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Fruit juice – a healthy option or a wolf in sheep’s clothing?

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Fruit is an obvious participant in a healthy balanced diet, and can contribute to our recommended 5 A DAY. So why then is fruit juice – simply juice from that same fruit, with nothing added – suddenly the subject of interrogation?

A quick reminder of why fruit is good for us

Fruits and vegetables are packed with vitamins and minerals that are essential for health. They also contain fibre and other naturally occurring chemicals, known as phytonutrients, which may play a role in warding off disease and keeping our bodies in fully working order.

To get these benefits, the World Health Organization recommends we eat at least 400g of vegetables and fruits every day. Here in the UK we divide that into 5 portions of 80g – that’s where the 5 A DAY message comes from.

Fruit and veg are also surprisingly filling when you think about how low in calories they are – most of us could eat an individual-size pizza without batting an eyelid, but to get a similar amount of calories from oranges (about 1,000 calories) you’d have to eat more than 20 peeled oranges – which would be a bit more of a challenge!

This means, as well as directly benefiting our health, eating plenty of fruit and veg is also a great way to keep our weight in check – this can help to reduce our risk of developing cancer as well as other diseases like heart disease.

So, what’s wrong with fruit juice?

It's better to eat the whole fruit, instead of juice, as you consume less calories

It’s better to eat the whole fruit, instead of juice, as you consume less calories

The biggest argument against fruit juice is that it’s higher in calories than whole fruit, and that most of these calories come from the current day demon, sugar, in the form of naturally occurring fructose (read about the sugar debate).

But what are we talking about when we say ‘higher in calories’? A portion (150ml) of a popular brand of fresh orange juice contains 72 calories, and while this is more than an orange (there’s about 45 calories in a small orange) it isn’t perhaps the huge leap the media seem to suggest.

But while it might not be the biggest of leaps in terms of calorie content, it’s easier to consume more calories from fruit juice. Why? Well, fruit juice is missing much of the fibre you’d get from eating a whole piece of fruit because the juicing process removes the skin of fruit – where most of the fibre is. As well as being good for the health of our guts, fibre helps fill us up. This means that  juice is less filling than fruit, so it is easier to consume more calories without feeling full.

As well as calories the sugar in fruit juice, combined with its natural acidity, can also contribute to dental erosion.

This potential damage to teeth (which may also occur from eating whole fruits) can be minimised by drinking juice at mealtime. This means your teeth are exposed to the sugars in foods and drinks fewer times over the course of the day.  

That’s not to say that fruit juice is no better for you than sugary soft drinks, like cola, lemonade or sugary cordials. Fruit juice still contains some of the vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients that you’d get from fruit, which is why current government advice is that it counts as one of our 5 A DAY.

One of your 5 A DAY

A 150ml glass of juice contains enough vital vitamins and minerals to count as one of your 5 A DAY, but due to the lack of fibre it can only count as one portion, regardless of how much you drink.

World Cancer Research Fund recommends sticking to one small glass a day, and ideally choosing water to keep you hydrated.

The bigger picture

It would be easy to argue that the best way to get your 5 A DAY would be through eating 5 portions of whole fruits or vegetables.

But the most recent Health Survey for England shows that, on average, we are only eating 3.6 portions of fruit and veg a day, and 1 in 4 people don’t even have 2 portions.

So, when we should be encouraging people to eat more fruits and vegetables, what benefit is there from telling people that fruit juice is bad for them and likening it to sugary soft drinks? At best, some people might swap from juice to fruit but – worst-case scenario – it might encourage people to feel that ‘they might as well drink cola’.

We believe fruit juice can be part of a healthy, balanced diet and a healthy lifestyle. But this debate is likely to continue for some time.



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