Aspartame: Popular Sweetener Is a Possible Carcinogen, Exists in Thousands of Products
The world’s most widely used and controversial artificial sweetener is slated to be labeled “possibly carcinogenic to humans” next month by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) cancer research arm—decades after scientists first sounded the alarm about the sugar substitute’s cancer-causing properties.
The International Agency for Research (IARC)’s external experts conducted a safety review of aspartame based on all published evidence and finalized a ruling earlier this month, two sources familiar with the process told Reuters.
The IARC’s job is to examine the cancer-causing potential of substances. Advice on how much of the product a person can safely consume will come from a separate WHO expert panel on food additives—the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA)—and national regulators.
The JECFA will announce its findings on July 14, the same day IARC is expected to announce its decision. A spokesperson for the IARC and JECFA said the findings were “complementary” and “the first fundamental step to understand carcinogenicity.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the WHO and IARC for further comment.
The food industry, whose members include Coca-Cola, Mars Wrigley, and Cargill—companies that manufacture aspartame-containing products—raised concerns about the IARC’s report.
“IARC is not a food safety body,” said Frances Hunt-Wood, the secretary general of the International Sweeteners Association. “Aspartame is one of the most thoroughly researched ingredients in history, with over 90 food safety agencies across the globe declaring it is safe, including the European Food Safety Authority, which conducted the most comprehensive safety evaluation of aspartame to date.”
Prior to the new designation, global revenue for artificial sweeteners, including aspartame, was expected to reach 34.1 billion dollars by 2028.
The IARC’s 2015 determination (pdf) that glyphosate was “probably carcinogenic to humans” was used by plaintiffs in numerous lawsuits against Monsanto—acquired by Bayer in 2016—to obtain damages for their glyphosate-induced cancers, raising concerns that the classification of aspartame as a potential carcinogen could do the same.
In 1985, Monsanto purchased G.D. Searle, the chemical company that held the patent to aspartame, and converted it into the NutraSweet brand. When the patent expired in 1992, other brands, including Equal and Sugar Twin, emerged.
Potentially Carcinogenic Aspartame Is in More Than 6,000 Products
The U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued its first regulation for aspartame in 1974, allowing it to be used as a tabletop sweetener, a sugar substitute for sweetening hot beverages, in cold breakfast cereals, as a sweetener and flavor enhancer for chewing gum, and as a dry base for instant coffee tea, puddings, fillings, dairy products, and toppings. Aspartame use has expanded over time (pdf), and it is now used in more than 6,000 products.
Here are some common foods containing aspartame:
- Zero-sugar diet sodas, including Diet Coke
- Sugar-free gum, such as Trident, Extra, and Orbit
- Drink mixes, including Crystal Light
- Reduced-sugar and sugar-free condiments
- Sugar-free Jello
- Low-sugar juices
- Breath mints and iced tea
- Yogurts, including Dannon Activia and Weight Watchers vanilla and toffee flavors
- Cereals, including General Mills Cheerios, Kellogg’s Special K, and Post Honey Bunches of Oats
According to the FDA, aspartame, or L-aspartyl-L-phenylalanine methyl ester, is a white, odorless powder derived from two amino acids: phenylalanine and aspartic acid. During digestion, approximately 50 percent of aspartame by weight breaks down into phenylalanine, 40 percent breaks down into aspartic acid, and 10 percent breaks down into potentially toxic methanol in the small intestine, where it converts to formaldehyde.
Methanol is a type of nondrinking alcohol commonly used in fuel, solvents, and antifreeze.
Aspartame is low in calories and 200 times sweeter than sugar, leading some to believe people would consume less sugar, experience fewer conditions associated with high-sugar intake, and consume fewer calories by replacing aspartame with sugar.
For perspective, a 12-ounce can of regular cola contains approximately 10 teaspoons of sugar and 156 calories, while a 12-ounce can of diet cola sweetened with 180 milligrams of aspartame contains no sugar and only seven calories. A 1-gram packet of aspartame contains four calories but is equal to the sweetness of 2 teaspoons—or 8 grams—of sugar, which has 32 calories.
FDA Approval of Aspartame Based on Industry-Funded Science
Scientists within the FDA and independent scientists have raised concerns about the possible health consequences of aspartame and weaknesses in the industry-funded science submitted to the agency by the original manufacturer, G.D. Searle.
Aspartame’s potential to be carcinogenic was first brought to the FDA’s attention in 1974 following the agency’s approval. After concluding some of Searle’s studies were questionable, the FDA in 1975 decided more studies were needed to determine whether aspartame caused brain tumors, and revoked aspartame’s approval.
FDA scientists in 1976 selected 15 of 144 aspartame studies for audit, planning to audit three of the 15 selected themselves with Searle—the patent owner and company attempting to get aspartame approved for use. Upon completion of the audits, scientists determined no data or reports of sufficient magnitude compromised Searle’s data. The FDA commissioner overturned the stay (pdf) and concluded aspartame would not cause brain tumors or have harmful effects at projected consumption levels. The agency expanded the approved use of aspartame several times after the stay was lifted.
The JECFA, which included a participant from the FDA, originally established an acceptable daily intake (ADI) in 1981 for aspartame at 40 mg/kg body weight. When the FDA approved the use of aspartame in carbonated beverages such as diet soda in 1983, it established an ADI of 50 mg/kg body weight.
This means a 150-pound person could safely consume about 3,400 milligrams of aspartame per day—the equivalent of 17 12-ounce cans of diet cola.
In an analysis of studies used to promote aspartame’s safety, Erik Paul Millstone, emeritus professor of science policy and one of the UK’s leading independent scholars of food safety policy, found 90 percent of reassuring studies were funded by large chemical corporations that manufacture and sell aspartame. “There’s a pattern there that suggests the industry designs and conducts studies that provide reassuring evidence. I saw that as an expression of a very profound and very dangerous bias,” Millstone said during a 2023 interview with BBC Panorama.
Numerous Studies Link Aspartame to Cancer
Although the FDA continued to receive numerous objections to its continually expanding use of aspartame, it determined there was no “scientific data or other information that would cause the agency to alter its conclusions about the safety of aspartame.”
Researchers in a 1996 study published in the Journal of Neuropathology & Experimental Neurology linked the introduction of aspartame to a sharp increase in the incidence and degree of malignancy of brain tumors, calling for the carcinogenic potential of aspartame to be reassessed.
Three lifespan studies conducted by the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Centre of the Ramazzini Institute (RI) in Italy provided consistent evidence of carcinogenicity in rodents exposed to aspartame. The RI in 2006 and 2007 linked aspartame to dose-related increases in malignant tumors in multiple organs in rats and mice. Researchers observed increased cancer rates at low levels of exposure approaching the ADI. “Prenatal exposures produced malignancies in rodent offspring at lower doses than in adults,” they noted.
In a 2012 study in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers reported a positive association between aspartame intake from diet soda and an increased risk of select cancers, including non-Hodgkin lymphoma and multiple myeloma in men, and leukemia in men and women.
A 2020 study by the RI linked cancers in mice and rats to aspartame. Yet the FDA said “no valid conclusion can be derived” from ongoing analysis by the RI and accused the institute of using samples previously deemed compromised.
A state-of-the-art reanalysis of 2021 RI data confirmed that aspartame is carcinogenic to rodents. Results showed 92 percent of observed lesions in animals exposed to aspartame were malignant, providing strong validation of the original conclusions. A 2023 RI analysis published in the Annals of Global Health also reinforced previous findings.
An observational study in March 2022 conducted in France among 100,000 adults showed artificial sweeteners, especially aspartame, and acesulfame-K, are associated with an increased risk of cancer.
Evidence also links aspartame to other health problems, including weight gain, increased appetite, obesity-related diseases, dementia, strokes, and nervous system disorders. In May 2023, the WHO advised people not to consume nonsugar sweeteners for weight loss, including aspartame. The recommendation was based on a systematic review of current scientific evidence linking the consumption of nonsugar sweeteners with an increased risk of Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and all-cause mortality.
About the Author: Megan Redshaw is an attorney and investigative journalist with a background in political science. She is also a traditional naturopath with additional certifications in nutrition and exercise science.
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