People are unaware as a study found out that drinking fizzy drinks like sodas alongside eating protein-enriched foods like meat and cheese affects the body in more ways than one. The study noted that the said process of ingesting those kinds of drinks and food together affects the body’s energy balance and decreases the body's fat-burning ability.
According to Science Daily, the study conducted by researchers from BioMed Central discovered that drinking high sugar content drinks with high protein filled foods affects the body’s way of storing fat. The study involved 13 men and 14 women which were in an average age bracket of 23 years old and has healthy weight records.
With that said, the participants stayed for two days. On their first day, they were given breakfast and lunch consisting of 15 percent protein meals. The participants were then given 30 percent protein meals after fasting the next day. The meals were stated to include 17g of fat and 500 non-beverage calories. Yet, they were given a sugar sweetened drink on their first day and a non-sweetened one on the second.
Furthermore, lead author of the study from USDA-Agricultural Research Service Grand Forks Human Nutrition Research Center, Dr. Shanon Casperson said that they discovered that the method reduced the participant’s fat metabolism as they took less energy to metabolize the meals. However, the process was said to allow the body to store more fat. The participant’s bodies’ fat-burning ability was also noted to have decreased by 8 percent on average.
"The results do suggest a mechanism whereby consumption of sugary drinks with meals might interfere with the body’s ability to regulate energy intake, and eventually lead to weight gain. However, for this to happen the observed effects would need to be maintained over an extended period of time, and the authors themselves are careful to point out that they have not yet shown this," a nutrition researcher at the Quadram Institute Bioscience, Dr. Ian Johnson explained in a statement on Medscape.
Aside from the results discovered, the participants were said to eat savory and salty foods for four hours as a result of after drinking sugary drinks alongside their provided high protein meal. The study was published last July 20 in the journal BMC Nutrition.
