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Many people regularly consume various drinks, mineral waters or juices sweetened with artificial sweeteners. They believe that by doing so they are doing something for their weight and health.
However, we must disabuse you. Artificial sweeteners do not add to your health, but destroy it.
According to experts, national health authorities should warn about these products similarly to how they do in the case of cigarettes, alcohol or drinks sweetened with regular sugar.
Suzan E. Swithers, PhD., Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Purdue University, says that we should limit not only sugar intake, but also intake of artificial sweeteners.
She reviewed several recent studies that dealt with the effect of artificial sweeteners on human health. She found that up to 30% of adults and 15% of children consume products containing aspartame, sucralose or saccharin.
As she states:
“These days there are great pressures to address the problems of overweight and obesity, which are becoming chronic diseases.
This creates a huge opportunity for the food industry to profit from selling products that contain few calories. “
This topic even becomes a political debate, because many politicians are coming up with proposals to burden foods high in sugar with extra taxes or to restrict their availability, for example in schools or hospitals.
The main problem with artificial sweeteners
The problem is that most of these measures do not concern artificial sweeteners, because they are seen as a healthier alternative to sugar. However, this is not true.
It turns out that artificial sweeteners confuse the body’s natural ability to regulate calorie processing.
This is because their consumption deceives the organism into thinking it has consumed sugar, whereas sugar was not actually present.
Such deception of the body increases the risk of developing metabolic syndrome up to twofold.
What happens in your body after consuming artificial sweeteners
Research has shown that regular consumption of artificial sweeteners leads to the following health problems:
1. Diabetes and metabolic syndrome
The journal Diabetes Care published in 2009 a study that showed that consumption of artificial sweeteners increases the risk of metabolic syndrome by 36% and type 2 diabetes by up to 67%.
Artificial sweeteners disrupt the connection between the digestive tract and the brain, which derails metabolism.
Experts from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel found that these drinks can adversely change your gut microbiota.
They fed mice calorie-free sweeteners such as saccharin, aspartame and sucralose. The mice fed in this way developed glucose intolerance over time.
2. Depression
Consuming more than 4 glasses of drinks with artificial sweeteners daily represents a 30% higher risk of diabetes.
On the other hand, drinking 4 cups of coffee (unsweetened) reduces this risk by 10%.
3. Lung damage
Artificial sweeteners increase the risk of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
According to one Australian study, 13% of patients with asthma and 16% of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease consumed more than 2 glasses of diet drinks daily.
4. Kidney damage
Experts at Harvard examined people who had drunk beverages with artificial sweeteners for more than 20 years.
They found that in these people it led to up to a 30% decrease in kidney function.
5. Cardiovascular disease
A study conducted at the University of Miami and Columbia University included 2,000 adults whom it examined over a 10-year period.
It concluded that those who consumed these beverages had a higher risk of heart attack and stroke. They also had a much higher risk of death from heart disease.
6. Brain damage
Aspartame, which is a frequently used artificial sweetener in many drinks, damages the brain’s antioxidant defense mechanisms.
Its long-term consumption increases the imbalance of oxidative processes, mainly through the glutathione defense mechanism.
Moreover, it has been shown that aspartame significantly increases the risk of developing tumors in the brain.
