For generations we've been warned to steer clear from fat by dieticians and doctors, but recently the finger has been pointed at sugar as the true bad guy.

According to anti-sugar campaigner and author of Sweet Poison, David Gillespie, Australians are junkies - hopelessly addicted to sugar.

“The reason we are addicted to sugar is it is embedded in just about every processed food we eat,” Gillespie said.

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Under the guidance of Gillespie an ordinary family has decided to take a sugar detox, turning their back on their love for the sweetener.

“The trap is to think of it as a diet. If you think of it as a diet you are on the scales every five minutes and you are thinking to yourself ‘the only measure of my outcome here is my weight’. That is not true,” Gillespie said of their decision.

Sugar and fat-filled foods are the biggest sellers in supermarkets. From sauces, confectionary, cakes, pastries and cordials, to soft drinks and fruit drinks - the list of sugar-high foods goes on.

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In the nineteenth century our diets included about one kilogram of sugar a year - mainly found in fruit.

Now we're eating 50 kilograms a year - that's about one kilogram a week.

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More stories from reporter Damien Hansen

• Sweet Poison - www.sweetpoison.com.au
• How Much Sugar - www.howmuchsugar.com

This reporter is on Twitter at @DamienHansen7