The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has launched a public consultation on its “first full risk assessment” of the artificial sweetener aspartame. According to a January 8, 2013, news release, EFSA’s Scientific Panel on Food Additive and Nutrient Sources Added to Food (ANS Panel) has issued a draft scientific opinion on the safety of aspartame that entailed “an in-depth review of peer-reviewed scientific and other literature on aspartame and its breakdown products, including new human studies.” Based on this information, the ANS Panel has concluded that aspartame and its breakdown products “pose no toxicity concern for consumers at current levels of exposure. The current Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI) is considered to be safe for the general population and consumer exposure to aspartame is below this ADI.” “The ANS Panel’s draft opinion has benefitted from the latest scientific thinking and methodological approaches,” concludes EFSA, which has requested comments on the draft…
Tag Archives artificial sweetener
A recent study has reportedly suggested that compared with sucrose, some nonnutritive sweeteners (NNSs) induce greater weight gain in Wistar rats. Fernanda de Matos Feijó, et al., “Saccharin and aspartame, compared with sucrose, induce greater weight gain in Wistar rats, at similar total caloric intake levels,” Appetite, November 2012. After feeding 29 male rats a free chow diet and yogurt sweetened with sucrose, saccharin or aspartame over the course of 12 weeks, Brazilian researchers found that “addition of either saccharin or aspartame to yogurt resulted in increased weight gain compared to addition of sucrose,” even though total caloric intake was similar among groups. “Although saccharin and aspartame promoted relatively fewer calories from yogurt intake when compared to sucrose, increases in calories from chow intake effectively compensated for decreases in calories from yogurt, in such a way that there was a similar total caloric intake among all groups after the 12-week…
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has proposed revoking “the standards of identity for artificially sweetened jelly, preserves and jam,” concluding that these standards “are both obsolete and unnecessary in light of [] regulations for food named by use of a nutrient content claim and a standardized term.” Responding to a citizen petition submitted by the International Jelly and Preserve Association (IJPA), the proposed rule notes that standards implemented in 1959 for fruit spreads containing nonnutritive sweeteners (NNSs) only provided for the use of saccharin, sodium saccharin, calcium saccharin, or any combination thereof (21 CFR 150.140 and 150.160). These standards did not include other NNSs approved for food use since 1959, although FDA later established under the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act a general standard of identity for foods named by a nutrient content claim such as “low calorie” or “sugar free” “in conjunction with a standardized food term,”…
Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWM) has reportedly walked back a recent study claiming to link aspartame with an increased risk of leukemia, non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and other blood-related cancers. Published ahead of print in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the study analyzed diet data from more than 77,000 women and 47,000 men enrolled in the Nurses’ Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study. The results apparently suggested “a positive association between diet soda and total aspartame intake and risks of NHL and multiple myeloma in men and leukemia in both men and women,” although “[a] higher consumption of regular sugar-sweetened soda was associated with higher risk of NHL and multiple myeloma in men but not in women.” Eva Schernhammer, et al., “Consumption of artificial sweetener—and sugar-containing soda and risk of lymphoma and leukemia in men and women,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, October 2012. But BWH has since cast…
Relying on data provided by a study of more than 60,000 Norwegian women from 1999 to 2008, Swedish and Norwegian researchers have found that a “high intake of both AS [artificially sweetened] and SS [sugar-sweetened] beverages is associated with an increased risk of preterm delivery.” Linda Englund-Ögge, et al., “Association between intake of artificially sweetened and sugar-sweetened beverages and preterm delivery: a large prospective cohort study,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, August 2, 2012. The women were asked about servings of carbonated soft drinks and non-carbonated beverages, both AS and SS, per day, week and month, and a serving was defined as 250 mL for all beverages. The groups were divided into AS and SS groups and further divided into intake categories. For women consuming more than one serving per day of AS beverages, the adjusted odds ratio for preterm delivery was 1.11. Consumption of more than one serving of…
As part of an ongoing food additive assessment, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has requested additional scientific data on aspartame “related to 5-benzyl-3,6-dioxo-2-piperazine acetic acid (DKP) and other primary or secondary degradation products from aspartame.” Asked by the European Commission in 2011 to reevaluate the safety of aspartame as a food additive, EFSA’s Scientific Panel on Food Additives and Nutrient Sources Added to Food initially called for aspartame data by September 30, 2011, but has since determined that there is further need for “data on products which can be formed from aspartame in different types of foodstuffs, in particular on [DKP], depending [for example] on pH, temperature and storage time.” As a result, EFSA has delayed its findings and instead requested data on “the presence and levels of DKP found in aspartame-containing foodstuffs (including beverages) found on the market” as well as “the formation of DKP and other primary…
New research conducted by Morando Soffritti, director of the Ramazzini Institute in Bologna, Italy, has allegedly found that male mice systematically dosed with sucralose throughout their life cycles were more likely to develop a specific type of cancer. Presented at the April 25 childhood Cancer 2012 Conference in London, the research evidently relied on 843 mice and appeared to identify a dose-dependent relationship between sucralose consumption and leukemia in male mice only. “Health concerns over aspartame are leading consumers to switch to the widely promoted alternative: sucralose,” said Soffritti, who has long lobbied European regulators to take aspartame off the market. “Now that we have found evidence of a link between sucralose and cancer in mice, similar research should be urgently repeated on rats, and large-scale observational studies should be set up to monitor any potential cancer risk to human health.” See Childhood Cancer 2012 Press Release, April 25, 2012. Meanwhile,…
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has issued a public call for data “on the artificial sweetener aspartame (E 951) for consideration in a full re-evaluation to be completed in 2012 as requested by the European Commission [EC].” EFSA has asked interested parties and stakeholders to submit “scientific or technical data—published, unpublished and newly generated—related to the use of aspartame in food and drinks and as a tabletop sweetener.” Originally scheduled for 2020, the aspartame review is “part of the systematic re-evaluation of all authorized food additives in the European Union.” EFSA apparently agreed to move up the proceedings after European Parliament members voiced concerns about the sweetener. “Due to EFSA’s scientific cooperation efforts, particularly with its partners in EU Member States, ongoing liaison with international partners and its stakeholder dialogue, EFSA can draw on a well-established network to ensure that all the relevant data are considered,” stated the agency, which…
The French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety (ANSES) has reportedly reassessed the nutritional benefits and risks of intense sweeteners, confirming that two new studies “provide no sufficient scientific basis for a toxicological re-evaluation of aspartame.” ANSES apparently dismissed the first study concerning the effects of aspartame on mice because of methodological deficiencies, while finding the second one insufficient to establish a cause and effect relationship between aspartame and preterm delivery. The agency concluded, however, that it shares “the desire of the European Food Safety Authority to study the toxicological risks inherent in sweeteners.” It thus noted that it intends to “broaden” its aspartame research, as well as initiate “a working group to assess the nutritional benefits and risks of intense sweeteners and the need to draw up recommendations for any vulnerable population groups—including pregnant women—identified in the course of its work.” See ANSES Press Release, March…
The European Committee for Standardization has approved a single-test method that can detect nine different sweeteners and their dosages in drinks, and canned and bottled fruits. Developed by the European Commission’s Joint Research Center’s (JRC’s) Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements, the method sets national standards for European Union (EU) member states, Croatia, Iceland, Norway, and Switzerland to evaluate sweetener levels in imported foodstuffs and those produced within the EU. Using a high-performance “liquid chromatographic with evaporative light scattering detection,” the method can simultaneously test for six EU authorized sweeteners: acesulfame-K (ACS-K), aspartame (ASP), cyclamic acid (CYC), saccharin (SAC), sucralose (SUC), and neohesperidine dihydrochalcone (NHDC). It can also test for three non-authorized sweeteners: neotame (NEO), alitame (ALI) and dulcin (DUL). According to JRC, the method “can provide several pieces of information which are needed to correctly label the food. It can provide whether or not the non-authorized or the authorized…
