High-sugar diet and less exercise more harmful to men than women, study finds

31 Oct 2022 --- A sedentary lifestyle and excessive sugar intake have more adverse effects on men than women, according to a new study. Men also experienced a decline in a protein called adropin – a key biomarker for cardiovascular disease and a regulator of insulin sensitivity.

The University of Missouri School of Medicine, US, human study is the “first” to show that short-term lifestyle changes can impair blood vessel response to insulin.

Furthermore, the researchers note that the study demonstrates how men and women respond to these changes can vary.

“These findings underscore a sex-related difference in the development of vascular insulin resistance induced by adopting a lifestyle high in sugar and low on exercise,” says Camila Manrique-Acevedo, associate professor of medicine at the University of Missouri.

“To our knowledge, this is the first evidence in humans that short-term adverse lifestyle changes can provoke vascular insulin resistance and it’s the first documentation of sex-related differences in the development of vascular insulin resistance in association with changes in adropin levels.”

Obesity and Type 2 diabetes are both associated with vascular insulin resistance, which worsens the vascular disease.

The impact of decreased exercise
The researchers analyzed the participants’ short-term exposure to decreased exercise and increased sugar consumption. They hypothesized that young women would be protected against vascular insulin resistance, given that the incidence of insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease is lower in premenopausal women than in men.

This is the “first” study to document how short-term adverse lifestyle changes can trigger vascular insulin resistance in people.“We know that incidence of insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease is lower in premenopausal women compared to men, but we wanted to see how men and women reacted to reduced physical activity and increased sugar in their diet over a short period of time,” adds Manrique-Acevedo.

By subjecting 36 young, healthy men and women to ten days of reduced physical activity – their daily step count dropped from 10,000 to 5,000 – researchers could investigate vascular insulin resistance. The participants also upped their daily intake of sugary beverages to six soda cans.

Following reduced physical activity and increased consumption of carbonated beverages rich in sugar, healthy young men but not women showed a slowed leg blood flow response to insulin and inhibited skeletal muscle microvascular perfusion.

More research and previous reports
In the future, the researchers would like to look at how long it takes to reverse these metabolic and vascular changes and more thoroughly evaluate the impact of sex on the onset of vascular insulin resistance.

According to preliminary WHO data, people were more exposed to obesity risk factors like sedentary lifestyles and unhealthy food consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic with the EU.

Previously, a report from the UK Advertising Association found that sedentary lifestyles had a greater impact on childhood obesity than junk food advertising. The report highlighted that unhealthy food advertising decreased in recent years, indicating an increase in sedentary behavior. 

Edited by Nicole Kerr