Copyright 2003 JunkScience.com
May 15, 2003

Dieters, diabetics, and health-conscious folk take cover -- the tabletop sweetener police are back, and they’re after your diet soft drink.

In the latest round of attacks against artificial sweeteners, a May 14 Wall Street Journal column reels off a number of false (and tired) accusations against aspartame, the sweetener marketed as Equal and NutraSweet.

The article notes there is no evidence to back up the claims. In fact, the claims have been repeatedly debunked in more than 200 studies and are frequently cited among the top "myths" online.

So why repeat them? It’s product character assassination, pure and simple.

The article attempts to impart a similar fate to saccharin, the granddaddy of the sugar substitutes known to most of us as Sweet ’N’ Low. Links between that product and health concerns, such as cancer, have been similarly disproved, but they surface again in the WSJ article with only an afterthought mention of the absence of independent confirmation of the charges.

The only sugar substitute that comes out smelling at all sweet in the article is sucralose, marketed by Johnson & Johnson as Splenda. That’s in part thanks to some junk science contributed by the food police at the Center for Science in the Public Interest - the same crowd who attacked the Harry Potter movies simply for accepting advertising from Coca Cola.

CSPI’s "Chemical Cuisine Guide to Food Additives" promoted by a Medusa-like mad scientist caricature toting a bottle of "graveyard" declares, without even the slightest shred of supporting scientific evidence, that "sucralose is safer than saccharin and cyclamate (another sugar substitute) and doesn’t raise the concerns that tests on acesulfame-K and aspartame have raised." (Note to Wall Street Journal editors and reporters: Always question the validity of food safety advice offered by cartoon characters.)

The WSJ erred by reporting that unlike the other sweeteners, "sucralose hasn’t been linked to any adverse health effects." But the very same fear profiteers who make false adverse health effect claims cited in the WSJ article make similar and worse claims regarding sucralose.

Take the dubious alternative health guru Joe Mercola, who asks of Splenda on his Web site: "Is it proven safe?... Are there any long term human studies.... The answer to all of these questions is unfortunately a resounding no...." Mercola further claims that research shows sucralose causes: "shrunken thymus glands; enlarged liver and kidneys; aborted pregnancy; diarrhea;" and more.

Mercola and other anti-sweetener luddites also expound against health issues that may result from Splenda’s chemical chlorination process, during which sugar molecules are converted to sucralose through the addition of chlorine molecules to the sugar atom. The negative health implications are as ridiculous and unfounded as those made against aspartame.

Like other sugar substitutes, Splenda isn’t dangerous and there’s no cause for concern.

What is a cause for concern, however, is the ease with which venerable, mainstream publications such as the Wall Street Journal will take undocumented accusations as fact and continue to repeat debunked claims, thus needlessly spreading fear among consumers who need to avoid sugar or who simply want to enjoy products with fewer calories.

With all the talk about the rising obesity numbers in America, such tactics and poor reporting leave a really bad aftertaste.