Sugar problem
All vertebrates need glucose (for cellular metabolism). The blood can absorb glucose either directly from refined sugars or indirectly from complex carbohydrates/starches, when the body must first broke them down by gastric juices.
The problem with refined sugar (which we use for cooking and baking) is that there is a sudden, large influx of glucose into body. On the other side this "natural" sugar (like in fruits) must be broken down first and it's influx is slow.
Even though degus was imported to Europe and America for their sensibility to sugar (diabetes research), we know that they still have the ability to metabolize sugar, although a bit smaller. So it's not right that immediately if degus get sugar, they become diabetec. They are just sensitive to sugar hights (and too high level is lower for degus than for people) and this can slowly lead to similar symptoms like with diabetic people.
The conclusion is that little sugar doesn't mean danger for degus and you don't have to panic if they steal one candy from your table and eat it. But they shouldn't get sweat cookies (contain refined sugers) regularly, otherwise they can slowly become diabetic. And fresh fruits isn't dangerous, if you don't overfeed degus by them, they contain only "natural" sugar, which is less problematic.
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