In breaking news, experts have announced that the teas, coffees and fluorescent pink sodas purchased from roadside vendors are not very good for you. That’s right, apparently, they’re loaded with sugar.
Sala, the bright pink syrup and soda by the same name, was called out as a specific sugar culprit. An average streetside plastic cup of the stuff contains a whopping 15.5 teaspoons of sugar.
A doctor from the Bright and Healthy Thai Kid Project, Chutima Sirikulchayanonta, reported on a recent investigation into street vendor drink stalls in three neighborhoods in the city: Phaya Thai, Silom and Victory Monument.
Their findings, in addition to probably providing a massive sugar rush, produced these results:
After sala soda, the most sugar-laden drink was iced Ovaltine drink with 13.3 teaspoons of sugar per plastic cup full, lemon iced tea came in next with 12.6 teaspoons, regular iced tea was in fourth place with 12.5 teaspoons and iced milk tea was in fifth position with 12.3 teaspoons.
Dr. Chutima heads the Bright and Healthy Thai Kid Project, a project funded by the Thai Health Promotion Foundation (ThaiHealth) that attempts to curb Thai childhood obesity, reported Bangkok Post.
The doctor noted that the typical Thai behavior of sipping these drinks everyday, sometimes more than once per day, was one of the leading factors for the increased incidences of diabetes in younger Thai people.
Four million Thais suffering with diabetes while another 7.7 million are at risk for getting it or have pre-diabetes.
The World Health Organization suggests that people eat no more than six teaspoons of sugar daily. These street side Thai beverages contain more than double that amount in a single cup. And that’s not counting the sugar that Thai people might consume throughout the rest of the day.
