Artificial Sweeteners and their long term effects?

redux1985 wrote: »

I used stevia for a while and it was excellent but then a study emerged strongly linking it to heart disease, that, along with aspartame possibly being a carcinogen made me decide to ditch artificial sweeteners completely!

I only really used it in porridge/oatmeal, now I just use a chopped banana and raisins instead.

If you are referring to the fairly recent release from WHO, then realize it is based on epidemiological studies which can really only find correlation, not causation. Even the press release itself said, "Because the link observed in the evidence between NSS and disease outcomes might be confounded by baseline characteristics of study participants and complicated patterns of NSS use, the recommendation has been assessed as conditional". The confounding factors in this sort of meta-analysis are huge as are the short falls of the base data that the original studies used since most, if not all, of it is user reported food diaries which are notoriously unreliable on their face, and usually don't track for long periods of time but assume that the small snapshot of a day or so is how people always eat. If you look at other things that have the same "danger" rating as Non-Sugar Sweeteners you will likely find a bunch of things that you use regularly and don't even think about them being a potential carcinogen. The reason the WHO recommends against NSS is that they don't believe they have any benefit, however, start talking to clinical practitioners who deal with weight loss and diabetes and you will find they very much do have benefits for many people, I being one of them.

rileysowner wrote: »

redux1985 wrote: »

I used stevia for a while and it was excellent but then a study emerged strongly linking it to heart disease, that, along with aspartame possibly being a carcinogen made me decide to ditch artificial sweeteners completely!

I only really used it in porridge/oatmeal, now I just use a chopped banana and raisins instead.

If you are referring to the fairly recent release from WHO, then realize it is based on epidemiological studies which can really only find correlation, not causation. Even the press release itself said, "Because the link observed in the evidence between NSS and disease outcomes might be confounded by baseline characteristics of study participants and complicated patterns of NSS use, the recommendation has been assessed as conditional". The confounding factors in this sort of meta-analysis are huge as are the short falls of the base data that the original studies used since most, if not all, of it is user reported food diaries which are notoriously unreliable on their face, and usually don't track for long periods of time but assume that the small snapshot of a day or so is how people always eat. If you look at other things that have the same "danger" rating as Non-Sugar Sweeteners you will likely find a bunch of things that you use regularly and don't even think about them being a potential carcinogen. The reason the WHO recommends against NSS is that they don't believe they have any benefit, however, start talking to clinical practitioners who deal with weight loss and diabetes and you will find they very much do have benefits for many people, I being one of them.

Hi, no, the one I saw wasn't from the WHO but from the Cleveland Clinic, published in the journal Nature.

Yes, I'm acutely aware that correlation ≠ causation; the starting point of this study was that heart disease and associated cardiac events were highly overrepresented in those with elevated blood levels of erythritol, an organic compound found in Stevia. Thus, they went about trying to determine if the compound was directly responsible for said conditions. The tests included exposing whole blood samples and isolated human platelets to erythritol itself, and concluded that consumption is likely linked to increased risk of thrombrosis.

"Our study shows that when participants consumed an artificially sweetened beverage with an amount of erythritol found in many processed foods, markedly elevated levels in the blood are observed for days – levels well above those observed to enhance clotting risks”

I'm not for a moment doubting the benefits of NSS. But the particular one I used to use now has a health question mark over it, and thus, I decided to stop it.