Abstract MP49: Sugar Sweetened and Artificially Sweetened Beverages and risk of Mortality in US adults

Background: Sugar sweetened beverages (SSBs) are the single largest source of calories and added sugars in the US diet and regular consumption has been associated with weight gain and risk of chronic diseases. Artificially sweetened beverages (ASBs) are often suggested as alternatives to SSB but little is known about their long-term health effects. Whether consumption of SSBs or ASBs is associated with risk of mortality is unknown. Methods: We prospectively followed 38,602 men from the Health Professional’s Follow-up study (1986-2010) and 82,592 women from the Nurses’ Health study (1980-2010) who were free from cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer at baseline. Diet was assessed using validated food frequency questionnaires every 4 years and Cox Proportional Hazards regression was used to estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI). Results: We documented 27,691 deaths (6,631 CVD and 10,447 cancer deaths) during 3.14 million person-years. After adjusting for major dietary and lifestyle risk factors, and BMI, baseline diabetes, hypertension and hypercholesterolemia, consumption of SSBs was associated with an increased risk of total mortality, which was mainly driven by CVD mortality among individuals consuming at least 2 servings per day; pooled HRs (95% CIs) across categories (<1/month, 1-4/month, 2-6/week, 1-<2/day and ≥2/day) were 1.00, 0.95 (0.91, 0.98), 0.96 (0.93, 0.99), 1.02 (0.96, 1.08), and 1.18 (1.04, 1.33), respectively (P-trend= 0.0001) for total mortality, and 1.00, 0.97 (0.90, 1.02), 0.96 (0.90, 1.02), 1.04 (0.93, 1.16) and 1.28 (1.09, 1.51), respectively (P-trend=0.007) for CVD mortality. In contrast, ASBs were not associated with mortality; pooled HR’s (95% CIs) across categories (<1/month, 1-4/month, 2-6/week, 1-<2/day and ≥2/day) were 1.00, 0.92 (0.89, 0.95), 0.91 (0.86, 0.97), 0.91 (0.86, 0.95) and 0.99 (0.85, 1.15), respectively (P-trend=0.50) for total mortality and 1.00, 0.86 (0.80, 0.92), 0.87 (0.81, 0.94), 0.96 (0.88, 1.06) and 0.96 (0.74, 1.25), respectively (P-trend=0.99) for CVD mortality. No associations were observed with cancer mortality for either SSBs or ASBs in multi-variable adjusted models. Conclusion: Regular consumption of SSBs is associated with an increased risk of total and CVD mortality, providing additional support for recommendations and policies to limit intake of these beverages.