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Lawmakers and consumers are turning against big sugar.

On Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration announced that Americans should eat and drink no more than 50 grams of sugar — roughly the amount in a can and a half of Coke — each day.

The new proposal has been years in the making: Chatter of the need for a cap on sugar has been circulating among consumers, lawmakers, and public-health advocates since research in the early 2000s first linked our excessive consumption of the stuff with obesity, weight gain, and other health problems — especially in children.

Not surprisingly, soda and processed-food companies are less than pleased.

The American Beverage Association, the soda industry’s main lobby group, has since invested millions of dollars fighting laws to tax and label sugary beverages. For its part, Coca-Cola has been accused of pumping money into misleading research that champions exercise over dietary changes for health and weight loss — the company has promised to increase transparency about these research partnerships going forward.

But if our diets are any clue into whether a sugar cutback could be useful, they reveal a pretty big area for improvement.

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