Why Aspartame Isn't Scary

The story of the approval process for aspartame (in spite of the many objections from the medical community) is an entertaining read: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robbie-gennet/donald-rumsfeld-and-the-s_b_805581.html

I have just two questions: If aspartame is so safe, why was the FDA's own toxicologist, Dr. Adrian Gross convinced that it was indeed toxic? And why are so many other physicians and neuroscientists convinced that it is harmful?

Can't comment without a citation, too vague.

People please, if you want a comment about something provide some sort of link to what you are talking about. Don't just hand-wave.

If where you got this information is someones blog then at least try to dig deeper to find the original source material and cite that, I don't want to have to dig for you. It has been 17 pages of thread and I am admittedly getting a bit tired of this.

Um, if you will check the link, it is an article from the Huffington Post and it is footnoted.

Did you read the footnoted primary sources yourself? Yes or no.

I'm really tired of people reading a 1 page news article that footnotes 12 primary studies that they haven't themselves read and then expect me to go through the trouble of commenting.

I do not comment on things I haven't read, to comment on this I would have to read through all those footnotes. If you have done that yourself and can highlight the specific portions you want me to address then fine but if all you did was read the article and not the primary sources yet want me to read the primary sources myself I find that a bit annoying.

At first I did that but after 17 pages of this happening I'm getting a little tired of it. Sorry but yeah.

So have you read those footnotes yourself or did you only read the Op Ed piece?

The story of the approval process for aspartame (in spite of the many objections from the medical community) is an entertaining read: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robbie-gennet/donald-rumsfeld-and-the-s_b_805581.html

I have just two questions: If aspartame is so safe, why was the FDA's own toxicologist, Dr. Adrian Gross convinced that it was indeed toxic? And why are so many other physicians and neuroscientists convinced that it is harmful?

Can't comment without a citation, too vague.

People please, if you want a comment about something provide some sort of link to what you are talking about. Don't just hand-wave.

If where you got this information is someones blog then at least try to dig deeper to find the original source material and cite that, I don't want to have to dig for you. It has been 17 pages of thread and I am admittedly getting a bit tired of this.

Um, if you will check the link, it is an article from the Huffington Post and it is footnoted.

Yes, footnoted with sources that are known to be biased, untrustworthy, and discredited. HuffPo isn't a scientific journal, it's a magazine. Any article that lists a guy like Mercola, who has been soundly discredited many times, as a source is not a valid article for debate. And Betty Martini is also a fraud.

Just for the fun of it, I wanted to see how many studies I could find that show a correlation between aspartame consumption and negative health effects. Here are just a few, all found on PubMed:

Aspartame administered in feed, beginning prenatally through life span, induces cancers of the liver and lung in male Swiss mice

Life-span exposure to low doses of aspartame beginning during prenatal life increases cancer effects in rats.

First experimental demonstration of the multipotential carcinogenic effects of aspartame administered in the feed to Sprague-Dawley rats.

Chronic Effect of Aspartame on Ionic Homeostasis and Monoamine Neurotransmitters in the Rat Brain

Neurobehavioral effects of aspartame consumption

Ameliorative effect of Pimpinella anisum oil on immunohistochemical and ultrastuctural changes of cerebellum of albino rats induced by aspartame

Rate of atherosclerosis progression in ApoE-/- mice long after discontinuation of cola beverage drinking

Cognitive and biochemical effects of monosodium glutamate and aspartame, administered individually and in combination in male albino mice

Aspartame-induced apoptosis in PC12 cells

Cytotoxic effect of aspartame (diet sweet) on the histological and genetic structures of female albino rats and their offspring


Shall I go on? Gosh, I love PubMEd! Incidentally, just enter the search word "aspartame" and see what comes up.

By far the most *facepalm* article I've read on MFP.... Why is this flagged?

I have been following this story for a number of years and I am familiar with the basis of the footnoted objections and those which are cited in the comments section under the article. But you have sidestepped my two questions. I understand that you may not have the answer to those two questions but they need to be answered before anyone can make the bold statement that "Aspartame isn't Scary". I'm not advocating that anyone should think of it as "scary" but caution may well be in order.

To those saying that in their personal experience that aspartame or artificial sweeteners give them headaches.

I really cannot comment on that. Its your personal experience, it is anecdote. I'm not going to tell you you are wrong but at the same time without knowing a mechanism I'm not going to say you are right either. I see a lot of reasonable sounding people posting about this who seem to recognize that the correlation doesn't demonstrate causation so I don't really have much to add there.

The point of my post was to say why I think the preponderance of evidence shows that aspartame is safe for consumption in the general population and that claims that it is "toxic" or "carcinogenic" are false. That is all really that I mean and I get the sense that no one really strongly disagrees with that.

For example I would also say that there is no reason to consider peanuts not safe for consumption in the general population and no one calls peanuts "toxic" or "carcinogenic" and yet some people are so allergic to them that touching the oil residue from a peanut could be fatal.

I am not going to claim it is utterly impossible that the body could react to a molecule in an unusual and undefined way. Causes of migraines and headaches are very ill defined and perhaps for some people it is a trigger, I don't know.

I don't think that connection, if genuine, means that aspartame is somehow dangerous or unsafe though. People have migraine or headache triggers for any number of things and as of yet there are so many triggers and the causes so vague that nothing is really known about it.

Could aspartame cause headaches for some people? I don't see how really but that is just to say I don't see how (in the literal sense). That doesn't mean it doesn't, I just don't see what the mechanism would be and I haven't heard anyone or any study propose or substantiate a mechanism.

In these cases I'd agree with the doctor who responds toa patient that says "Doctor, it hurts when I do this" by saying "Then don't do that."

I have been following this story for a number of years and I am familiar with the basis of the footnoted objections and those which are cited in the comments section under the article. But you have sidestepped my two questions. I understand that you may not have the answer to those two questions but they need to be answered before anyone can make the bold statement that "Aspartame isn't Scary". I'm not advocating that anyone should think of it as "scary" but caution may well be in order.

So far so good. Hundreds of millions of people, if not billions, have been eating the stuff for decades now to no ill effect. Longer than my entire life, worldwide, and so far no conclusive evidence of any bad health effects. Aspartame is just about the most exhaustively tested and studied food additive in existence. And still...no dice. Its been repeatedly examined, and repeatedly approved in more than 90 countries.

I have been following this story for a number of years and I am familiar with the basis of the footnoted objections and those which are cited in the comments section under the article. But you have sidestepped my two questions. I understand that you may not have the answer to those two questions but they need to be answered before anyone can make the bold statement that "Aspartame isn't Scary". I'm not advocating that anyone should think of it as "scary" but caution may well be in order.

So far so good. Hundreds of millions of people, if not billions, have been eating the stuff for decades now to no ill effect. Longer than my entire life, worldwide, and so far no conclusive evidence of any bad health effects. Aspartame is just about the most exhaustively tested and studied food additive in existence. And still...no dice. Its been repeatedly examined, and repeatedly approved in more than 90 countries.

Just because something has been approved doesn't mean that it is safe. Thalidomide was approved in Germany and other countries worldwide (resulting in the death and deformity of about 10,000 infants). It was only an alert pharmacologist at the FDA (Frances Oldham Kelsey M.D. Ph.D) that saved the U.S. from such a clear disaster. However, since Richardson-Merrell had already distributed millions of tablets to physicians in preparation for clinical trials, it is impossible to know how many were affected, since that possible use of the drug was never tracked.

The story of the approval process for aspartame (in spite of the many objections from the medical community) is an entertaining read: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robbie-gennet/donald-rumsfeld-and-the-s_b_805581.html

I have just two questions: If aspartame is so safe, why was the FDA's own toxicologist, Dr. Adrian Gross convinced that it was indeed toxic? And why are so many other physicians and neuroscientists convinced that it is harmful?

Can't comment without a citation, too vague.

People please, if you want a comment about something provide some sort of link to what you are talking about. Don't just hand-wave.

If where you got this information is someones blog then at least try to dig deeper to find the original source material and cite that, I don't want to have to dig for you. It has been 17 pages of thread and I am admittedly getting a bit tired of this.

Um, if you will check the link, it is an article from the Huffington Post and it is footnoted.

Yes, footnoted with sources that are known to be biased, untrustworthy, and discredited. HuffPo isn't a scientific journal, it's a magazine. Any article that lists a guy like Mercola, who has been soundly discredited many times, as a source is not a valid article for debate. And Betty Martini is also a fraud.

Say you and your friends. G.D. Searle was similarly disposed to slander those who did not agree with them as "unscientific". I repeat: I have two questions. Why did the FDA's own toxicologist insist that aspartame was unsafe? Why are so many other neuroscientists and physicians convinced that it is harmful? There are a number of PubMed articles on its questionable safety. Here is just one: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17684524

ETA: Why crucify medical reporters? How can Mercola be "discredited"? He, as far as I know, is not engaged in any research efforts of his own. He functions as a medical reporter who highlights news from the world of science. You may not agree with the findings of any individual researcher but you are obligated to provide your own scientific findings in refuting any individual research findings.

And THAT is a ridiculous assertion. Most of us would just be happy if we could always buy food that is free of added chemicals and genetic modification. Cancer has edged out heart disease as the number one cause of death. Just how can you be certain that it is not due to changes in the food supply?

No, actually, its entirely correct. Every week its a new boogie man that is later found to be just fine. Butter is bad! Eat margarine!....oh wait, nevermind, transfats...our bad for killing a bunch of you. MSG is bad, don't eat it!....oh wait nevermind glutamic acid is actually an ever present amino acid, our bad...Carbs! Carbs are the devil and they're killing us all!....oh wait, nevermind,...its GLUTEN!...but nevermind that its a protein.

Oh...and don't vaccinate children!

And so on and so forth. We want to know that there are bad guys in the food world, and that we can avoid them. It makes us feel empowered and in control of our health destiny, at least to a small degree. So...things that are biochemically verified over and over again to be acceptable, especially in comparison to the other things that actually ARE bad and that we refuse to stop doing anyways, are continued to be vilified by those of us desperate to believe that we are in control of our destinies if only we eat certain things and don't eat other things...which of course are sure to change later on as the vogue continues to shift.

Personally, as to cancer rates, I suspect its more to do with a combination of increased lifespan, decreased mortality from other causes that can be more effectively treated than in the past, and all the household chemicals, industrial chemicals, air quality, pesticides, fertilizers, etc, etc, rather than the food itself. Also...scope out how the cancer rate increase correlates with everyone being massively over-chem'ed on prescription drugs. Almost 3/4 of Americans are on prescriptions drugs even as I write this.

Don't bother, the OP doesn't care. He will claim you didn't actually read that study (because he's the only one that reads studies), and that the studies that support his claim, are of course, some how better than any you found.

Yeah....that was the impression I was getting. I find it rather obnoxious to accuse someone of not reading a study he or she references because that person doesn't agree with him, and therefore he or she MUST be a moron who is incapable of reading a scientific study. This is a diet and weight loss forum. It isn't peer-reviewed, and citations in proper format aren't required to participate. You are all allowed to chime in without writing a bloody dissertation (been there, done that....) and being subject to the inquisition (or what those of us in the scholarly community might call a dissertation defense). What I originally thought would be a interesting read has been spoiled by condescension. Good gracious...I may go find one of those forums about rating the person's picture above you that the teenagers on here make just to face a bit less criticism.