Replacing Sugar Sweetened Beverages with Plain Water Improves Body Composition among Female Youth

Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) intake is considered an important contributing factor to obesity in youth. Replacing SSB with calorie-free beverage has potentially reduced energy intake and obesity prevention; however the health outcomes remain unclear. We evaluated the effect of the substitution of plain water for SSBs with incident of obesity in female youth. We conducted a two months intervention on plain water intake. A total of 43 overweight female (age 22.0 ± 2.6 years) were randomly assigned to Intervention (n=23) and Control (n= 20) groups. The intervention regime consists of increasing intake of daily plain water consumption, and avoiding SSB. However, intake of 1 serving of fresh milk per day is allowed. Body composition measurements, diet history questionnaires (DHQ), SF-36 and goal-adjustment scale (GAS) questionnaires were ascertained at baseline and week 8. There was a significant increase (p<0.001) in plain water intake in the Intervention group as compared to the Control group. With respect to body composition, there was a significant intervention effect in body weight (p<0.05) and BMI (p<0.01). It was shown that both body weight and BMI improved in the Intervention group as compared to Control. Both waist circumference and body fat percentage revealed significant group effect (p<0.05). No significant intervention effect was found on both SF-36 and GAS items. Replacing SSB with plain water is effective in improving body composition among youth. There is a need to conduct a larger scale study with longer duration and measuring biochemical parameters for further research.