6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.com

Hello this is 6 minute English from BBC learning English. I'm Neil and I'm

George. Would you like a cup of tea, Neil?

Oh yes thanks Georgie with milk and three sugars please. Three sugars?

Wow you really have a sweet tooth. You like eating sweet things. Aren't you

worried about your weight? Yes, but I can't say no to sugar. Just as our

addiction to oil is causing a climate emergency, our addiction to

sugar is causing a health emergency for our bodies. Sugar gives us an

instant hit of the chemical hormone dopamine making us feel good but in the long

run causing obesity tooth decay and diseases like diabetes.

But how did our addiction to the sweet stuff begin? That's what we'll be discussing in

this program and as usual we'll be learning some useful new vocabulary as well.

Anyway here's your tea, Neil. I just put one sugar. Thanks, Georgie.

I'll give it a try. Now, before we go on, I have a question for you. Sugar cane, which grows naturally in Asia, Africa and the Americas, first came to

England in the 11th century.

Back then, it was an expensive luxury item, only to Kings, Queens and the very rich.

So which English monarch loved eating sugar so much their teeth turned black.

Was it A. King Henry the 8th, B, Queen Elizabeth the 1st, or C Mary Queen of Scots?

I know Henry the 8th was very unhealthy, so I'll guess it's him.

Okay Georgie we'll find out the answer later in the program.

Just now I compared sugar to oil as the world's most important commodity. A commodity is a product or natural

resource that can be traded, bought and sold. Today economies, governments and wars are based on controlling oil, but in earlier centuries the same was true of sugar.

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