Fructose vs. Your Liver: The Fight of the Century

Announcer: "In this corner.... weighing in at 3lbs., the reigning champion of detoxing and synthesis, give it up for... YOUR LIVER!!!

Audience cheers


Announcer: "Now meet his challenger.... weighing in with a molar mass of 180.16 g/mol, meet the lean, mean, monosaccharide... FRUCTOSE!!!

Audience boos


Referee: "Now I want a good clean fight... no low blows and you break when I tell you to."

Announcer: "And they are off... liver is defiently favored heavily in this battle... fructose just isn't big enough to take the liver down... and the first punches are thrown... fructose coming at liver with a flurry but liver easily defends [a low level (25g), acute fructose exposure] and BAM fructose takes a hit right in the hydroxymethyl. He has got to learn to protect methyl otherwise this match will be over quick.

And here comes fructose again but wow look at that power! Liver is just able to avoid injury there, that was close [a high level (+50g) acute fructose exposure or chronic medium-high (+30g) exposure for a month or so].

Now here comes liver in a fury! He takes fructose to the ground and this match seems to be all over!! [maintaining low levels (>30g) throughout life]

But wait! Fructose manages to get out from under the liver and is now back on his feet [temptation]. The round will go to liver but fructose isn't going down without a fight!

Now look at fructose go! Holy moly! Fructose is just knocking triglycerides [chronic high levels of exposure] out of liver left and right... just look at liver now! He's covered in them! [fatty liver disease] This looks like the end for liver... Liver takes a fall, he's down, he's down! Fructose is all over him and liver cannot fight him off any longer!!

The referee is stepping in now [doctor, if your lucky] to save liver from getting killed because he can no longer defend himself! It's all over... Fructose is the new champion!!"

The End


Case in point don't let fructose become a Cinderella story... keep fructose low, no more than 30g per day, and keep larger dosages of it as infrequent as possible.