Excessive sugar has a strong mal-effect on the functioning of active organs such as the heart, kidneys and the brain. Shipwrecked sailors who ate and drank nothing but sugar for nine days surely went through some of this trauma.
　　This incident occurred when a vessel carrying a cargo of sugar was shipwrecked in 1793. The five surviving sailors were finally rescued nine days after the accident. They were in a wasted condition due to starvation, having consumed nothing but sugar.
　　French physiologist F. Magendie was inspired by that incident to conduct a series of experiments with animals. In the experiments, he fed dogs a diet of sugar and water. All the dogs wasted and died.
　　The shipwrecked sailors and the French physiologist's experimental dogs proved the same point. As a steady diet, sugar is worse than nothing. Plain water can keep you alive for quite some time. Sugar and water can kill you. Humans and animals are “unable to subsist on a diet of sugar”. The dead dogs in Professor Magendie's laboratory alerted the sugar industry to the hazards of free scientific inquiry. From that day to this, the sugar industry has invested millions of dollars in behind-the-scenes, subsidized science. The best scientific names that money could buy have been hired, in the hope that they could one day come up with something at least pseudoscientific in the way of glad tidings about sugar.
　　It has been proved, however, that（1）sugar is a major factor in dental decay;（2）sugar in a person's diet does cause overweight;（3）removal of sugar from diets can cured symptoms of crippling, worldwide diseases such as diabetes, cancer and heart illnesses.
　　Sir Frederick Banting noticed in 1929 that, among sugar plantation owners who ate large amounts of their refined stuff, diabetes was common. Among native cane-cutters, who only got to chew the raw cane, he saw no diabetes.
　　However, the story of the public relations attempts on the part of the sugar manufacturers began in Britain in 1808 when the Committee of West India reported to the House of Commons that a prize of twenty-five guineas had been offered to anyone who could come up with the most “satisfactory” experiments to prove that unrefined sugar was good for feeding and fattening oxen, cows, hogs and sheep. Food for animals is often seasonal, always expensive. Sugar, by then, was dirt cheap. People weren't eating it fast enough.
　　Naturally, the attempt to feed livestock with sugar in England in 1808 was a disaster.