http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=34040
"A statistically significant increase in the incidence of malignant tumors, lymphomas and leukemias in rats exposed to varying doses of aspartame appears to link the artificial sweetener to a high carcinogenicity rate, according to a study accepted for publication today by the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives"
This looks more like a case of "Research Causes Cancer in Rats" to me. From the actual article, which BTW was released in PDF format by the NIH:
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/docs/2005/8711/abstract.html
> APM was administered with feed to 8 week-old Sprague-Dawley rats (100-150/sex/group), at concentrations of 100,000; 50,000; 10,000; 2,000; 400; 80 or 0 ppm.
A hundred thousand parts per million is an awfully heavily concentrated dose of sweetener. No matter if it's natural or artificial, of course they suffered ailments from a diet of that much sweetener.
It must be funding time in Washington.
Washington?
The National Institutes of Health are a U.S. federal government agency, which means Congress controls their money. This seems to me like a report to prove to Congress that they deserve increased funding for more research studies like this one.
I'm sorry if I come across as cynical, but that sort of happened after similar studies concluded that pizza burns the roof of your mouth because the tomato sauce is hot, and that regular sunshine is a carcinogen.
I doubt that the NIEHS will do a study, they have "done" one already. "critics charged that the investigators did not follow the guidelines for scientific study outlined by the NIEHS' own research group, the National Toxicology Program. They further noted that the NTP's own animal studies involving similar levels of aspartame exposure showed no link between the sweetener and an increase in cancers." http://www.webmd.com/content/article/115/111805.htm
As for the toxic levels given in the Italian research, I forgot the number but it was like 5-7+ diet cokes a day, not too many people drink that many per day for long periods of times.
Fun facts from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame :
"The FDA receives more complaints related to aspartame than any other food additive." "The 92 health effects reported to the FDA are: abdominal pain, anxiety attacks, arthritis, [snip, snip] and weight gain."
"Donald Rumsfeld, a friend and political ally of the George Bush family, was chairman of Searle at the time when Reagan appointed defense department contractor Arthur Hull Hayes, the FDA commissioner who eventually approved aspartame. Hayes left the FDA in 1983 under fire for accepting corporate gifts and joined Searle's public relations firm as senior medical advisor."
> abdominal pain
Drinking carbonated beverages makes you cramp up, whodathunkit?
> As for the toxic levels given in the Italian research, I forgot the number but it was like 5-7+ diet cokes a day, not too many people drink that many per day for long periods of times.
Bottles or cans? Either way, it's still about two or three liters a day.
Still, interesting facts at any rate.
>>7 Cans.
Let's just redo the math ourselves:
"study has shown that [] carcinogenic effects are also evident at a daily dose of 20 mg/kg"
"The ADI of aspartame is 50 mg/kg of body weight per day (22 cans of a diet soft drink for a 175 pound man; 15 cans for a 120 pound woman)" www.aspartame.net/media/info/faqmenu.html
22 * (20 / 50) = 8.8 cans for a man
15 * (20 / 50) = 6 cans for a woman
Aspartame is used in more than carbonated beverages. Hopefully they would have checked the complaint against those of sugar-sweetened carbonated beverages.
The weight gain one is hilarious. Talk about defeating most of the purpose.
Aspartame gives me indigestion. No problem for me if it's a carcinogen.