diet soda's bad too from what I understand. The aspartame breaks down into formaldehyde in the body. The FDA concludes that aspartame has no carcinogenic properties, and yet curiously, will admit that aspartame metabolizes into formaldehyde, a known carcinogen, before leaving the digestive tract. This seems to be a semantic run-around. The FDA won't conclude something is carcinogenic for what it metabolizes into.
So the FDA concludes that aspartame has no association with cancer, and there are many citations for this, and yet, curiously, the FDA also concludes that formaldehyde is carcinogenic, and that aspartame breaks down into formaldehyde before it leaves the digestive tract. This seems to be a semantic run-around. The FDA won't conclude something is carcinogenic for what it metabolizes into, only for what it is. Common sense would dictate that this should not be enough to determine food safety. The FDA's approval process for aspartame was furthermore problematic, and fraught with conflicts of interest. Donald Rumsfeld, who was a former member of the U.S. Congress and the Chief of Staff in the Gerald Ford Administration, was hired as G.D. Searle’s President. Attorney James Turner, Esq. alleged that G.D. Searle hired Rumsfeld to handle the aspartame approval difficulties as a “legal problem rather than a scientific problem.” (US Senate 1987). For this approval process, Rumsfeld hired the following people:
- John Robson as Executive Vice President. He was a former lawyer with Sidley and Austin, Searle’s Law Firm and also served as chairman of the Civil Aeronautics Board, which was then connect to the Department of Transportation.
- Robert Shapiro as General Counsel. He is now head of Searle’s NutraSweet Division. He had been Robson’s Special Assistant at the Department of Transportation.
- William Greener, Jr., as Chief Spokesman. He was a former spokesman in the [Gerald] Ford White House.
Donald Rumsfeld was on the Board of Directors of the Chicago Tribune which recently wrote a glowing article about the NutraSweet Company.
On January 10, 1977, FDA Chief Counsel Richard Merrill recommended to U.S. Attorney Sam Skinner in a 33-page letter detailing violations of the law that a grand jury be set up to investigate G.D. Searle. In the letter, Merrill stated:
“We request that your office convene a Grand Jury investigation into apparent violations of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, 21 U.S..C. 331(e), and the False Reports to the Government Act, 18 U.S.C. 1001, by G.D. Searle and Company and three of its responsible officers 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 the drug Aldactone and the food additive Aspartame.”
Aspartame has been controversial since day one. Searle, the manufacturer, had failed to win FDA approval for 16 years and was under investigation for performing fraudulent studies. Aspartame was suddenly approved in 1981 when Donald Rumsfeld, former CEO of Searle and new member of President Ronald Reagan's transition team, appointed a new FDA commissioner.
The controversy never died down. Today for example, the State of New Mexico is attempting to ban aspartame. It is banned in Japan and officially discouraged in China. But in the USA, the FDA and lobbying groups like the Calorie Council continue to proclaim its safety.
A 1996 review of past research conducted on aspartame found that every industry-funded study had said the sweetener was safe to consume. However 92 percent of independent studies claim one or more problems exist with its use, the British newspaper the Guardian reported. FullerFalafelLover (talk) 13:57, 14 July 2022 (UTC)
