SWEET TREAT OR SWEET POISON
FOR OR AGAINST ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS?
I’m often asked what I think of artificial sweeteners. Are they a better alternative to sugar or not?
Most of us of a certain age will probably recall the scare surrounding saccharin, the chemical sweetener which was alleged to cause cancer in rats. Believe it or not, arguments about the safety or otherwise of this bitter chemical have raged for more than 100 years but it was as a result of several studies carried out during the 1960s that saccharin earned its reputation as a possible animal carcinogen. Despite a stack of other studies showing no correlation between cancer and saccharin, the ensuing flurry caused widespread fear and panic. The case was not proven and, as a result, some countries still allow saccharin to be added to medicines and toothpaste and used as a food and beverage sweetener. If you buy anything which carries the food additive code number E954, then it contains saccharin.
In the wake of the saccharin debacle, a new chemical ‘candy’ was launched. It was, in fact, something discovered quite by accident back in 1965 by a chemist who was looking into possible new treatments for ulcers. Enter the now ubiquitous aspartame, available not only as tablets and sprinkling sweetener but also a common ingredient in a whole range of packaged foods. If you’ve seen the E number E951 on any label or heard of product names such as NutraSweet, Canderel, Insta Sweet, Taste, Equal, Equal-Measure, Spoonful or Sweet Sprinkles, they’re all born from the same chemical parentage. But just because it’s so widely used, is it really a healthier alternative?
Well, you would certainly think so, especially when I tell you that it's been subjected to wide-ranging studies and apparently extensive investigations and apparently approved by a whole melee of official health departments and food agencies around the world, including prestigious organisations such as the American Food & Drug Administration, the UK Food Standards Agency and the European Scientific Committee on Food.
And yet . . . and yet . . . aspartame remains one of the most controversial of all food ingredients.
An assorted selection of reports, books and articles published over more than 40 years has highlighted again and again the many potential downsides of aspartame use. On the World Wide Web, the word aspartame often appears alongside headlines such as Conspiracy Theory, Cover-Up, Conflict of Interest, suggesting we should avoid it like the plague, that it's by far the most dangerous substance on the market, and an imminent public health threat, accompanied by horribly long lists of symptoms and illnesses that are said to be linked to this sweetener. Indeed, there are so many, it’s hard to know where to begin but how about this lot ►
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As I’m sure you will have noticed, history has a habit of repeating itself and, in a study carried out by scientists in Italy in 2005, aspartame, like its sickly saccharin predecessor, was also found to cause cancer in rats. I should quickly point out three things here:
(1) the researchers in this case medicated their captives with massive doses of the stuff, way beyond the daily recommended amounts for humans
(2) the National Cancer Institute of America says there’s no evidence that aspartame – or any other artificial sweetener for that matter - causes cancer and
(3) that aspartame was approved by the Food & Drug Administration only after many other studies showed it to be safe.
So should we pay any attention to stories of so-called ‘Aspartame Disease’ or go with the official line that the product is safe for human use and that all this is nothing more than a hoax, a load of nonsense or unsupported/questionable research?
First of all, let's look at what's in it:
Of the three basic breakdown products of aspartame, two of them (aspartic acid and phenylalanine) are nothing more than amino acids. Amino acids are merely the building blocks of proteins and, as a result, sound comfortingly safe.
But it’s the third one, methanol, which, arguably, causes the most consternation amongst the anti-aspartame lobby because it's a substance known to be toxic to humans. Several studies show it to be exceptionally toxic even at low doses.
Promoters of aspartame are quick to point out that methanol levels in the product are well within safe levels and anyway methanol can also be found in alcoholic drinks, milk, meat, some vegetables, citrus fruit and juices where it does no harm. The opposition view suggests that not only is the methanol which occurs naturally in these foods bound chemically to that food in such a way that it isn't absorbed into the body, it's also the case that another ingredient, ethanol, occurs in food as a protector. The methanol component of aspartame, on the other hand, has no such ethanol support and is also in a free state which can be absorbed. And anyway, is the so-called 'safe' level determined by truly independent means and how do they know it is really safe?
Critics further counter that methanol is wood alcohol or wood spirit and is used in many industrial applications including solvents, duplicator fluid, anti-freeze, and as a fuel additive. Not something that sounds like a must-have food additive.
Once inside the body, methanol breaks down into formic acid and formaldehyde.
Formic acid is what some insect stings are made of but it also turns up in products and preparations as an anti-bacterial agent and preservative, as a mite killer in beehives, added to cleaning products, and in the production of rubber, textiles and leather.
Formaldehyde, again, has wide-ranging industrial applications including making fabrics crease-resistant, in adhesives and resins for things like flooring, in foam and other insulation materials, in the construction of mobile homes, in paint, disinfectant, explosives (!) and embalming (!).
While it’s true that formic acid is eliminated from the body, it's also the case that these by-products have been shown to cause damage to the optic nerve and subsequent blindness.
Over the years, I've read considerable quantities of literature on both sides of the aspartame debacle and tried always to keep an open mind. And although it's all too easy to see-saw between arguments, I find the evidence against aspartame impossible to ignore.
There have been several leading critics of aspartame over the years including Dr John W. Olney of the Washington University School of Medicine, Dr Russell L Blaylock, Professor of Neurosurgery at the Medical University of Mississippi and Dr Woodrow Monte, Director of Food Science and Nutrition Laboratory at Arizona State University.
I've looked at this research and, to me at least, it seems entirely plausible and well presented. It’s hard not to smile at the results of a 1996 examination of aspartame research by a psychologist at North-eastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, one Ralph G Walton, who turned up this little gem. He found that every single one of the safety studies funded by the aspartame industry were positive for the product (in other words, found no problems) and yet the vast majority of independent studies did express worries about the use of this sweetener. Unfortunately for Walton, his work was heavily criticised, not least by those with links to the supply and manufacture of the sweetener in question. Why am I not surprised? A good deal of the research which he claimed was independent (not funded by industry) actually came down to anecdotal evidence, duplicated documents, review articles, case reports, chapters from books – in other words not from published studies. But does it mean that concerns expressed in media other than medical or scientific peer-reviewed journals should be dismissed as worthless?
Apart from the symptom list I gave you above, one of the major worries appears to be how the ingredients in aspartame might affect the brain and nervous system and whether or not aspartame could therefore be considered a neurotoxin.
Someone who has always thought so is Dr H J Roberts, one of the most vociferous critics. He has called the aspartame issue an ignored epidemic. He points out that it’s not necessarily safe even at low doses and certainly not health-building. Dr Roberts has catalogued a long list of what are, in anybody’s language, bothersome adverse reactions resulting from the ingestion of aspartame – and at levels many times lower than the Acceptable Daily Intake sanctioned by the FDA. His own personal data collected over many years includes a wide range of reactions to aspartame including depression, digestive complaints, dizziness, headache, joint pain, memory loss, skin rashes, visual disturbance and the worsening of diabetic symptoms. He’s also quoted as being concerned about the connection between aspartame use and serious disorders such as multiple sclerosis, dementia and epilepsy.
Having had experience where patients with problems such as headaches, memory loss, aggravation of irritable bowel symptoms, joint pain and skin problems - that either completely disappeared or improved dramatically when artificial sweeteners were removed from their diets - it's pretty difficult to continue to take a balanced view on this issue. I would certainly say that there is good empirical evidence that aspartame can aggravate depression in people who have a history of depressive illness. I've also seen several cases involving overweight patients who were using aspartame as a sugar substitute in a calorie controlled diet and whose weight did not begin to reduce until the aspartame was removed from the diet. The web is chock full of questions about the possibility that aspartame hinders effective weight loss either by some mechanism as yet undiscovered or simply because it's zero cal status doesn't satisfy the appetite and therefore encourages people to eat more as a result of increased hunger. Then there are those with symptoms identical to Multiple Sclerosis whose problems have resolved entirely when they gave up aspartame-containing food and drink. In addition, I've heard from different patients that diet cola has aggravated a range of other conditions, in particular, the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, and (more times than I can count) of hyperactivity and Attention Deficit Disorder in children. It may be that the aspartame content is entirely to blame but, as yet, no-one can be absolutely certain given that cola contains so many other ingredients. There's certainly a good deal of Internet speculation about whether or not aspartame really does damage the nervous system and a shed load of anecdotal evidence from sufferers and their families; and whilst this has been much criticised by experts who believe they know better, isn't it a fact of life that 'there ain't no smoke without fire'?
The so-called Acceptable Daily Intake of aspartame, by the way, is 50 mg per kilogram of body weight. To save you having to carry your scales to the shops, I can tell you this would be around twenty cans of diet cola ( yes, 20) which I’m sure you’re already protesting couldn’t possibly apply to you. But even if you wouldn’t be seen dead with a diet ring-pull on your finger, this figure is easier to reach than you might imagine simply because of the hidden prevalence of aspartame in so many supermarket products. Children are a particular risk of aspartame overload but adults are not immune. In countries with higher temperatures and hotter summers, it’s extremely easy to exceed the recommended intake many times over because of the reliance on soft drinks. People who don't like to drink water may also go above the advised intake if their main source of fluid is diet soda or other sugar-free soft drinks.
Consumers turn to chemical sweeteners because they think they’re somehow safer – as well as being lower in calories - than sugar. Diabetics who rely on aspartame and related products as a way to satisfy a sweet tooth without disturbing blood sugar levels should bear in mind that so-called ‘diet’ foods can still raise the glucose in the blood if they contain other carbohydrates. And it’s worth keeping in mind that a product proclaiming itself to be sugar-free will almost always be sweetened with aspartame or some other artificial sweetener. This is why label reading is such a healthy habit. You may be surprised, even horrified, at what skulks around in the small print.
With sugar, especially the highly refined white stuff, being a disreputable robber of nutrients in the body and a notorious contributor to weight gain and pre-diabetes, the question I’m most often asked when I suggest the avoidance of artificial sweeteners is ‘What do I put in my tea and coffee then?’ In an ideal world not plagued by a sweet tooth epidemic, the answer would be, shock horror, manage without. But in a realistic one, the best advice is to first switch to unrefined cane sugar, reducing by a few grains each day until you’re down to half a teaspoon or nothing. Or, better still, add a little good-quality honey (not the syrupy supermarket stuff). Try the health food store or local honey supplier instead.
What it comes down to in the end is that the scientific evidence against aspartame has yet to fully complete and present its case for the prosecution. In other words, more long-term double-blind controlled clinical trials are needed before the jury can decide finally whether aspartame really is a safe sugar substitute, helpful for diabetics, beneficial for weight control and a useful part of a healthy diet as claimed by the manufacturers, or something to be avoided. But if you are suffering any of the symptoms mentioned on this page or in any of the on-line articles you read, then I would say check your diet for aspartame and consider avoiding it. As for the rest, I leave you to make up your own mind.
Of the three basic breakdown products of aspartame, two of them (aspartic acid and phenylalanine) are nothing more than amino acids. Amino acids are merely the building blocks of proteins and, as a result, sound comfortingly safe.
But it’s the third one, methanol, which, arguably, causes the most consternation amongst the anti-aspartame lobby because it's a substance known to be toxic to humans. Several studies show it to be exceptionally toxic even at low doses.
Promoters of aspartame are quick to point out that methanol levels in the product are well within safe levels and anyway methanol can also be found in alcoholic drinks, milk, meat, some vegetables, citrus fruit and juices where it does no harm. The opposition view suggests that not only is the methanol which occurs naturally in these foods bound chemically to that food in such a way that it isn't absorbed into the body, it's also the case that another ingredient, ethanol, occurs in food as a protector. The methanol component of aspartame, on the other hand, has no such ethanol support and is also in a free state which can be absorbed. And anyway, is the so-called 'safe' level determined by truly independent means and how do they know it is really safe?
Critics further counter that methanol is wood alcohol or wood spirit and is used in many industrial applications including solvents, duplicator fluid, anti-freeze, and as a fuel additive. Not something that sounds like a must-have food additive.
Once inside the body, methanol breaks down into formic acid and formaldehyde.
Formic acid is what some insect stings are made of but it also turns up in products and preparations as an anti-bacterial agent and preservative, as a mite killer in beehives, added to cleaning products, and in the production of rubber, textiles and leather.
Formaldehyde, again, has wide-ranging industrial applications including making fabrics crease-resistant, in adhesives and resins for things like flooring, in foam and other insulation materials, in the construction of mobile homes, in paint, disinfectant, explosives (!) and embalming (!).
While it’s true that formic acid is eliminated from the body, it's also the case that these by-products have been shown to cause damage to the optic nerve and subsequent blindness.
Over the years, I've read considerable quantities of literature on both sides of the aspartame debacle and tried always to keep an open mind. And although it's all too easy to see-saw between arguments, I find the evidence against aspartame impossible to ignore.
- Why wouldn’t the manufacturers and suppliers go for the positive publicity, seeing their product in the best possible light? They’re in business to make money, after all. But do they the conscience to put public safety above profits?
- As to the negative reports about aspartame, one of my first thoughts is: Why would anyone bother to make all this up? Aspartame is said to account for around three-quarters of all food additive adverse reactions reported to the USFDA (the United States Food & Drug Administration). So if there are no side effects from this product, why would these reports be happening?
There have been several leading critics of aspartame over the years including Dr John W. Olney of the Washington University School of Medicine, Dr Russell L Blaylock, Professor of Neurosurgery at the Medical University of Mississippi and Dr Woodrow Monte, Director of Food Science and Nutrition Laboratory at Arizona State University.
I've looked at this research and, to me at least, it seems entirely plausible and well presented. It’s hard not to smile at the results of a 1996 examination of aspartame research by a psychologist at North-eastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, one Ralph G Walton, who turned up this little gem. He found that every single one of the safety studies funded by the aspartame industry were positive for the product (in other words, found no problems) and yet the vast majority of independent studies did express worries about the use of this sweetener. Unfortunately for Walton, his work was heavily criticised, not least by those with links to the supply and manufacture of the sweetener in question. Why am I not surprised? A good deal of the research which he claimed was independent (not funded by industry) actually came down to anecdotal evidence, duplicated documents, review articles, case reports, chapters from books – in other words not from published studies. But does it mean that concerns expressed in media other than medical or scientific peer-reviewed journals should be dismissed as worthless?
Apart from the symptom list I gave you above, one of the major worries appears to be how the ingredients in aspartame might affect the brain and nervous system and whether or not aspartame could therefore be considered a neurotoxin.
Someone who has always thought so is Dr H J Roberts, one of the most vociferous critics. He has called the aspartame issue an ignored epidemic. He points out that it’s not necessarily safe even at low doses and certainly not health-building. Dr Roberts has catalogued a long list of what are, in anybody’s language, bothersome adverse reactions resulting from the ingestion of aspartame – and at levels many times lower than the Acceptable Daily Intake sanctioned by the FDA. His own personal data collected over many years includes a wide range of reactions to aspartame including depression, digestive complaints, dizziness, headache, joint pain, memory loss, skin rashes, visual disturbance and the worsening of diabetic symptoms. He’s also quoted as being concerned about the connection between aspartame use and serious disorders such as multiple sclerosis, dementia and epilepsy.
Having had experience where patients with problems such as headaches, memory loss, aggravation of irritable bowel symptoms, joint pain and skin problems - that either completely disappeared or improved dramatically when artificial sweeteners were removed from their diets - it's pretty difficult to continue to take a balanced view on this issue. I would certainly say that there is good empirical evidence that aspartame can aggravate depression in people who have a history of depressive illness. I've also seen several cases involving overweight patients who were using aspartame as a sugar substitute in a calorie controlled diet and whose weight did not begin to reduce until the aspartame was removed from the diet. The web is chock full of questions about the possibility that aspartame hinders effective weight loss either by some mechanism as yet undiscovered or simply because it's zero cal status doesn't satisfy the appetite and therefore encourages people to eat more as a result of increased hunger. Then there are those with symptoms identical to Multiple Sclerosis whose problems have resolved entirely when they gave up aspartame-containing food and drink. In addition, I've heard from different patients that diet cola has aggravated a range of other conditions, in particular, the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, and (more times than I can count) of hyperactivity and Attention Deficit Disorder in children. It may be that the aspartame content is entirely to blame but, as yet, no-one can be absolutely certain given that cola contains so many other ingredients. There's certainly a good deal of Internet speculation about whether or not aspartame really does damage the nervous system and a shed load of anecdotal evidence from sufferers and their families; and whilst this has been much criticised by experts who believe they know better, isn't it a fact of life that 'there ain't no smoke without fire'?
The so-called Acceptable Daily Intake of aspartame, by the way, is 50 mg per kilogram of body weight. To save you having to carry your scales to the shops, I can tell you this would be around twenty cans of diet cola ( yes, 20) which I’m sure you’re already protesting couldn’t possibly apply to you. But even if you wouldn’t be seen dead with a diet ring-pull on your finger, this figure is easier to reach than you might imagine simply because of the hidden prevalence of aspartame in so many supermarket products. Children are a particular risk of aspartame overload but adults are not immune. In countries with higher temperatures and hotter summers, it’s extremely easy to exceed the recommended intake many times over because of the reliance on soft drinks. People who don't like to drink water may also go above the advised intake if their main source of fluid is diet soda or other sugar-free soft drinks.
Consumers turn to chemical sweeteners because they think they’re somehow safer – as well as being lower in calories - than sugar. Diabetics who rely on aspartame and related products as a way to satisfy a sweet tooth without disturbing blood sugar levels should bear in mind that so-called ‘diet’ foods can still raise the glucose in the blood if they contain other carbohydrates. And it’s worth keeping in mind that a product proclaiming itself to be sugar-free will almost always be sweetened with aspartame or some other artificial sweetener. This is why label reading is such a healthy habit. You may be surprised, even horrified, at what skulks around in the small print.
With sugar, especially the highly refined white stuff, being a disreputable robber of nutrients in the body and a notorious contributor to weight gain and pre-diabetes, the question I’m most often asked when I suggest the avoidance of artificial sweeteners is ‘What do I put in my tea and coffee then?’ In an ideal world not plagued by a sweet tooth epidemic, the answer would be, shock horror, manage without. But in a realistic one, the best advice is to first switch to unrefined cane sugar, reducing by a few grains each day until you’re down to half a teaspoon or nothing. Or, better still, add a little good-quality honey (not the syrupy supermarket stuff). Try the health food store or local honey supplier instead.
What it comes down to in the end is that the scientific evidence against aspartame has yet to fully complete and present its case for the prosecution. In other words, more long-term double-blind controlled clinical trials are needed before the jury can decide finally whether aspartame really is a safe sugar substitute, helpful for diabetics, beneficial for weight control and a useful part of a healthy diet as claimed by the manufacturers, or something to be avoided. But if you are suffering any of the symptoms mentioned on this page or in any of the on-line articles you read, then I would say check your diet for aspartame and consider avoiding it. As for the rest, I leave you to make up your own mind.
A word of warning:
If you go searching the Internet for aspartame information, do be aware that the arguments for and against are equally fierce and that it can be difficult to make an informed decision. Those who believe that the whole ‘aspartame is bad for you’ argument is nothing more than an elaborate hoax, and who pepper their texts with Smear Campaign, Unsupported ‘Evidence’, Misleading Statements, False Data, or Scare Tactics, are just as vociferous as the opposing camp who think aspartame is an industry conspiracy to make money at the expense of consumer health.
In truth, there's a fair bit of barking mad bias on both sides. One extraordinary comment which made me laugh out loud was a fellow in favour of this chemical whose website suggested people who think aspartame is unsafe are the sort that believe any factory processed food is bad for you. This is a doctor, no less, who clearly knows his chemistry and so, one assumes, is educated/intelligent ??? Err, well, umm . . . Yet, to illustrate his belief that aspartame critics are crazy he suggests that these types would rather eat vegetables fertilised with human poo than consume any that have been grown with agrochemical fertiliser! Either his tongue is firmly in his cheek or maybe he has some double blind controlled clinical trial evidence to back-up such an extreme suggestion but just failed to mention it?
My own observations, inevitably coloured by having seen so many patients with adverse reactions, leave me with a personal preference to avoid all kinds of artificial additives as much as possible. When it comes to aspartame, my honest opinion is that I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole! Whilst I stress that this is my personal view, I make no apologies. A mantra from a lecture on toxicity that I attended way back in 1987 still rings long and loudly in my ears: Question marks will always hang over artificial sweeteners. Nearly one quarter century later they’re still hanging and, in the meantime, we humans remain the guinea pigs.
If you go searching the Internet for aspartame information, do be aware that the arguments for and against are equally fierce and that it can be difficult to make an informed decision. Those who believe that the whole ‘aspartame is bad for you’ argument is nothing more than an elaborate hoax, and who pepper their texts with Smear Campaign, Unsupported ‘Evidence’, Misleading Statements, False Data, or Scare Tactics, are just as vociferous as the opposing camp who think aspartame is an industry conspiracy to make money at the expense of consumer health.
In truth, there's a fair bit of barking mad bias on both sides. One extraordinary comment which made me laugh out loud was a fellow in favour of this chemical whose website suggested people who think aspartame is unsafe are the sort that believe any factory processed food is bad for you. This is a doctor, no less, who clearly knows his chemistry and so, one assumes, is educated/intelligent ??? Err, well, umm . . . Yet, to illustrate his belief that aspartame critics are crazy he suggests that these types would rather eat vegetables fertilised with human poo than consume any that have been grown with agrochemical fertiliser! Either his tongue is firmly in his cheek or maybe he has some double blind controlled clinical trial evidence to back-up such an extreme suggestion but just failed to mention it?
My own observations, inevitably coloured by having seen so many patients with adverse reactions, leave me with a personal preference to avoid all kinds of artificial additives as much as possible. When it comes to aspartame, my honest opinion is that I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole! Whilst I stress that this is my personal view, I make no apologies. A mantra from a lecture on toxicity that I attended way back in 1987 still rings long and loudly in my ears: Question marks will always hang over artificial sweeteners. Nearly one quarter century later they’re still hanging and, in the meantime, we humans remain the guinea pigs.
Important note: Aspartame should not be used by people suffering the rare hereditary disease known as PKU (phenylketonuria), a condition where the body cannot properly metabolise the amino acid phenylalanine.
Kathryn Marsden
Kathryn's views are completely independent. She is not employed by any pharmaceutical company, supplement supplier or food producer nor is she persuaded in any way, financially or otherwise, to recommend particular products or services.