking water and as such
your body is missing out on essential elements that it requires!
Furthermore, I also drink milk, fruit juice
(but not conserved fruit juices or juices with high sugar content, just all
natural fresh juice, often homemade) and other healthy stuff. But my main
liquid that I consume every day is water - on average 1 to 2 litres a day. I
cannot stress enough how crucial it is to drink water on a daily basis and no,
the carbonated water you consume through sodas does not count towards your
daily water intake!
