WWII Sugar Rationing Linked to Lower Dementia and Cancer Rates Decades Later

A wartime food policy in Britain has given researchers an unusual way to study how early-life sugar intake may relate to health nearly 70 years later. For roughly a decade during World War II, individual sugar consumption was capped at about 40 grams a day—approximately ten standard sugar cubes. When rationing ended in September 1953, national consumption almost doubled. Because children born only months apart could have experienced sharply different levels of sugar exposure, researchers treated the change as a natural experiment. According to Smithsonian Magazine, two studies published in July examined records from tens of thousands of people in the U.K. Biobank. One team analyzed more than 60,000 participants born between October 1951 and March 1956. People whose first 1,000 days—from conception onward—fell under rationing had a 46 percent lower risk of Alzheimer’s disease and a 27 percent lower risk of dementia from any cause than those born after restrictions ended. Their reported risks of depression and anxiety were also 11 percent and 20 percent lower, respectively. Brain scans provided additional differences: those exposed to lower sugar levels early in life had brains that appeared 0.39 years younger than their chronological age and had larger volumes in structures including the hippocampus and thalamus. A separate study of nearly 65,000 records found lower risks of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease of 23 percent and 28 percent. Among people who developed cognitive decline, symptoms began an average of nearly 2.6 years later in the rationing group. Another study, published in August, associated early-life sugar rationing with lower rates of five adult cancers: breast, prostate, liver, rectal and lung cancer. The reported difference was largest for liver cancer, at about 69 percent, and smallest for breast cancer, at roughly 36 percent. Researchers proposed possible biological and behavioral pathways, but the findings do not establish that sugar restriction directly caused the later health differences. The studies identified longer telomeres and lower levels of a marker associated with chronic immune stress among people exposed to rationing. Around age 50, this group also tended to consume less sugar, eat smaller portions and have more varied diets. A physician not involved in the research cautioned that the results do not mean all sugar should be eliminated. He emphasized limiting excessive added sugar while also focusing on exercise, sleep and management of blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes.