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Medicine Biotech

Sugar-Free Products Might Actually Stop Us From Getting Slimmer (dw.com) 172

Nutritionists suspected that artificial sweeteners weren't really helping people lose weight, according to a new article submitted by schwit1. Now there's hints of proof in a new aspartame study by the Massachusetts General Hospital. "We found that aspartame blocks a gut enzyme called intestinal alkaline phosphatase," explains Professor Hodin. IAP is produced in the small intestine. "We previously showed [this enzyme] can prevent obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome [a disease characterized by a combination of obesity, high blood pressure, a metabolic disorder and insulin resistance]. So, we think that aspartame might not work because, even as it is substituting for sugar, it blocks the beneficial aspects of IAP...."

The researchers confirmed their suspicions via a variety of tests on mice. In one case, they fed IAP directly to mice, who were also on a high-fat diet. It turned out that the IAP could effectively prevent the emergence of the metabolic syndrome. It also helped relieve symptoms in animals that were already suffering from the obesity-related illness.

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Sugar-Free Products Might Actually Stop Us From Getting Slimmer

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  • by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @03:40PM (#53372837) Journal
    Sugar free. First good. Then bad. Then good. Now bad again. Much like eggs (which seem to bounce between good and bad every 6-8 years). Moderation is really the key. Eat moderately, exercise moderately and you'll be OK.. Unless your genes say otherwise, that is...
    • Dr. Orva: Here. You smoke this, and be sure you get the smoke deep down into your lungs.

      Miles Monroe: I don't smoke.

      Dr. Orva: It's tobacco. It's one of the healthiest things for your body. Now go ahead. You need all the strength you can get.

    • They do the same with hamburger meat.

    • by Rei ( 128717 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @04:52PM (#53373159) Homepage

      Sigh... this again.

      Everything you eat can have good and bad effects. That a new good or bad effect to some particular food may be discovered in the future does not invalidate those discovered previously.

      Furthermore, a lot of the "refinements" are just that - refinements. For example, fat. First it was "too much fat is bad". Then we broke fats down: "saturated fat is bad, unsaturated fat is good". Then we broke those down. For example, "polyunsaturated fats are mixed but often bad, monounsaturated are mixed but often good". Then you break those down - for example, "omega-3 polyunsaturated are good, most of the others are consumed in too much quantity relative to the amount of omega-3". And then you break those down - "ALA omega-3 is good, but EPA and DHA are better".

      Just because you learn more and break categories down in more detail doesn't mean that the previous, more general statements, were wrong. Yes, sometimes things will actually be wrong, but that's not the general case; you just add more information to the corpus.

      As to this article:

      However, aspartame does not block the enzyme directly. It does so through one of its intestinal breakdown products called phenylalanine.

      So it's not actually a study on aspartame (which breaks down immediately in the stomach to phenylalanine, methanol and aspartic acid). Phenylalanine is an amino acid, found in many foods in quantities well more than in typical amounts of aspartame - for example, eggs, meat / seafood, nuts, legumes, dairy, etc are all high in phenylalanine. Basically, most source of protein are also major sources of phenylalanine. So why spin this study as an anti-aspartame study? And furthermore, are people who eat high protein diets (aka, rich in phenylalanine) famous for being overweight, for that matter?

      Looks like this study involved a questionable procedure I've seen in the past - feeding mice ad libitum either aspartame-sweetened water, or just plain water. The ones that had the sweetened water ate more and gained more weight. Great, except that's not comparing what you're claiming it's comparing. If you want to see the benefits of switching from sugary drinks to artificially sweetened ones, the control group should be drinking sugar sweetened water ad libitum, not plain water. At least in this study the sweetener was in the water in this one; I've seen some where they put the sweetener in the food. Which leads to the result "gee, I am so shocked that they ate more of their food after you sweetened it up". Even in this case, they're having a sweet liquid with their food, which could on its own explain why they're eating more of it. I'm no expert in the flavour of lab mouse food, but I'm going to wager that it's not the most delicious of substances on Earth.

      • Then we broke those down.

        "We" didn't, the food industry did, so that they could sell more food and/or charge more for pseudo health labeling.

        If you want to see the benefits of switching from sugary drinks to artificially sweetened ones, the control group should be drinking sugar sweetened water ad libitum, not plain water.

        That would answer "whether". We already know "whether" and would like to understand "why".... Specifically, the mechanism by which Aspartame promotes weight gain / hinders weight loss.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by cayenne8 ( 626475 )
        Here's the thing.

        Try to eat as much unprocessed whole foods...period.

        If you stick with a diet of foods (and yes, you need to learn the relatively EASY task of cooking your own food from scratch) composed in the majority of fresh vegetables, fruits and healthy protiens....you'll do much better.

        Your body is trained and knows how to process these and keep you healthy. If you're eating mostly vegetables, you'll be full and not overeat calorically....so, put those meats and stuff fin there too, but don't make

        • Exactly! Sugar-free and aspartame aren't even synonyms.

          Anything I would eat that is sugar-free is also aspartame-free, so the whole premise of the story is crap.

          Food. It's what's for dinner.

        • Oh look, unprocessed whole food woo [rationalwiki.org]. We should avoid vaccines too?

          Most people are kind of shocked to learn a poorly-tuned fast food diet (yes, even McDonalds) is actually as healthy (or more) as a heavy-tuned fruits-and-vegetables diet, so long as you avoid eating too god damned much. The problem is meats and complex foods in general (that is: hamburgers with ketchup and onions and lettuce) contain an average amount of nearly all nutrients; various plant-based foods are high in specific nutrients, altho

        • by kaybee ( 101750 )

          Except unprocessed whole foods is kind of unclear for many people, and some of them aren't necessarily healthy. If you ate nothing but raw honey all day then you'd have serious health issues. Then there is "whole grain wheat" which can be as little as 15% whole grain.

      • Looks like this study involved a questionable procedure I've seen in the past - feeding mice ad libitum either aspartame-sweetened water, or just plain water. The ones that had the sweetened water ate more and gained more weight. Great, except that's not comparing what you're claiming it's comparing. If you want to see the benefits of switching from sugary drinks to artificially sweetened ones, the control group should be drinking sugar sweetened water ad libitum, not plain water.

        I'm not sure what the study is "claiming it's comparing," but at face value I think the study is claiming that artificial sweeteners may have an effect that causes weight gain, whereas water does not. That's a distinct claim from the way many such sweeteners are marketed, where they assume there is no calories, therefore no impact on digestion or metabolism and thus no impact on the way people eat otherwise. (Basically, the substances are assumed to be inert.)

        You seem to want them to do a different stud

      • Everything you eat can have good and bad effects. That a new good or bad effect to some particular food may be discovered in the future does not invalidate those discovered previously.

        I'm sorry, but this is the wrong explanation. The right explanation is that doing nutritional research is hard and that nutritional claims are often not well-supported.

        There was never enough proof to say "Fat is bad for you", nor is there currently enough proof to say that "Saturated fat is bad for you". Besides being instantly suspect by being ridiculously simplistic, such claims are almost exclusively based on correlations or effects in high-risk groups. But people really want nutritional advice, so someb

        • You're free to disagree with all major medical associations on saturated fat's correlation with heart disease if you want.

          • Major medical associations use scientific conclusions to engineer a position. Scientific conclusions from decades ago were based on poor methodology; modern science has punched holes in those conclusions. If your major medical associations changed positions every time the wind blew, they'd give conflicting advice on a daily basis; part of their job is to resist change as a means to buffer hype, and that does put them behind the curve of inertia.
          • And this is how total misunderstanding of nutritional science spreads.

            Correlation does not equal causation and 'all major medical associations' do not disagree with me on this.
            There are plenty of studies that did not find any correlation or only a very very weak one between saturated fat and heart disease. Even if a correlation is found, it still does not prove causation.

      • This post by Rei just has so much smart thought put down in writing for the general public to consider, I had to post this saying so. Some common sense items that I never considered: rats probably like sweeter food. Rats probably don't like general lab food. When they do these tests, do they sweeten the food or the water?

        Thank you for the post!

    • by KiloByte ( 825081 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @05:30PM (#53373359)

      Sugar free. First good. Then bad. Then good. Now bad again.

      This article doesn't say a word about sugar. It's not sugar that's good, it's aspartame that's worse.

      And it was always a questionable ingredient, despite an overwhelming amount of sponsored research claiming that it's all ok.

      • by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @06:50PM (#53373721)

        And it was always a questionable ingredient, despite an overwhelming amount of sponsored research claiming that it's all ok.

        A good rule of thumb is don't eat anything that we didn't evolve to eat. If hunter-gathers didn't eat it, neither should you. I eat mostly roots, berries and grubs.

        • by tpgp ( 48001 )

          A good rule of thumb is don't eat anything that we didn't evolve to eat. If hunter-gathers didn't eat it, neither should you.

          Except, you're totally ignoring all the evolution that has happened since hunter-gathering times. Lactase persistence [wikipedia.org] for instance only evolved 5k-10k years ago

        • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward

          A good rule of thumb is don't eat anything that we didn't evolve to eat. If hunter-gathers didn't eat it, neither should you. I eat mostly roots, berries and grubs.

          I'm lucky, my genetic profile shows I descend from a bacon-hunting and pancake-gathering tribe!

      • by Tukz ( 664339 )

        And it was always a questionable ingredient, despite an overwhelming amount of sponsored research claiming that it's all ok.

        Just like sugar back in the days.

        Different day, different ingredient.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Gr8Apes ( 679165 )

      Sugar free. First good. Then bad. Then good. Now bad again.

      Actually - sugar-free is good, and has been good always. Sugar substitutes whose ingredients include toxins (methanol)? Now that sounds like it's just bad.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Yes, but here at least in the US sugar-free means one of the substitutes. Not actually free from that junk.

      • Sugar free isn't really good. Humans tend to seek out sugar. Most foods have sugars in them. Our bodies are designed to process them effectively.

        The problem is that people like to use fake sugar due to a fear of sugar, or they replace fat with sugar... These things confuse the digestive tract, which causes the body to do weird things it shouldn't do to compensate. It's why "sugar substitutes" that insulin doesn't break down seem to be contributors to diabetes in the long term.

        • by Gr8Apes ( 679165 )
          Sugar-free means free of added sugar, not free of normal natural sugars inherent in the food. Take a look at anything called "sugar-free" and this quickly becomes obvious when compared to their "normal" counterparts. Foods labeled "sugar-free" are inherently bad for you. Water, the ultimate free from sugar ingestible, is not so labeled as a counterpoint. You should read "sugar-free" as "contains artificially created sweetening agents that are known to cause cancer by the state of CA", or at least I'd assume
          • by gfxguy ( 98788 )
            Yes... the packaged fruit I sometimes buy (I buy a lot fresh, too, don't hassle me) doesn't say "sugar free," it says "no added sugar." Huge difference; people need to read beyond the splashy labels.
      • Just about anything can be toxic if levels exceed our bodies ability to deal with them.

        • by Gr8Apes ( 679165 )

          Just about anything can be toxic if levels exceed our bodies ability to deal with them.

          Moderation is key. I don't know of a single substance that an excess of won't kill you.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      it was always bad according to scientists that weren't paid by the people promoting aspartame

      ALWAYS

      This has been known longer than i have been alive but marketing > science to most people

    • Coffee is another one. Every 30 days or so, there is media coverage declaring coffee is healthy and good for you. And then 30 days after that, more media coverage declaring coffee is going to kill you.

      Ultimately life is fatal. We all die. I am not particularly interesting in living in a live sanitized and isolated for my protection and devoid of fun, just so I can maybe live a bit longer before I die. Screw that.

      But the aspartame thing makes sense. There are an awful lot of very heavy people who dri

    • Sugar-free was NEVER good, except for the chemical companies.
    • The consensus in the nutrition research boils down to two things:

      1. Don't eat too much.

      2. Eat mostly plants.

      If you want to add a #3, it would be "exercise."

      Other than those points, nutrition research says more about the scientists, the design of the studies, and the complexity of the human body than it does about what you should eat (and should generally be ignored).
    • by hoggoth ( 414195 )

      > Sugar free. First good. Then bad. Then good. Now bad again.

      No, sugar-free has always been good. Weird chemicals that simulate some of the taste properties of sugar while causing unknown side-effects are bad.

      I dropped all added sugar and much sugary foods from my diet with great results. That means no cake no cookies no ice-cream no soda. Few packaged-factory-produced foods of any type because its impossible to find them without tons of sugar. I have not replaced these with "diet" garbage.

  • Added sugar vs (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 27, 2016 @03:56PM (#53372891)

    There is a difference between adding aspartame and not adding it.

    Its not the absent of sugars that will stop us from getting slimmer. Its (allegedly) the adding of aspartame.
    So I should not eat carrots and tomatoes?
    "Sugar-Free Products Might Actually Stop Us From Getting Slimmer" I should drink more of Coca-Cola to get slimmer?

    PS
    Don't post this in the internet. Trump will now take this as we need more sugars in all food. "All I know is whats on the internet"
    Can someone call Bill Gates so he can remove it? He is the one with the off-switch, right?

  • Aspartame and Mice (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jwymanm ( 627857 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @03:58PM (#53372903) Homepage
    I hate these hit pieces about _all_ sugar free food when it is really about a specific calorie free sweetener in lab mice. I'd like to see other results using sugar alcohols, splenda, etc before saying they all do the same thing. I also would like to see it done in human trials. Not saying discount this test but it needs to be expanded and the frigging fake news (again!) headlines need to point out the specific substances involved and not label it everything. You suspect these are hit pieces because of this fact - but maybe it is just lazy journalism, who knows. Shills exist for every industry including both artificial and real sweeteners. My favorite for tea, Sweet'N Low caused cancer in rats' bladders but was shown not to in humans: http://www.health.com/health/g... [health.com]
    • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Sunday November 27, 2016 @04:24PM (#53373047) Homepage Journal

      There have been studies on other sweeteners. Basically all of the sugar alcohols except erythritol interfere with your system in some way when used as a sugar substitute... And maybe that one too, and they just haven't figured it out yet. Stevia, on the other hand, so far appears as if it may even be beneficial. If you don't mind that it tastes like a leaf.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • My guess is that it wouldn't work well in cakes or pies.

          Your guess is correct. I mix it with erythritol, you can also buy a product in which that is done for you. I have some right now, but forget what it's called.

      • by rhazz ( 2853871 )
        Stevia's taste is only awful if you compare it to the real sugar it is replacing. It is far better than aspertame.
  • by WolphFang ( 1077109 ) <m@conrad@202.gmail@com> on Sunday November 27, 2016 @04:00PM (#53372915)
    How long before this intestinal alkaline phosphatase (IAP) stuff comes as pills or a liquid in the herbs in bottles section of the store? The aspartame being potentially bad for you isn't the interesting part. This is the interesting part: ... fed IAP directly to mice, who were also on a high-fat diet. It turned out that the IAP could effectively prevent the emergence of the metabolic syndrome. It also helped relieve symptoms in animals that were already suffering from the obesity-related illness.
  • by Anonymous Coward

    "Sugar-Free Products Might Actually Stop Us From Getting Slimmer" should be
    "Aspartame Products Might Actually Stop Us From Getting Slimmer "

  • aspartame only (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ooloorie ( 4394035 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @04:14PM (#53372967)

    Even if they turn out to be reproducible, these results only apply to aspartame, not to all sugar-free products. Most sugar-free products don't contain aspartame.

  • I had to take care of my late father for two months after he had an episode that pushed him from pre-diabetic to diabetic and an extended stay at the hospital. I took him to a nutritional class that his doctor ordered. The instructor warned us that food labeled "healthy" are often less healthy than the regular food and check the labels to compare the differences. Food companies often compensate for something else to make a food product more healthier.
    • All you need to do is skip all the processed food in the middle of the grocery and stick to what is around the outside for a much healthier diet.
    • It's not so much the "healthy" label, it's "low fat" (which means it's crammed full of sugar to make it taste good and give it texture) or "low sugar" (which means it's crammed full of bullshit chemicals to make it sweet, because the shittiest non-sugar sweeteners are also the cheapest.)

    • by Anonymous Coward

      If your food has a label, you're doing it wrong already.

  • These so-called "scientists" are just trying to cover up the fact that Diet Coke contains natural compounds that act as nature's Viagra.

    And, they're trying to suggest that being fat is somehow bad just because the new Leader of the Free World is a fat SOB.

  • by future assassin ( 639396 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @04:39PM (#53373111)

    when I start my energy drink addiction vs caffeine pills I gain weight even with one large (Xience) sugar free drink per day. I do get less anxiety from the energy drinks like say Beaver Buzz Green Tea vs popping one pill. Seem the pill (200mg) hits way faster. One thing I did notice if I get 8+ hours of sleep I much way less during the day and especially at night when I get crazy cravings if I only get 5 hours of sleep or less. It does take about a week for the body to adjust from the short to long hour sleeps.

  • Nothing at all to do with being sugar-free and everything to do with the artificial sweeteners?

    • Everything to do with *one* artificial sweetener. No study done on sucralose/splenda, stevia, etc. Incredibly misleading title.

  • by RogueWarrior65 ( 678876 ) on Sunday November 27, 2016 @05:27PM (#53373343)

    The whole industry is predicated on you not losing weight in a short period of time and keeping it off without you continually having to buy their products. If you lost weight in six months by using a product that reset your metabolic rate to a faster rate permanently, you wouldn't need to buy that product anymore (and they've lost a revenue stream). Think this sounds crazy? Consider how many things in your life that you never actually own but rather pay "rent" on every month. You don't pay for just the electricity or water you use. You cough up a mandatory service fee every month. So in a way you rent your utilities. Same with your cellphone and internet access. Same with your car particularly if you haven't paid it off. Think you own your house because you paid off your mortgage? Think again. You're paying property tax (a form of rent) and insurance (another form of rent). More and more businesses are changing over to subscription models, basically rent. Health insurance is yet another form of rent and an expensive one at that and by extension, your health itself is being rented. Ultimately, you're renting an attractive body (not a healthy weight), by paying for a gym membership and/or Weight Watchers. Welcome to The Machine.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Short answer: eat real food and stop eating sugar and you'll lose weight quickly, without starving and without even exercising.

      • You mean all I have to do is burn more calories than I eat? But how can businesses make money with that model?

  • From the article: "aspartame does not block the enzyme directly. It does so through one of its intestinal breakdown products called phenylalanine."

    So I guess phenylaline is a terrible substance that gives people the fats?

    "Good sources of phenylalanine are eggs, chicken, liver, beef, milk, and soybeans. Other sources include spinach and leafy greens, tofu, amaranth leaves, and lupin seeds." It's also an important component of mother's milk.

    So, I guess the same logic as this study could tell you to never eat

    • So, I guess the same logic as this study could tell you to never eat some of the healthiest foods we are aware of, or else you will get fat.

      The question is, then, what is found in those healthy foods that helps your body process that phenylalanine, potentially rendering it beneficial (or, at least, neutral) rather than harmful? Much like fruits (not juices) contain fructose, which we know is bad for us in quantity, they're fine because that fructose is bundled with fiber, which your body utilizes in the course of processing and storing that sugar, rendering it beneficial (as a stored source of energy) rather than harmful (as a literal poison).

  • "We previously showed [this enzyme] can prevent obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome [a disease characterized by a combination of obesity, high blood pressure, a metabolic disorder and insulin resistance]. So, we think that aspartame might not work because, even as it is substituting for sugar, it blocks the beneficial aspects of IAP...."

    So when looking for the mechanism that causes weight gain with all low calorie sweeteners[1], we found that aspartame reduces the effect of IAP in mice. IAP, in turn,

  • by Chris Katko ( 2923353 ) on Monday November 28, 2016 @03:10AM (#53375607)

    But I have consistently been able to identify (without prior knowledge) sucralose, an artificial sweetener, in my food.

    I can do that because I get sick immediately after.

    I get a horrible after-taste coming up from my stomach, and one time I ate a whole can of peaches before realizing it (canned PEACHES have artificial sweetener now?!), I ended up dizzy and I could feel heart was beating out of my chest and a pain all around it.

    I've thought about doing a live double blind study, on video, and posting it to Youtube to prove I'm not full of crap. But it's also strange that I'd have to go to such extravagant lengths to "prove" I'm not lying. Are we supposed to assume every chemical produced by a "food" company is good for us now? When did Big Pharma become the good guys?

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Have you been checked for this?

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenylketonuria

    • I could see that. Myself, I have a correlation between a few (but not most) sugarfree soft-drinks and getting a headache.
      So I simply have stopped drinking those. One does wonder about the others though...

  • Here's the actual URL to the Massachusetts General's study. Initially, I questioned whether this was true or a hit-piece/fake news against Aspartame.

    http://www.massgeneral.org/abo... [massgeneral.org]

    http://www.massgeneral.org/about/pressrelease.aspx?id=2016

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