Aspartame's Safety Questioned Again
Another Study Suggests It Heightens Cancer Risk
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Sour News On NutraSweet
A new report suggests aspartame, better known as NutraSweet, is not safe. Dr. Mallika Marshall speaks with Julie Chen about possible cancer risks associated with artificial sweeteners.
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Dr. Mallika Marshall (CBS/The Early Show)
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But the Food and Drug Administration has said repeatedly, and as recently as last Friday, that aspartame is safe.
On The Early Show Tuesday, medical contributor Dr. Mallika Marshall explained to co-anchor Julie Chen that, "These were researchers in Italy who have believed for some time that aspartame poses an increased risk of cancer."
Marshall said the researchers gave aspartame to pregnant rats, and to the baby rats beginning five weeks after birth.
"After the dose was adjusted for the smaller body weights of the rats," Marshall continued, "(the researchers) say there was a slightly increased risk of cancer among those rats who were given about 40 percent of what the FDA has deemed a maximum accepted daily dose of aspartame. Among those rats who got twice that dose, they say the risk of cancer was significantly higher."
That's a possible source of concern, Marshall pointed out, because aspartame is "all over the place. It's estimated there are 6,000 products worldwide that contain it … from diet sodas to reduced calorie foods, to gum and sugar-free candy. It can even be found in some medications to sweeten the taste to 'help the medicine go down.' so to speak. It's so all around us."
So, how concerned should consumers be?
"There are a couple of things to keep in mind," Marshall responded. "First of all, for the past 25 to 26 years, aspartame has generally been regarded as safe in the United States, based on previous studies that haven't shown a significant link with cancer or any other serious health problems. Also, this study wasn't particularly large, and the data hasn't even been published yet. I think it's going to take some time to tease out this information and try to figure out whether there is a health risk and how that should change how we handle aspartame in our food supply.
"That said, however, parents of children should keep one thing in mind. And that is, if there is a toxic effect of aspartame, and I'm not saying there is, the jury is still out, but if there is, the effects are probably going to be greater, the smaller your body weight, so children would be more susceptible than adults.
"I know we have this growing problem of childhood obesity in this country, and parents are looking for any way to reduce the caloric intake of their kids. But I think we should probably be a little less cavalier about giving our children tons of foods with artificial sweeteners and probably should go back to the basics of milk and water and fruits and vegetables instead of diet soda and reduced calorie foods."
The researchers cautioned that pregnant moms that consumed aspartame appeared to pass on the cancer risk to fetuses, with the vulnerability of fetuses being such that exposure in womb seemed to add to cancer risk later in life. The researchers noted that that parallels the human experience.
Just last Friday, the FDA shot down the conclusion of the same researchers, based on a 2005 study they did, that aspartame raises cancer risks. Previously, the European Food Safety Authority had done the same when it looked at that 2005 study.
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http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1404
One liter aspartame diet soda, about 3 12-oz cans,
gives 61.5 mg methanol,
so if 30% is turned into formaldehyde, the formaldehyde
dose of 18.5 mg is 37 times the recent EPA limit of
0.5 mg per liter daily drinking water for a 10-kg child:
www.epa.gov/teach/chem_summ/Formaldehyde_summary.pdf
2007.01.05 [ does not discuss formaldehyde from methanol
or aspartame ]
http://www.epa.gov/teach/teachsurvey.html comments
teach@environmentalhealthconsulting.com
"Of course, everyone chooses, as a natural priority,
to actively find, quickly share, and positively act upon
the facts about healthy and safe food, drink, and
environment."
Rich Murray, MA Room For All rmforall@comcast.net
505-501-2298 1943 Otowi Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/messages
group with 79 members, 1,415 posts in a public, searchable archive
http://RMForAll.blogspot.com
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1340
aspartame groups and books: updated research review of
2004.07.16: Murray 2006.05.11
/1143 methanol (formaldehyde, formic acid)
disposition: Bouchard M et al, full plain text,
2001: substantial sources are degradation of fruit
pectins, liquors, aspartame, smoke:
Murray 2005.04.02
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/
915 formaldehyde toxicity: Thrasher & Kilburn:
Shaham: EPA: Gold: Wilson: CIIN: Murray 2002.12.12
Thrasher (2001): "The major difference is that the
Japanese demonstrated the incorporation of FA and
its metabolites into the placenta and fetus.
The quantity of radioactivity remaining in
maternal and fetal tissues at 48 hours was 26.9%
of the administered dose." [ Ref. 14-16 ]
Arch Environ Health 2001 Jul-Aug; 56(4): 300-11.
Embryo toxicity and teratogenicity of
formaldehyde. [100 references]
Thrasher JD, Kilburn KH. toxicology@drthrasher.org
Sam-1 Trust, Alto, New Mexico, USA. full text
http://www.drthrasher.org/
formaldehyde_embryo_toxicity.html
The FDA has the big drug manufacturers and other companies that make additives for food in their back pocket. They take what these companies say and that is it. Apparently the FDA does not do any testing of it's own with the result they take what the manufacturers say and that is that. Need I remind everyone about the pet food that was contaminated by a chemical added to make it more protein apparent. How many cats and dogs have died because of what the FDA did not do to protect them.
I laugh all the way to the doctor everytime I see one these commercials for Sports Water or Vitamin Water or whatever they are pouring downs kids throats on any given day - most loaded with gobs of high frutose corn syrup and the acids required to make them not too sweet.
We have been sold to the lowest bidder and the biggest crooks in government and the food industry-- and don't even mention so-called vegetable oils, yuoouch!
Give me a break.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-7w5PU3P18
www.ramazzini.it/fondazione/newsDetail.asp?id=12
April 05, 2007
ERF announces launch of dynamic web portal: raw data from long term carcinogenesis studies now available for download
On 5 April 2007 the European Ramazzini Foundation (ERF) launched its new dynamic, bi-lingual web portal at www.ramazzini.it. For the first time, users may now download raw study data from selected long term carcinogenicity bioassays conducted at the ERF%u2019s Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center of Bentivoglio (Bologna).
In addition, the new web portal includes a searchable index of the last ten years of the Foundation's scientific publications...
The Ramazzini portal, which also links to the National Ramazzini Institute and the Collegium Ramazzini, is uniquely bi-lingual, with all content available side-by-side in Italian and English.
second large Ramazzini study on low dose lifetime aspartame in rats confirms carcinogenicity -- Morando Soffritti will give data and get Selikoff award April 23 at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in NYC: Murray 2007.04.24
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1415
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by splenda6
April 27, 2007 12:35 AM PDT
- Hello, I would like to tell you my comment on
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Reply to this comment
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See all 18 Commentsaspartame,nutrasweet,equal,I used it every since
it came out on the market.For about ten years I
had seizures,non of my doctors in California,or
here in Indiana could tell me why. When splenda
came out on the market, and I started using it, andnothing else my seizures stopped. only when I used products that contained the aspartame my seizures came back, so I don't dare use it again.
Thank you Sencerley
Virginia L. Pershing
248 N. Providence Place
West Terre Haute, In 47885
812-533-9922
ginnylee35@yahoo.com