PHOSPHORUS IN SODA POP LINKED TO CALCIUM DEPLETION IN BONES

PHOSPHORUS IN SODA LINKED TO CALCIUM DEPLETION IN BONES

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Animal studies demonstrate that phosphorus, a common ingredient in soda, can deplete bones of calcium. And two recent human studies suggest that girls who drink more soda are more prone to broken bones. The industry denies that soda plays a role in bone weakening.

Animal studies -- mostly involving rats -- point to clear and consistent bone loss with the use of cola beverages. But as scientists like to point out, humans and rats are not exactly the same.

Even so, there's been concern among the research community, public health officials and government agencies over the high phosphorus content in the U.S. diet. Phosphorus -- which occurs naturally in some foods and is used as an additive in many others -- appears to weaken bones by promoting the loss of calcium. With less calcium available, the bones become more porous and prone to fracture.

The soft drink industry argues that the phosphoric acid in soda pop contributes only about 2 percent of the phosphorus in the typical U.S. diet, with a 12-ounce can of soda pop averaging about 30 milligrams.The National Academy of Sciences has set 3 grams (or 3,000 milligrams) per day as the tolerable upper limit of phosphous for children ages 1 to 8 years, and 4 grams per day for those 9 years and older.

To reach that amount would require drinking at least 100 cans of soda pop per day. But there's growing concern that even a few cans of soda today can be damaging when they are consumed during the peak bone-building years of childhood and adolescence. A 1996 study published in the Journal of Nutrition by the FDA's Office of Special Nutritionals noted that a pattern of high phosphorus/low calcium consumption, common in the American diet, is not "conducive to optimizing peak bone mass in young women."

The scientific literature is scant on this topic, and the soft drink industry says the few studies that have been done are flawed. But the studies seem to consistently link soft drink use with the kind of bone weakening that can raise the risk of fractures. Most troubling is that the studies suggest the increased risk of fractures occurs as early as adolescence.

A 1994 study of bone fractures in teenage athletes by Grace Wyshak, then a researcher at Harvard's Center for Population Studies, found a strong association between cola beverage consumption and bone fractures in 14-year-old girls. A follow-up study of 468 9th- and 10th-grade girls, also conducted by Wyshak, who is now at the Harvard School of Public Health, concluded that girls who drank cola were about five times more likely to suffer bone fractures than girls who didn't consume soda pop. She also found that girls who drank only non-cola carbonated drinks were three times more likely to develop bone fractures than those who didn't consume soda pop.

Exactly how soft drinks may contribute to bone weakening is not yet known. But Pennsylvania State University researcher Leeann Birch has found that soft drinks often displace more nutritious beverages, including milk. And just how much soda are teens -- whose bones are growing at peak levels -- drinking? Shanty Bowman, a researcher at USDA's Agricultural Research Service in Beltsville, finds that Americans 12 to 19 years old consume an average of 503 grams of carbonated beverages each day, the equivalent of about half a quart. About 61 percent of teens report drinking carbonated beverages on any given day, compared with just half who drink milk. Bowman says that only one in every five meets the current milk requirement.

It's that combination of increased consumption of soda, decreased consumption of milk and other beverages, and the possible link between phosphorus and bone health that researchers such as Wyshak believe is enough to justify a "national concern and alarm about the health impact of carbonated beverage consumption on teenage girls."

Besides, to many researchers, the combination of rising obesity and bone weakening has the potential to synergistically undermine future health. "Adolescents and kids don't think long-term," says Jamie Stang, professor of epidemiology at the University of Minnesota. "But what happens when these soft-drinking people become young or middle-aged adults and they have osteoporosis, sedentary living and obesity?"

By that time, switching to water, milk or fruit juice may be too little, too late.

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