Here is good discussion about sweeteners from Derek Lowe: Trouble With Erythritol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/trouble-erythritol https://www.sci

Here is good discussion about sweeteners from Derek Lowe: Trouble With Erythritol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/trouble-erythritol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/trouble-erythritol Sugar Substitutes Surprise https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/sugar-substitutes-surprise https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/sugar-substitutes-... And Now Xylitol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/and-now-xylitol It seem that most artificial sweeteners have issues. But interestingly aspartame is probably the least harmful, if not for other reason than being so sweet that you need much less of the molecule, and get always low dose. > .... At any rate, I would regard these studies as reason enough to avoid both of these compounds as sweeteners, and I would extend the caution to the other sugar alcohols as well (maltitol, mannitol, sorbitol, etc.) We really need to understand more about these things, and ditching the sugar-free gummy candies and the like seems like a prudent move. >Naturally, the question comes up about the effects of other artificial sweeteners. I also wrote last year about a study that showed that saccharin and sucralose seem to have unexpected effects on glucose tolerance, but aspartame and stevia did not show this. One difference between some of these and the sugar alcohols is that things like aspartame (and acesulfam-K) are far, far sweeter than sugar and are thus used in much lower amounts. You don't have the gut-fermentation aspect the way you do with the quantities of sugar alcohols that are needed. >Note that I am discounting the years of hyperventilating messages about aspartame (in particular) leading to supposedly sweeping epidemics of cancer, autism, seizures and what have you. These are not based on any solid evidence, and after the original trials and forty years on the worldwide market, there would be solid evidence by now if any such things were happening. >No, for bad effects coming from artificial sweeteners, I would look to just kinds of things we're talking about now: slight impairments or increases in trouble in areas that many likely customers for lower-calorie foods already would be experiencing trouble with (glucose tolerance, cardiovascular effects). This makes such things harder to spot in a population; you need a good amount of effort in well-powered trials to believe that they're there at all (the glucose tolerance results are in need of this for more validation, I should add). Let's find out what's going on.