Thank you for mentioning glycemic index.
Diabetes Canada has been a supporter and proponent of the glycemic index for a number of years. The reason for that is when people consume a diet with a lower glycemic index.... For those of you who may not be aware, glycemic index measures or ranks foods according to how high blood sugar is raised after consuming those foods or beverages. Foods with a low glycemic index take a much longer time to raise blood sugar. Foods with a high glycemic index raise blood sugar levels immediately, so that would be the difference between having lentils, which are low glycemic index, versus pure sugar or glucose, which has a high glycemic index.
The impact of consuming a more low glycemic index diet is that the outcomes of studies have shown that people have a much quicker sense of satiety, so they tend to eat less. It contributes to lower incidence of cardiovascular disease, and it can help people to lose weight. Much to our benefit at Diabetes Canada, it can help to prevent diabetes.
We would love Canadians to have more foods with a low glycemic index. Right now, it's very difficult for Canadians to identify foods that are low glycemic index, because it's not written anywhere on the package, and it's very hard to find a list of which foods are low glycemic index.
In a culture where we are demonizing carbohydrates, and people are talking about no carbs and low carbs, and “I don't eat carbs after 4 p.m.”, we need to look for alternatives that are what we call healthy carbs or quality carbs, because they are a great source of energy as well as fibre. Having more of the right carbs is really the direction we should be going in as opposed to telling people to eat no carbs or fewer carbs.