Artificial sweeteners as a sugar substitute: Are they really safe?

Abstract

Nonnutritive sweeteners (NNS) have become an important part of everyday life and are increasingly used nowadays in a variety of dietary and medicinal products. They provide fewer calories and far more intense sweetness than sugar-containing products and are used by a plethora of population subsets for varying objectives. Six of these agents (aspartame, saccharine, sucralose, neotame, acesulfame-K, and stevia) have previously received a generally recognized as safe status from the United States Food and Drug Administration, and two more (Swingle fruit extract and advantame) have been added in the recent years to this ever growing list. They are claimed to promote weight loss and deemed safe for consumption by diabetics; however, there is inconclusive evidence to support most of their uses and some recent studies even hint that these earlier established benefits regarding NNS use might not be true. There is a lack of properly designed randomized controlled studies to assess their efficacy in different populations, whereas observational studies often remain confounded due to reverse causality and often yield opposite findings. Pregnant and lactating women, children, diabetics, migraine, and epilepsy patients represent the susceptible population to the adverse effects of NNS-containing products and should use these products with utmost caution. The overall use of NNS remains controversial, and consumers should be amply informed about the potential risks of using them, based on current evidence-based dietary guidelines.

Coconut (Cocos nucifera L.) sap as a potential source of sugar: Antioxidant and nutritional properties

“…Nowadays, low‐sugar, sugar‐free, and synthetic sugar products are abundantly available in food markets. However, many of these are considered unsafe and unhealthy, as these products can cause side effects such as weight‐gain, brain tumor, and balder cancer (Kroger, Meister, & Kava, ; Sharma, Amarnath, Thulasimani, & Ramaswamy, ). Thus, this issue imposes an urgent need for the development of healthier sugar products.…”

Non-Nutritive Sweeteners: Evidence on their Association with Metabolic Diseases and Potential Effects on Glucose Metabolism and Appetite

“…Due to its high sweetness, advantame is used in very small quantities, does not provide significant amounts of calories, and can be consumed by people with phenylketonuria 14,15 .…”

Production of low‐calorie apricot nectar sweetened with stevia: Impact on qualitative, sensory, and nutritional profiles

“…To this end, non‐nutritive sweeteners (NNS), providing more potent sweetness and no or few calories, are increasingly popular as an alternative to sugar for the production of beverages, dietary, and dairy products (de Carvalho et al, ; Kalicka, Znamirowska, Pawlos, Buniowska, & Szajnar, ; Kumari, Arora, Choudhary, Singh, & Tomar, ; Lange, Scheurer, & Brauch, ). The United States Food and Drug Administration authority has approved six NNS (saccharine, aspartame, sucralose, neotame, acesulfame‐K, and stevia) for use in humans and has classified them under generally recognized as safe (GRAS) category (Sharma, Amarnath, Thulasimani, & Ramaswamy, ).…”