A Caution On So-Called 'Better Alternatives'
The Market Ticker - Commentary on The Capital Markets
Login or register to improve your experience
Main Navigation
Sarah's Resources You Should See
Full-Text Search & Archives
Leverage, the book
Legal Disclaimer

The content on this site is provided without any warranty, express or implied. All opinions expressed on this site are those of the author and may contain errors or omissions. For investment, legal or other professional advice specific to your situation contact a licensed professional in your jurisdiction.

NO MATERIAL HERE CONSTITUTES "INVESTMENT ADVICE" NOR IS IT A RECOMMENDATION TO BUY OR SELL ANY FINANCIAL INSTRUMENT, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO STOCKS, OPTIONS, BONDS OR FUTURES.

Actions you undertake as a consequence of any analysis, opinion or advertisement on this site are your sole responsibility; author(s) may have positions in securities or firms mentioned and have no duty to disclose same.

The Market Ticker content may be sent unmodified to lawmakers via print or electronic means or excerpted online for non-commercial purposes provided full attribution is given and the original article source is linked to. Please contact Karl Denninger for reprint permission in other media, to republish full articles, or for any commercial use (which includes any site where advertising is displayed.)

Submissions or tips on matters of economic or political interest may be sent "over the transom" to The Editor at any time. To be considered for publication your submission must be complete (NOT a "pitch"; those get you blocked as a spammer), include full and correct contact information and be related to an economic or political matter of the day. All submissions become the property of The Market Ticker.

Considering sending spam? Read this first.

2025-02-24 07:00 by Karl Denninger
in Personal Health , 79 references Ignore this thread
A Caution On So-Called 'Better Alternatives'
[Comments enabled]

Aspartame is a very common "sugar replacement", found in "diet" soft drinks, lower-sugar yogurts and other things where sweetness is desired but sugar is not -- never mind as a sugar substitute in coffee.  These substitutions have been widely promoted for insulin-compromised individuals, particularly those who are overweight or Type II diabetic.

Saccharin was among the first of these, but many people eschewed it after it was linked to the possibility of causing cancer.  The science on that is less-than-conclusive, but needless to say it scared a lot of people off.  The doses used in those studies were insanely high (and in rats) and in 2000 it was concluded it didn't apply in reasonable and consumable doses in humans.  Well, if you believe the studies anyway.

Now we have a study out of Sweden that throws a great deal of shade in aspartame, which is the most-common non-sugar sweetener used in various foods and beverages -- by far.

For the new study, mice were fed food containing 0.15% aspartame every day for 12 weeks — that’s the equivalent of humans drinking about three daily cans of diet soda.

Aspartame-fed mice developed larger and more fatty plaques in their arteries and experienced higher levels of inflammation, a major contributor to heart disease.

The obvious caution is that this was in mice, not humans, but note that this looks a lot like coronary artery disease and it may be related to insulin signaling because the immune signal involved and identified in the study is sensitive to that signal.

The dysregulation of this particular signaling pathway is not well-understood at all -- that is, we know what happens in this regard but not why it happens.

This however begs the question: How is it that this problem in a substance that is this widespread in use, artificially made and when caused by exposure is in a reasonable amount that human would be expected to consume, was not identified before it was approved fifty years ago?

The FDA says:

The FDA first approved aspartame as a sweetener in 1974 and scientific evidence has continued to support the agency’s conclusion that aspartame is safe for the general population when made under good manufacturing practices and used under the approved conditions of use. The FDA-established acceptable daily intake (ADI), or the amount of aspartame that is considered safe to consume each day over the course of a person’s lifetime, continues to be protective of public health.

Three sodas a day is certainly within the realm of expected and reasonable amount of use.

So why is this study a new discovery?

You'd think that's not possible, considering that the changes found against controls were quite dramatic, they occurred at very reasonable levels of consumption and took just about three months to show up in the mice -- and not an extended period of time.

But the record says its not only possible, that's what happened.

Which means nobody looked, because if they looked they would have found it.

Why and how did that happen, and what else has been similarly not looked at?

Go to responses (registration required to post)
 



 
No Comments Yet.....
Login Register Top Blog Top Blog Topics FAQ
Page 1 of 46  First123456789Last
Login Register Top Blog Top Blog Topics FAQ
Page 1 of 46  First123456789Last