Consumption of nonnutritive sweeteners and sweetened beverages in children's population

As one of the habits of a healthy lifestyle is to reduce the fast sugars in our meals, the supply of nonnutritive sweeteners in the food supply has increased by offering sweeter meals without extra calorie intake.  The aim of study was to assess whether children consume nonnutritive sweeteners and what is the consumption of sweetened beverages. A cross-sectional population study was carried out in 3 schools including 694 students aged 8-17. A voluntary anonymous questionary about their anthropometric data, lifestyle, eating and physical activities habits was administrated. Data was statistically analyzed by Microsoft Excel 2010 and SPSS program version 19.0 software for Windows and RStudio IDE 1.3. 15 % of the respondents had overweight or obesity (BMI>85th perc.). The prevalence of overweight and obesity in boys was significantly higher than in girls (M BMI 85-95perc. = 11%, >>95perc. = 6 %, F BMI 85-95perc. = 8%, >>95perc. = 4%, p=0.07). In the pubertal age (14-17) prevalence of obesity (BMI >>95perc. = 1.9%) was lower in age group 8-13(BMI >>95perc. = 6.5%)) p=<0.001)<0.001). In all age groups respondents consume less fruits and vegetables than WHO recommended 5 portions of fruits and vegetables per day (Normal weight =54.01%, Overweight= 64.44%, p=0.025) 77.5 % of respondents drink at least 250ml of sweetened beverages per day. At pubertal age students use more sweetened beverages than younger age group 8-13 (30.5% /26.8% one glass per day) Boys drink more sweetened beverages than girls (p<0.001) Most popular sweetened beverages are fruit juice (68.63% drink more than once a month), but the least is Coca-Cola Zero (60% never use). Students choose more sugar sweetened meals than nonnutritive sweetened. There is a correlation between overweight and nonnutritive sweetener consumption that needs to be explored more.