Madeline Adams
Aspartame is officially classified as completely harmless. According to a 2019 study, not everything went right with the risk assessment of aspartame.
Reassessment: Is aspartame safe for human consumption?
Many people believe that sweeteners like aspartame are much healthier than sugar. Finally, the latter can demonstrably u. increase the risk of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Is aspartame really as healthy and harmless as we are officially led to believe?
Ever since the synthetic sweetener aspartame was accidentally discovered in 1965, its harmlessness has been repeatedly questioned. In a 2006 study of rats given lifelong aspartame, researchers at the Ramazzini Cancer Research Center found that the sweetener increased the risk of malignancies (particularly in females), as well as an increase in lymphoma leukemia and renal pelvic cancers, ureter and nervous system. Under the experimental conditions tested, aspartame is a multipotent carcinogen, the conclusion said.
In 2012, a human study found that men who drink soft drinks (which are often sweetened with aspartame) tend to develop the same types of cancer that rodents did.
In March 2019, a publication stated that other carcinogenicity studies conducted with aspartame had found no evidence that aspartame could be carcinogenic in rats up to a dose of 4 g per kg body weight per day.
In April 2021, tissue samples from rats that had been given aspartame for life were examined again. The original cancer rate from the 2006 Ramazzini trials was confirmed at 92.3 percent. Of particular concern, the researchers found was that offspring of animals given aspartame also had an increased risk of cancer. Health authorities should therefore urgently review their assessments of the health risks of aspartame.
Studies also suggest that aspartame could increase the risk of migraines and also the risk of diabetes.
However, neither the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) nor the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has seen any reason to question the safety of the sweetener. However, according to a British study published in 2019, there are serious doubts that aspartame is even suitable for human consumption.
Only aspartame-friendly studies were used for the reassessment of aspartame
The research team from the University of Sussex reviewed EFSA’s 2013 full reassessment of the safety of aspartame and found serious shortcomings.
It was criticized that the EFSA panel ignored the results of 73 studies, according to which aspartame could be harmful. 84 percent of the studies that assured the safety of aspartame were classified as reliable, although no really reliable proof could be provided.
Aspartame-friendly studies are often of poorer quality than contra studies
Prof. Erik Millstone from the University of Sussex had already written a dossier in view of EFSA’s reassessment in 2013, in which the inadequacy of 15 previous key studies was described. However, EFSA did not even share this work with its scientific advisers.
According to Sussex University scientists, the entry barriers for aspartame-friendly studies were lower than for studies in which the sweetener was found to be unsafe. Significantly, many of the 73 studies rejected by EFSA were far more robust.
Reassessment of aspartame took place “in secret”.
The researchers indicated that EFSA’s guidelines on transparency of risk assessments had been breached in a number of ways. As a result, they are demanding that approval for the sale or use of aspartame in the EU must be suspended pending an independent and thorough review of the relevant evidence.
According to Prof. Erik Millstone, there is also the question of whether commercial conflicts of interest could have influenced the reassessment of aspartame. After all, all meetings were held in secret, i.e. closed to the public.
He therefore also advocates a radical overhaul of the food safety processes in the EU, including ending discussions behind closed doors.
So avoid sweeteners like aspartame!
Other researchers who were not involved in the said study also questioned the widespread belief that aspartame is a safe alternative to sugar. Among them is Prof. Tim Lang, who works at the University of London. He stated that this investigation was important and timely.
Instead of recommending sweeteners as a sugar substitute, it would make more sense to educate people about an overall healthy diet, especially since drinks and food sweetened with sweeteners (such as aspartame) can usually pose a health problem, and not just because of the sweetener itself. So sugar-free drinks – just like sugary drinks – are harmful to the teeth.
If you read information such as “sugar-free” on food packaging, be sure to keep an eye on the E numbers. The label E 951 indicates aspartame.
Sweeteners have long been in the water and in the environment
Did you also know that artificial sweeteners are eaten so frequently that they can now be found everywhere in the environment? Whether acesulfame-K, sucralose, cyclamate, or saccharin – numerous studies have already been able to prove the sweeteners in surface water, groundwater, tap water, rainwater, and also in seawater. Sweeteners are classified as “not highly toxic” to aquatic life, at least not at current concentrations. Aspartame, on the other hand, is considered toxic to aquatic life but is not yet present in the environment in critical amounts. So even if you don’t want to consume artificial sweeteners at all, you might do so if you’re just drinking water.
