Safe to consume 40mg aspartame per kg body weight daily
New Delhi, July 14(Press Ki Taquat)
The World Health Organisation’s cancer research arm on Friday classified non-sugar sweetener aspartame used in Diet Coke and several other products such as cough syrups and tooth pastes as a “possible carcinogen”, citing its limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans.
Releasing the assessments of the health impacts of the non-sugar sweetener aspartame today, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) said, “Due to ‘limited evidence’ for carcinogenicity in humans, IARC classifies aspartame as possibly carcinogenic to humans (IARC Group 2B) and JECFA reaffirmed the acceptable daily intake of 40 mg/kg body weight.”
Aspartame has been put in the third of the four levels of substances with cancer hazard due to limited evidence of adverse impact in humans and anima trials. This means moderate drinkers of diet cokes need not worry, since the daily recommended aspartame dose also remains unchanged.
JECFA concluded that the data evaluated indicated no sufficient reason to change the previously established acceptable daily intake (ADI) of 0–40 mg/kg body weight for aspartame.
“The committee reaffirmed that it is safe for a person to consume within this limit per day. For example, with a can of diet soft drink containing 200 or 300 mg of aspartame, an adult weighing 70 kg would need to consume more than 9-14 cans per day to exceed the acceptable daily intake, assuming no other intake from other food sources,” the agency said.
IARC classified aspartame as possibly carcinogenic to humans (Group 2B) on the basis of limited evidence for cancer in humans, specifically, for hepatocellular carcinoma, which is a type of liver cancer. There was also limited evidence for cancer in experimental animals and limited evidence related to the possible mechanisms for causing cancer.
IARC’s hazard identifications are the first fundamental step to understand the carcinogenicity of an agent by identifying its specific properties and its potential to cause harm, i.e., cancer.
IARC classifications reflect the strength of scientific evidence as to whether an agent can cause cancer in humans, but they do not reflect the risk of developing cancer at a given exposure level.
The IARC hazard evaluation considers all types of exposures (e.g. dietary, occupational). The strength-of-evidence classification in Group 2B is the third highest level out of 4 levels, and it is generally used either when there is limited, but not convincing, evidence for cancer in humans or convincing evidence for cancer in experimental animals, but not both.
“The findings of limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans and animals, and of limited mechanistic evidence on how carcinogenicity may occur, underscore the need for more research to refine our understanding on whether consumption of aspartame poses a carcinogenic hazard,” said Dr Mary Schubauer-Berigan of the IARC Monographs programme.
