Worse news about sucralose....

Today's Post:  Tuesday, 7-8-2014

Since the time of the poison gasses of World War I chlorinated hydrocarbons have been used as poison gasses and insecticides.

Chlorine gas is harmful and chlorinated hydrocarbons often are.

So, when I found out that Sucralose (Splenda is a trade name for it) was in essence chlorinated sugar, a hydrocarbon, I suspected it was likely best to avoid ingesting it.

In fact, it apparently was created in hopes of being an insecticide.  The idea was to make something that would be sweet enough to attract bugs; but would harm them at the same time.

(Mixing boric acid with real sugar does do that and kills roaches.)

But they found it was sweeter than sugar and hard enough to digest it had the effect of almost no calories.  And, they found it wasn’t as toxic to insects as they had hoped.

Surprisingly, they then got it passed as an artificial sweetener.

We already know that sucralose is one of the artificial sweeteners that tend to be fattening by causing your body to crave real sugar and by being so sweet that it tends to increase the amount of sugar you need to taste as sweet.

We already know that people who get these artificial sweeteners in diet soft drinks tend to be even fatter with bigger waists than people who drink regular soft drinks which are also fattening.

And, sucralose is on the list of artificial sweeteners that are thought to have some risk of causing cancer.

More recently research found that sucralose causes several changes in metabolic processes in the body none of which are beneficial.

Then it was found that ingesting sucralose killed a very large number of bacteria in the gut.

Since most of these are probiotic bacteria that help you digest your food and help keep inflammation low and prevent harmful bacteria from moving in, sucralose likely should have been banned at that point.

It did occur to me when I read of that research that maybe sucralose could help kill off bacteria that cause diarrhea such as cholera and C. Difficile.

 I don’t know if that’s been tried or not.

The new information suggests it might not work very well because sucralose tested as killing probiotic bacteria better than harmful bacteria.  Too bad it’s not the same or the reverse.

And, tests found it caused DNA damage which is one of the causes of cancer and aging.

(If you must have some sweet things and want to use no sugar, it turns out that moderate use of the natural sugar alcohol, erythritol, solves these problems.  It tested as not causing the blood sugar changes that make people crave sugar.  It’s a bit less sweet than sugar, so unlike the artificial sweeteners, real sugar still tastes sweet enough instead the reverse.  As a result, unlike the artificial sweeteners, using some erythritol is not fattening.  And, in moderate quantities or small quantities it is not gas producing in your gut as xylitol and the other sugar alcohols are.

Or you can have half erythritol and half sugar using a kind of sugar with added flavor such as honey, dark molasses, or real maple syrup. That combination has half the sugar and half the calories and is about as sweet.)

But whether you cut way back on real sugar or cut back some on sweetened foods and use erythritol for the rest, you can easily do without sucralose.

It certainly looks to be well worth avoiding!

Here are the quotes that caught my attention and the link to the Medical News Today study:

[I added the bolding.]

"At concentrations typically used in foods and drinks, sucralose suppresses beneficial bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract with less effect on pathogenic bacteria," article co-author Susan Schiffman, Ph.D said. 

"Most consumers are unaware of these effects because no warning label appears on products containing sucralose." 

Schiffman also said went onto say that the change in balance of gastrointestinal bacteria has been associated with weight gain and obesity. 

At elevated levels, sucralose also damages DNA. 

These biological effects occur at the levels of sucralose currently approved by regulatory agencies for use in the food supply."

Popular artificial sweetener not so sweet

http://mnt.to/l/4nWX

One of the active ingredients in a popular artificial sweetener could have the 

potential to limit the impact of therapeutic drugs, reduce the number and 

balance of beneficial bacteria in the…