It's Official, This Sweetener Is The Devil

I hate to be the bearer of bad news. 

Wait, no I don't...not if it means it could prevent you from developing cancer or succumbing to a number of other potentially awful conditions.

One of America's most popular artificial sweeteners, the heir to aspartame and saccharine, has now been determined to be potentially fatal.

The worst thing is just how pervasive this chemical additive is. I mean, it's in just about everything.

In a new and damning report, it was revealed the artificial sweetener Splenda has been linked to a series of deadly diseases; it was most strongly associated with leukemia, as well as other blood cancers.

Considering how many different products Splenda (aka sucralose) is found in, this is bad news for millions.

It's believed Splenda can be found in an estimated 4,500 different products throughout the United States. Sucralose has been touted as a healthier alternative to sugar and other controversial sweeteners, but it looks like that just isn't the case.

In this landmark study, researchers concluded Splenda was a potential carcinogen after studying what happened to mice who were given the artificial low-cal sweetener.

For the new study, published in the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, researchers fed 457 male mice and 396 female mice 0; 500; 2,000; 8,000; or 16,000 ppm of sucralose added to their feed from 12 days of gestation through death.

The researchers found an overall increased incidence of malignant cancer in male mice with increasing amounts of Splenda in the rodents' diets. They also found significantly increased incidence of leukemia in male mice, especially at 2,000 ppm and 16,000 ppm.

Now without being overly hasty, I should stress just because one study concludes this about Splenda doesn't mean it's a verified fact...

However, I wouldn't be wrong to say Splenda and other artificial sweeteners are dangerous. 

I've warned about the dangers of artificial sweeteners in other articles I've written.

This study showing a correlation to Splenda consumption and cancer risk isn't ground-breaking, necessarily.

Why You Should Be Worried About The Chemical Makeup Of Splenda

The truth is, this study confirms what many people have already begun to expect in regards to the chemical makeup of Splenda.

Believe it or not (here's a link in case you don't believe it), Splenda was originally developed for agricultural use...as a pesticide.

It was only when the makers of Splenda accidentally realized it was sweet to the taste and had alternative uses as a low-calorie sweetener that it assumed its popular role as a sugar-free sweetening substitute. 

Now I'm not going to get on a very tall soap box here (just a small one), and I'm going to come out against what happened afterwards.

In the interest of profit over human health, Splenda was then introduced to the public and sold as yet another option to help dieters avoid sugar.

It's really too bad this is the schtick companies stick with in the race to make a profit.

Surprisingly, Splenda was never subjected to rigorous testing, but it made its way onto the market as a consumer product anyway.  

Here's a quote from the article I linked to above talking about how Splenda finally made its way onto the shelves.

"Sucralose (Splenda) was declared safe by the Food and Drug Administration in 1998, but most taste researchers I talked to won’t eat it. “I look at that structure and I have an irrational fear of it,” one of them said. 'I’ve seen the safety studies, and you feed it to rats and mice forever and nothing happens. But it just scares me.'"

The only problem is now we have studies showing rats developing cancer because of Splenda consumption.

Here's another thing that ought to make you sick to your stomach....

Why I Think Splenda Is One Of The Scariest Artificial Sweeteners Around

A few years before I was born, there was this big crisis in the state of California.

Toward the end of the 70's, a very rare bid in California was slowly slipping into endangered status. The California Condor, one of the largest flying birds on Earth, was failing to reproduce. The reason why is because the shells of the bird's eggs were too thin and brittle to support a healthy chick.

The reason this was happening was because farmers in the state (along with farmers all over the nation) were spraying a very specific, very harmful pesticide on their crops.

That pesticide was DDT, and DDT has since been banned because of its dangerous chemical makeup.

The crazy thing here is, molecularly speaking, Splenda is almost a carbon copy of DDT. Remember, it was originally discovered because researchers were trying to find a new pesticide, and so it appears they stumbled upon one that wasn't DDT but was pretty close.

And now it's in your soda...

That's kinda of creepy, don't you think?

It's for these reasons publications like the Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health have created long lists of health concerns associated with Splenda, including "toxicity, DNA damage, and heightened carcinogenic potential when used in cooking," and more.

Not to mention the fact it can actually work against your ability to lose weight and balance blood sugar.

Use This Instead Of Splenda 

Just because Splenda has been found to be less than desirable doesn't mean your low-calorie sweetener fixes are impossible.

I recommend low-calorie Stevia. It's very concentrated and can really help out people who have conditions like diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and those who just have trouble managing blood sugar levels.

Stevia is all-natural and comes from the leaf of the plant Stevia Rebiana; if you're getting raw Stevia, there's nothing to worry about. Stay away from Stevia products mixed with erythritol, as erythritol is usually made out of GMO corn.