Aspartame

[Sherrie]

Heres another useful article on that site:


FDA Lists 92 Symptoms from Nutrasweet (Aspartame)
(including Death!)
http://www.relfe.com/Aspartame_92.html

Please Note: Nutrasweet is in Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi

Article courtesy of: Mark Gold mgold@tiac.net
(researcher for twenty years on such subjects)
This article originally appeared on www.dorway.com

Note: This information required a Freedom Of Information Act request to pry it from the reluctant hands of the FDA.


Nutrasweet (brand name for Aspartame) was not approved until 1981, in dry foods. For over eight years the FDA refused to approve it because of the seizures and brain tumors this drug produced in lab animals. The FDA continued to refuse to approve it until President Reagan took office (a friend of Searle) and fired the FDA Commissioner who wouldn't approve it. Dr. Arthur Hull Hayes was appointed as commissioner. Even then there was so much opposition to approval that a Board of Inquiry was set up. The Board said: "Do not approve aspartame". Dr. Hayes OVERRULED his own Board of Inquiry.

Shortly after Commissioner Arthur Hull Hayes, Jr., approved the use of aspartame in carbonated beverages, he left for a position with G.D. Searle's Public Relations firm.

Long-Term Damage. It appears to cause slow, silent damage in those unfortunate enough to not have immediate reactions and a reason to avoid it. It may take one year, five years, 10 years, or 40 years, but it seems to cause some reversible and some irreversible changes in health over long-term use.

METHANOL (AKA WOOD ALCOHOL/POISON) (10% OF ASPARTAME) Methanol/wood alcohol is a deadly poison. People may recall that methanol was the poison that has caused some "skid row" alcoholics to end up blind or dead. Methanol is gradually released in the small intestine when the methyl group of aspartame encounter the enzyme chymotrypsin.

The absorption of methanol into the body is sped up considerably when free methanol is ingested. Free methanol is created from aspartame when it is heated to above 86 Fahrenheit (30 Centigrade). This would occur when aspartame-containing product is improperly stored or when it is heated (e.g., as part of a "food" product such as Jello).

Methanol breaks down into formic acid and formaldehyde in the body. Formaldehyde is a deadly neurotoxin. An EPA assessment of methanol states that methanol "is considered a cumulative poison due to the low rate of excretion once it is absorbed. In the body, methanol is oxidized to formaldehyde and formic acid; both of these metabolites are toxic." The recommend a limit of consumption of 7.8 mg/day. A one-liter (approx. 1 quart) aspartame-sweetened beverage contains about 56 mg of methanol. Heavy users of aspartame-containing products consume as much as 250 mg of methanol daily or 32 times the EPA limit.

The most well known problems from methanol poisoning are vision problems. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen, causes retinal damage, interferes with DNA replication, and causes birth defects. Due to the lack of a couple of key enzymes, humans are many times more sensitive to the toxic effects of methanol than animals. Therefore, tests of aspartame or methanol on animals do not accurately reflect the danger for humans. As pointed out by Dr Woodrow C. Monte, Director of the Food Science and Nutrition Laboratory at Arizona State University, "There are no human or mammalian studies to evaluate the possible mutagenic, teratogenic, or carcinogenic effects of chronic administration of methyl alcohol."

It has been pointed out that fruit juices and alcoholic beverages contain small amounts of methanol. It is important to remember, that the methanol in natural products never appears alone. In every case, ethanol is present, usually in much higher amounts. Ethanol is an antidote for methanol toxicity in humans.

The troops of Desert Storm were "treated" to large amounts of aspartame-sweetened beverages which had been heated to over 86 degrees F. in the Saudi Arabian sun. Many of them returned home with numerous disorders similar to what has been seen in persons who have been chemically poisoned by formaldehyde. The free methanol in the beverages may have been a contributing factor in these illnesses. Other breakdown products ofaspartame such as DKP, may also have been a factor.

In a 1993 act that can only be described as "unconscionable", the FDA approved aspartame as an ingredient in numerous food items that would always be heated to above 86°degrees F (30°Degrees C).

Much worse, on 27 June 1996, without public notice, the FDA removed all restrictions from aspartame allowing it to be used in everything, including all heated and baked goods.

The truth about aspartame's toxicity is far different than what the NutraSweet Company would have you readers believe. In February of 1994, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released the listing of adverse reactions reported to the FDA (DHHS 1994). Aspartame accounted for more than 75% of all adverse reactions reported to the FDA's Adverse Reaction Monitoring System (ARMS). By the FDA's own admission fewer then ONE PERCENT of those who have problems with something they consume ever report it to the FDA. This balloons the almost 10,000 complaints they once had to around a million.

However, the FDA has a record keeping problem (they never did respond to the certified letter from the WEBMASTER of this site a major victim!) and they tend to discourage or even misdirect complaints, at least on aspartame. The fact remains, though, that MOST victims don't have a clue that aspartame may be the cause of their many problems! Many reactions to aspartame were very serious including seizures and death.

Those reactions included:

* Abdominal Pain
* Anxiety attacks
* arthritis
* asthma
* Asthmatic Reactions
* Bloating, Edema (Fluid Retention)
* Blood Sugar Control Problems (Hypoglycemia or Hyperglycemia)
* Brain Cancer (Pre-approval studies in animals)
* Breathing difficulties
* burning eyes or throat
* Burning Urination
* can't think straight
* Chest Pains
* chronic cough
* Chronic Fatigue
* Confusion
* Death
* Depression
* Diarrhea
* Dizziness
* Excessive Thirst or Hunger
* fatigue
* feel unreal
* flushing of face
* Hair Loss (Baldness) or Thinning of Hair
* Headaches/Migraines dizziness
* Hearing Loss
* Heart palpitations
* Hives (Urticaria)
* Hypertension (High Blood Pressure)
* Impotency and Sexual Problems
* inability to concentrate
* Infection Susceptibility
* Insomnia
* Irritability
* Itching
* Joint Pains
* laryngitis
* "like thinking in a fog"
* Marked Personality Changes
* Memory loss
* Menstrual Problems or Changes
* Migraines and Severe Headaches (Trigger or Cause From Chronic Intake)
* Muscle spasms
* Nausea or Vomiting
* Numbness or Tingling of Extremities
* Other Allergic-Like Reactions
* Panic Attacks
* Phobias
* poor memory
* Rapid Heart Beat
* Rashes
* Seizures and Convulsions
* Slurring of Speech
* Swallowing Pain
* Tachycardia
* Tremors
* Tinnitus
* Vertigo
* Vision Loss
* Weight gain

Aspartame Disease Mimics Symptoms or Worsens the Following Diseases

* Alzheimer's Disease
* Arthritis
* Birth Defects
* Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
* Diabetes and Diabetic Complications
* Epilepsy
* Fibromyalgia
* Lupus
* Lyme Disease
* Lymphoma
* Multiple Chemical Sensitivities (MCS)
* Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
* Parkinson's Disease

How it happens:

Methanol, from aspartame, is released in the small intestine when the methyl group of aspartame encounters the enzyme chymotrypsin (Stegink 1984, page 143). Free methanol begins to form in liquid aspartame-containing products at temperatures above 86 degrees F. also within the human body.

The methanol is then converted to formaldehyde. The formaldehyde converts to formic acid - ant sting poison. Toxic formic acid is used as an activator to strip epoxy and urethane coatings. Imagine what it does to your tissues! (Note from Stephanie Relfe - Even the Australian Cancer Council says that there are NO safe levels of formaldehyde).

Phenylalanine and aspartic acid, 90% of aspartame, are amino acids normally used in synthesis of protoplasm when supplied by the foods we eat. But when unaccompanied by other amino acids we use [there are 20], they are neurotoxic.

That is why a warning for Phenylketonurics is found on EQUAL and other aspartame products. Phenylketenurics are 2% of the population with extreme sensitivity to this chemical unless it's present in food. It gets you too, causing brain disorders and birth defects! Finally, the phenyalanine breaks down into DKP, a brain tumor agent.

In other words: Aspartame converts to dangerous by-products that have no natural countermeasures. A dieter's empty stomach accelerates these conversions and amplifies the damage. Components of aspartame go straight to the brain, damage that causes headaches, mental confusion, seizures and faulty balance. Lab rats and other test animals died of brain tumors.

Despite the claims of Monsanto and bedfellows:

1. Methanol from alcohol and juices does not get converted to formaldehyde to any significant extent. There is very strong evidence to confirm this fact for alcoholic beverages and fairly strong evidence for juices.

2. Formaldehyde obtained from methanol is very toxic in *very small* doses as seen by recent research.

3. Aspartame causes chronic toxicity reactions/damage due to the methanol to formaldehyde and other break down products despite what is claimed otherwise by the very short, industry-funded experiments using a test substance that is chemically different and absorbed differently than what is available to the general public. "Strangely enough", almost all independent studies show that aspartame can cause health problems.

4. A common ploy from Monsanto is to claim that aspartame is "safe" yet a few select people may have "allergic" reactions to it. This is typical Monsanto nonsense, of course. Their own research shows that it does not cause "allergic" reactions. It is there way of trying to minimize and hide the huge numbers of toxicity reactions and damage that people are experiencing from the long-term use of aspartame.

Summary

Given the following points, it is definitely premature for researchers to discount the role of methanol in aspartame side effects:

1. The amount of methanol ingested from aspartame is unprecedented in human history. Methanol from fruit juice ingestion does not even approach the quantity of methanol ingested from aspartame, especially in persons who ingest one to three liters (or more) of diet beverages every day. Unlike methanol from aspartame, methanol from natural products is probably not absorbed or converted to its toxic metabolites in significant amounts as discussed earlier.

2. Lack of laboratory-detectable changes in plasma formic acid and formaldehyde levels do not preclude damage being caused by these toxic metabolites. Laboratory-detectable changes in formate levels are often not found in short exposures to methanol.

3. Aspartame-containing products often provide little or no nutrients which may protect against chronic methanol poisoning and are often consumed in between meals. Persons who ingest aspartame-containing products are often dieting and more likely to have nutritional deficiencies than persons who take the time to make fresh juices.

4. Persons with certain health conditions or on certain drugs may be much more susceptible to chronic methanol poisoning.

5. Chronic diseases and side effects from slow poisons often build silently over a long period of time. Many chronic diseases which seem to appear suddenly have actually been building in the body over many years.

6. An increasing body of research is showing that many people are highly sensitive to low doses of formaldehyde in the environment. Environmental exposure to formaldehyde and ingestion of methanol (which converts to formaldehyde) from aspartame likely has a cumulative deleterious effect.

7. Formic acid has been shown to slowly accumulate in various parts of the body. Formic acid has been shown to inhibit oxygen metabolism.

8. The are a very large and growing number of persons are experiencing chronic health problems similar to the side effects of chronic methanol poisoning when ingesting aspartame-containing products for a significant length of time. This includes many cases of eye damage similar to the type of eye damage seen in methanol poisoning cases.

Note: It often takes at least sixty days without any aspartame NutraSweet to see a significant improvement. (Note from Stephanie Relfe: Drink plenty of good water. Preferably water filtered by reverse osmosis. If not that, spring water. Not tap, distilled or mineral water).

Check all labels very carefully (including vitamins and pharmaceuticals). Look for the word "aspartame" on the label and avoid it. (Also, it is a good idea to avoid "acesulfame-k" or "sunette.") Finally, avoid getting nutrition information from junk food industry PR organizations such as IFIC or organizations that accept large sums of money from the junk and chemical food industry such as the American Dietetic Association.

If you are a user of any products with aspartame, and you have physical, visual, mental problems take the 60-day no aspartame test. If, after two months with no aspartame your symptoms are either gone, or are much less severe, please get involved to get this neurotoxin off the market. Write a letter to the FDA, with a copy to Betty Martini (for proof of how the FDA doesn't keep proper records). Write your congressmen. Return products containing aspartame to the point of purchase... for a FULL refund. Make a big stink if they WON'T give you a full refund! Tell all your friends and family... and if they stop using aspartame and also "wake up well"... get them involved in the same way.

Aspartame is an "approved sweetener" because of a few greedy and dishonest people who place profits above human life and well-being. With the FDA and our Congress culpable, only an INFORMED and ACTIVE public will affects its reclassification from "food additive" to TOXIC DRUG, and removed from the human food chain.

From Stephane Relfe: Note that Michael J. Fox, who was spokesperson for Pepsi, has an old man's disease (Parkinson's Disease) at only 30 years old!

Also Note: Aspartame has one use that I know of - it makes an EXCELLENT ant poison. Put a few tablespoons on a nest of fire ants and see how long before they disappear.

For more information:

www.dorway.com

www.aspartamekills.com

www.nexuxmagazine.com/Aspartame.html

http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

http://www.trufax.org/menu/chem.html#aspartame

Addresses:

Commissioner
Food and Drug Administration
5600 Fishers Lane
Rockville, Maryland 20857

Mrs. Betty Martini
Mission Possible International
9270 State Bridge Road Suite 215
Duluth, Georgia 30097
Internet E-mail: bettym19@mindspring.com

NOW... that you are aware of the 92 FDA recognized symptoms (that required a Freedom Of Information Act request to pry from their reluctant hands) and HOW aspartame does its dirty work, change to Dorway's Official Dogma page.

www.dorway.com/offasprt.html

On this page Mark Gold has taken the IFIC "Official" aspartame safety myth and shot it full of holes using all of the smoking guns that were used by the FDA to approve this poison as a food additive, along with information they either ignored or discounted. This excellent debunking of the official FDA/Monsanto/Searle/Nutrasweet/Nutrasweet Kelco/AMA/ADA/IFIC/??? chain of lies and half truths includes a long history of this "product's" sordid trail to the marketplace and the sweet tooth.

Other great Aspartame / Phenylalaine links:

/www.mercola.com/article/aspartame/phenylalanine.htm

http://www.heall.com/body/askthedoct...weeteners.html



Excitotoxins: The Taste that Kills
Russell Blaylock

Excitotoxins are substances added to foods and drinks that literally stimulate nerve cells to death, causing brain damage. They can be found in such ingredients as monosodium glutamate (MSG), aspartame (nutrasweet) and hydrolyzed vegetable protein. The dangers of these substances is so overwhelming that they can no longer be ignored.

Do a search on the web on `aspartame' and you will see that it can cause Parkinson's disease (why did Michael Fox, spokesman for Diet Pepsi, get an old man's disease at 30?), MS and cravings for carbohydate (thereby causing an INCREASE in weight).

Was $17.95, Now $14.36
Order_this_book_from_Amazon excitotoxins

[sambalam]

jesus christmas it should be illegal for this gear to be in anything edible.

ant poison hey? i might give that a go!

[Sherrie]

Aspartame Interacts With
ALL Drugs Vaccines And Toxins
FDA Put On Notice

From Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum.
Bettym19@mindspring.com
2-23-5


Who knows more about the toxicity of aspartame than the FDA. Their toxicologists, Doctors Adrian Gross and Jacqueline Verrett strenuously objected to aspartame approval for 16 years. It wasn't just that aspartame is not safe and in original studies triggered brain tumors, seizures and all sorts of other tumors, it was that the manufacturer filtered out what they didn't want FDA to see.

(January 10, l977 in a 33 page letter, FDA Chief Counsel Richard Merrill recommended to U.S. Attorney Sam Skinner that a grand jury investigate Searle for "apparent violations of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, 21 U.S.C.331(e), Act 18 USC 1001, for "their willful and knowing failure to make reports to the Food and Drug Administration required by the Act 21, U.S.C. 355 (i) and for concealing material facts and making false statements in reports of animal studies conducted to establish the safety of (aspartame)," The FDA called special attention to studies investigating the effect of NutraSweet on monkeys and hamsters. ) Both U.S. Prosecutors hired on with the defense team and the statute of limitations expired. Still the FDA kept saying loudly no - no - no!

FDA's Jerome Bressler wrote the brilliant FDA audit, the Bressler Report on http://www.dorway.com in regard to Searle's testing. In speaking with Bressler he told me personally the studies were so bad the worst 20% was removed by FDA when retyped. He also told this to Doctors H. J. Roberts and Dr. Russell Blaylock. Dr. Roberts asked his congressman to get the rest of the report from the FDA who promptly refused.

In the incredible aspartame documentary, Sweet Misery, A Poisoned World, from the very mouth of Attorney James Turner who assisted the famed Dr. John Olney in trying to prevent approval came mind boggling facts! Don Rumsfeld, currently Secretary of Defense, was CEO of Searle and said he would call in his markers and get aspartame approved. To Rumsfeld the fact the FDA said "no" meant only he would have to use politics instead of science to get this neurotoxin approved, knowing full well it would poison the public, causing in humans the injuries seen in lab animals, brain tumors and seizures. He was on Reagan's transition team and the day after Reagan took office Arthur Hull Hayes was appointed to approve this toxin, since no former FDA Commissioner had been willing to do so.

ASPARTAME WAS APPROVED BY PRESIDENTIAL ORDER

President Reagan knew it would take 30 days to get Hayes to FDA so he wrote an executive order making the outgoing FDA Commissioner powerless to oppose aspartame. From the congressional record, Senate, page S5497, May 7, l985:

"Two FDA officials have told Common Cause Magazine that Hayes was determined to push aspartame forward, in part as a signal that the Reagan administration was ushering in a new regulatory era. One official privy to some of the deliberations made at Hayes' level says the "people at the top" were not receptive to important concerns raised about the quality and validity of some of the key tests submitted in support of aspartame."

"There were real questions" about the reliability and interpretation of the data "that were glossed over" at the commissioner's level, this official says, adding that Hayes and his close associates wanted FDA scientists to concentrate on providing rationales for overturning the l980 Public Board of Inquiry instead of focusing on the fact that there were unresolved issues about a number of key tests."

John Hoey, M.D. in reviewing Marcia Angell's book, "The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It" (10/7/2004) says:

"By Angell's account, the current slide toward the commercialization and corruption of clinical research coincided with the election of President Ronald Reagan in l980 and the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act, a new set of laws that permitted and encouraged universities and small businesses to patent discoveries from research sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Research paid for by the public to serve the public instantly became a private and salable, good, one that is producing drug sales of more than $200 billion a year."

Further, Dr. Hoey in discussing research commercialization said: "The broader effects are felt in the commercialization of universities, medical faculties, and our profession. In 2000, in a letter written in response to Angell's Journal editorial, Is Academic Medicine for Sale?" a reader supplied the answer: No. The current owner is very happy with it. The increasing intrusion of industry into medical education and the almost complete domination of continuing medical education (especially regarding drugs) by the marketing departments of large pharmaceutical companies are a scandal."

When Arthur Hull Hayes got to the FDA a Board of Inquiry was set up with the finest scientists FDA had. They declared: " ..the Board concludes that approval of aspartame for use in foods should be withheld at least until the question concerning its possible oncogenic potential has been resolved by further experiments. The Board has not been presented with proof of a reasonable certainty that aspartame is safe for use as a food additive under its intended conditions of use. "

"ORDER: The foregoing constitutes the Board's findings of fact and conclusions of law. Therefore, it is ORDERED that: (1) Approval of the food additive petition for aspartame (FAP 3A2885) be and it is hereby withdrawn. (2) The stay of the effectiveness of the regulation for aspartame, 21 CFR 172.804, is hereby vacated and the regulation revoked."

--- This PBOI report on 9/3/80 was signed by Walle J. H. Nauta, M.D., Ph.D., Chairman, Peter W. Lampert, M.D., and Vernon R. Young, Ph.D., Member

Dr. Hayes wouldn't take "no" because he was there to get aspartame approved. As the Congressional Record continues, Senate, S5497, May 7, l985: "Hayes decisions to approve aspartame for use in dry foods such as cereals in l981 and soft drinks in l983 does not square with the role of the FDA is supposed to play. The FDA is the government agency that reviews and approves all tests submitted by companies before allowing food additives on the market. The law requires a manufacturer - in this case Searle - to prove to the satisfaction of the FDA that there is a "reasonable certainty" that a food additive is safe. The government does not have to prove that it is harmful - an important distinction. If tests are inconclusive, an additive is not suppose to be approved by the FDA."

When Hayes finished his job to get a neurotoxic drug on the market he hired on with the public relations firm, Burston Marsteller, who represented NutraSweet, for $1000.00 per day as a consultant. Hayes refused to talk to the press since. He had no excuse for approving a toxic drug whose petition was revoked by FDA scientists. Hayes had full knowledge that its a carcinogen in violation of the Delaney Amendment which forbid adding carcinogens to food and drugs.

WHEN FDA WAS PUSHED OFF ITS PEDESTAL: Imagine an intact FDA which tried to do its job of protecting the public, having to proclaim that a horrendous neurotoxic drug is safe. Would could FDA say when asked if aspartame was safe? Could they say "we approved it but its poison"? Probably the only thing they could say was "Ask us no questions and we will tell you no lies." Even today when journalists ask the FDA to comment on aspartame they say: "No comment. See our web site." The web site is just lying industry propaganda. Beginning with Reagan and Hayes the pharmaceutical cartel had the power to get approved the worst drugs. FDA seemed to care not. Their bulletin, the FDA Consumer continued to tout the safety of aspartame and letters to victims whose lives were destroyed said aspartame was the most tested additive in history. Even letters to congressmen lied and lied.

Dr. John Olney knew what aspartame would do to the brains of our children. and discussed it in his report to the Board of Inquiry. In l999 Parents Magazine asked "What's Happening to our Children", announcing that families all over America were experiencing so much depression it was estimated that 1 out of 4 had contemplated suicide. The 50% phenylalanine in aspartame lowers the seizure threshold and depletes serotonin,and can trigger bipolar or manic depression, mood swings, paranoia, hallucination and suicidal tendencies. So our children are medicated instead of educated. Seventy per cent of consumers use aspartame and 40% of the children. Dr. Olney's prophecy is fulfilled.

To get a copy of the congressional record, Board of Inquiry Report and Dr. Olney's Report to the Board of Inquiry on CD you can contact Bob Flint at bobflint@greatfallspro.com. The web site would be www.greatfallspro.com

Three congressional hearings were held by Senator Howard Metzenbaum who wrote a bill to have independent studies done on the problems from aspartame, effect on the fetus, behavioral problems in children, seizures and drug interactions. The producers saw to it that the bill never got out of committee. The last of the heros of FDA toxicologists Adrian Gross and Jacqueline Verrett testified to no avail. Dr. Adrian Gross said without a shadow of a doubt aspartame causes brain tumors and brain cancer, and violates the Delaney Amendment. His last words were : "And if the FDA violates its own laws who is left to protect the public?"

We are now taking case histories on brain tumors and seizures starting in New York and New Jersey. Dr. Verrett said: "All studies were built on a foundation of sand and should be thrown out." Today's FDA is the handmaiden of the pharmaceutical/chemical cartel. The revolving door is so busy they need a bridge for the traffic. I told all this to Acting Commissioner Dr. Michael Friedman. He defended Monsanto on 60 Minutes when Dr. Olney made world news about the aspartame brain tumor association. Then Friedman hired as Vice President of Searle for big bucks - crime pays well.

In l986 the Community Nutrition Institute in Washington, D.C. petitioned FDA to ban aspartame because so many were having seizures and going blind from the free methyl alcohol in the drug. Aspartame is sold as an additive but it's a neurotoxic drug. FDA law requires an additive be inert or non-reactive. The medical text on aspartame disease lists countless diseases and symptoms and drug interactions by the toxin.

ASPARTAME DISEASE RAGES, INTERACTS WITH ALL DRUGS, VACCINES AND TOXINS.

When aspartame was news, Dr. H. J. Roberts in a press conference foretold that in 5 or 10 years we would have a global plague. And it was Dr. Roberts who declared Aspartame Disease to be a global plague and published the medical text in 2001, Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic, www.sunsentpress.com or 1 800 827 7991.
His chapter on drug interaction goes into Coumadin, Dilantin, antidepressants and other psychotropic agents, Inderal, Aldomet, hormones and insulin. He says aspartame interacts with all cardiac medication and even discusses drug reactions after the cessation of aspartame.

In his general considerations he discusses that aspartame may either reduce or potentiate drug action by various mechanisms. He lists a few of the possibilities.

* Alteration of the blood proteins to which drugs attach.
* Alteration of drug receptors on cell membranes.
* Changes in the sites at which impulses are transmitted along nerves and to muscle.
* Metabolic abnormalities in the elderly that are known to enhance their vulnerability to drug reactions (Weber l986). This problem increases in the case of persons taking multiple drugs ("polypharmacy") prescribed by several physicians.
* Interference with drug action by amino acids and protein. An example is the erratic therapeutic effects when patients with parkinsonism who were controlled on levodopa began to use aspartame products. The antagonism of levodopa by dietary protein presumably reflects impaired transport from serum across the blood brain barrier by neutral amino acids (Pincus l986).

Dr. Roberts also discusses Lidocaine (Xylocaine) which he says is an important drug used for local anesthesia and the treatment of ventricular arrhythmias in intensive care units. Alterations of its pharmacology by aspartame require study. He says: "Kim et al (l987) reported that the intraperitoneal administration of aspartame significantly reduced the 50% convulsion dose of lidocaine. They indicated that PKU patients and asymptomatic PKU heterozygotes may be more sensitive to the toxic effects of this and related local anesthetics."

Today Dr. Roberts explained: "An interaction should be suspect with virtually every drug if the patient is using aspartame."

This goes along with conversations with Dr. James Bowen who says because aspartame damages the mitocondria of the cell it will interact with all drugs and as a chemical hypersensitization agent will interact with vaccines, unsafe sweeteners like Splenda or sucralose ( chlorinated hydrocarbon) and toxins.

Dr. Bowen wrote about the biochemical interactions between aspartame and other poisons including many pharmaceuticals illustrated in Dr. Roberts medical text and said Dr. Mercola's web site has them as well. Further he wrote: "Because aspartame in the processes of digestion and metabolism, forms about ten other known severe poisonings, and intermediate metabolites, it's potential for drug related interactions is immeasurable. To top that off, the aspartame molecule is so heinously poisonous in different ways that it never passed a single FDA standard toxicity test! So Donald Rumsfeld, CEO of aspartame manufacturer Searle employed political power to get it approved, after the FDA for 16 years refused to allow it on the market because of aspartame toxicity. Then Reagan took direct executive measures to paralyze FDA from further action against aspartame.

Our FDA has never been the same since. Deadly chemicals now being blessed by FDA are marketed as wholesome pharmaceuticals, are just the tip of the iceberg, and result of Rumsfeld's damage to FDA. If any concern whatsoever for human welfare still existed, aspartame would be immediately pulled from the market! The reasonable FDA lawful standard is that a chemical must pass all toxicity tests at one hundred times the "maximum human dose," in order to pass as a food additive. What the original tests showed is that at a dose of three cans of pop per day, scaled to the weight of the animal, aspartame releases DKP, a recognized virulent brain carcinogen. No other chemical causes the brain cancer rate to jump as much."

Dr. Bowen continues, "Aspartame is a known destroyer of DNA. The mitocondrial DNA (MtDNA) is especially damaged, yielding the present epidemic of diseases aspartame consuming mothers pass on to all future generations. Aspartame also directly damages the mitochondria, thus having a "double whammy" effect on mitochondrial function! The summation of these many known severe toxicities and its immune, genetic, mitochondrial, and metabolic damages, make clear that aspartame will not only cause many diseases, which the FDA and CDC have already noted but it has pathways of approach to interact adversely with every conceivable pharmaceutical. My forth coming book: "Sweet Mystery in The Present Darkness: Whatever Happened to We Scientists Who First Spoke Out Against Aspartame?" will delve into all of this in greater detail and more specificity."

The Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste wrote in the spring of l996 the article: "The Rising Rates of Health Problems - Is There A Toxic Connection? Stephen Lester.
It might as well have been written about aspartame because the diseases it lists are all ones that have been written about as triggered by aspartame, from birth defects to chemical sensitives. Under the title Cancer Lester says:

"When has gone wrong with our way of thinking when it is considered "normal" that 1 in 3 people get cancer? IT IS NOT NORMAL.. Cancer is not a natural disease and even if it were, it wouldn't be "normal" for cancer to claim the lives of 25% of the population. " Again, one can only think of aspartame when in original studies it triggered brain, mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, thyroid and pancreatic tumors and violated the Delaney Amendment. The Pharmaceutical and Chemical cartel know aspartame violates the law, so one would ask is that why the Delaney Amendment was repealed? When a law for the safety of the public gets in their way of marking poison they simply do away with the law.

In June it will be 3 years since I petitioned the FDA to ban aspartame because I have the FDA records and they lie to the public. The law states they have 180 days to answer. Their letter to me states they have more important things to do. So the FDA continues to recall drugs that interact and leave the poison aspartame on the market. Aspartame triggers an irregular heart rhythm and interacts with all cardiac Rx. It damages the cardiac conduction system and causes sudden death. With people dropping dead so fast that defibrillators are now sold over the counter, they took the opportunity to pull ephedra (Chinese MaHaung )off the market when an athlete died who was using Diet coke. Dr. John Olney reviewed the FDA records on ephedra and found it to be safe. One attorney said, "it wasn't Chinese Mahaung at all, but the drug that caused some problems." So what does the FDA do, leave the drug on the market causing the problems and snatches a safe supplement in their continuing loyalty to the pharmaceutical cartel.

MSG has an additive and synergistic effect with aspartame. Is that why the glutamate industry used aspartame as their placebo, so they could show that one excitotoxin does not react more than the placebo when, in fact, the aspartic acid in aspartame is also an excitotoxin. They started doing this before aspartame was approved, so it was well known in the industry that aspartame would react. The records found in the FDA files by Jack Samuels (www.truthinlabeling.org) who filed suit against the FDA on labeling of MSG, showed the FDA had known all along and the industry had been doing this for 25 years against the law. While the FDA had to admit it was wrong they did nothing, again giving their loyalty the glutamate industry.

One can only remember the words of Dr. James Bowen to the FDA over 18 years ago: "Aspartame is mass poisoning of the American public and over 70+ countries of the world". What does it take to save the people from this poison when government lies?

Dr. John Hoey, writing about the book The Truth About the Drug Companies says according to Angell, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, the pharmaceutical industry's U.S. trade association has "the largest lobby in Washington," which in 2002 employed 675 lobbyists (including 26 former members of Congress) at a cost of more than $91 million. The result has been above-average growth in corporate profits during both Republican and Democratic administrations.

The most recent and perplexing lobbying effort caused Congress explicitly to prohibit Medicare from using its huge purchasing power to get lower prices for drugs, thus opening up a dollar pipeline, in the form of higher drug prices, directly from taxpayers to corporate coffers. These changes, along with the cave-in by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in l997 that permitted direct-to-consumer advertising to bypass mention in their ads of all but the most serious side effects, have further augmented profits. The overall effect has been a corruption not only of science but also of the dissemination of Science." No wonder new books keep being published like Dr. Carolyn Dean's "Death of Medicine".

Dr. Betty Martini
Founder, Mission Possible Intl
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
770 242-2599

http://www.wnho.net and http://www.dorway.com

New Aspartame Information List - click on banner on www.wnho.net

Books on aspartame, including medical text, Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic, www.sunsentpress.com or 1 800 827 7991 by H. J. Roberts, M.D.

Books on aspartame by Dr. Russell Blaylock, M.D., www.russellblaylockmd.com

Movie on aspartame - contact cori@soundandfuryproductions.com
Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World

http://rense.com/general63/asp.htm

[Sherrie]

ASPARTAME

http://www.2012.com.au/Aspartame.html


FDA ISSUING FOR COLLUSION WITH MONSANTO
written by Nancy Markle


I have spent several days lecturing at the WORLD ENVIRONMENTAL CONFERENCE on "ASPARTAME, marketed as 'NutraSweet', 'Equal', and 'Spoonful'".

In the keynote address by the EPA, they announced that there was an epidemic of multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus, and they did not understand what toxin was causing this to be rampant across the United States. I explained that I was there to lecture on exactly that subject.When the temperature of Aspartame exceeds 86 degrees F, the wood alcohol in ASPARTAME converts to formaldehyde and then to formic acid, which in turn causes metabolic acidosis.(Formic acid is the poison found in the sting of fire ants). The methanol toxicity mimics multiple sclerosis; thus people were being diagnosed with having multiple sclerosis in error. The multiple sclerosis is not a death sentence, where methanol toxicity is! In the case of systemic lupus, we are finding it has become almost as rampant as multiple sclerosis, especially with Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi drinkers. Also, with methanol toxicity, the victims usually drink three to four 12 oz. cans of them per day, some even more. In the cases of systemic lupus, which is triggered by ASPARTAME, the victim usually does not know that the aspartame is the culprit. The victim continues its use aggravating the lupus to such a degree, that sometimes it becomes life threatening.

When we get people off the aspartame, those with systemic lupus usually become symptomatic. Unfortunately, we cannot reverse this disease. On the other hand, in the case of those diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, (when in reality, the disease is methanol toxicity), most of the symptoms disappear. We have seen cases where their vision has returned and even their hearing has returned. This also applies to cases of tinnitus.

During a lecture I said, "If you are using ASPARTAME (NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonful, etc.) and you suffer from fibromyalgia symptoms, spasms, shooting pains, numbness in your legs, cramps, vertigo, dizziness, headaches, tinnitus, joint pain, depression, anxiety attacks, slurred speech, blurred vision, or memory loss--you probably have ASPARTAME DISEASE!" People were jumping up during the lecture saying, "I've got this, is it reversible?" It is rampant. Even some of the speakers at my lecture were suffering from these symptoms. In one lecture attended by the Ambassador of Uganda, he told us that their sugar industry is adding aspartame! He continued by saying that one of the industry leader's sons could no longer walk--due in part by product usage! We have a very serious problem. Even a stranger came up to Dr. Espisto (one of my speakers) and myself and said, "Could you tell me why so many people seem to be coming down with MS?" During a visit to a hospice, a nurse said that six of her friends, who were heavy Diet Coke addicts, had all been diagnosed with MS. This is beyond coincidence. Here is the problem. There were Congressional Hearings when aspartame was included in 100 different products. Since this initial hearing, there have been two subsequent hearings, but to no avail. Nothing has been done. The drug and chemical lobbies have very deep pockets.

Now there are over 5,000 products containing aspartame, and the PATENT HAS EXPIRED! At the time of this first hearing, people were going blind. The methanol in the aspartame converts to formaldehyde in the retina of the eye. Formaldehyde is grouped in the same class of drugs as cyanide and arsenic - DEADLY POISONS! Unfortunately, it just takes longer to quietly kill--but it is killing people and causing all kinds of neurological problems.

Aspartame changes the brain's chemistry. It is the reason for severe seizures. This drug changes the dopamine level in the brain. Imagine what this drug does to patients suffering from Parkinson's Disease. This drug also causes Birth Defects. There is absolutely no reason to take this product. It is NOT A DIET PRODUCT! The Congressional record said, "It makes you crave carbohydrates and will make you FAT". Dr. Roberts stated that when he got patients off aspartame, their average weight loss was 19 pounds per person. The formaldehyde stores in the fat cells, particularly in the hips and thighs. Aspartame is especially deadly for diabetics.

All physicians know what wood alcohol will do to a diabetic. We find that physicians believe that they have patients with retinopathy, when in fact, it is caused by the aspartame. The aspartame keeps the blood sugar level out of control, causing many patients to go into a coma. Unfortunately, many have died. People were telling us at the Conference of the American College of Physicians, that they had relatives that switched from saccharin to an aspartame product and how that relative had eventually gone into a coma. Their physicians could not get the blood sugar levels under control. Thus the patients suffered acute memory loss and eventually coma and death. Memory loss is due to the fact that aspartic acid and phenylalanine are neurotoxic without the other amino acids found in protein. Thus it goes past the blood brain barrier and deteriorates the neurons of the brain. Dr. Russell Blaylock, Neurosurgeon, said, "The ingredients stimulate the neurons of the brain to death, causing brain damage of varying degrees. As the hospice nurse told me, women are being admitted at 30 years of age with Alzheimer's Disease.

Dr. Blaylock and Dr. Roberts will be writing a position paper with some case histories and will post it on the Internet. According to the Conference of the American College of Physicians, "We are talking about a plague of neurological diseases caused by this deadly poison". Dr. Roberts realized what was happening when aspartame was first marketed.

He said, "his diabetic patients presented memory loss, confusion, and severe vision loss".

At the Conference of the American College of Physicians, doctors admitted that they did not know. They had wondered why seizures were rampant. (The phenylalanine in aspartame breaks down the seizure threshold and depletes serotonin, which causes manic depression, panic attacks, rage and violence).

Just before the Conference, I received a FAX from Norway, asking for a possible antidote for this poison because they are experiencing so many problems in their country. This "poison" is now available in 90 PLUS countries worldwide. Fortunately, we had speakers and ambassadors at the Conference from different nations who have pledged their help. We ask that you help too. Warn everyone you know by Email Forwarding...by printing this article and Delivering, Mailing or Faxing it.

Take anything that contains aspartame back to the store. Take the "NO ASPARTAME TEST" and send us your case history. I assure you that MONSANTO, the creator of aspartame, knows how deadly it is. They fund the American Diabetes Association, American Dietetic Association, Congress, and the Conference of the American College of Physicians. The New York Times, on November 15, 1Blazer ZR2 996, ran an article on how the American Dietetic Association takes money from the food industry to endorse their products. Therefore, they cannot criticize any additives or tell about their link to MONSANTO.

How bad is this? We told a mother who had a child on NutraSweet to get off the product. The child was having grand mal seizures every day. The mother called her physician, who called the ADA, who told the doctor not to take the child off the NutraSweet. We are still trying to convince the mother that the aspartame is causing the seizures. Every time we get someone off of aspartame, the seizures stop. If the baby dies, you know whose fault it is, and what we are up against.

There are 92 documented symptoms of aspartame, from coma to death. The majority of them are all neurological, because the aspartame destroys the nervous system. Aspartame Disease is partially the cause to what is behind some of the mystery of the Desert Storm health problems (Gulf War Syndrome). The burning tongue and other problems discussed in over 60 cases can be directly related to the consumption of anaspartame product. Several thousand pallets of diet drinks were shipped to the Desert Storm troops. (Remember heat can liberate the methanol from the aspartame at 86 degrees F). Diet drinks sat in the 120 degree F. Arabian sun for weeks at a time on pallets. The service men and women drank them all day long. All of their symptoms are identical to aspartame poisoning.

Dr. Roberts says "consuming aspartame at the time of conception can cause birth defects". The phenylalanine concentrates in the placenta, causing mental retardation, according to Dr. Louis Elsas, Pediatrician Professor - Genetics, at Emory University in his testimony before Congress. In the original lab tests, animals developed brain tumors (phenylalanine breaks down into DXP, a brain tumor agent). When Dr. Espisto was lecturing on aspartame, one physician in the audience, a neurosurgeon, said, "when they remove brain tumors, they have found high levels of Aspartame in them".

Stevia, a sweet herb, NOT AN ADDITIVE, which helps in the metabolism of sugar, which would be ideal for diabetics, has now been approved as a dietary supplement by the F.D.A. For years, the F.D.A. has outlawed this sweet food because of their loyalty to MONSANTO. If it says "SUGAR FREE" on the label--DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT IT! Senator Howard Metzenbaum wrote a bill that would have warned all pregnant mothers, their infants and children of the dangers of aspartame. The bill would have also instituted independent studies on the problems existing in the population (seizures, changes in brain chemistry, changes in neurological and behavioral symptoms). It was killed by the powerful drug and chemical lobbies, letting loose the hounds of disease and death on an unsuspecting public.

Since the Conference of the American College of Physicians, we hope to have the help of some world leaders. Again, please help us, too! There are a lot of people out there who must be warned, *please* let them know this information. You might want to print it out and hand it out or fax it to people who are not online. Young people drink a lot of diet coke.

Dr. Demetrios Kydonieus...Hampton NJ...0011 1 908-537-7760

[Sherrie]

Garry just sent this to me:

Sweetener manufacturer disputes validity of new health research

Felicity Lawrence / London Guardian | October 02 2005


Aspartame, the artificial sweetener used in more than 6,000 food and drink products around the world, is the subject of renewed controversy this week after the results of the latest research into whether it can cause cancer.

Scientists at the independent European Ramazzini Foundation for cancer research in Bologna presented new results from its long-term, large-scale study of the effect of aspartame on 1,800 rats, at its international conference on cancer and environmental sciences in Italy last week.

The research centre said analysis of its latest results showed aspartame caused cancer of the kidney, and of the peripheral nerves, mainly in the head. Earlier data from the same study published in July linked aspartame to an increased risk of leukaemias and lymphomas in female lab rats "at doses very close to the acceptable daily intake for humans".

Manufacturers of the sweetener have challenged the validity of the study. They say the research is "in total conflict with hundreds of credible studies that have been thoroughly reviewed by the regulatory authorities around the world" and that "the allegations are inconsistent with human epidemiological data". They question the record of the institute and say it is "criminal" for it to present its data publicly before it had made it all available to the regulatory authorities and before it had been fully reviewed.

Aspartame is roughly 200 times sweeter than sugar. It is regularly consumed by more than 350 million people worldwide, and is estimated to account for 62% of the market in sweetening agents. It is commonly found in the UK in diet colas and other low-calorie drinks, juices, sweets, chewing gum, cereals, yoghurts, other desserts, snack foods such as crisps, medicines and vitamin supplements, including those for children.

The European Food Safety Authority is not at present recommending any change in consumers' diets. "Up to now aspartame has been considered safe, based on the studies available," it said. It would review the research "as a matter of high priority, in the context of previous extensive safety data available on aspartame".

Aspartame has been authorised for use in foods for a long time but has a "controversial history", according to EFSA. Because it is widely consumed, particularly by young children and pregnant women, the European Ramazzini Foundation decided to carry out an unusually large study of feeding aspartame to laboratory rats, according to its director, Dr Morando Soffritti.

The rats were studied for nearly three years, until the end of their natural lifespan; most studies last about two years. Six different dose levels were tested against a control group not given aspartame. The National Toxicology Programme of the US National Institutes of Health convened a pathology working group to provide a second opinion on the interpretation of some of the cancerous lesions observed by the Ramazzini researchers, and helped with the statistical evaluation of data.

The Italian scientists concluded that aspartame is a "multipotential carcinogen", causing a dose-related increase in leukaemias and lymphomas in female rats, and a dose-related increase in incidence of cancer and its precursors in the kidney (renal pelvis and ureter) as well as tumours in the peripheral nerves, in particular in cranial nerves.

Aspartame is metabolised into aspartic acid, phenylalanine and methanol. Methanol is in turn metabolised to formaldehyde. Previous large-scale experiments by the Ramazzini Foundation have linked both methanol and formaldehyde to a significant increase of leukaemias and lymphomas, the researchers say. However, they point out that the other sorts of cancer they observed in their aspartame study did not show up in studies on methanol and formaldehyde, suggesting an urgent need to study whether aspartic acid or phenylalanine were also potential carcinogens.

The researchers also found that while rats fed aspartame ate less food, there was no difference in weight between treated and untreated animals. The first results have been published in the foundation's journal, the European Journal of Oncology, and have been peer-reviewed by seven international experts, according to the journal's editorial board. The second results have not yet been peer-reviewed.

The foundation is now planning to enlarge its study to embryonic rats and mice - work that will take several years to complete. Meanwhile, one of the authors of the study, Fiorella Belpoggi said: "In our opinion, the results of our first experiment on aspartame call for urgent reconsideration of the rules governing its use as an artificial sweetener."

One of the largest manufacturers of aspartame, Ajinomoto, the Japanese multinational which also makes monosodium glutamate, has challenged the research. Its senior scientists said they did not agree with the interpretation of results, nor did they believe that the study's protocols met internationally approved standards. They said the results were not statistically significant, that numerous studies had shown aspartame was safe, and that regulatory bodies around the world had concluded it was safe.

"Aspartame has a record of 25 years of safe use. Aspartame is made from amino acids and is broken down into common dietary components. Aspartame itself therefore brings nothing new to the diet," a spokesman said. "Raising ill-founded fears about an ingredient which helps people to control calorie intake is not benign."

The International Sweeteners Association said last week: "Aspartame is one of the most tested food ingredients ever and all evaluations undertaken by independent risk assessors at international, European, and national level have concluded that aspartame is a safe foodstuff ... Aspartame can make a useful contribution to weight control. With billions of man-years of safe use, there is no indication of an association between aspartame and cancer in humans."

Aspartame was approved for use by the US Food and Drug Administration in 1981, and for use in soft drinks a couple of years later. The FDA looked at four previous studies conducted for the industry on whether aspartame causes cancer.

One had reported an increase in brain tumours in rats, although the FDA ruled that parts of the study were flawed. Three others concluded it was not carcinogenic. When the FDA reviewed all the data, it concluded that there was no evidence of a carcinogenic effect on the brains of animals. A review of all the data on aspartame was carried out in 2002 by the European commission's scientific committee on food. It concluded that it was safe and reconfirmed the previously established acceptable daily intake of the additive.

Speaking on behalf of Ajinomoto, Ewan Currie, of the Aspartame Information Service, said: "We are confident that when it has been scrutinised by third parties, aspartame will be exonerated."

Footnotes

Peripheral nerves: Parts of motor and sensory nerves, branch from the brain and spinal cord

Leukaemias and lymphomas: Malignant diseases of the blood and lymphatic system. Lymphomas are tumours arising from lymphoid tissue

Acceptable daily intake: The amount of an additive the regulatory authorities calculate a person may eat/drink each day without causing any known harm to health. The UK ADI for aspartame is 0-40mg per kg of body weight

Epidemiological data: The pattern of disease in the population as a whole

http://www.prisonplanet.com/Pages/Oc...5aspartame.htm

[sambalam]

i react to aspartame. last week i had a drink with (unbeknownst to me) aspartame in it and it gave me the worst headaches i've ever had. i had the first one for 3 days and the one after that for 2, i then twigged and checked the label, then chucked the stuff out.

[Sherrie]

The study results that were published in July: http://www.ramazzini.it/fondazione/d...ameGEO2005.pdf

They held a conference a couple of weeks ago involving:

"The aims of this year’s conference are to:

-update the state of knowledge on carcinogenic risks, of which we have long been aware and which still remain present in the workplace and general environment, in order to define the scientific bases for more stringent regulations and more effective prevention. Paradigmatic examples include asbestos, benzene, some pesticides, ionizing radiation etc;

-present the results of studies on hazardous agents and situations brought about by recent technological innovations and new lifestyles in order to suggest the application of new strategies for prevention;

-evaluate data on the diffusion of industrial hazards from developed to developing nations;

-review the scientific tools currently available for prevention and if necessary, re-direct the strategies."

"During the conference, FER will present the results of four important studies including:

-final results of the research on the carcinogenic effects of aspartame

-results of the research on the carcinogenic effects of exposure to low dose ionizing radiation

-the long term effects of Coca-Cola consumed by rats as a substitute for drinking water over the course of their life span

-results of an experiment to evaluate the carcinogenic effects of arsenic"

Sounds interesting!

[Sherrie]

Another one:


Aspartame Causes Cancer in Rats at Levels Currently Approved for Humans


Aspartame Causes Cancer in Rats at Levels Currently Approved for Humans
Category: Public Health News
Article Date: 23 Nov 2005
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medi...?newsid=34040#


A statistically significant increase in the incidence of malignant tumors, lymphomas and leukemias in rats exposed to varying doses of aspartame appears to link the artificial sweetener to a high carcinogenicity rate, according to a study accepted for publication today by the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP). The authors of the study, the first to demonstrate multipotential carcinogenic effects of aspartame administered to rats in feed, called for an "urgent reevaluation" of the current guidelines for the use and consumption of this compound.

"Our study has shown that aspartame is a multipotential carcinogenic compound whose carcinogenic effects are also evident at a daily dose of 20 milligrams per kilogram of body weight (mg/kg), notably less than the current acceptable daily intake for humans," the authors write. Currently, the acceptable daily intake for humans is set at 50 mg/kg in the United States and 40 mg/kg in Europe.

Aspartame is the second most widely used artificial sweetener in the world. It is found in more than 6,000 products including carbonated and powdered soft drinks, hot chocolate, chewing gum, candy, desserts, yogurt, and tabletop sweeteners, as well as some pharmaceutical products like vitamins and sugar-free cough drops. More than 200 million people worldwide consume it. The sweetener has been used for more than 30 years, having first been approved by the FDA in 1974. Studies of the carcinogenicity of aspartame performed by its producers have been negative.

Researchers administered aspartame to Sprague-Dawley rats by adding it to a standard diet. They began studying the rats at 8 weeks of age and continued until the spontaneous death of each rat. Treatment groups received feed that contained concentrations of aspartame at dosages simulating human daily intakes of 5,000, 2,500, 500, 100, 20, and 4 mg/kg body weight. Groups consisted of 100 males and 100 females at each of the three highest dosages and 150 males and 150 females at all lower dosages and controls.

The experiment ended after the death of the last animal at 159 weeks. At spontaneous death, each animal underwent examination for microscopic changes in all organs and tissues, a process different from the aspartame studies conducted 30 years ago and one that was designed to allow aspartame to fully express any carcinogenic potential.

The treated animals showed extensive evidence of malignant cancers including lymphomas, leukemias, and tumors at multiple organ sites in both males and females. The authors speculate the increase in lymphomas and leukemias may be related to one of the metabolites in aspartame, namely methanol, which is metabolized in both rats and humans to formaldehyde. Both methanol and formaldehyde have shown links to lymphomas and leukemias in other long-term experiments by the same authors.

The current study included more animals over a longer period than earlier studies. "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 authors wrote.

The authors of the study were Morando Soffritti, Fiorella Belpoggi, Davide Degli Esposti, Luca Lambertini, Eva Tibaldi, and Anna Rigano of the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center, European Ramazzini Foundation of Oncology and Environmental Sciences, Bologna, Italy. Funding for the research was provided by the European Ramazzini Foundation of Oncology and Environmental Sciences, Bologna, Italy. The article is available free of charge, click here.

EHP is published by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. EHP EHP is an Open Access journal. More information is available online at http://www.ehponline.org.

[Sherrie]

New Mexico Aspartame Battle Depends On Attorney General's Opinion

From Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum.
Bettym19@mindspring.com
12-15-5

www.rense.com

Release date: 2005-12-14

(Newswire Today) _ Santa Fe, New Mexico, 2005-12-14 - Aspartame Battle in NM shifts from Boards to Attorney General's Opinion on how an FDA approved product and neurotoxic food and medicine additive can be challenged despite industry claims of federal preemption.

Both the New Mexico Board of Pharmacy and the Environmental Improvement Board have petitions before them to amend the Administrative Code with a new chapter which bans neurotoxic additives, to medications and to foods.

There are over 6000 food products with aspartame and over 500 medications, primarily children's meds and vitamins, which contain aspartame, even though everyone knows that it turns to Formaldehyde (among other toxic metabolites).

The world's largest Aspartame manufacturer, Ajinomoto (also the world's largest MSG manufacturer) has hired the Rodey Firm and a Washington D.C. law firm FDA specialist to hammer these two boards into silence and to force them to abandon any future hearings on aspartame, primarily riding on the absurd legal logic that because aspartame was approved by the FDA, any state level challenge would therefore be preempted by the Federal approval.

The Ajinomoto/Rodey lawyer in so many words told the Pharmacy Board on November 14 that they didn't have the expertise nor the manpower to read, let alone to comprehend the FDA's one to ten million pages proving that aspartame was safe, even though 6 out of 9 of them are pharmacists, and that the reason the petitioners, myself and Santa Fe Pediatrician Ken Stoller, came to them instead of the FDA with this petition, is that we thought they "must be easier to push around."

In fact, the FDA has ignored all of the petitions to ban aspartame, and a meaningful preemption for aspartame is impossible, given the political channels used to get its approval in 1981, and for soft drinks, over the objections of the National Soft Drink Association, in 1983. I believe that the FDA's approval processes for food additives are so corrupt and manipulated by corporate mendacity and phony research, that the states' regulatory processes are the only possible salvation for health in America.

Under pressure from Ajinomoto/Rodey and a bit less pressure from the Montgomery and Andrews firm, retained by industry front group, the Calorie Control Council, both boards have asked Attorney General Patricia Madrid for a formal Attorney General's Opinion as to whether this Federal-preemption-due-to-FDA-approval crumbling mythologies will prevent any action by the two boards.

The co-petitioners and other consumer advocates who recognize the importance of this Attorney General's Opinion are hopeful that with her generally strong stands for New Mexico states' rights over the past 7 years, as well as the clear authority for these boards explicitly delineated in several NM statutes to examine such questions, that her Opinion will be a landmark one for consumer protection efforts in every state.

Rather than wait till such opinion is delivered, however, I encourage the reader to write to the Honorable Patricia Madrid, and to her Deputy, the Honorable Stuart Bluestone, the Bataan Building, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501, and make your views known. You can contact them directly at (505) 827-6000 and (505) 827-6004, and you can email them as well. You can also discuss this urgent medical need with your legislators and encourage them to support the creation of a powerful new New Mexico Nutrition Council, described in Senator Altamirano's Senate Bill 525 from 2005, which you can read on the NM Legislature website. Altamirano is the President Pro Tempore of the New Mexico Senate.

Governor Bill Richardson's views on this are clear: he supports the EIB's decision to move forward with aspartame hearings, because "the Federal government has not done enough to warn people about the dangers of aspartame," he stated on October 5 to the Albuquerque Journal. Richardson can be reached at 505 827-3000; Press Sec. is Billy Sparks.

For more information, please go to the website for the World Natural Health Organization, wnho.net, and for the Aspartame Toxicity Information Center, in Concord, New Hampshire. Please closely examine the articles by H.J.Roberts, M.D., author of Aspartame Disease: an Ignored Epidemic, and by Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock, M.D., author of Exicitoxins: the Taste that Kills.

The Aspartame/formaldehyde and the Thimerosal/mercury in vaccines are tied to together in these considerations before the two New Mexico Boards, because they are both proven neurotoxins with deadly neurodegenerative effects, and this is the subject of the additional chapter for the Administrative Code. Such additions are the concerns of the Boards and Commissions. The statutes delineating the entire authority to implement these permanent bans are cited in detail at www.wnho.net, click on aspartame.

It is very clear that a great deal depends on the Attorney General's Opinion as a formal legal document, because if states are powerless to question any FDA approved product, then the corporate plutocracy/kleptocracy and "toxic idiocracy" which has dumped all of these neurotoxic additives and carcinogens into the American diet and American pharmacology win the right to keep doing so, to the extreme detriment of the health of every American.

The international implications are clear also, since these same corporations like Ajinomoto and many American companies use their products FDA approval to push approval through in hundreds of other nations in the world, by saying: "The FDA has the most stringent approval processes in the world."

Clearly, this is an absurd and flawed bit of logic, and once it is dispensed with and these crumbling mythologies are discarded forever, everyone's health can improve, particularly that of the children in New Mexico, in the United States, and all over the world.

The aspartame corporate dominoes are beginning to fall, starting in New Mexico, through the relevant regulatory bodies of the state, and this consumer protection effort could take place in every state in the United States, depending on the statutes of each state, and the energy advocates are willing to devote to this vital and long overdue effort.

Stephen Fox
New Millennium Fine Art
stephen[...]santafefineart.com
505 983-2002

Agency/Source: New Mexico Nutrition Council

Related Link: http://wnho.net



Note from Dr. Betty Martini, Founder, Mission Possible Intl, 9270 River Club Parkway, Duluth, Georgia 30097:, 770 242-2599 : For those who want to help please write the Attorney General today at the address above. Remember if we can get aspartame out of New Mexico we can get it off the planet. Help set a precedent for the world to follow. This is very very important. If you're a victim explain what it has done to your life. Give the Attorney General encouragement. If you want to keep up with stay what is going on you can subscribe to the Aspartame Information List on www.wnho.net You can also get information on aspartame from http://www.dorway.com and the Aspartame Toxicity Center, http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

The Aspartame documentary is Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World, www.docworkers.com Show it everywhere. You can get 24 page booklets on asparstame for distribution called the Artificially Sweetened Times from the Idaho Observer, www.idaho-observer.com The new ones have information on New Mexico.

© PRZOOM.com - NewswireToday.com - Press Release
& Newswire Distribution Network.

[Sherrie]

New Fed Aspartame 'Study'
Is Cockamamie Claptrap

http://www.rense.com/general70/coca.htm

[Sherrie]

Remember that 7 year study on aspartame by the European Ramazzini Foundation?

Well here's an interview straight from the source:

'Yes, Aspartame Is a Carcinogen'


Francesca Colombo*

BOLOGNA, Apr 15 (Tierramérica) - The Italian scientist Morando Soffritti has revived the debate about the safety of aspartame, an artificial sweetener used in many popular products, including diet softdrinks made by Coca-Cola and Pepsi Co. After studying 1,800 rats over eight years, his research team concluded that aspartame could have carcinogenic effects.

The results, first released in July 2005 and published in March in the U.S. Department of Health's journal, "Environmental Health Perspectives", contradict other studies financed by the company that created the sweetner, G.D. Searle & Company, which assures aspartame poses no risks to human health.

For the past 25 years, the product has been authorised by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for human consumption.

The sale of aspartame, with only four calories per gram and 200 times sweeter than sugar, is sold under the trademarks NutraSweet and Equal, bringing in 570 million dollars a year. It is estimated that some 350 million people around the world, many in hopes of losing weight, consume aspartame daily through 6,000 kinds of foods and beverages. In Europe alone, 2,000 tonnes of the sweetener are sold annually.

Soffritti's investigation was conducted at the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Centre, of the European Ramazzini Foundation in Bologna, which he heads. This institution, founded in 1971, won international credibility when it uncovered the cancer-causing properties of the gasoline additive MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether), which led to its ban in 21 U.S. states.

Tierramérica spoke with Soffritti in Italy. Following are excerpts from that dialogue:

Q: What are the results of your investigations conducted between 1997 and 2005 about the effect of aspartame?

A: The results indicate that aspartame is a multi-potential carcinogen, even consumed daily at 20 milligrams per kilogram of body weight. That is a lower quantity than the maximum recommended by the FDA (50 mg/kg of body weight) and the European Union (40 mg/kg).

Q: What kind of cancer does it produce?

A: Our study showed for the first time that aspartame increases the incidence of malignant tumours in rats. In the females it increases leukaemia and lymphomas, as well as cancerous cells in the pelvis and urethra. In the males, it especially increases the incidence of malignant tumours in peripheral nerves.

Q: How many rats were studied and what method was used?

A: We studied 1,800 rats (Sprague-Dawley) that were raised for this purpose. We gave them, by groups, doses similar to those ingested daily by people, of 5,000, 2,500, 500, 100, 20, 4 or 0 mg/kg of body weight. Aspartame was added to the standard diet (seven doses in the food).
The experiment began when the animals were eight months old and lasted until their natural death, at 159 weeks. When the rats died we conducted histopathological studies of their organs and tissues. We analysed more than 30,000 samples.

Q: Can it be assumed that what happened in the rats could also happen in human beings?

A: According to an investigation of cancer by the World Heath Organisation, the experimental study of carcinogenic agents in rats is very important for humans. One-third of the cancer-causing agents in man have been discovered with experiments conducted on animals.

Q: Aspartame is sold mainly as a means for people to control their weight. In your experiment, did the animals lose weight?

A: No. We saw that those consuming aspartame ate less, but their body weight remained the same. We don't have an explanation for that, not in our field.

Q: Aspartame is also consumed by children and by pregnant women. What effects could it have on them?

A: The study of the doses correlated between the milligrams that were consumed and body weight. This tells us that the carcinogenic effect in children could be greater (because of their lower weight). The carcinogenic agents have a stronger effect on the embryo, which is why pregnant women are at greater risk.

Q: Are people who consume aspartame condemned to developing cancer?

A: Cancer is related to many factors and to genetics. We can't say that a consumer of aspartame will develop cancer. There are people who smoke cigarettes their entire lives and never develop lung cancer.

Q: There are several studies that assure aspartame is harmless to human health. What is the difference between those and the study that you led?

A: First, those studies about the cancerous effect in rats and mice were done in the 1970s, before the commercialisation of aspartame began, and were paid for by the companies that produced [the sweetener].
The results of those studies did not show that aspartame was carcinogenic. But some members of the scientific community doubt the quality of of those experiments because some animals that consumed aspartame presented with brain tumours, while the control animals didn't have any problems.
Second, those studies utilised fewer animals (280 and 688 rats) and were not conducted according to the standards of "Good Laboratory Practices", so one cannot conclude with certainty that aspartame is not a carcinogen. Our research centre is independent. It doesn't receive any financing from the industry producing the product.

Q: Are new scientific studies about the potential cancer-causing effects of aspartame necessary?

A: Yes, more studies are needed in order to obtain greater precision in quantifying the risk. The current results already demand -- by the competent bodies -- an urgent review of the norms regulating the use and consumption of aspartame in order to protect public health, especially children's health.

Q: Your study is being reviewed by the European Commission's Food Safety Authority, which will issue a statement in May. Do you think it will validate your study, and do you think government agencies in Europe and elsewhere should ban aspartame?

A: I hope they revise their current regulations.

(* Francesca Colombo is a Tierramérica contributor. Originally published Apr. 8 by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme.)

(END/2006)

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32904[/b]

[Sherrie]

Remember the big Italian study? Well they have released a new one which reports and expands on the previous one...

"The results of this carcinogenicity bioassay not only confirm, but also reinforce the first experimental demonstration of APM's multipotential carcinogenicity at a dose level close to the acceptable daily intake (ADI) for humans. Furthermore, the study demonstrates that when lifespan exposure to APM begins during foetal life, its carcinogenic effects are increased," wrote lead author Morando Soffritti.

Article:


New study reignites aspartame cancer concerns

Heres the actual study:

Lifespan Exposure to Low Doses of Aspartame Beginning During Prenatal Life Increases Cancer Effects in Rats

[LC_Dave]

Just as we mock the romans for having lead in their water pipes,

future human generation will be in their rights to mock the chemicals we consume.

What's worse about aspartame is that nobody will listen to me, whether it's artciles I show them, or relay my honest personal tale.

PEOPLE JUST WILL NOT LISTEN.

[Sherrie]

Hawaiian Legislative Efforts to Ban Aspartame, Artificial Sweetener

[melvan]

Finally somebody in the States is working on that, it's about time...