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Are Artificial Sweeteners Bad For You? | Nutritionist Explains | Myprotein
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Jan 30, 2025
Are artificial sweeteners bad for you? Are artificial sweeteners safe to use? Expert nutritionist explains all. Sweeteners are in more and more of our food and drink, but they seem to get a lot of bad press and there are some pretty scary headlines about their potential side effects. But what's fact and what's fiction? Nutritionist and PhD researcher, Richie Kirwan, is here to help with the latest research and evidence-based advice. Find Richie on Instagram: @be_more_nutrition ********************************* Chapters: 00:00 - Introduction 00:36 - What is a sweetener? 3:33 - Examples of non-nutritive sweeteners 3:56 - Differences between non-nutritive sweeteners 4:49 - Acceptable daily intake for sweeteners 5:42 - Do sweeteners contain methanol? 6:31 - What about cancer? 9:06 - Aren't they just as bad as sugar? 10:14 - What about cravings? 10:52 - Don't they cause weight gain? 12:59 - Do you have any more sweetener questions?
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0:00
artificial sweeteners are pretty
0:01
polarizing some people swear by them and
0:03
others are convinced they're the worst
0:05
thing for your health
0:07
what does the research tell us about
0:09
let's talk about that
0:12
how's it going guys my name's richie
0:14
kirwan and today we're going to talk all
0:16
about artificial sweeteners what they
0:17
are why they're so popular what are
0:20
their benefits and what negative effects
0:22
they might have as always i want to
0:23
point out that i'm not recommending you
0:25
use a particular sweetener what i am
0:27
going to do is help you understand what
0:29
the research says about their pros and
0:31
cons so you can make a better more
0:33
informed decision about using them or
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not let's get started first off what
0:37
even is a sweetener basically it's a
0:39
food additive that gives a sweet taste
0:41
to food but has far fewer calories or
0:44
virtually none compared to sugar you
0:46
might ask why would people want to
0:48
replace sugar in their diet there's
0:50
nothing inherently wrong with sugar
0:52
itself but added sugars in food can
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contribute to people taking in a lot
0:57
more calories than they normally would
0:59
you can add a lot of sugar to food
1:01
without increasing its volume a huge
1:02
amount which means it can make food very
1:05
calorie dense and sugar also improves
1:07
the texture and moisture content of food
1:08
as well which makes them sweeter and a
1:11
lot more enjoyable that makes food more
1:14
appealing and a lot easier to overeat
1:16
and that's really the main issue with
1:18
added sugars they make overeating a lot
1:21
more likely which makes weight gain a
1:23
lot more likely to now don't get me
1:25
wrong i'm not saying sugars cause
1:26
obesity because sugar is often found in
1:29
a lot of other foods together with fat
1:31
adding to that calorie density if you
1:33
can replace sugar with something that
1:35
still tastes sweet so it still makes
1:37
food appealing to humans because we
1:39
naturally have a sweet tooth without
1:41
adding all of the calories of sugar you
1:43
can potentially help people to lower
1:45
their total calorie intake and either
1:47
lose weight or help them maintain weight
1:49
loss because of this artificial
1:50
sweeteners have become a multi-million
1:53
dollar industry at this point i also
1:54
need to talk about the elephant in the
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room the word artificial in artificial
1:58
sweeteners really does put some people
2:00
off using them this is because of
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something called the naturalistic
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fallacy the naturalistic fallacy is the
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idea that anything that is natural is
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inherently good and anything that is
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unnatural or artificial is inherently
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bad this is terrible logic let me give
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you an example of that
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one of the most toxic substances known
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to mankind is botulinum toxin which is
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100 natural on the other hand there are
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a lot of artificially produced compounds
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which are incredibly beneficial to human
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health for example many of the new
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varieties of antibiotics which save
2:33
people's lives or artificially
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synthesize vitamin d which can cure
2:37
deficiencies saying natural is good and
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artificial bad is overly simplistic
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thinking because of that sometimes
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people use other words to describe
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artificial sweeteners and say things
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like non-nutritive sweeteners or
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non-caloric sweeteners i should also
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point out that there is another group of
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sugar substitutes known as polyols or
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sugar alcohols these include such common
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sweeteners as sorbitol mannitol
2:59
erythritol xylitol which many of you
3:01
probably have heard of while these
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sweeteners are often considered to be
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natural because they're found in nature
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many of them are produced industrially
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by hydrogenation of sugars for example
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which shouldn't be confused with
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hydrogenation of oils or by fermentation
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the difference between sugar alcohols
3:16
and non-nutritive sweeteners is that
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sugar alcohols do provide some calories
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but they are generally much lower than
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the calories found in sugar usually
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between 0.2 and 2.5 calories per gram
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compared with 4 calories per gram in
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sugar unfortunately that's all i'm going
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to say about sugar alcohols today
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instead i'm going to talk about
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non-nutritive sweeteners some examples
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of which include sucralose often known
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by its trade name splenda
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aspartame
3:41
ace sulfate and potassium or acethane k
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otherwise known as ace k and stevial
3:45
gykoside which many of you will probably
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know as the natural sweetener stevia or
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also mugracide which is naturally found
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in monk fruit just to give you a little
3:52
idea of the difference between some
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non-nutritive sweeteners
3:58
sucralose is the world's most commonly
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used artificial sweetener and is about
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300 to 600 times sweeter than table
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sugar
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it's heat stable and is often used in
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cooked food products the food and drug
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administration or fda states that there
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are about 110 different studies which
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were used to confirm its safety as a
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food additive aspartame is about 180 to
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200 times sweeter than sugar and is not
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heat stable so it's not suitable for
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cooked foods or baked goods according to
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the fda there are over 100 safety trials
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that confirm the safety of aspartame ace
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k is about 200 times sweeter than sugar
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and is heat stable so again it's used in
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cooked foods according to the fda there
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are over 90 safety trials confirming the
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safety of ace k as for the natural
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sweeteners
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stevial glycosides which are an extract
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from the stevia plant are about 250 to
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300 times sweeter than sugar
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each sweetener also has an adi or an
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acceptable daily intake an adi is
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calculated based on how much of a
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substance a person can consume every day
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without any health effects and has a
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huge safety margin built into it as well
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that means if you consume something up
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to its adi you are still nowhere near
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consuming enough to have a negative
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effect on your health for example the
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adi for sucralose is five milligrams per
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kilogram of body weight per day for 70
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kilogram person that's 350 milligrams
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per day meaning you'd need to use over
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26 individual serving packages of super
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loss a day just to reach the adi and
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that's still nowhere near the amount
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that would be harmful other sweeteners
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have similarly safe adis now as you can
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see there are a lot of different
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sweeteners on the market all of which
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can have different properties and
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effects that means that you can't assume
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that the effects of one sweetener would
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be the same as another
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don't some sweeteners contain methanol
5:45
this is another issue related to
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aspartame i already mentioned that when
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aspartame is broken down in the body it
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forms aspartic acid and phenylalanine
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it also releases a molecule of methanol
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which indeed is toxic
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however the amount of methanol that's
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released from a moderate intake of
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aspartame is actually far less than the
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methanol we normally get from fruit and
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vegetables that we eat daily which occur
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totally naturally there's a really
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important saying in toxicology the dose
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makes the poison this means that
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something can only have a toxic effect
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when its dose is high enough a good
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example of this is vitamin d if you
6:20
don't get enough vitamin d you can
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suffer from a lot of healthy juice but
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if you get too much for example by
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taking excessive supplements it can have
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toxic effects in the body don't forget
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the dose makes the poison what about
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cancer
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this is another common question i hear
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about sweeteners oftentimes when a study
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says something really bad about a food
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or a nutrient if someone hears that it
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tends to stick in their memory and
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that's why a lot of inaccurate
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information tends to persist as
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so-called common knowledge there have
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been a number of studies that have shown
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that high intakes of aspartame can cause
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an increase in tumors now that sounds
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really scary until you read those
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studies firstly these studies were
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carried out in rats oil experiments in
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rats are really important for human
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health studies as well
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oftentimes something that happens in
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rats or mice doesn't happen the same way
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in humans we are different animals with
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different metabolisms and those
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metabolisms react differently to
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different foods the classic example of
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this is chocolate chocolate is quite
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possibly one of the most popular sweet
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snacks on earth and dark chocolate is
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even known to have health benefits but
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if you give chocolate to a dog it will
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kill it
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why because dogs metabolize chocolate
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differently some of these studies were
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also carried out in the prenatal stage
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which means that female mice were
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treated with aspartame while they were
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pregnant and the offspring were then fed
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aspartame for the rest of their lives
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you can't compare giving a substance to
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a fetus in utero while it's in the womb
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with taking lower doses of it as a fully
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formed human being finally these studies
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also used incredibly high doses of
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aspartame which is perfectly normal for
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a toxicity study by the way the adi for
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aspartame is 50 milligrams per kilogram
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of body weight and some of these studies
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used up to 5 000 milligrams per kilogram
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that's not a dose of aspartame that a
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human would ever consume normally any
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time a substance is associated with a
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very serious condition such as cancer we
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need to take that seriously and that's
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why we perform all of these scientific
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trials to determine whether it's safe or
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not as i mentioned aspartame has already
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been deemed to be safe by the fda in
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over 100 scientific trials but because
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those my studies were sensationalized by
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the media they're forever burned into
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the memory of the population and this is
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why people are continuously suspicious
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of aspartame in science we have to base
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our judgments on all of the available
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information that we have and that
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information does change over time as we
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perform more studies at the moment the
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consensus of studies is that there
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doesn't seem to be a link between
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artificial sweetener consumption and
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cancer in humans now i'm a scientist and
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that means i have to change my mind when
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i'm presented with new evidence so if
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some new evidence comes to light in the
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coming years that makes me change my
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opinion about artificial sweeteners
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i will
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aren't they just as bad for your blood
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sugar as real sugar this idea gets
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bannied around a lot
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let me clarify one thing straight off
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the bat
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non-nutritive sweeteners can't directly
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cause your blood sugar to rise because
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they don't contain any sugar themselves
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no sugar in the sweetener
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not entering your bloodstream
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no increase in blood sugar a different
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side of that coin is overall blood sugar
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control there is evidence that the sweet
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taste alone without any sugar or
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calories can cause insulin levels to
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rise a small amount without food even
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entering the stomach in some people this
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is called the cephalic phase insulin
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response or cpir and it happens in
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response to the expectation
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of food it's also a considerably smaller
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rise in insulin compared to the second
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phase in response to sugar that said the
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cpir is not necessarily a negative
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effect what would be worrying is if
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non-nutritive sweeteners had an effect
10:00
on blood sugar control but a recent
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meta-analysis that's a study that looks
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at the combined results of a number of
10:06
similar studies found that sweeteners
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including aspartame saccharin
10:09
steviosides and sucralose did not
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elevate blood glucose levels what about
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causing you to want to eat more sweet
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food
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well there was a recent study that asked
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this question and found that
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artificially sweetened drinks actually
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reduced desire for sweet food and drinks
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immediately after consuming them now
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there is a possibility that using
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sweeteners very often might make you
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want more sweets in general but we don't
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have any hard evidence to say that this
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actually happens we do however have good
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evidence from multiple randomized
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control trials using different types of
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sweeteners showing artificial sweeteners
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don't cause people to overeat calories
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in general it just doesn't happen
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despite all the rumors you may have
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heard ah and here's my favorite
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don't they cause weight gain
10:54
this idea comes from observational
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studies just to give you an idea
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observational studies are where you take
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a group of people and measure something
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about them like their height or weight
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or health status but don't actually do
11:05
an experiment or intervention with them
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these early studies found that people
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who use non-nutritive sweeteners were
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more likely to be overweight here's the
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thing though this is likely an example
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of something called reverse causation
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for example when people who have
11:18
overweight or obesity start using
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non-nutritive sweeteners to help lose
11:22
weight this produces a false association
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between sweetener intake and obesity
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however there is a lot of data from
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well-controlled studies that show that
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sweeteners do help with weight loss
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efforts they do this in two ways one by
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replacing the calories that would
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normally be found in sugar-sweetened
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foods especially sugary drinks and two
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by helping people to manage hunger or
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cravings for sweet foods here's the
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thing
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many people including myself
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love sweet foods and the food industry
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figured that out a long time ago that's
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why added sugars are found in so many
11:53
different foods these days it's cheap
11:56
and it causes people to eat more which
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means people are more likely to gain
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weight if we can satisfy people's desire
12:01
for sweet food without adding all of the
12:03
calories of added sugars it makes it
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more likely that people will eat less
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unless they decide to compensate later
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to congratulate themselves for having
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one sugar-free product in the day you
12:12
might think that sounds silly but that's
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exactly how humans think finally for
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anyone who likes to think that
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artificial sweeteners are as bad as
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sugar think of it like this
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if someone drinks a lot of sugary drinks
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and that causes them to gain weight and
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develop conditions like diabetes or
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fatty liver or high blood pressure
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simply switching to artificially
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sweetened drinks might be an incredibly
12:34
easy way to help them lose body fat and
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improve their health in that situation
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which is better
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using sugar and having a higher risk of
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developing a load of conditions
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associated with calorie excess or
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using a sweetener which has no
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definitive associations with any
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negative health effects like i said i'm
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not here to tell anyone to use
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artificial sweeteners or not whatever
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you do i just rather you make your
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decision from an informed place so did
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this answer your sweetener questions as
13:01
always if you have any more let me know
13:02
in the comments below and remember to
13:04
like and subscribe to the my protein
13:05
youtube channel for even more great
13:07
evidence-based nutrition information
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