Coca-Cola may swap out high-fructose corn syrup with cane sugar, Trump says. Is that healthier?

President Donald Trump announced this week that the Coca-Cola Company has agreed to his requests for the brand to use “REAL” cane sugar in its US products instead of high-fructose corn syrup.

The company hasn’t confirmed the swap, but high-fructose corn syrup has been one of many products targeted by US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. in recent months.

Kennedy called the common, cheap sweetener a “formula for making you obese and diabetic” in a September episode of Dr. Jordan Peterson’s podcast. Kennedy and the “Make America Healthy Again” movement he leads have been lobbying the food and beverage industry to remove several ingredients from product formulations, including artificial food dyes and seed oils.

Is cane sugar soda better for you?

Sugar-filled soda isn’t good for you regardless of whatever sugar is used to sweeten it, according to health experts.

What is high-fructose corn syrup?

Cane sugar is produced from sugarcane and is sucrose, a type of sugar naturally comprised of two simple sugars, glucose and fructose, in equal measure.

Sugar vs. high-fructose corn syrup

Most studies have supported the idea that “from a nutritional standpoint, there’s no difference between high-fructose corn syrup and sucrose,” said Dr. Marion Nestle, the Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Emerita, at New York University.