Seminar with Paul Gertler co-sponsored by CPIP and Joe C. Wen School of Population and Public Health
Paul Gertler is Li Ka Shing Professor of Economics, Professor in the School of Public Health, Faculty Director of the Institute for Business and Social Impact, and Scientific Director of the Center for Effective Global Action at the University of California, Berkeley.
The Sweet Life: Long Term Effects of a Sugar Rich Early Childhood
Paul Gertler and Tadeja Gracner show that sugar-rich diet early in life has large adverse effects on the health and economic well-being of adults more than fifty years later. Excessive sugar intake early in life led to higher prevalence of chronic inflammation, diabetes, elevated cholesterol and arthritis. It also decreased post-secondary schooling, having a skilled occupation, and accumulating above median wealth. They identified elevated sugar consumption across lifespan as a likely pathway of impact. Exploiting the end of the post-WWII rationing of sugar and sweets in 1953 in the United Kingdom, they used a regression discontinuity design to identify these effects.
