New research warns against Nutrasweet

U.S. FDA says unmoved by aspartame/cancer report

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

REUTERS, 3:59 p.m. June 25, 2007

WASHINGTON – A U.S. consumer group called for an urgent Food and Drug Administration review of the safety of aspartame Monday, but the FDA said there was no immediate need to do so despite a new study showing the sweetener may cause cancer.

Italian researchers published a new study last week that showed aspartame – widely used in soft drinks – might cause leukemia, lymphoma and breast cancer in rats.

“This is the second study by the same lab showing that aspartame causes cancer in rats,” Center for Science in the Public Interest executive director Michael Jacobson said in a telephone interview.

Aspartame is used mostly in soft drinks but is also sold in packets to use in coffee, tea or on food. “People can easily avoid products using Nutrasweet or Equal and keep these products away from kids,” Jacobson added.

Morando Soffritti of the Ramazzini Foundation in Bologna, Italy and colleagues tested aspartame in rats, which they allowed to live until they died naturally.

Their study of more than 4,000 rats showed a lifetime of eating high doses of the sweetener raised the likelihood of several types of cancer.

“On the basis of the present findings, we believe that a review of the current regulations governing the use of aspartame cannot be delayed,” Soffritti's team wrote in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, which is published by the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

“This review is particularly urgent with regard to aspartame-containing beverages, heavily consumed by children.”

FDA spokesman Michael Herndon said the agency had not yet reviewed the study.

(More here. Thanks for the tip from Minnesota Central.)