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Writer's pictureSpica Yellux
Jul 13, 20222 min read

How Does Sugar Affect Your Body?


Sugar is a form of carbohydrates. It is divided into two categories:

  1. Simple sugars (monosaccharides): glucose, fructose, and galactose

  2. Compound sugars (disaccharides) are made of two bonded monosaccharides: sucrose (glucose + fructose), lactose (glucose + galactose), and maltose (two molecules of glucose).

Some sugar naturally occurs in food such as in fruit (fructose) and milk (lactose). In the body, compound sugars are hydrolyzed into simple sugars. Glucose moves into the bloodstream upon absorption from the intestine. It enters the cell with the help of two proteins, the first one is called a glucose transporter, or GLUT protein, and the second is the hormone insulin, which the pancreas releases into the bloodstream to allow glucose to enter the body’s cells to provide energy. Galactose is transported in the same way as glucose. Meanwhile, fructose moves entirely via facilitated diffusion.


All monosaccharides will end up in the liver. Galactose and fructose will be removed from the blood and converted into other metabolites. Only a small amount of fructose reaches the bloodstream, so blood fructose concentrations are usually always low. When we consume a moderate quantity of fructose, most of it will be converted to glucose, glycogen, and lactate. A fraction of these elements may also be oxidized or converted into fatty acids and uric acid. Galactose is primarily converted into glucose and stored as glycogen. Glycogen is stored in the liver and muscles. The liver capacity is approximately 100 grams of glycogen which will be used to maintain basal blood glucose levels between meals, whilst the muscle capacity is around 400–500 grams often used during movement. Once these reserves hit a peak, excess glucose is converted to fat for longer-term storage.


Most of the food we eat daily is containing sugar, just look at the bread and fruit we eat for breakfast or the rice we eat for lunch. We don’t need added sugar in our food to prevent excessive sugar consumption, which causes high blood sugar levels that will trigger the pancreas to produce more insulin, thus blood sugar will decrease rapidly and make us crave to eat sweet food all over again. Excessive sugar intake leads to insulin resistance, the condition when cells in your body become numb to the insulin. This causes high blood sugar levels because the hormone insulin cannot work as an intermediary that delivers glucose to body cells. The result of this situation leads to prediabetes.


Additionally, insulin resistance and high blood sugar level interfere with leptin, a hormone that is produced by the body’s fat cells. Adequate fat stores/leptin decrease hunger, and vice versa. Likewise, high sugar intake is associated with leptin resistance, which increases appetite and caused weight gain and excess body fat.


AHA suggests the sugar limit for adult men is no more than 150 calories per day (9 teaspoons or 36 grams). For adult women no more than 100 calories per day (6 teaspoons or 24 grams). As for children ages 2–18 the sugar daily intake is less than 6 teaspoons or 24 grams per day, and sugary beverages should be limited to no more than 8 ounces a week.

It’s important to maintain your daily sugar intake to avoid various diseases.


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