Malik VS, et al. – Via analysis of 37,716 men from the Health Professional’s Follow-up study (1986-2014) and 80,647 women from the Nurses’ Health study (1980-2014), researchers assessed the risk of total and cause-specific mortality in relation to consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and artificially sweetened beverages (ASBs). They used Cox proportional hazards regression to calculate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals. The participants were free from chronic diseases at baseline. The investigators performed over 3.4 million person-years of follow-up, which revealed 36,436 deaths (7,896 due to cardiovascular disease [CVD] and 12,380 due to cancer). A higher risk of total mortality was observed in relation to the consumption of SSBs, once major diet and lifestyle factors were adjusted. An association of ASBs with total and CVD mortality was found in the highest intake category only. Intake of SSBs was found to be positively related to mortality mainly via CVD mortality and demonstrated a graded link with dose. Among females, high intake levels of ASBs were positively related to total and CVD mortality.