Does Diet Soda cause weight gain?
Tampa, Florida - You’re thirsty, you’re watching your weight, your first instinct may be to grab a diet soda.
Mary Sivret, drinks diet soft drinks:
“It definitely keeps my weight down, which I have a problem with that.”
But not so fast. A study eight years in the making by the University of Texas Health Science Center indicates people who drink diet soft drinks may gain weight. The study says there was a 41% increase in risk of being overweight for every can or bottle of diet soft drink a person drinks each day. Registered dietician Cynthia Sass explains why that may be the case for some.
Cynthia Sass, American Dietetic Association:
“Diet sodas do not directly cause you to gain more weight, it’s an indirect cause..but kind of like a chain reaction. It’s that sweet taste that makes you want to have more sweets, makes you eat more, makes you eat more calories than you can burn that leads to weight gain, so there’s nothing in diet drinks themselves that makes you gain weight.”
To give you an idea: a diet soda may contain zero calories, but say you also eat candy every day, i.e. six Jolly Ranchers, that’s an additional 140 calories. For a 150lb woman, it would take at least 35 minutes of walking to burn off those calories. And if you weren’t able to, in a year’s time, you would have gained 14lbs.
Cynthia Sass, American Dietetic Association:
“Some people might think there’s something in that drink that will help them burn calories, but the word ‘diet’ on a beverage doesn’t necessarily mean that there is any substance in that drink that will help you burn calories or melt fat away, or somehow speed up your metabolism, it’s simply not true. So just by drinking diet drinks and still eating as much as you want is not a good weight loss strategy.”
Sass suggests slowly weaning yourself off of diet drinks by drinking brewed unsweetened tea, and of course water.
