A study warns of the danger of sugar to colon health

Health

Published: 30 May 2023

A recent medical study has linked gut and colon health to the amounts of sugar we eat.

The study, the results of which were published in the journal “Liver and gastrointestinal diseases”, said that the consumption of excess sugar, disrupts the cells that maintain colon health, and causes inflammation of the intestine.

Edited by |ANNA sam

Health section - CJ journalist

Washington - May,30,2023

Commenting on the study, Timothy hand, professor of immunology at the American University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, said: “the prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease is increasing all over the world, and it rises even higher in countries with industrial and urban lifestyles, whose citizens usually eat high-sugar meals.

“Excessive sugar intake is not good for several reasons, and our study adds new evidence to this, as this substance can be harmful to the intestines and colon,”hand added.

During the study, the researchers fed mice with a standard or high-sugar diet, and then simulated the symptoms of inflammatory bowel disease by exposing them to a chemical called DSS, which damages the colon.

All the mice that ate a high-sugar diet died within nine days, while all the animals fed a standard diet lived until the end of the 14-day experiment, the scientific news website Studyfinds reported.

To find out why things went wrong, the team looked for answers inside the colon, which is usually lined with a layer of epithelial cells, which is repeatedly renewed by stem cell division, to maintain the health of the colon.

And the protective layer of cells completely disappeared in some mice, filling the colon with blood and immune cells.

This explains that sugar may directly affect the colon, hindering the division of stem cells that maintain this organ.

“We found that stem cells divide much more slowly in the presence of sugar, and it is likely that they are very slow to repair damage to the colon,”hand summed up the conclusion of his study by saying.

Written by Castle Journal