An Overdue Ban On A Dangerous Sweetener
Dr Epstein below suggests that the US Food and Drug Administration, whose safety standards are followed by most international regulatory authorities, may consider a review of aspartame’s safety. Dr Epstein is, of course, implying that Dr. Margaret Hamburg, the newly appointed FDA Commissioner and “inspiring public health advocate, will promptly ban the continued use of aspartame” on the basis of her previous track record. Unfortunately, this is probably wishful thinking on Dr Epstein’s part. Since chemical industry influence dominates Washington and the Obama presidency White House (see “Contaminated Regulation”), Dr Hamburg will simply take up the poisoned chalice of her predecessors, drink deeply, and carry on the present status quo where the FDA simply rubber-stamps its safety approval on any product the chemical industry decides to release to the human foodchain.
Of course Rachel Carson’s earlier work, Silent Spring, published in 1963, gave even earlier warning of carcinogenicity in common chemicals introduced to our environment since the end of World War II in 1945. To our shame, we, as consumers, have done absolutely nothing with the scientifically established information collected by Rachel Carson and Dr Epstein. Instead, while cancer rates have increased dramatically, we have bought into the chemical industry-sponsored bullshit spread widely through the conventional media that toxic chemicals at low dosage rates pose no problem to human health:
Aspartame, first discovered in 1965 by the pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle, is an artificial sweetener marketed by Ajinomoto Sweeteners under trademark names including Nutrasweet, Equal and Canderel. After saccharin, aspartame is the commonest sweetener, consumed by over 200 million people worldwide, and represents about 60 percent of the artificial sweetener market.
Aspartame provides food, soft drinks, candy and chewing gum manufacturers with substantial cost savings compared to sugar, which is 200 times less sweet. Aspartame is a low calorie, which helps people control their weight. It is also used in vitamins and pharmaceuticals, including syrups and antibiotics for children.
In January 1976, then Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Schmidt testified before Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass) that Hazleton Laboratories, under contract to Searle, had been charged with falsifying toxicological data on the sweetener.
The FDA subsequently convened a Public Board of Inquiry to review concerns on aspartame's carcinogenic effects in experimental animals. In 1980, the Board concluded that aspartame could "contribute to the development brain tumors." The FDA then recommended that, pending confirmation of these findings, this sweetener should no longer be used.
In 2006, based on highly sensitive and life long feeding tests in groups of about 200 rats and at doses less than usual human dietary levels, the prestigious Italian Ramazzini Foundation confirmed that aspartame is unequivocally carcinogenic. A high incidence of cancers was induced in multiple organs, including lymph glands, brain and kidney.
Not surprisingly, these findings have been sharply challenged by the sweetener industry, major sweetener users, such as Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestlé and Monsanto, and also by the industry oriented scientific journal Critical Reviews in Toxicology. Other critics included Donald Rumsfeld, former U.S. Defense Secretary, and earlier CEO of Searle.
This evidence on the carcinogenicity of aspartame was strongly reinforced in a unique 2007 feeding test, based on maternal feeding of rats in early pregnancy, resulting in their lifelong exposure to aspartame, beginning in fetal life. This resulted in a still higher increase in the incidence of cancers at sites including those previously reported. In April 2007, the results of this study were presented by Ramazzini scientists at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York.
Under the explicit provisions of the 1958 Delaney Law, which requires an automatic ban on carcinogenic food additives, it is anticipated that Dr. Margaret Hamburg, the newly appointed FDA Commissioner and inspiring public health advocate, will promptly ban the continued use of aspartame.
~ Huffington Post: August 3, 2009
Samuel S. Epstein, M.D. is Professor emeritus of Environmental & Occupational Medicine at the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health; Chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition; and author of over 200 scientific articles and 15 books on cancer, including the groundbreaking 1979 The Politics of Cancer, and the 2009 Toxic Beauty.
Dr Epstein is a longstanding opponent of the unrestricted release of hazardous chemicals into the environment and food chain and his landmark text, The Politics of Cancer, first published in 1979, gave substantial evidence for the cancer-causing potential of a large number of common chemicals in daily use.