What if I told you we could prevent 500,000 cardiovascular deaths in America and add 6.7 million years to our combined lifespan if we reduced our sugar intake by just 20 percent? According to the National Institutes of Health, that goal is within our grasp. But how we can achieve this can be not very clear.
We see a new report daily with advice to make our lives healthier, only to see a contradictory report the next day. We just saw this happen with the World Health Organization saying low-calorie sweeteners like aspartame don’t support weight loss. Meanwhile, high-quality randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have consistently proved the opposite: low-calorie sweeteners are a critical public health tool to help cut calories and sugar.
Public opinion is clear. Americans know the risks of excess sugar — high blood pressure, inflammation and fatty liver disease, to name a few — and want to make healthier choices. A 2023 International Food Information Council survey found that 72 percent of Americans are trying to consume less sugar. Their reasons for doing this are “to lose weight,” “to avoid gaining weight” and “to improve my diet in general.”
The food and beverage industry has answered this call. Thanks to low-calorie sweeteners, nearly 60 percent of beverages sold in the United States now contain zero sugar. We cannot allow low-quality studies to undermine decades of progress based on rigorous, reliable high-quality research.
Over the last 40 years, health agencies from more than 90 countries have repeatedly verified that aspartame is safe. That adds to a vast body of science showing it can help people lose weight and stay healthy. In 2022, the Journal of the American Medical Association published an analysis of 17 RCTs that found low-calorie sweeteners “were associated with reduced body weight, body mass index, percentage of body fat, and intrahepatocellular lipid, providing benefits that were similar to those of water.” Before that, Obesity Reviews analyzed several RCTs and found that using low-sugar sweeteners “leads to weight reduction.”
Just last year, the WHO’s systematic review of non-sugar sweeteners found they “resulted in a reduction in body weight,” and, in the case of one RCT, contributed to “significant” weight loss. All this makes it so surprising that the WHO would contradict its established research by claiming that non-sugar sweeteners do not support weight loss.
Perhaps even more surprising, the WHO based this assertion on the least credible data in their review: observational data rather than the scientific gold standard of RCTs.
The observational data the WHO reviewed looked at people who had gained weight and then cherry-picked one factor as the cause — ignoring all the holiday dinners, long workdays and countless other factors that shape a person’s weight. That’s why most credible research uses RCTs, which eliminate the complex universe of variables and isolate with mathematical precision whether “X” causes “Y.” That’s why across so many prior studies, reliable RCTs show a distinctly positive relationship between aspartame and weight loss.
The WHO has been consistent on one subject: People consume too much sugar, and the risks of obesity and cardiovascular disease are serious. The WHO should reconsider its research methods to ensure it bases public health recommendations on high-quality science. One report can have consequences, confusing consumers about what safe choices they have regarding beverages. And that’s a mistake.
The puzzle of a balanced diet is complex, and it’s unique for every person. That’s why people should have safe choices regarding their diets. For millions of Americans, low-calorie sweeteners are a critical piece of that puzzle.
