The past year has been a busy one in regard to Aspartame, and Sucralose has also been in the spotlight.
On July 14th, 2023, for the first time in history, the International Agency for Research on Cancer made an announcement, listing Aspartame as an IARC Group 2B carcinogen. Substances in that category are described as "possibly carcinogenic to humans".
Well, it's a start.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) cited “limited evidence” for carcinogenicity in humans and JECFA reaffirmed the acceptable daily intake of 40 mg/kg body weight, this was their third ruling on the subject.
This 'Jeckyll and Hyde' result caused a ruckus in the news and raised the profile for Aspartame and its possible safe use. Of course, the usual 'doctors' and 'dentists' were quick on the scene; paramedics swarmed the internet, armed with disinformation to quell those who might become believers in the Aspartame Fraud... Further flood gates opened and another bombshell was dropped from The Washington Post on 13th September, 2023:
The Food Industry pays ‘influencer’ dietitians to shape your eating habits
Read the full post HERE (extract below)
...As the World Health Organization raised questions this summer about the risks of a popular artificial sweetener, a new hashtag began spreading on the social media accounts of health professionals: #safetyofaspartame.
Steph Grasso, a registered dietitian from Oakton, Va., used the hashtag and told her 2.2 million followers on TikTok that the WHO warnings about artificial sweeteners were “clickbait” based on “low-quality science.”
Another dietitian, Cara Harbstreet of Kansas City, reassured her Instagram followers not to worry about “fear mongering headlines” about aspartame because “the evidence doesn’t suggest there’s a reason for concern.”
In a third video, Mary Ellen Phipps, a Houston-area dietitian who specializes in diabetes care, sipped from a glass of soda and told her Instagram viewers that artificial sweeteners “satisfy the desire for sweetness” without affecting blood sugar or insulin levels.
What these dietitians didn’t make clear was that they were paid to post the videos by American Beverage, a trade and lobbying group representing Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and other companies. In all, at least 35 posts from a dozen health professionals were part of the coordinated campaign by American Beverage. The trade group paid an undisclosed amount to 10 registered dietitians, as well as a physician and a fitness influencer, to use their social media accounts to help blunt the WHO’s claims that aspartame, a mainstay of Diet Coke and other sodas, is ineffective for weight loss and “possibly carcinogenic.”...
As you can imagine, this admission is HUGE and should have been bigger news! What a surprise that I have heard no more on the subject... Is there a knock-on effect? It's slow, but I think so.
In the following weeks, my daily Industry Google Alerts popped up some interesting tidbits, it seems the food industry is getting twitchy with mixed opinion from attendees and exhibitors at the IFT FIRST, the Institute of Food Technologists’ annual meeting held July 16-19, in Chicago. But what I found very encouraging was the admission by Thom King, chief executive officer, Icon Foods, Portland, Ore:
“Our booth was slammed so hard the first two hours we ran out of brochures,” Mr. King said. “Many major manufacturers were clamoring to talk about ways to get aspartame and sucralose out of their finished goods."...
And that’s what a lot of formulators were exploring, that between the WHO’s evaluation of aspartame, and a March 2023 article in Nature suggesting sucralose may increase cancer risk, his company has been inundated by requests for clean label replacements.
“There are a lot of options like stevia, monk fruit, allulose, erythritol, sweet fibers and thaumatin. These read well on an ingredient declaration, as well as the Nutrition Facts panel. Consumers will demand these sweeteners.”
Read the full post HERE
Also, new arrival of aspartame studies might tip the balance:
Long-Term Artificial Sweetener Intake Linked to Risk for Obesity (Endocrinology Advisor)
Read it HERE (September 15th 2023)
Researchers discover learning and memory deficits after ingestion of aspartameby Robert Thomas, Florida State University Read it HERE (18th September, 2023)
Drinking diet sodas and aspartame-sweetened beverages daily during pregnancy linked to autism in male offspring (The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio) read it HERE (20th September, 2023)
Memory Deficits Linked to Aspartame May Be Heritable, Study Says (Psychiatrist+ Newsweek) read it HERE (September 21st, 2023) and HERE (Sept 22nd, 2023)
Study links aspartame consumption to learning and memory deficits in mice (Food Safety News) read it HERE (September 25th 2023)
CPSI calls on USDA to update school snacks’ nutrition standards
read it HERE (19th October 2023)
“The standards regulating Smart Snacks should protect children from adverse health outcomes and should be aligned with the latest scientific evidence and the recommendations of the most recent Dietary Guidelines for Americans. However, the current Smart Snacks standards do not address added sugars, low-calorie sweeteners, or synthetic dyes,” Samuel Hahn, policy coordinator at the CSPI, tells Nutrition Insight.
A whole lot of other news has peppered the internet, so you can read all the news articles reporting adverse effects of consuming aspartame HERE
Returning to the decision by Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) reaffirming the acceptable daily intake of 40 mg/kg body weight - ...The committee therefore reaffirmed that it is safe for a person to consume within this limit per day. For example, with a can of diet soft drink containing 200 or 300 mg of aspartame, an adult weighing 70kg would need to consume more than 9–14 cans per day to exceed the acceptable daily intake, assuming no other intake from other food sources. Often it is forgotten that a can of diet soft drink, when consumed by an adult is very different to a child who has a lower body weight, yet still consumes equal amounts of aspartame per can of diet soft drink!
How the JECFA came to their original decision of what constitues the acceptable daily intake of aspartame is a mystery! Apparently, the IARC and WHO will continue to monitor new evidence and encourage independent research groups to develop further studies on the potential association between aspartame exposure and consumer health effects.
Those of us that have witnessed these illusory promises over the decades are a little more jaded.
Sucralose. A couple of reports have appeared in 2023:
A chemical found in common artificial sweetener may cause DNA damage, cancer
(Medical News Today) Read it HERE (July 17th, 2023)
Study indicates human sewage across Kaua‘i’s waters
Read it HERE (The Garden Island dotcom) July 25th, 2023
A newly published report detected sucralose — an artificial sweetener commonly found in manufactured foods — throughout Kaua‘i’s streams and rivers, indicating nearly islandwide water contamination by human sewage [...]
Sucralose is only partially metabolised by the human body, unlike Aspartame that is fully metabolised, the remainder is excreted and we simply don't have enough data to know the impact sucralose has on the natural world let alone fellow humans who don't choose to consume it. Several studies as far back as 2009 confirm Sucralose as a contaminant in wastewater/sewage plants, lakes, marine and coastal waters.
In 2016, the CSPI downgraded sucralose from "caution" to "avoid" - Read about it HERE
Center for Science in the Public Interest, February 8, 2016 ... The Center for Science in the Public Interest has downgraded its safety rating of sucralose, the artificial sweetener also known by the brand name Splenda, from “caution” to “avoid” in the group’s Chemical Cuisine glossary of food additives. ...
Monosodium Glutamate and Hydrolyzed Protein (glutamic acid) coming to your kitchens whether you like it or not...
Glutamic Acid Market To Reach $19,444 Million by 2030 - Read it HERE
...Glutamic acid is used for protein production. The increasing consumption of this kind of acid in the food and beverage sector as a food preservative and enhancer, together with the rising necessity for animal feed because of the augmented consumption of poultry products like chicken, pork, turkeys, beef and geese, along with increasing requirement for aquatic products like fish and shrimp, will drive the industrial growth in the future...
