25 Mar 2016 Soda and Oral Health
Taking care of your teeth enables you to keep them and lets you enjoy a healthy smile longer. There are a number of foods that will hurt your teeth, and soda has to be one of the worst of them.
Drinking soda has become a favorite drink of many Americans, and that is why so many have soda cavities.
Why Soda Is So Bad for Your Teeth
Soft drinks have been identified as one of the worst products for your teeth. The combination of sugars and acids places it at the top of the list of products that are sure to weaken and soften the enamel of your teeth. Healthline states that with every swig of soda you take, it creates a damaging reaction to your teeth that will last for 20 minutes. This leads to getting cavities sooner, and getting more of them.
The damage to your teeth goes beyond simply eating away at the enamel. Soda also affects the layer underneath the enamel – the dentin. The sugars are absorbed into the dentin, which speeds up the destruction of the protective layers of the teeth, causing soda cavities faster than would occur normally. Of course, if you do not brush or floss your teeth often, they will decay even sooner.
Diet sodas really are not much better. The Mississippi State Department of Healthsays that diet sodas still contain acid, and it will still harm your teeth. The acid will weaken the enamel, and sugars from the food you may be eating with the soda will also attack your teeth.
Sugar Increases the Bacteria in Your Mouth
It’s not just the soda that damages your teeth. The sugar creates an environment that enables bacteria in your mouth to grow rapidly, and they can cause even more damage.
The Appearance of Teeth Affected by Soda
People who drink a lot of soda develop what is often referred to as soda teeth. This is an obvious discoloration of the teeth because some of the enamel is missing in places, or damaged. They are less white, may be stained or yellower than other teeth, and the chewing surface may be damaged.
What may be worse, says healthyeating.sfgate, is that damaged enamel could let the person feel more pain when eating, because nerves are closer to the surface. Other drinks, such as juice and sports drinks may contain even more sugar than some of the more popular sodas, which means that people need to be even more aware of their soda oral health.
Sodas May Affect Children’s Teeth Even More
Children are even at greater risk for damage to their teeth from drinking soda because their tooth enamel is not yet fully developed. The damage of soda can be reduced by rinsing the sugar out of your mouth with water after you finish drinking the soda.
In order to restore and maintain your smile, you should start by drinking less soda. If you have soda teeth or soda cavities and live in Holladay, UT, you can visit the dentist to restore your soda oral health and get a beautiful smile again.