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What it argues
The Case Against Sugar is Gary Taubes's focused argument that sugar — sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup specifically — is the primary cause of the obesity and diabetes epidemics, and the likely driver of the cluster of diseases, from heart disease to Alzheimer's, that researchers now associate with insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome. Where Good Calories, Bad Calories mounted a broad scientific and historical argument, this book trains its focus on a single substance and makes the case against it as precisely as Taubes can.
The historical argument is compelling. Taubes traces sugar consumption in Western countries from a luxury commodity to a dietary staple, documenting the parallel rise of obesity, diabetes, and associated chronic diseases wherever Western diets, anchored by sugar, spread. Indigenous populations that had little history of sugar consumption developed obesity and diabetes at dramatic rates within a generation of adopting Western diets. Taubes argues this is the natural experiment that most clearly indicts sugar rather than fat, sedentary behavior, or total calories.
What it gets right
- 1.
Sugar — sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup — is Taubes's prime suspect for the obesity and diabetes epidemics that have tracked rising sugar consumption across the Western world.
- 2.
Fructose is metabolized primarily in the liver and, in large chronic quantities, produces fatty liver disease, insulin resistance, and elevated uric acid — a cluster of conditions preceding metabolic syndrome.
- 3.
Indigenous populations with no history of sugar consumption developed obesity and diabetes at high rates within a generation of adopting Western diets, suggesting a specific culprit rather than general overeating.
What it covers
Who wrote it
Gary Taubes is an American science journalist and author who has written extensively about physics, medicine, and nutrition. He holds a physics degree from Harvard, a master's in aerospace engineering from Stanford, and a journalism degree from Columbia. He has received the Science in Society Award from the National Association of Science Writers three times. His books include Good Calories, Bad Calories, Why We Get Fat, The Case for Keto, and The Case Against Sugar. He co-founded the Nutrition Science Initiative, a nonprofit aimed at conducting rigorous dietary research. His work has been central to the rehabilitation of low-carbohydrate approaches in both popular and…
