Experts examined the health records of more than 63,000 people dating back to the Second World War
Research has suggested that limiting sugar intake in the first two years of life can have long-term benefits for heart health. Experts discovered that individuals were less likely to experience conditions such as heart attacks, heart failure and strokes if they consumed little sugar during early childhood and if their mothers also had a low sugar intake during pregnancy.
The research, published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), analysed data from the period of sugar rationing in the UK during the Second World War.
Data from 63,433 people from the UK Biobank, born between October 1951 and March 1956 with no history of heart disease, was examined. The study included 40,063 individuals who experienced sugar rationing, which lasted from 1940 to 1953, and 23,370 who did not.
Health records were scrutinised for instances of conditions such as heart disease, heart attack, heart failure, irregular heartbeat, stroke, and deaths from these conditions. Compared with those never exposed to rationing, those who had sugar restricted during pregnancy and in the first two years of life had a 20% lower risk of heart disease, 25% lower risk of heart attack, 26% lower risk of heart failure, atrial fibrillation (24%), stroke (31%), and cardiovascular death (27%).
A correlation was found between longer exposure to sugar rationing and progressively lower heart risks, partly due to less diabetes and lower blood pressure. People also enjoyed more time without heart problems – up to two-and-a-half years- than those who never experienced rationing.
During the rationing period, everyone’s sugar allowance, including that of pregnant women and children, was restricted to less than 40g per day – with no added sugars given to babies under two.
A team of researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and the School of Medicine in Boston, USA, concluded: “The first 1,000 days after conception are a critical window when nutrition shapes lifelong cardiometabolic risk.
“Many infants and toddlers consume excess added sugars via maternal diet, formula, and early solids.. Early-life sugar restriction was associated with lower risks of (heart attack), heart failure, atrial fibrillation, stroke, and cardiovascular mortality.”