How Fast Food Affects Your Health?

The number of fast food outlets has increased significantly. This clearly shows that there is a growing demand for fast foods among the masses. A survey shows that the majority American population spends 45% of their income on fast foods. Eating fast foods once in a while does not bring harm to your health. But regular eating can cause lots of damage to our physical health and we will see how.

Majority of the fast food items are high on carbohydrates and contain no or very less fiber. During the digestion process, these carbohydrates are released as sugar, which directly gets into our bloodstream, thereby increasing our body sugar level.

The surge in the blood sugar level forces the pancreas to secrete more insulin. The role of the insulin is to transport the sugar throughout the body to provide energy. The surge in sugar level comes to normal when our body uses and utilizes the sugar.

As long as our body is healthy, our organs can ideally deal with the irregularity in the body sugar level. But regularly eating high carbohydrate foods can result in a regular spike in the blood sugar level, which could lead to the condition called type 2 diabetes.

Sugar and Fat

Most fast foods contain a high amount of sugar. This sugar is not only added to extra calories but also hold no nutritional value. Trans fat is a type of fat that created artificially during food processing. This type of fat is mostly found in pastries, fried pies, pizza dough, cookies, and crackers.

Trans fat is not good for health, even in small quantities. This fat can increase the risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

Sodium

Sodium or salt is added to the fast foods to provide extra taste. Food that is high on sodium can result in water retention, which makes us look very bloated or puffy after eating fast food. High sodium can also be dangerous to people with high blood pressure.

Impacts On Respiratory System

Increased calories can cause obesity or body weight. When our body becomes overweight, our respiratory system needs to work a lot to pump in and out of the air, thereby causing the respiratory system to experience more stress. This is how obesity affects our respiratory system.

Impacts Reproductive System

Research shows that fast food contains a high amount of phthalates, a type of chemical that can affect our reproductive system.

Apart from the above list of adverse effects, the fast foods also affect our bones, skins and central nervous system. In fact, these foods remain as the major cause of various lifestyle disease among the majority population.
In some countries, governments have created policies to contain the sales of fast foods. It is the responsibility of the adults to stay alert about the bad effects of fast foods. And parents should educate their kids about the risks of eating fast foods.

Fast foods can cause addiction, which is very difficult to get reversed. So, fast foods should be avoided at any cost.