With public health advice to reduce our intake of sugar and the introduction of the Sugar Tax, most (if not all) food and drink manufacturers have been either completely replacing natural sugar with artificial sweeteners OR reducing the amount of sugar whilst adding some sweeteners to maintain the “sweet” taste.
Look at the ingredients labels and you will find sweeteners such as Sucralose, Saccharin, Aspartame, Acusflame-K, etc.
Although these artificial sweeteners offer benefits such as zero or very low calories (it’s main selling point), there is no evidence about its long term safety for human health.
Your readers might be interested in reading the following study which was published in the BMJ: https://www.bmj.com/content/364/bmj.k4718 which concluded that:
- There was no compelling evidence to indicate important health benefits of non-sugar sweetener use on a range of health outcomes
- Potential harms from the consumption of non-sugar sweeteners could not be excluded
The problem for us consumers is that we do not seem to have a choice in whether to ingest artificial sweeteners! It is included in the recipes by food and drink manufacturers leaving us no choice in the matter.
Surely, it would be far better if the food/drinks industry would offer products with natural sugar and with artificial sweeteners so customers can choose which one they want to buy.
The only fizzy drink which does NOT contain artificial sweeteners that I can find is the original Coca Cola and original Pepsi. My son’s favourite fizzy drink Lucozade now contains sweeteners without a sugar option.
Whatever happened to consumer choice?
Dinesh Rai
By email
