| "What a bizarre statement." Exactly, I don't have diabetes and I always choose the sugar-free ones because of their reduced calories. I'm not implying that artificial sweeteners are completely safe as I simply don't know—and that's the real problem. What's damn annoying about these studies is that there are many artificial sweeteners with vastly different chemical structures but generally they're all lumped together. If the gut microbiome is affected and it increases diabetes risk then it's hard to believe that these vastly different chemistries would all have the same effect. On the other hand, if the body responds badly to the sensation of sweetness then that could explain the result—all other factors being equal. It seems obvious to me the first job is to determine whether sweetness itself is a factor before anything else. The 'debate' over artificial sweeteners has been raging for many decades and it's high time it was resolved to avoid confusion. For example where I am the star rating system gives artificially sweetened drinks typically 3.5/5 versus a worse figure of 1–2/5 for those sweetened with sugar. We need to have faith in officially sanctioned government health warnings. |