The Dangers of Aspartame
Aspartame is a common ingredient in many diet and sugar free products, due to it's low caloric content and ultra sweet taste. In fact Aspartame is said to be 200 times sweeter than ordinary sugar. It is however a powerful excitotoxin.
"Excitotoxicity is the pathological process by which nerve cells are damaged and killed by excessive stimulation by neurotransmitters such as glutamate and similar substances"
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excitotoxicity
You may have heard a little bit about Aspartame from friends and relatives - an association with Cancer exists and further reading into this awful additive in our food, drinks and Vaccines should excite some fear in you, because if this stuff is so bad, and if they have known about it's dangers for so long - why is it still to this day hidden in so many processed foods and drinks? It's certainly not because the science is somehow fallible and this additive is actually safe - it's not. So what other reason would any Safety Authority or responsible Conglomerate Company have to continue to allow this to be consumed by so many in the population? .... that's the problem. Their concern is not foremost for the health and safety of products but of money and greed. Pathological greed it seems.
The Big USFDA Cover Up Relating to Aspartame
The U.S Food and Drug Administration, the Organisation responsible for ensuring the safety of products such as aspartame, interestingly isn't all too interested in updating their information about Aspartame, they apparently have missed a few memos recently. Not surprising really, I'm sure it's difficult to think straight when you're drinking Fluoridated water, lathering yourself with chemicals in personal care items, pumping yourselves full of vaccinations and medicating all aches and ailments with psychotropic and various pharmaceutical drugs. I bet all that experimenting is getting to their Agents. It's a tough gig.
"The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or USFDA) is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, one of the United States federal executive departments. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the regulation and supervision of food safety, tobacco products, dietary supplements, prescription and over-the-counter pharmaceutical drugs (medications),vaccines, biopharmaceuticals, blood transfusions, medical devices, electromagnetic radiation emitting devices (ERED), and veterinary products.
The FDA also enforces other laws, notably Section 361 of the Public Health Service Act and associated regulations, many of which are not directly related to food or drugs. These include sanitation requirements on interstate travel and control of disease on products ranging from certain household pets to sperm donation for assisted reproduction."
Read More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration
Reading the wikipedia and cancer.org entries on aspartame, it would appear that these Organisations are oblivious to the proven direct negative health consequences associated with it's use.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame
http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancercauses/othercarcinogens/athome/aspartame
However Thetruthisbrighter website shows an alternative view of the product. And it would be interesting to compare the research and critical analysis between the Cancer.org and wikipedia sites and those with scientific evidence to back the dangers of Aspartame.
New Study - Low Doses Of Aspartame Cause Cancer
Environmental Health Perspectives, the Journal of the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences ranks first among more than 200 environmental science and occupational health journals and is read in 190 countries. At New York's Mt Sinai School of Medicine DR. MORANDO SOFFRITTI was honored in April with the Irving J Selikoff Award for Outstanding contributions to the identification of environmental and industrial carcinogens, and his promotion of independent scientific research. The prestigious Selikoff Award is only granted for groundbreaking cancer research. It was created 1993 by the Collegium Ramazzini, an academy of 180internationally renowned experts in occupational and environmental health from over 30 nations. It has been awarded just twice before being presented to Dr. Soffritti.
His research was conducted for 36 months using 1,800 rats. It forced the conclusion that aspartame is a multipotential carcinogen. Cancers aspartame produced included leukemia, lymphoma, kidney, and cranial peripheral nerves among others. Only the rats fed aspartame got malignant brain tumors. This prodigious work was peer reviewed by 7 world experts. This work confirmed studies presented to the FDA 25 years ago that documented a catalogue of brain, uterine, ovarian, testicular, mammary, pancreatic and thyroid tumors. Based on the evidence FDA denied approval of aspartame for 16 years from the time it was discovered. Then Don Rumsfeld, who was the CEO of NutraSweet's parent, the G. D. Searle Co., went to Washington to be newly elected Ronald Reagan's Secretary of Defense. The existing FDA Commissioner was asked to resign and aspartame was approved by Arthur Hull Hayes appointed by President Reagan. He did this over the objections of the FDA's scientific Board of Inquiry who had revoked the petition. President Reagan had written an executive order making FDA powerless to do anything about aspartame until Hayes could get to FDA. Now the floundering Searle became profitable. The compromised FDA had full knowledge of aspartame's toxicity and the approval of this deadly carcinogen sentenced millions to disability and death.
Read More: http://rense.com/general77/lowdoses.htm
By Dr. Mercola: -
"More than 90 countries have given the artificial sweetener aspartame the green light to be used in thousands of food and beverage products.1
Two hundred times sweeter than sugar, aspartame allows food manufacturers to produce sweet foods they can market as “low calorie,” “diet,” or sugar-free,” appealing to hundreds of millions of consumers looking to cut sugar from their diets.
No doubt about it, the less sugar you include in your diet, the better. But replacing sugar with aspartame is not the solution, and in fact is likely to be even worse for your health.
Despite assurances from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other public health agencies that aspartame is safe, the research says otherwise…
So What the Heck is Aspartame Made Of?Virtually all of the marketing material emphasizes the fact that aspartame is natural and made of two amino acids, the building blocks of protein. But, like many deceptions, this is only partially true. While there are two amino acids that comprise 90% of aspartame, aspartic acid and phenylalanine, they are held together in a methyl ester bond that comprises 10% of the molecule.
The methanol is released from the aspartame within hours of consumption after hydrolysis of the methyl group of the dipeptide by chymotrypsin in the small intestine. Once this methyl ester bond is broken it liberates free methyl alcohol or methanol, which is commonly called wood alcohol. The problem with methanol is that it passes into your blood-brain barrier and is converted into formaldehyde, which causes the damage. You may recognize formaldehyde as embalming fluid.
Interestingly, methanol is only toxic in humans. All other animals are able to detoxify it before it causes damage.
Methanol is a toxin that destroys the myelin tissue in your body, which is the insulating material around your nerves that allows nerve signals to travel properly. Once injured, one can have what are called demyelinating symptoms that are commonly seen in diseases like MS and also migraines that can include bizarre and inconsistent visual field disruptions.
My sister that helped me start my practice in 1985 is actually one of the people that develops these symptoms when exposed to aspartame. In the late ‘80s I helped to diagnose her with this sensitivity and she has avoided it for over 25 years.
Why is Methanol So Toxic?
Methanol breaks down into formic acid and formaldehyde in your body. Many experts believe formic acid is the problem but the real problem is the formaldehyde, which is a deadly neurotoxin and carcinogen. An EPA assessment of methanol states that methanol "is considered a cumulative poison due to the low rate of excretion once it is absorbed. In the body, methanol is oxidized to formaldehyde and formic acid; both of these metabolites are toxic."2
They recommend a limit of consumption of 7.8 mg/day. But according to Woodrow Monte, Ph.D, R.D., director of the Food Science and Nutrition Laboratory at Arizona State University:3
“When diet sodas and soft drinks, sweetened with aspartame, are used to replace fluid loss during exercise and physical exertion in hot climates, the intake of methanol can exceed 250 mg/day or 32 times the Environmental Protection Agency's recommended limit of consumption for this cumulative toxin.”
Further, he states that due to the lack of a couple of key enzymes, humans are many times more sensitive to the toxic effects of methanol than animals. Therefore, tests of aspartame or methanol on animals do not accurately reflect the danger for humans.
“There are no human or mammalian studies to evaluate the possible mutagenic, teratogenic, or carcinogenic effects of chronic administration of methyl alcohol,” he said.
Symptoms from methanol poisoning are many, and include headaches, ear buzzing, dizziness, nausea, gastrointestinal disturbances, weakness, vertigo, chills, memory lapses, numbness and shooting pains in the extremities, behavioral disturbances, and neuritis. The most well known problems from methanol poisoning are vision problems including misty vision, progressive contraction of visual fields, blurring of vision, obscuration of vision, retinal damage, and blindness. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen that causes retinal damage, interferes with DNA replication and may cause birth defects. The researchers in the featured study then reasoned that the aspartame-induced methanol exposure was likely possible for oxidative stress in the brain.
New Study Shows Aspartame Damages Your BrainA newly published study with rats investigated the chronic effect of aspartame on oxidative stress in the brain. Researchers found that there was a significant increase in lipid peroxidation levels, superoxide dismutase activity, GPx levels and CAT activity, showing that chronic exposure of aspartame resulted in detectable methanol in the blood, which may be responsible for the generation of oxidative stress and damage in the brain.4
So the study found that aspartame exposure did result in “detectable levels” of methanol in the blood. Methanol is gradually released in the small intestine when the methyl group of aspartame encounters the enzyme chymotrypsin."
Read More: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/09/26/aspartame-causes-brain-damage.aspx
http://aspartame.mercola.com/http://www.mercola.com/article/aspartame/deadly_deception.htm
From NaturalHealthNews:-
Each of the three ingredients in Aspartame poses its own dangers and each is well documented as causing a long list of side effects and dangerous health conditions. Watch for the ingredient Acesulfame Potassium, which is just another name for Aspartame.
Phenylalanine: Even a single use of Aspartame raises the blood phenylalanine levels. High blood phenylalanine can be concentrated in parts of the brain and is especially dangerous for infants and fetuses. Because it is metabolized much more efficiently by rodents than humans, testing and research on rats alone is not sufficient enough to denounce the dangers of Aspartame for human consumption. Excessive levels of phenylalanine in the brain cause serotonin levels to decrease, leading to emotional disorders like depression.
Aspartic Acid: Aspartic acid is considered an excito-toxin, which means it over stimulates certain neurons in the body until they die. Much like nitrates and MSG, aspartic acid can cause amino acid imbalances in the body and result in the interruption of normal neurotransmitter metabolism of the brain. (http://www.holisticmed.net/aspartame/aminoacid.pdf)
Methanol becomes Formaldehyde (Embalming fluid): The most prominent danger of Aspartame is that when ingested, the methanol (wood alcohol) is distributed throughout the body, including the brain, muscle, fat and nervous tissues, and is then metabolized to form formaldehyde, which enters cells and binds to proteins and genetic material (DNA). Methanol is a dangerous neurotoxin and a known carcinogen, which causes retinal damage in the eye, interferes with DNA processes, and can cause birth defects. (http://aspartame.mercola.com/)
The EPA's recommended limit of consumption of Methanol is 7.8 milligrams per day, but a one liter bottle of an Aspartame-sweetened beverage contains over 50 mg of methanol. Heavy users of Aspartame-containing products consume as much as 250 mg of methanol daily, which is over 30 times the EPA limit.
Suspiciously similar to the symptoms of Fibromyalgia and Multiple Sclerosis, Aspartame's long list includes dizziness, headaches, behavioral changes, hallucinations, depression, nausea, numbness, muscle spasms, weight gain, rashes, fatigue, irritability, insomnia, vision problems, hearing loss, heart palpitations, breathing difficulties, anxiety attacks, slurred speech, loss of taste, tinnitus, vertigo, memory loss, and joint pain. Also, many illnesses can be worsened by ingesting Aspartame, including chronic fatigue syndrome, brain tumors, epilepsy, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, mental retardation, and especially diabetes.
Birth defects: According to Dr. Louis Elsas, Pediatrician Professor of Genetics at Emory University, Phenylalanine can concentrate in the placenta, causing mental retardation of a fetus. Also, formaldehyde in the blood stream of a pregnant woman can cause her immune system to target the fetal tissue as a foreign substance and destroy it, the result being a miscarriage. This can happen before she even knows she is pregnant. (http://www.dorway.com/dr-elsas.txt)
Read more: http://www.naturalnews.com/034320_aspartame_sweetener_side_effects.html#ixzz2J7riT5oe
"Excitotoxicity is the pathological process by which nerve cells are damaged and killed by excessive stimulation by neurotransmitters such as glutamate and similar substances"
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excitotoxicity
You may have heard a little bit about Aspartame from friends and relatives - an association with Cancer exists and further reading into this awful additive in our food, drinks and Vaccines should excite some fear in you, because if this stuff is so bad, and if they have known about it's dangers for so long - why is it still to this day hidden in so many processed foods and drinks? It's certainly not because the science is somehow fallible and this additive is actually safe - it's not. So what other reason would any Safety Authority or responsible Conglomerate Company have to continue to allow this to be consumed by so many in the population? .... that's the problem. Their concern is not foremost for the health and safety of products but of money and greed. Pathological greed it seems.
The Big USFDA Cover Up Relating to Aspartame
The U.S Food and Drug Administration, the Organisation responsible for ensuring the safety of products such as aspartame, interestingly isn't all too interested in updating their information about Aspartame, they apparently have missed a few memos recently. Not surprising really, I'm sure it's difficult to think straight when you're drinking Fluoridated water, lathering yourself with chemicals in personal care items, pumping yourselves full of vaccinations and medicating all aches and ailments with psychotropic and various pharmaceutical drugs. I bet all that experimenting is getting to their Agents. It's a tough gig.
"The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or USFDA) is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, one of the United States federal executive departments. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the regulation and supervision of food safety, tobacco products, dietary supplements, prescription and over-the-counter pharmaceutical drugs (medications),vaccines, biopharmaceuticals, blood transfusions, medical devices, electromagnetic radiation emitting devices (ERED), and veterinary products.
The FDA also enforces other laws, notably Section 361 of the Public Health Service Act and associated regulations, many of which are not directly related to food or drugs. These include sanitation requirements on interstate travel and control of disease on products ranging from certain household pets to sperm donation for assisted reproduction."
Read More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration
Reading the wikipedia and cancer.org entries on aspartame, it would appear that these Organisations are oblivious to the proven direct negative health consequences associated with it's use.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame
http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancercauses/othercarcinogens/athome/aspartame
However Thetruthisbrighter website shows an alternative view of the product. And it would be interesting to compare the research and critical analysis between the Cancer.org and wikipedia sites and those with scientific evidence to back the dangers of Aspartame.
New Study - Low Doses Of Aspartame Cause Cancer
Environmental Health Perspectives, the Journal of the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences ranks first among more than 200 environmental science and occupational health journals and is read in 190 countries. At New York's Mt Sinai School of Medicine DR. MORANDO SOFFRITTI was honored in April with the Irving J Selikoff Award for Outstanding contributions to the identification of environmental and industrial carcinogens, and his promotion of independent scientific research. The prestigious Selikoff Award is only granted for groundbreaking cancer research. It was created 1993 by the Collegium Ramazzini, an academy of 180internationally renowned experts in occupational and environmental health from over 30 nations. It has been awarded just twice before being presented to Dr. Soffritti.
His research was conducted for 36 months using 1,800 rats. It forced the conclusion that aspartame is a multipotential carcinogen. Cancers aspartame produced included leukemia, lymphoma, kidney, and cranial peripheral nerves among others. Only the rats fed aspartame got malignant brain tumors. This prodigious work was peer reviewed by 7 world experts. This work confirmed studies presented to the FDA 25 years ago that documented a catalogue of brain, uterine, ovarian, testicular, mammary, pancreatic and thyroid tumors. Based on the evidence FDA denied approval of aspartame for 16 years from the time it was discovered. Then Don Rumsfeld, who was the CEO of NutraSweet's parent, the G. D. Searle Co., went to Washington to be newly elected Ronald Reagan's Secretary of Defense. The existing FDA Commissioner was asked to resign and aspartame was approved by Arthur Hull Hayes appointed by President Reagan. He did this over the objections of the FDA's scientific Board of Inquiry who had revoked the petition. President Reagan had written an executive order making FDA powerless to do anything about aspartame until Hayes could get to FDA. Now the floundering Searle became profitable. The compromised FDA had full knowledge of aspartame's toxicity and the approval of this deadly carcinogen sentenced millions to disability and death.
Read More: http://rense.com/general77/lowdoses.htm
By Dr. Mercola: -
"More than 90 countries have given the artificial sweetener aspartame the green light to be used in thousands of food and beverage products.1
Two hundred times sweeter than sugar, aspartame allows food manufacturers to produce sweet foods they can market as “low calorie,” “diet,” or sugar-free,” appealing to hundreds of millions of consumers looking to cut sugar from their diets.
No doubt about it, the less sugar you include in your diet, the better. But replacing sugar with aspartame is not the solution, and in fact is likely to be even worse for your health.
Despite assurances from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other public health agencies that aspartame is safe, the research says otherwise…
So What the Heck is Aspartame Made Of?Virtually all of the marketing material emphasizes the fact that aspartame is natural and made of two amino acids, the building blocks of protein. But, like many deceptions, this is only partially true. While there are two amino acids that comprise 90% of aspartame, aspartic acid and phenylalanine, they are held together in a methyl ester bond that comprises 10% of the molecule.
The methanol is released from the aspartame within hours of consumption after hydrolysis of the methyl group of the dipeptide by chymotrypsin in the small intestine. Once this methyl ester bond is broken it liberates free methyl alcohol or methanol, which is commonly called wood alcohol. The problem with methanol is that it passes into your blood-brain barrier and is converted into formaldehyde, which causes the damage. You may recognize formaldehyde as embalming fluid.
Interestingly, methanol is only toxic in humans. All other animals are able to detoxify it before it causes damage.
Methanol is a toxin that destroys the myelin tissue in your body, which is the insulating material around your nerves that allows nerve signals to travel properly. Once injured, one can have what are called demyelinating symptoms that are commonly seen in diseases like MS and also migraines that can include bizarre and inconsistent visual field disruptions.
My sister that helped me start my practice in 1985 is actually one of the people that develops these symptoms when exposed to aspartame. In the late ‘80s I helped to diagnose her with this sensitivity and she has avoided it for over 25 years.
Why is Methanol So Toxic?
Methanol breaks down into formic acid and formaldehyde in your body. Many experts believe formic acid is the problem but the real problem is the formaldehyde, which is a deadly neurotoxin and carcinogen. An EPA assessment of methanol states that methanol "is considered a cumulative poison due to the low rate of excretion once it is absorbed. In the body, methanol is oxidized to formaldehyde and formic acid; both of these metabolites are toxic."2
They recommend a limit of consumption of 7.8 mg/day. But according to Woodrow Monte, Ph.D, R.D., director of the Food Science and Nutrition Laboratory at Arizona State University:3
“When diet sodas and soft drinks, sweetened with aspartame, are used to replace fluid loss during exercise and physical exertion in hot climates, the intake of methanol can exceed 250 mg/day or 32 times the Environmental Protection Agency's recommended limit of consumption for this cumulative toxin.”
Further, he states that due to the lack of a couple of key enzymes, humans are many times more sensitive to the toxic effects of methanol than animals. Therefore, tests of aspartame or methanol on animals do not accurately reflect the danger for humans.
“There are no human or mammalian studies to evaluate the possible mutagenic, teratogenic, or carcinogenic effects of chronic administration of methyl alcohol,” he said.
Symptoms from methanol poisoning are many, and include headaches, ear buzzing, dizziness, nausea, gastrointestinal disturbances, weakness, vertigo, chills, memory lapses, numbness and shooting pains in the extremities, behavioral disturbances, and neuritis. The most well known problems from methanol poisoning are vision problems including misty vision, progressive contraction of visual fields, blurring of vision, obscuration of vision, retinal damage, and blindness. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen that causes retinal damage, interferes with DNA replication and may cause birth defects. The researchers in the featured study then reasoned that the aspartame-induced methanol exposure was likely possible for oxidative stress in the brain.
New Study Shows Aspartame Damages Your BrainA newly published study with rats investigated the chronic effect of aspartame on oxidative stress in the brain. Researchers found that there was a significant increase in lipid peroxidation levels, superoxide dismutase activity, GPx levels and CAT activity, showing that chronic exposure of aspartame resulted in detectable methanol in the blood, which may be responsible for the generation of oxidative stress and damage in the brain.4
So the study found that aspartame exposure did result in “detectable levels” of methanol in the blood. Methanol is gradually released in the small intestine when the methyl group of aspartame encounters the enzyme chymotrypsin."
Read More: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/09/26/aspartame-causes-brain-damage.aspx
http://aspartame.mercola.com/http://www.mercola.com/article/aspartame/deadly_deception.htm
From NaturalHealthNews:-
Each of the three ingredients in Aspartame poses its own dangers and each is well documented as causing a long list of side effects and dangerous health conditions. Watch for the ingredient Acesulfame Potassium, which is just another name for Aspartame.
Phenylalanine: Even a single use of Aspartame raises the blood phenylalanine levels. High blood phenylalanine can be concentrated in parts of the brain and is especially dangerous for infants and fetuses. Because it is metabolized much more efficiently by rodents than humans, testing and research on rats alone is not sufficient enough to denounce the dangers of Aspartame for human consumption. Excessive levels of phenylalanine in the brain cause serotonin levels to decrease, leading to emotional disorders like depression.
Aspartic Acid: Aspartic acid is considered an excito-toxin, which means it over stimulates certain neurons in the body until they die. Much like nitrates and MSG, aspartic acid can cause amino acid imbalances in the body and result in the interruption of normal neurotransmitter metabolism of the brain. (http://www.holisticmed.net/aspartame/aminoacid.pdf)
Methanol becomes Formaldehyde (Embalming fluid): The most prominent danger of Aspartame is that when ingested, the methanol (wood alcohol) is distributed throughout the body, including the brain, muscle, fat and nervous tissues, and is then metabolized to form formaldehyde, which enters cells and binds to proteins and genetic material (DNA). Methanol is a dangerous neurotoxin and a known carcinogen, which causes retinal damage in the eye, interferes with DNA processes, and can cause birth defects. (http://aspartame.mercola.com/)
The EPA's recommended limit of consumption of Methanol is 7.8 milligrams per day, but a one liter bottle of an Aspartame-sweetened beverage contains over 50 mg of methanol. Heavy users of Aspartame-containing products consume as much as 250 mg of methanol daily, which is over 30 times the EPA limit.
Suspiciously similar to the symptoms of Fibromyalgia and Multiple Sclerosis, Aspartame's long list includes dizziness, headaches, behavioral changes, hallucinations, depression, nausea, numbness, muscle spasms, weight gain, rashes, fatigue, irritability, insomnia, vision problems, hearing loss, heart palpitations, breathing difficulties, anxiety attacks, slurred speech, loss of taste, tinnitus, vertigo, memory loss, and joint pain. Also, many illnesses can be worsened by ingesting Aspartame, including chronic fatigue syndrome, brain tumors, epilepsy, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, mental retardation, and especially diabetes.
Birth defects: According to Dr. Louis Elsas, Pediatrician Professor of Genetics at Emory University, Phenylalanine can concentrate in the placenta, causing mental retardation of a fetus. Also, formaldehyde in the blood stream of a pregnant woman can cause her immune system to target the fetal tissue as a foreign substance and destroy it, the result being a miscarriage. This can happen before she even knows she is pregnant. (http://www.dorway.com/dr-elsas.txt)
Read more: http://www.naturalnews.com/034320_aspartame_sweetener_side_effects.html#ixzz2J7riT5oe
RADIO INTERVIEW WITH MARY STODDARD
ERNIE: Thanks for joining us tonight. We're glad you're with us. All across the state of Texas and parts beyond, it's good to have you here. Some important information and some information that will challenge, mystify and also make you want to maybe think about the things you eat and drink. Tonight I welcome Mary Stoddard to the microphone. Mary is here to talk about Aspartame. This is something that we've been hearing a little bit about in the media, but not a whole lot yet.
MARY: Yes, that's right. Based on the latest studies about connecting Aspartame with brain tumors and a higher incidence of brain tumors since the advent of Aspartame on the market, we have made the news quite a bit, all around the world, lately.
ERNIE: Now, when you talk about Aspartame, you're talking ... is this NutraSweet?
MARY: Aspartame is known as NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonfuls, DiabetiSweet, etc. It's known by a number of names around the world: Canderel in Europe. It's NatraSweet, I believe, in Brazil, and other places around the world it's called different things, but if you look for Aspartame on the label, you should be able to find it and be okay.
ERNIE: This is a chemical substitute for sugar. We find this in diet drinks, and Sweet and Low type products, things that take sugar out of the diet and put Aspartame in.
MARY: Right, the only thing that doesn't have it would be Sweet & Low. However is is combined with saccharin in some products, such as TAB, for example, the diet soft drink.
ERNIE: Well, why is this something to worry about? What is Aspartame all about?
MARY: Because, first of all, the tests were falsified to get it approved and get it on the market in the first place. The tests were submitted ... the lab animals in those tests had seizures. They had brain tumors. They had pancreatic tumors. They had mammary tumors, and they had uterine tumors. But, all this was covered up and erased when the tests were submitted.
ERNIE: Why?
MARY: Because it wouldn't have been approved.
ERNIE: Right.
MARY: And, it was approved as a food additive, not a drug. It was discovered as a drug in the 60's by a scientist who licked his fingers, said it tasted sweet, so let's make it a sweetener instead of a drug for peptic ulcers. It was first approved in 1974, but the approval was rescinded because of the brain tumor issue. That issue remains a very valid one today.
ERNIE: I remember back when this first came out, that ... I'm speaking from a very vague memory here ... but, there was a lot of furor about it. That it causes cancer, etc., and people didn't use it very much for awhile.
MARY: Yes.
ERNIE: What ever became of that?
MARY: Well, what became of it is a major marketing campaign was put into effect. Billions of dollars were spent on PR and Marketing, and it's been very effective. I mean, they're very good at that. Not a great products, but they're good at marketing their product.
ERNIE: Why is Aspartame bad? What does it do? What are the qualities of it ... the compounds?
MARY: Okay. First of all, it's a synthetic compound. It's two amino acids: Phenylalanine 50% which lowers the seizure threshold in some individuals, and the head of Brain Science at MIT said that it causes seizures and can cause brain tumors. Aspartic Acid is 40% of the molecule and according to Dr. John Olney, the world expert on Aspartic Acid, who just held the News Conference in Washington, November the 18th, in connection with Aspartame and brain tumors, said that it caused lesions in the brains of lab animals. What's more, it changed the DNA ... which means that it will affect future generations. It skipped a generation and went on to the third generation in the lab animal experiments ... producing morbidly obese and sexually dysfunctional lab animals.
ERNIE: So, this is something that people ... I'm sure there are people out there who drink diet drinks every day trying to lose weight, who are listening to this thinking: Well, maybe one or two reactions -- I've heard this before. I drink 'em. I don't have any problems. Or, this is the first time they've heard this and there's: Wait a second, what is this? They wouldn't put something that's so deadly on the market.
MARY: Well, they actually would. We compare this to the cigarette issue because it's a very close parallel. How many cigarettes does it take to cause lung cancer or a stroke, or a heart attack? How many diet drinks do you have to consume to get a brain tumor? How many spoonfuls of Equal do you have to take to have a pancreatic tumor or liver damage? The answer is: We don't know exactly what amount because it does not show up in short term testing. It's the long term effect. I got into this in the first place because of children and the effect it is having on children. I saw the effects in my youngest, who began to have migraines when she started drinking this Kool Aid flavored drink (Crystal Light) that came in sample packets in the mail to us. She developed chest pains and heart attack-like symptoms ... which I took her to a Heart Specialist for. Finally, she was carried in from a school field trip, after having had a grand mal seizure.
ERNIE: Now, what's that?
MARY: That is the worst kind of seizure. You lose consciousness, you fall to the ground in a fetal position and you're just out of it. That is the worst kind of seizure. There are many kinds of seizures that people can experience from Aspartame and from other causes as well, but the grand mal is the top of the line as far as danger goes. And so, when I discovered the one thing she was having was causing all these problems twelve years ago, I got her off of it and she's been just fine. Very healthy and seizure-free and no problem with that in the interim.
ERNIE: How did you know to trace it back to those things?
MARY: Well, it tasted funny to me. I was used to saccharin. I used the artificial sweetener, saccharin which has been around for a hundred years and no deaths reported ... only six complaints about saccharin had been reported to the FDA as of a couple of years ago, versus thousands and tens of thousands of complaints reported to the FDA about Aspartame. In fact, it's the most complained about additive in history. Aspartame has the most complaints on record. And, yet, the FDA refuses to do anything. I work with pilots. I have established a pilot's hotline in regard to this because an F-16 pilot asked me to do so when we were both in Washington testifying at the Senate Hearings. Working with pilots is an amazing thing. They lose their jobs. They lose, in some cases: their marriages, their homes, their families ... everything. And, in some cases ... their lives. I just finished filming a 60 Minutes segment for Australian TV for their 60 Minutes show. In it I had a pilot who was interviewed because he had a grand mal seizure in the cockpit in flight on a commuter airline in Alaska. This made national headlines about three years ago. Since he stopped using the artificially sweetened, ah, I think he was using Equal in his coffee and some drinks as well, he's been seizure-free. And, so he's been interviewed by the TV crew because it's such an astonishing story. Dozens of pilots have lost their medical certification to fly and one FAA Medical Examiner said, 'The FDA has its foot caught in a bucket, and it can't get it out.' And, so they don't know what to do. So, we're going to try to help them.
ERNIE: Well, now ... some statistical information on this: You have millions of people drinking these every day, but you're not getting reports of these types of things.
MARY: Well, you're just not getting reports of these types of things because, as I said to the doctors three weeks ago, when I was the first non-MD to lecture at Southwest Medical School in their Continuing Medical Education Series: You are going to find that these things mimic other syndromes such as MS (which is very difficult to diagnose); Fibromyalgia, which was never heard of before the advent of Aspartame and has become epidemic; Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ... when I called the Chronic Fatigue Hotline in 1987, they said to me Chronic Fatigue symptoms can be changed by changing your diet. I said, well, what does that mean? They said, do this, this and this .. and eliminate artificial sweeteners. Then, I said: Oh, you mean saccharin and Aspartame? They said: No, saccharin's okay. So, they knew back then that it caused Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. We also have more cases of brain tumors (10% more); Lupus; Manic Depression: Lou Gehrig's Disease; Attention Deficit Disorder in children, which Aspartame is capable of causing (hyperactivity in kids). A University of North Texas Professor came down with Graves Disease. She was checked into the hospital. Her doctor said: We must now irradiate your thyroid, young lady. And, she said, No, I don't think so. She checked herself out and went to a Nutritionist. He took her off Aspartame, put her on a healthy diet and she cured her Graves Disease.
ERNIE: I've heard this before. I have two friends who are Nutritionists. They have both told me the same thing about the diet drinks. They said: Don't drink them, because when they get hot, for example, the compounds that they break down into ... could you give us a little detail on that?
MARY: Right. They're (Phenylalanine and Aspartic Acid) are held in chemical bond by Methanol. Aspartame's 10% Methanol by weight. But, Methanol breaks down further into Formic Acid (the venom in ant stings), Formaldehyde (embalming fluid) and Diketopiperazine, the brain tumor agent ... the thing that kept it off the market, remember, back in 1974, when it was first approved by the FDA. The DKP kept it off the market because it causes brain tumors and the National Soft Drink Association complained bitterly about having to put Aspartame in soft drinks. They didn't want it. They didn't want the brain tumor issue associated with their product. And, you know it's a funny thing ... Monsanto is the parent company now of NutraSweet and Aspartame. Just a couple of weeks ago, they split their company in half. They split the Food part, which is the part that produces Aspartame, away from the Agricultural and other products part. And, when people say: Why did they do that? One reason, I think is because there are going to be lawsuits. I can't stop people from bringing suit against the company. I don't encourage it ever. But, I can't stop it on the other hand, and they know this is coming. They've hired big law firms. But, they falsified their tests to begin with.
ERNIE: Is that provable?
MARY: Yes. A U.S. Prosecutor ... and, this is all in our book, "Deadly Deception" ... there's a timeline and a history of Aspartame and the approval process, showing that Samuel Skinner, the U.S. Prosecutor, recused himself at the last minute. He was prosecuting the Pharmaceutical Company (G.D. Searle) for illegal acts. For falsifying their test results and turning in the tests tumor-free. And, not showing that some of the lab animals actually died and on paper, they were shown to be alive. We call it the Case of the Resurrected Rats. You know, these things really occurred, and they are criminal acts. And, so, they were being prosecuted and at the last minute, Samuel Skinner, the U.S. Prosecutor, went over to the Pharmaceutical Law Firm side and went to work for them (Sidley & Austin). He ended up in the White House as Bush's Chief of Staff, Samuel Skinner. His wife continued to work for Sidley & Austin, the NutraSweet law firm, while her husband, Skinner was in the White House. A former Monsanto attorney is now on the U.S. Supreme Court. Judge Clarence Thomas is a former Monsanto attorney. So, they have their Gate Keepers. They have people in high places. The company hired Donald Rumsfeld as its President. Now, Donald Rumsfeld was Chief of Defense in the Ford Administration, and has been very high up in many offices in many administrations. Now, why was he hired as head of a pharmaceutical company? It was political. This was gotten on the market by political and PR means, and has nothing to do with Science.
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