Sugar is bad for almost every part of our body. For example, sugar that makes its way to your skin cells has been linked to early wrinkles in your skin. Sugar in your "eye" cells can lead to worsening eye problems. This is a lifetime scale though so you won't usually see immediate affects. Just look up papers about the effects of consuming sugar on the human body. I once did a deep dive. I am type 2 diabetic myself.

consuming sugar can lead to type 2 diabetes

Not misleading, that's factually correct. However, it's that specific type of generalised statement people often take issue with and nitpick to death; especially if they like sugar.

Also loving all the questions you're posting lately, they're interesting and starting proper discussions and disagreements.

Yes, because it's ambiguous.

Define sugar.

Define consume.

It's a blanket statement without nuance.

Also everyone consumes sugars in some form - i.e. Carbohydrates.

The simpler the carb, the greater the volume, the more of a concern/risk.

Such ambiguous statements are a major problem with the medical community these days, as all sorts of things get communicated without any quantification.

Things like you're at a greater risk of X because of Y.

OK, how much greater? 60%? Or 0.006%? Is that absolute risk or relative risk?

The blood pressure debate is awash with this problem. As is the realm of biologics (used for autoimmune/autoinflammatory diseases) when looking at increased risk for infections. Yes, there's an increased risk, but across the board of all biologics that increase is something like 1 case in 5000 man-years - with no determination if that's truly because of the biologic or because they study participants already have immune dysregulation

And for specific biologics and specific diseases, there's no demonstrable increase in risk, based on massive meta-analysis.

The devil is in the details.

IMO, it's only misleading in that it doesn't express the quantity needed to really negatively impact your health. A single candy bar ain't gonna lead to diabetes. But eating 50 a day very well could.

No its not misleading because sugar consumption is a known risk factor.

If you said sugar consumption leads to type 1, that would be an outright lie.

Is it ‘misleading’ to say that consuming sugar can lead to type 2 diabetes?

I think it’s misleading as stated. At a minimum “excess consumption of sugar can lead to diabetes” would be somewhat more reasonable.

In isolation it implies a more direct connection between the two when the reality is other factors are much higher indicators such as genetics, excess body weight, and physical inactivity.

So in a list of those factors it’s more reasonable than as a standalone statement, but then when excess consumption of anything, along with physical inactivity, is going to lead to excess body weight, it seems a little redundant.

Not really. Large influxes of sugar put a lot of strain on the bodies ability to regulate blood sugar levels. It's not surprising that when we regularly consume way more than our ancestors would have that things go south.

Its misleading in the same way as saying 'crossing the road can lead to getting hit by a car.'

I'd prefer "ultra-processed, non-whole foods & beverages that especially contain added sugar beyond naturally-occurring density and absent of regulating soluble fiber increases diabetes risk" but yeah

Kind of. Just about anything can lead to just about anything else. I mean, there's all-l-l-l sorts of zany causal chains in this wide world. Dropping out of college can lead to becoming one of the richest men in the world, after all. It would be misleading to advise people to drop out of college in order to become rich. There were a lot of additional qualifiers to that story, just as there are lots of additional qualifiers you should mention regarding sugar and diabetes.

I would say that it is technically misleading, but it's misleading in the way that your telling your kid to do a thing "because I told you so".

There is depth and nuance available in that conversation, but it requires effort to express it and explain it completely.

Big ag here, responsible consumption of sugar and corn-based sweeteners may provide health benefits.

Yes

Is it ‘misleading’ to say that smoking cigarettes can lead to heart disease and cancer?

Is it ‘misleading’ to say that drinking alcohol can lead to liver disease?

Is it ‘misleading’ to say that consuming red meat can lead to high cholesterol?

It all depends on a lot of very nitpicky things like your definitions of "consume", "can", "lead to", and "misleading", but in general, if you apply the same lens to each question, you get the same answer.