Diet & Fitness Blog
Ask Pam: Artificial Sweeteners
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What's the scoop on artificial sweeteners? - FranFran wants to know which artificial sweeteners are OK to consume. I have been getting asked this question a lot lately, and it’s no wonder – they seem to be everywhere. More and more products contain them, and new substances are being introduced into the marketplace. A lot of it comes down to preference and choice. I hope to shed some light on basically what kind of artificial sweeteners are out there and some facts to help you make the decision to consume or not to consume them.
Let’s start with the more common ones we know: Aspartame (Equal®), Sucralose (Splenda®), and Saccharin (Sweet’N Low®). All have been recognized as approved sweeteners by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but there is still controversy whether using them is safe or not.
Aspartame has been approved for more than 20 years by the FDA as a general purpose sweetener. We often know it as Equal®. It does provide some calories but since it is so sweet, you only need a small amount, so to most the calories are negligible.
Aspartame is probably one of the most talked about sweeteners and controversial because most of the studies done (the ones touting its safety/recommending) on it were funded by companies supporting aspartame, so some people question whether the studies are misleading and biased. In addition, some studies do show that use of it has been linked to headaches, depression, cancer and increased hunger – but more research to determine efficacy needs to be done.
Sucralose is the one we think about as being the closest to sugar; it provides no calories and is not fully absorbed in the body. The tricky part here is that Splenda® isn’t 100 percent natural sucrose and contains additional bulking agents (e.g. maltodextrin), which have carbohydrates. The amount can be negligible but if someone is using it in baking for instance, it will contain calories and carbohydrates.
Saccharin has been used as a sweetener for many years – actually one of the most researched. Much of the testing has been done on rats and its relationship to cancer, expanding into human studies supporting there were no carcinogenic effects (the dose given to the rats was hundreds times higher than a human would consume). Still, there's a lot of controversy over whether evidence of carcinogens in rats show that humans should try to limit overall consumption.
So should you consume or not? My thoughts are that if you can go natural, go for it. Limit your use if possible and look for products that have natural ingredients.
Check out this video below for more info on sweeteners!
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Labels: artificial sweeteners, ask pam, sweet, sweeteners
Comment by 
said... - Friday, June 12, 2009 1:21:00 PM
How about sweeteners like Erythritol (Z-Sweet, Organic Zero) or Diabetisweet? These are the sweeteners I generally use, and they're good for baking.
Comment by 
Eric said... - Friday, June 12, 2009 2:58:00 PM
Thanks for the article but is there any reason why there was no mention about products like TruVia as *healthy alternatives* to artificial sweeteners? It's a natural sweetener, zero calories...seems like a win-win situation? Am I missing something?
Comment by said... - Wednesday, June 17, 2009 9:32:00 AM
I have done much research and have one question--is a little poison okay to consume?
Comment by said... - Saturday, June 27, 2009 5:32:00 PM
Splenda causes palpitation (heard from my family doctor). I also experienced it when I used splenda in my tea!!!! Also, I think that most of the or all of the artificial sweetners which they usually say are Zero calories and taste cup for cup like sugar...do have some negative impact on our health, in the long run...and also they have side effects...I experienced palpitations and breathing issues with Aspartame and sometimes with splenda.
Comment by said... - Friday, December 11, 2009 3:53:00 AM
There was no mention of Stevia, although I think that's an ingredient in Truvia. Stevia is plant derived and therefore natural, right?
Comment by lavinia.tj said... - Friday, December 11, 2009 4:23:00 AM
I don't understand about the paragraph saying that adding maltose to a cake add calorie and carbohydrate into it, since flour IS carbs, and like it or not, we'd be putting at least twice more flour than sugar into the cake..
So anyone making cake should be aware that what they're making IS carbs..
For sweeteners, I suggest using xylitol or Fructose which are more natural and are lower in calories than glucose.
I do consume artificial sweetener. They are basically sweet chemicals. A large amount of it may be poisonous, however as in with other chemicals and biological (bacterial) toxins, each people's tolerance to these 'poison' is different. I personally would not like to find my limit (by hitting it) and upset my system, and rather limit their use (once a week, twice a month).
Comment by said... - Friday, December 11, 2009 5:36:00 AM
I do not agree with the recommendation to "go natural". Does that mean we should eat sugar beet, right? Or to eat that sugar produced in chemical plants, anyway?
I would recommend sweeting your foods and drinks as little as possible or consume them unsweetened. And if we are overweight or obese, the sweetener should always be an artifial one.
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