Sugar may be one of the hottest topics in the news, but a new survey has shown a desperate need for better sugar education as Britons think chocolate, sweets and fruit juice contain no sugar.
A survey of more than 2,0001 people carried out by Denplan revealed one in five people (21%) don't believe chocolate contains sugar, with the same amount (22%) thinking biscuits are sugar-free too. Drinks are not immune from sugar ignorance either, with almost half (47%) of respondents believing that neither wine or beer contain sugar. Perhaps more worryingly, over a third (38%) of people asked did not know that fruit juice contained sugar, despite warnings from Action on Sugar that many juices contain at least six teaspoons of sugar - more than cola.2
Other food and drinks which respondents believed were free of sugar included:
The new results also showed the public's desire for more clarity on labelling of products, as 54% admitted that they wanted to reduce their sugar consumption, but just one in five respondents could decipher whether a product contains sugar by reading ingredient labels. 80% said they don't always check the list of ingredients before buying or eating food, and over a third of respondents (38%) said they didn't know the difference between ‘sugar-free’ and ‘no added sugar’.
Henry Clover, Deputy Chief Dental Officer at Denplan said: 'With sugar ‘hidden’ in so many unexpected foods and drinks, managing our daily sugar consumption can be a challenge.'
References
A Onepoll survey of 2,000 participants conducted in May 2015
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Sugar-free confusion not sweet for teeth. BDJ Team 2, 15121 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/bdjteam.2015.121
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/bdjteam.2015.121