Daily dose of soft drinks leads to hair loss: Study

Some people are fond of soft drinks so much so that they consume them even at times in place of or in addition to water. As a result, it sometimes causes addiction to such beverages. However, they are not the healthiest option, and while it affects your white teeth, what about our hair? According to a study published in the journal Nutrients, hair loss has increased over the past several years, and drinking too many sugary drinks may increase the risk.

To evaluate self-reported lifestyle practices and hair loss, researchers from Tsinghua University in Beijing examined data from more than 1,000 Chinese men, aged 18 to 45, between January and April 2022. During the research, they discovered that men who regularly drank up to one sugary beverage per day, such as soda, juice, energy drinks, sports drinks, and sweetened coffee and tea, experienced hair loss at a rate that was about 30% higher (totalling between one to three litres per week).

Men who reported drinking more than one sweetened beverage per day (almost a gallon or more per week) had a 42% higher risk of experiencing hair loss than men who never drank sweetened beverages.

The majority of study participants drank at least some sugar-containing beverages as part of their daily diet, and over half said they did so more than once per day, according to the researchers. But compared to males who didn’t report hair loss, those who did were likely to drink more—about 12 servings weekly on average—than those who did.

The youngest men surveyed had the largest intake of sweetened beverages, which researchers attributed to their “unawareness of the negative implications” of the sugary drinks. Young people “are unwilling to give up the satisfaction offered by SSBs for the sake of long-term health goals since chronic diseases and deaths are so nebulous and remote for them,” the scientists stated.

Researchers came to the further conclusion that ingesting four to seven sugary drinks increased the chance of hair loss by 26% while consuming one to three sweet drinks increased the risk by 21%.

In addition to hair loss, they discovered a link between the consumption of sweetened beverages and psychological well-being, which may be feeding a vicious cycle of despair and anxiety that is exacerbated by hair loss.

Nutritionists and diabetes specialists advise consuming sugary snacks and drinks in moderation and combining them with protein and fibre to balance blood sugar levels, even though no single food or drink is likely to make or break your health or hair.

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