Hello, this is Monica Reinagel, and you are listening to the nutrition divas quick and

dirty tips for eating well and feeling fabulous.

If you're a brand new listener of the podcast, welcome, I'm so glad you're here.

And if you've been listening for years, thank you. You guys are the reason I get up in the

morning.

The familiar nutrition facts label that appears on all packaged foods is getting an overhaul. In a recent blog post I

highlighted three things I particularly like about the proposed changes. For example,

the current label shows how many grams of sugar a food contains, but it doesn't distinguish between naturally occurring sugars, such as those in fruits, vegetables, and dairy products, and sugar from added sweeteners like sugar, corn syrup, or honey.

The proposed new label shows these added sugars separately, which I think is a great idea.

Encouraging people to cut back on their sugar intake is a major priority in the

fight against obesity, diabetes, and other chronic diseases, but it's not the naturally occurring

sugars in fruits and vegetables that we're worried about.

It's all the sugar in your soda, tea, coffee, energy drinks, breakfast cereals,

flavored yogurt's, energy bars, snacks, and desserts, that's really causing the problem.

So when I suggest that you try to limit your sugar intake to about 25 grams a day, it's

the added sugar that I want you to count, not the sugar in your baby

carrots. But some have argued that listing added sugars separately on nutrition facts labels is confusing and unnecessary. Adding sugar is

and unnecessary.

Sugar is sugar, they say,

and it's treated the same way by the body

whether you add a spoonful of it to your coffee

or you drink a glass of juice.

...