I get this all the time at the doctor’s office, but they never say what the particular mechanism is that *makes* it bad for you. So, what is it? Is it just “empty calories”? How can that have a negative impact on your kidneys (I hear a lot that drinking soda will give me kidney stones)?
I’m in ELI5, but ELI15 or even ELI25 would be preferred (non medical student level, though)
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Not just the extra calories and how easy it is to load up on soda throughout the day, but what’s in the soda. Namely the extremely high amounts of added sugar / the high fructose corn syrup.
Added sugars are associated with weight gain, obesity, and type 2 diabetes. Drinking all of that will make you crave more of it when you don’t need it. It provides no nutrients, just empty calories. It causes insulin spikes, and it’s also associated with insulin resistance (leading to diabetes).
They say you shouldn’t be consuming more than about 30ish grams of added sugar a day. But 12floz of Coke has 39g, Pepsi 41g, and Mountain Dew 46g, for example.
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