So what's some of the latest research on the sugar added to your diet from eating heavily processed foods? That it's bad for your health.

If that doesn't strike you as breaking news, there's good reason. Prior research suggested the same.In 2011, for instance, a study that reviewed added-sugar intake for 27 years found a strong correlation between an increase in it and body mass index (BMI) in both men and women. And during the length of the study, added-sugar consumption increased by a teeth-rotting 37.8 percent for men and 26.2 percent for women.Also in 2011, Rachel Johnson, PhD, MPH, RD, of the University of Vermont reported to the American Dietetic Association Food and Nutrition Conference and Expo that the average American consumes an average of 475 calories a day through added sugars, or about 119 grams a day far exceeding the American Heart Association's recommendation of a 37.5-gram-per-day maximum for men and a 25-gram-per-day maximum for women.Most 12-ounce sodas, for reference, contain about 35 grams of added sugars.By 2013, a U.S. Centers for Disease and Control Prevention (CDC) study showed total calories consumed as added sugars to be down from 2011, but not significantly. In fact, 13 percent of overall calories consumed that year came from added sugars, despite the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans report that no more than 5 to 15 percent of overall calories should come from the combination of added sugars and solid fats.Additionally, other 2013 studies linked added sugars to overeating and diabetes, so what possible "news" could be found in 2014 from studying the adverse effects added sugars have on overall health? That added sugars increase the risk of heart attacks and other cardiovascular diseases.A study published in JAMA Internal Medicine led by Quanhe Yang, PhD, of the Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention at the CDC based on data culled from the National Health Nutrition Examination Surveys found that when respondents were divided into groups based on their added sugar consumption, those in the top 20 percent for consumption were twice as likely to die from heart disease as those in the bottom 20 percent. Broken down another way, when daily calorie consumption from added sugars reached 25 percent of total calories, those subjects were 2.75 times more likely to develop cardiovascular disease than those getting less than 10 percent of their daily cals from added sugars.In the past, excessive sugar consumption was seen as a contributor to cardiovascular disease, but only because it increased your chance of obesity and diabetes, which in turn increased the risk of heart disease. This study now shows that excessive added sugar ingestion even if you aren't overweight or suffer from type 2 diabetes is an independent factor in the increased incidence of cardiovascular disease.But added sugars may not be the only types of sugars to beware.According to an article published in the Lancet, there really is no difference in the sugar naturally found in fruit juices and the added sugars in sodas.In fact, Naveed Sattar, professor of Metabolic Medicine, and Dr. Jason Gill, both of the Institute of Cardiovascular and Medical Sciences at the University of Glasgow, Scotland argue that fruit juices should not be included in dietary advice that calls for the consumption of five servings of fruits and vegetables a day.Fruit juice sugar can be so deleterious that the authors recommend that food companies voluntarily add to their labels that consumption of it should be limited to about 6 ounces a day.About the recommendation, Dr. Gill says in an article published online by Medical News Today that "there seems to be a clear misconception that fruit juices and smoothies are low-sugar alternatives to sugar-sweetened beverages."Yet ounce-for-ounce, fruit juices have about 1.5 times the sugar of soda.While Gill and Sattar grant that fruit juices do contain vitamins and minerals not found in sodas, they argue that this does not negate the adverse affect fruit juice has on health. As proof, they cite a trial where subjects drank about 16 ounces of 100 percent grape juice every day for three months. While the subjects recorded higher levels of antioxidants, drinking the juice also caused the overweight subjects to gain weight and become more insulin resistant.The details of one final study about sugar consumption increasing diabetes, published in PLOS ONE in 2013, does much to clarify the degree to which you should avoid sugar. After eliminating all other variables, the researchers found that every additional 150 calories added to your diet increases your risk of getting diabetes by 0.1 percent.Change those calories to sugar, however, and the risk of getting diabetes increases by ten times, up to a full 1 percent.