100% fruit juice with no added sugar can be part of a healthy diet when enjoyed on special occasions, the pulpier, the better. Fruit juice is high in vitamin C, a powerful antioxidant that lowers inflammation. Real fruit juice with strong natural colours like cherry, pomegranate, and berry contains potent antioxidants with inflammation-lowering ability. When you drink the juice instead of eating the whole fruit, you don’t get the complete fibre hit and miss out on other nutritional compounds.

How much fruit juice is a healthy amount?

We don’t recommend you drink fruit juice daily because it is high in sugar, and too much sugar leads to various health issues, including increased inflammation. The World Health Organisation recommends we consume about 10% of our total caloric intake as free sugars and limit this to 5% for added health benefits. Free sugars are “Sugars* added to foods and beverages by the manufacturer, cook or consumer. It also includes sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, fruit juices, and fruit juice concentrates.”

A recent review of studies on people who drink 100% orange juice and inflammation markers found that there is weak evidence that including 100% orange juice in the diet doesn’t increase inflammation; in fact, these people had lower inflammatory markers.

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