Aspartame, the controversial artificial sweetener that was approved when Donald Rumsfeld decided to call in his political markers to override the FDA's scientific doubts, seems to be nearing the end of its 'useful' life span. Not only are consumers getting increasingly angry - once they find out what causes their ills and they get off the poison - but threatening black scientific and legislative clouds are lining the horizon as well.
Italian study
A large multi-year study of a private Italian health research foundation has acutely confirmed what studies in the 1980s had already found: brain tumors and other unsavory effects of aspartame consumption. The study, which used laboratory animals to test the cancer hypothesis, has been published by Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP), a monthly journal of peer-reviewed research and news on the impact of the environment on human health. The article is available on the EHP website.
The study's authors said that previous studies on aspartame were too short to show the cancer causing potential of the substance: "In our opinion, previous studies did not comply with today's basic requirements for testing the carcinogenic potential of a physical or chemical agent, in particular concerning the number of rodents for each experimental group (40 - 86, compared to 100 - 150 in the current study) and the termination of previous studies at only 110 weeks of age of the animals."
The study has made headline news, but most countries are wary to take a first step - the FDA is held in high esteem, although opinions might be changing after recent scandals have shaken in the agency.
Consumer complaints
Consumer complaints about aspartame were collected by the FDA and in a rare slip, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in February of 1994 released a listing of adverse reactions. There are some 92, the listing can be found in Aspartame... the BAD news!. Apparently aspartame accounted for more than 75% of all adverse reactions reported to the FDA's Adverse Reaction Monitoring System.
The FDA is in a very unenviable position. It has approved a neurotoxic carcinogen to be used as an artificial sweetener and complaints are piling up to where they are difficult to hide. But once the sweetener was approved it became almost impossible for the agency to admit wrongdoing, without unleashing a scandal the likes of which has not been seen since the thalidomide disaster.
New Mexico
Against this background, there is now action in the New Mexico legislature to hear evidence about aspartame's health effects. Heaven forbid that there should be hearings, Ajinomoto, the principal manufacturer of aspartame, has hit the ceiling. Lawyers hired by Ajinomoto descended on legislative committees to argue why the fact that aspartame has FDA approval should prevent any independent hearings from taking place. The Calorie Control Council, a group close to industry, was called in to help. They dutifully attempted to demolish the Italian study saying it did not follow the guidelines of the National Toxicology Program...
The people pressure against aspartame comes from a network of former 'addicts' who have kicked the diet habit and from doctors who have seen the damage and halted or reversed it in their patients. Books have been written (look at the Amazon ads in the side bar ... hint, hint) that condemn the sweetener and document its ill effects, aspartame detoxification programs and aspartame help groups exist, a video Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World documents the history of aspartame's approval and its egregious side effects.
A tireless lady by the name of Betty Martini, who founded Mission Possible is arguably the most well known among the aspartame opponents, although hers is not a lonely crusade. Aspartame users (mostly ex, to be sure) and doctors in some 30 countries are involved. They swear they won't rest until the poison has been removed from the food supply and those responsible for overriding science and covering up the deadly effects are brought to justice.
It is Betty Martini who wrote the following two letters, one to the New Mexico Environmental Improvement Board and another, more recent one, to the Governor and the Attorney General of New Mexico. While her tone reflects her frustration of seeing official inaction in the face of an obvious catastrophe, we should not make light of what she has to say. Her comments and documentation go well beyond the immediate issue of the New Mexico hearings.
Anyone serious about understanding what the aspartame controversy is all about would do well to read her letters. That includes any health officials who might be reading this article - especially! I have added some links to the references in the letters, to make it easier for those interested to arrive at the documents...
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Why New Mexico must not capitulate to the flimsy and flawed arguments by the world's largest Aspartame Manufacturer, Ajinomoto, regarding ostensible FDA preemption for Aspartame, and Ajinomoto's corporate attempts to prevent two Board hearings on Aspartame's Neurotoxicity
Letter to the Governor, the Attorney General, and the Deputy Attorney General of New Mexico
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November 28, 2005
The Honorable William Blaine Richardson
The Honorable Patricia Madrid
The Honorable Stuart Bluestone
Dear Governor Richardson, Attorney General Patricia Madrid, and Deputy Attorney General Stuart Bluestone:
Below please find the letter I wrote the EIB [Environmental Improvement Board] in September proving that aspartame violates both State and Federal Statutes on Adulteration. I want each of you to take the time to read the EIB letter from September, and this more current one to you with my responses to the Ajinomoto of Japan's New Mexico lawyer's brief asking that the Board of Pharmacy not move forward with any hearing on aspartame's neurotoxicity. Thus, you will know that aspartame is a product that is poisonous, mislabeled, and adulterative, making it unfit for human consumption.
If aspartame were under consideration for approval today based on science instead of by the politics of Don Rumsfeld, there is no way it would be approved today. The FDA refused approval for 16 years, and at one point, even asked the Justice Department to prosecute the manufacturer for fraud and submission of false documents! This is the first and only time in its history that FDA did this. However both prosecutors, Sam Skinner and William Conlon, hired on with the defense team representing the industries, and the statute of limitations expired.
FDA continued to deny approval, and another branch of the Federal Government, the Department of Defense, was doing research on using aspartame as a biological weapon against other nations. Then Donald Rumsfeld, President of G.D. Searle, who was also on Reagan's transition team, "called in his markers," as he worded it, and his choice for the new FDA Commissioner, Dr. Arthur Hull Hayes, was appointed. It mattered not that aspartame was a proven carcinogen and triggered in original studies brain, mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, pancreatic and thyroid tumors, as well as testicular atrophy, polyps and seizures.
Dr. Adrian Gross, FDA toxicologist, told Congress that aspartame, without a shadow of a doubt triggers brain cancer and violates the Delaney Amendment forbidding carcinogenic additives. Hayes ignored the objection of his own Public Board of Inquiry and approved it in 1981. Dr. Gross told Congress in 1985 that since it triggers brain tumors, FDA could not by law have set an allowable daily dose. In 1987 FDA toxicologist, Dr. Jacqueline Verrett, testified to Congress that all Searle's studies were built on a foundation of sand and should be thrown out; it had not been proven safe, though it was on the market in thousands of products at that time.
FDA is the handmaiden of Big Pharma, their loyal attack dog. Dr. James Bowen of Hawaii, who has Lou Gehrig's caused by aspartame, has written that before the FDA approved aspartame, it was intact, but once it was approved and FDA had to lie about its safety, it is as though they no longer cared. One employee of the FDA told the mother of an aspartame-seizure victim:
"We revoked the petition for approval; we tried to indict the company; we said it wasn't safe, and we said it caused seizures and brain tumors. They should have listened to us. Now what do you want us to do?"
On www.dorway.com please see the Bressler Report, an FDA audit by Jerome Bressler, now retired. It gives the manufacturer indigestion. I thanked Mr. Bressler for his candor in letting the world know how deadly aspartame is, and he told me the studies were much worse than his FDA Audit showed because when they retyped it, they removed the worst 20%. He didn't say who was behind it but to look for two mice studies and a cover letter and I would learn how bad it is. Dr. Bressler repeated this to Dr. Russell Blaylock, a neurosurgeon who spoke to him on the matter. Dr. H. J. Roberts of Palm Beach Florida asked his congressman to get the missing records. The FDA wrote the congressman that the information is confidential and they would not release it. That is against the law, of course, but if the FDA released this particular information, they'd be found guilty of altering reports.
Dr. John Olney, one of the world's most renowned neuroscientists [who] founded the field of neuroscience called excitotoxicity, after doing the studies on MSG and aspartic acid, the acid which constitutes 40% of aspartame by molecular weight. He found lesions in the brains of mice from these chemicals and tried to prevent aspartame approval. (An excitotoxin is a biochemical that literally stimulates the neurons of the brain to death. Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock wrote a book on this subject - Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills).
Dr. Olney, fed up with all the fraud, insisted that Searle do studies in his lab so he could oversee them, and prevent manipulation. The studies showed brain damage. Dr. Olney thought it would never be approved, but didn't realize that Searle simply deleted those studies from its report to FDA.
In 14 years, I've spoken to a lot of informants and could give a course on how manufacturers of aspartame manipulate studies, and mislead the public. You simply cannot get a chemical poison like aspartame, a deadly, deadly neurotoxic drug, and carcinogen, to show safety unless you manipulate the studies for that purpose.
One study pivotal in the approval of aspartame was a 52-week oral toxicity study on 7 infant monkeys. Five had grand mal seizures and one died. However, it's very well known that aspartame is a seizure triggering drug, and interacts with anti-seizure medication and all medication and vaccines. It damages the mitochondria of the cells; this is one of the reasons, and, of course, it is a chemical hypersensitization agent that triggers polychemical sensitivity syndrome.