Starting this fall, consumers in the U.S. will have the option to buy Coca-Cola’s signature soda sweetened with domestic cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup.
The move, confirmed by the beverage company in July, was hailed by White House officials as a major win for their “Make America Healthy Again” initiative.
“It’s just better!” President Donald Trump wrote in a July 16 post on X, saying he had been speaking with the company about the change.
Coca-Cola’s shift is the latest in a string of food reforms announced by U.S. companies in line with the Trump administration’s MAHA agenda. The growing list includes Kraft Heinz’s vow to remove artificial dyes from its products by 2027 and a similar pledge from cereal brand WK Kellogg Co., which Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called a move “toward common sense.”
“MAHA is winning,” Kennedy wrote on X, celebrating the restaurant chain Steak ‘n Shake’s plan to soon “offer Coca-Cola with real cane sugar in glass bottles.”
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While studies have linked high-fructose corn syrup to conditions such as insulin resistance, nutrition experts told PBS News that cane sugar is not a healthier alternative.
“It makes no sense — health officials celebrating swapping high-fructose corn syrup for cane sugar as a win for public health,” said Eva Greenthal, senior policy scientist at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. “It’s things like this that can make it hard to take the administration seriously.”
What is the difference between cane sugar and high-fructose corn syrup?
A Coca-Cola Co. employee loads boxes of cane sugar-based soda from Mexico for distribution at a bottling plant, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Photo by Howard Schneider/Reuters
Cane sugar is refined from the crystallized juices of sugar cane, which is cultivated in warm climates around the world and in the southern United States.
High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is also derived from the refining of a U.S.-grown plant, corn, and gained popularity since the 1980s for being cheaper to produce. But while cane sugar, known scientifically as sucrose, is made up of 50% glucose and 50% fructose molecules, high-fructose corn syrup can contain variable amounts of fructose.
HFCS 42 (which contains 42% fructose and 58% glucose) is primarily used in processed foods, cereals and baked goods, whereas HFCS 55 (which contains 55% fructose) is often found in sodas, according to the Food and Drug Administration.
One 2014 study published in the journal Nutrition analyzed an assortment of sweetened beverages and fruit juices sold by retailers in California, and found that the amount of fructose in popular drinks that contained high-fructose corn syrup ranged as high as about 60% of the sugar content.
Those higher levels of fructose may be significant, some researchers say, because fructose metabolizes in the liver differently than glucose. Past studies have suggested that the differences can lead to metabolic problems, increasing risks for obesity and Type 2 diabetes.
But the subject is a matter of ongoing debate among scientists. One 2021 study, funded by the National Institutes of Health, tested drinks sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup and cane sugar against aspartame-based sodas and found that both the syrup and cane sugar increased fatty liver disease and decreased insulin sensitivity, a risk factor for Type 2 diabetes, with “no significant differences” between the two.
“The biggest difference to a consumer when they buy a sucrose soda versus a high-fructose corn syrup soda [is] they know what they’re getting with the sucrose: 50-50,” said Kimber L. Stanhope, a research nutritional biologist at the University of California, Davis, who contributed to the study.
Is the swap healthier for Americans?
Switching from high-fructose corn syrup to cane sugar is not likely to “change anybody’s health,” Stanhope said.
U.S. adults consume an average of 17 teaspoons of added sugar a day, more than two to three times the recommended daily allowance, according to the American Heart Association.
“Americans currently consume way too much added sugar, and there’s really strong research that this is associated with adverse health outcomes,” said Juliana Cohen, adjunct professor of nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Kennedy himself has referred to sugar as “poison” and praised West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey for seeking to ban all sodas from Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits in the state.
What makes soda “unhealthy” is the lack of nutritional benefits for the amount of calories the drinks contain, nutritionists told PBS News.
While Cohen, a school nutrition policy expert, advocates for policies that reduce sugar intake, she said replacing high-fructose corn syrup with cane sugar is “more akin to putting a filter on a cigarette.”
“It doesn’t suddenly make it a health food. It’s still going to be an ultra-processed food with 39 grams of sugar,” Cohen said, referring to the amount of sugar in a 12-ounce can of Coca-Cola. That’s more than half of the daily added sugar intake recommended for adults in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Does cane sugar make products less ultra-processed?
Coca-Cola’s announcement is in line with growing trends that signify more desire among consumers to avoid ultra-processed products, said Duane Stanford, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest, an industry research and analysis publication.
Over the past few decades, Stanford said, the beverage space has moved toward an emphasis on health and wellness.
It has led to rising interest among American consumers in Mexico’s cane sugar-based Coca-Cola, served in glass bottles and seen as a specialty product in the U.S., and other niche products such as prebiotic and probiotic sodas.
Coca-Cola rival PepsiCo announced this month plans to launch a prebiotic version of their flagship drink, which has less sugar than the original, to cater to young consumers interested in gut health. The move comes after the company acquired the popular alternative soda company Poppi in May. Poppi is currently being sued over claims that their drink contains too much sugar and not enough prebiotic fibers to be labelled “gut healthy.”
While the Trump administration has referred to cane sugar as “real” in contrast to high-fructose corn syrup, experts are skeptical about how much less ultra-processed cane sugar-based soda actually is.
Despite rising public interest in the term, there is no universal definition of “ultra-processed” foods for policy purposes, Greenthal said. The FDA and USDA recently put out a public request for information to help develop a uniform definition for the term.
“We definitely think some of the definitions proposed by states have been too narrow,” Greenthal said. “They define ultra-processed food by a short list of additives and leave out many harmful products, including products that are high in sugar.”
For Stanhope, although the production of high-fructose corn syrup is a more complex process than cane sugar, both are derived from a natural product that has been stripped of all health benefits. Both, she said, are “absolutely, positively ultra-processed.”
What policies should the federal government put in place to make America healthier?
As the federal government continues to seek changes in the U.S. food industry, nutrition experts expressed optimism at interest in reforms, but said policies that tackle reducing the overall consumption of processed foods should be prioritized.
“This is an area where I think regardless of whether you’re on the left or the right, most people agree that we really should be reducing the amount of ultra-processed foods that we have, and it’s really wonderful that this administration is prioritizing that and showing the power that the president can have over the food supply,” Cohen said.
But for Cohen and other experts, other Trump administration policies stand in opposition to the goal of expanding healthier options for Americans.
“One of the most powerful things that they could do would be to reinvest in farm-to-school initiatives to allow schools to bring more local and fresh products,” Cohen said.
The administration’s cuts to the USDA earlier this year abruptly cancelled grants that provide public schools across the country with locally grown produce.
Greenthal added that cuts to SNAP and Medicaid under Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” are “absolutely devastating to public health and need to be reversed,” saying they are “hypocritical to the mission of improving American health.”
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Beyond policies that increase access to whole, healthy foods, experts said that requiring food companies to list the percentage of fructose in products sweetened by high-fructose corn syrup and establishing added sugar reduction targets would be more helpful than switching to cane sugar.
“When I hear RFK Jr. say ‘sugar is poison,’ I feel optimistic about how he will lead his agencies to reduce sugar in our food supply,” Greenthal said. “On the flip side, when I see him celebrate a swap from high-fructose corn syrup to cane sugar, I start to question whether to take it seriously about taking steps to improve health.”
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