Sweet tooth hazards
爱吃甜食给健康带来的隐患
Sweet or savoury? What kind of tastes do you like? If like me, you have a sweet tooth, you probably can't resist eating cakes, biscuits or chocolate and will sweeten your tea or coffee with spoonfuls of sugar - delicious! But the taste makes it very easy to ignore the warnings that too much of the white stuff is bad for our health.
甜的还是酸的？你喜欢哪种口味？如果像我一样喜欢吃甜食，那你抵挡不住蛋糕，饼干或巧克力的诱惑。而且还会在茶里或咖啡中加一勺糖——美味不可挡！但美味很容易让人忘记吃太多糖的坏处。
Consuming sugar is an addiction - the more we eat, the more we want. Today's processed food, like ready meals, is laced with the stuff and many fizzy drinks contain seven teaspoons of sugar in just one can. In the UK, statistics show that sugar consumption is at its highest level in history and the government is trying to get the food industry to cut the amount of sugar in popular products like chocolate bars by 20% by 2020.
吃糖会上瘾——越吃越想要。当今的加工过的食品，比如即食食品，都含有糖。许多碳酸饮料也如此，一罐里就含有7勺的糖。在英国，统计数据显示，糖的消费量达到了历史最高水平，政府正试图让食品行业在2020年前将巧克力棒等受欢迎产品中的糖含量减少20%。
Of course, sugary food tastes nice, it can help lift our mood, and the glucose in it can give us an energy boost. But there are dangers too: a high-sugar diet is linked to obesity, and being overweight can increase the risk of getting type 2 diabetes. With these warning signs, I have considered changing my diet by replacing sugary snacks with fruit and savoury biscuits - but that's boring, I need my sugar fix!
当然，糖类食品可口，还有助于提升我们的情绪。其中的葡萄糖害可以给我们提供能量。但也有危险：高糖饮食与肥胖有关，超重会增加患2型糖尿病的风险。有了这些警告，我已经考虑改变我的饮食，用水果和咸饼干代替含糖零食——但那就很没意思了，我要我的糖！
I'm not alone. BBC journalist Radhika Shanghani, has gone one step further. Encouraged by some celebrities and nutritionists promoting a 'zero tolerance' approach to sugar, she gave it up altogether, thinking it would make her healthier. Initially she says, "My first fortnight involves mood swings worse than puberty. I have agonising headaches and feel permanently hungover." These symptoms disappeared but she still found food shopping hard as she was stressing about buying the right things.
戒糖路上我并不孤单。BBC记者Radhika Shanghani已经在我之前就开始了。在一些名人和营养学家倡导的对糖采取“零容忍”态度的鼓励下，她彻底戒了糖，认为这会让自己更健康。起初她说：“前两个星期，我前两周情绪波动比青春期还严重。我头痛得厉害，而且总是昏昏沉沉的。”这些症状消失了之后，她仍然觉得买食物很难，因为她不知道买哪些是对的。
Her experiment wasn't a success. She eventually sought advice from Susan Jebb, professor of diet and population health at Oxford University who said: "Lots of people enjoy sugar and gain pleasure from it, so one has to find a balance between enjoyment and eating the right amount."
她的尝试没有成功。最终，她向牛津大学饮食与人口健康学教授苏珊·杰布(Susan Jebb)求助。杰布表示：“很多人喜欢吃糖，并从中获得乐趣，所以必须找到平衡点，既能享受快乐，又能吃到适量的糖。”
There are health benefits of cutting down sugar such as improving dental care and reducing weight gain, but there's no need to be obsessive about it. Eating some sugar as part of a balanced diet is fine and exercising will help burn it off. So rather than dealing with your sugar cravings by cutting it out of your diet altogether, why not work on your willpower and learn to say 'no' to a second serving of chocolate fudge cheesecake.
减少食糖对健康有好处，比如改善牙齿问题，减少体重增加，但没有必要过分感到压力。吃一些糖作为平衡饮食的一部分是好的，只需锻炼就能把摄入的糖分消耗掉。因此，与其彻底饮食中的糖，不如增强意志力，学会对第二份巧克力软糖芝士蛋糕说“不”。
词汇表
savoury
咸的
sweet tooth
喜好甜食
addiction
上瘾
processed food
加工食品
lace
（偷偷地）给（食物或饮品）掺
glucose
葡萄糖
obesity
肥胖（症）
overweight
肥胖的，超重的
Type 2 diabetes
二型糖尿病
fix
用量（幽默的说法）
nutritionist
营养学家
zero tolerance
零容忍政策
mood swings
情绪波动
puberty
青春期
hungover
宿醉的
symptom
症状
a balance
平衡
dental care
牙科护理
weight gain
体重增加
obsessive
过分的
craving
难以抑制的渴求
willpower
意志力