Fizzy Pop can poison us

[SpiderPig]

I thought I would jot down a few lines about diet drinks specifically those containing aspartame. This affects those of us here in Italy most particularly due to the heat that we for the most part relish during the spring and summer months.

During the summer months I used to guzzle diet coke, bottles and bottles of the stuff. It was only following a breakdown of my immune system that a friend suggested I look hard at the amount of toxins I was consuming in my food and drink.

To cut a long story (much research later) I determined to cut all the processed goods <with the obvious exception of baked beans> out of my diet.

The real horror discovery for me was the fact that some elements in diet drinks break down in the heat. These bottles are treated as ambient goods and as such can sit around for weeks/months in high temperatures whilst they are industriously morphing the aspartame content into delights such as embalming fluid and formic acid!

Aspartame poisoning is generally accepted as having been responsible for Gulf War Syndrome. There is an awful lot of controversial material on the net on this subject. I find it telling that even the Wikipedia editors are currently in dispute over a biased entry.

Most interesting of all is that the Americans are still testing the gunk after over forty years of sanctioning it safe for human consumption.

Yuk!



ARTIFICIAL SWEETENER, ASPARTAME, (EQUAL, NUTRASWEET) LINKED TO BREAST CANCER AND GULF WAR SYNDROME

Escape the Aspartame Trap | www.DORway.com

[alan h]

Originally Posted by SpiderPig

................Aspartame poisoning is generally accepted as having been responsible for Gulf War Syndrome. ....................[/url]

That's one heck of a statement to make - apart from some [mainly American] postings on the net, I can find little hard proof, backed by the respective medical authorities, to validate the statement.

I much prefer the suggestion that, made in November, 2004 in an independent British study, that Gulf veterans were twice as likely to suffer from ill health than if they had been deployed elsewhere. It concluded the illnesses suffered were the result of a combination of causes. These included multiple injections of vaccines, the use of organophosphate pesticides to spray tents, low level exposure to nerve gas, and the inhalation of depleted uranium dust.

Still -- nobody knows for sure yet - so you could be right.....


.

[SpiderPig]

Hi Alan

I agree that most of the information is American in origin, I believe that the British government accepted the American sanction of aspartame without conducting their own tests.

For myself the fact remains that aspartame is proven to break down at temperatures that we regularly exceed here.


I found this on my hunt for sound aspartame info:

Various causes of Gulf War Syndrome have been suggested:
- Depleted uranium poisoning
- The side-effects of drugs given for protection against nerve agents
- Autoimmune diseases induced by squalene, an adjuvant used in anthrax vaccines to speed up the development of anthrax immunity.
- Parasites
- Biological or chemical weapons whose use has not been disclosed or discovered
- Fumes from oil well fires
- Aspartame poisoning. Large quantities of aspartame sweetened diet soft drinks were provided to Gulf War troops, often times sitting in high temperature conditions. This artificial sweetener breaks down at roughly 85 °F (29.5 °C) into, among other things, methanol, formaldehyde, diketopiperazine and formic acid.
Gulf War Syndrome

Thank you for your addition - I am all ears...

[DavidUno]

Dear Spiderpig,
Some "info" for your perusal.

From Ecologist mag, Sept 2005.

"Aspartame is the most controversial food additive in history. The most recent evidence, linking it to leukaemia and lymphoma, has added substantial fuel to the ongoing protests of doctors, scientists and consumer groups who allege that this artificial sweetener should never have been released onto the market and that allowing it to remain in the food chain is killing us by degrees.

Once upon a time, aspartame was listed by the Pentagon as a biochemical warfare agent.Today it's an integral part of the modern diet."

How's that? I wonder if it was used for an assassination attempt on Castro?

[nickbass]

i have been using aspartame in hot drinks for years instead of sugar. could this have the same effects as fizzy drinks?

[Moxie]

I am not very well equipped to answer this one but maybe this link will help?
Dangers of Aspartame Poisoning!

Honey perhaps is the way forward... dunno

Just Moxie

[juliancoll]

This thread has a bittersweet aftertaste for some reason!

[DavidUno]

I've been itching to reply but maybe it's only my diet drink consumption! Have you seen the ads that appear on this thread?
Yes this is inane babble, possibly spurious, de-stressing!

[DavidUno]

Blast! by not using those words in my post, the ads for this sweet poison have gone! Redressed.
This is serious though, Aspartame is not all sugar and spice.

[Moxie]

Maybe a little 'anorakky' but I put some questions re this thread to the British Food Standards Agency and you would not believe the waffle I received from them.
Re - temperature for storage for diet drinks containing aspartame.

'As regards the guarantee from food manufacturers, I am not in a position to comment.' ie no comment

Re - Is this stuff safe or not?

'There are many adverse reports in ciruclation which cast doubt on the safety of aspartame. These reports are taken very seriously by the Food Standards Agency (FSA), as they have contributed to consumer concern regarding aspartame’s safety. In light of continuing consumer concern and reports of alleged ill-health arising from aspartame consumption, the FSA has recently proposed that the EFSA should undertake further research on aspartame. I am pleased to confirm that the EFSA has announced an initiative in cooperation with its Advisory Forum to address this public concern. As a first step, the EFSA has made a call for data to determine what new scientific evidence and other information is available subsequent to the last evaluation of aspartame by the former Scientific Committee on Food (SCF) in 2002. Since approval of all food additives is undertaken at European Union (EU) level, this study applies not only to the UK but to other EU Member States.'

I took this to mean we are more than a little worried so we are going to test the additive again... eventually.

The rest of the email consisted of platitudes and more platitudes - I am so glad I asked!

Hope this is helpful as summer is coming - drink water!

Moxie