Think yogurt is healthy? Maybe not

Yogurt can be a portable, protein-rich snack — but not so much when it’s packed with more sugar than a cola. As a recent study published in the British Medical Journal shows, although many supermarket yogurts are presumably “healthy,” they contain “well above” the recommended sugar limit.

More than half of an adult’s recommended daily sugar intake, which is 30 grams according to the U.K.’s National Health Service (NHS), could be lurking in a single yogurt cup.

In their analysis of roughly 900 yogurts available for sale at grocery stores in late 2016, researchers found organic varieties and products designed for children’s lunch-boxes to be among the most sugar-laden.

Organic yogurts contained an average of 13.1 grams per 100 grams of total sugars; children’s varieties had 10.8 grams, which is sweeter than 100 mL of Coca-Cola (10.6 grams of sugar).

“Items labelled ‘organic’ are often thought of as the ‘healthiest’ option, but they may be an unrecognized source of added sugars in many people’s diets,” lead author Bernadette Moore of the University of Leeds, told The Telegraph.

Scientists divided the yogurt samples into eight groups: children’s, dairy alternatives (e.g. soy), desserts, drinks, flavoured, fruit, natural/Greek and organic.

According to European Union regulations, in order for a product to be labelled low sugar it must adhere to five grams of total sugars per 100 grams.

Just two of 101 children’s products were low in sugar.

“This is ‘concerning,’ given the rise in childhood obesity and the prevalence of tooth decay among young children,” the researchers said in a statement.

The daily sugar threshold is capped at 19 grams (or five sugar cubes) for children aged four to six and 24 grams (six sugar cubes) for children aged seven to 10, according to the NHS.

As The Telegraph reports, Public Health Liverpool previously found several major brands “contain the equivalent of almost five sugar cubes.”

For a child, eating just one yogurt cup as a snack could represent an entire day’s worth of sugar.

Overall, fewer than nine per cent of the samples were low sugar, the researchers said.

Greek-style and natural (plain) yogurts proved to be the exception. Higher in protein and lower in carbohydrates, they had the least amount of sugar at five grams per 100 grams (most of which was lactose, a naturally-occurring sugar).

“While yogurt may be less of a concern than soft drinks and fruit juices, the chief sources of free sugars in both children and adults’ diets, what is worrisome is that yogurt, as a perceived ‘healthy food,’ may be an unrecognized source of free and added sugars in the diet,” the researchers wrote.