Aspartame (artifical sweetener in drinks) causes cancer...

Basil_Fawlty

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/051114/full/051114-15.html

I just noticed this on Nature Online. Has anyone seen this before or have more recent studies disproved the findings here?

I guess so because as of this morning Diet and Zero drinks were still on sale at m'local supermarket

If anyone knows more about this, please let me know, cheers

BF

Ted_Hutchinson

The link you've provided goes to a subscription service, but I would presume this to be discussing the Italian research in which some rats given large amounts of aspartame were found to be more prone to cancer.

The mechanism by which this occurs may be found here but if you multiply the "chronic aspartame (ASP) consumption" of 75 mg/kg by the weight of a child or adult you will find it is an impossibly high amount in relation to the quantities most people are exposed to.

In practice most studies end like this one
Our findings do not support the hypothesis that aspartame increases hematopoietic or brain cancer risk. however in this study the method they use to count the amount of aspartame people consume is notoriously imprecise so it cannot be relied upon. Similarly small increases in cancer rates are extremely hard to detect. This study also only used people 50 to 69 years old, the rats studies took them to the end of their lives. Given the longer life span it may be that similar effects would be more easily detected.

You may be interested in Sweet Nothings

In the same way that responsible companies like Bird's Eye have been weaning us of salt by consistently reducing the salt content of their foods responsible food companies should be reducing the sweetness of foods, particularly baby foods, so we lose our sweet tooth. For some years now I've not added sugar to cooked fruit and now when I do accidently get some sweetend fruit, it tastes really unpleasently sweet.

Toothsmith

To put this in context as well.

Sugar, in the actual doses that are found in our food WILL cause tooth decay, obesity, diabetes and heart disease.

So, artificial sweeteners may or may not be safe.

Natural sweeteners are definitely UNSAFE.

tiff

So what do we use?

Ellie2758

Aspartame tastes FOUL - why would anybody want to eat/drink any product containing it. As for sugar itself - everything in moderation is surely a good motto.
(she said, ladling two teaspoons of sugar into her tea)

tomstickland

Most foodstuffs containing artificial sweeteners are not necessary. Fizzy drinks etc. I think it tastes foul.

In fact, we don't really need natural sugar in our diets either. The correct answer is to eat fruit and not add sugar to things that don't need it (most things really).

Toothsmith

tiff wrote:

So what do we use?

Ellie is right. - Everything in moderation.

Anything can harm you if taken to excess. Aspartame is no better/worse than sugar.

Horasio

I don't like the taste much either

sheeny_2

If you Google for 'aspartame' you will find plenty of information about the health effects.
Then search using the words 'aspartame' and 'addiction' and read on. It might put you off the stuff for good. :eek:

Toothsmith

sheeny wrote:

If you Google for 'aspartame' you will find plenty of information about the health effects.
Then search using the words 'aspartame' and 'addiction' and read on. It might put you off the stuff for good. :eek:

You can find an awful lot of rubbish about an awful lot of things by typing it into Google.

The trick is to sift out the 'conspiracy theorist' stuff and get at the facts.

Ted seems particularly good at this, and I would commend the links in his post above.

Scarlett1

I dont let DD have anything with aspartame in it (which I know of), fruit shoots, flavoured water, diet drink and even (some) kids vitamins are ruled out :mad: