Is this no-cal sweetener actually sabotaging your dieting efforts?
When the artificial sweetener sucralose came out, it was supposed to be different.
In fact, the little yellow packets said “Made from sugar so it tastes just like sugar.”
Sounds like a simple twist on a natural substance, right?
Not exactly.
It turns out this no-cal sweetener has some high-calorie tricks up its sleeve.
In fact, some new research has discovered how sucralose might be sabotaging your plans to drop some weight.
And that’s because not only does it fool your taste buds, but it can trick the part of your brain that tells you when it’s time to stop eating.
We all know these no-calorie sweeteners aren’t good for us. I’ve been warning you about how they can do devastating things to your health for years now.
But a new study out of the University of Sydney has discovered how sucralose (also sold as Splenda) can have us packing on the pounds.
According to neuroscientist Susan Swithers, sucralose basically makes us think we need to eat, even when we don’t.
By testing sucralose on fruit flies and then mice, the Aussies were able to pinpoint exactly how this fake sweetener can keep you hungry… and keep you eating.
It actually plays a trick on our brains, triggering what researchers call a “neuronal starvation response.”
In other words, you may have just consumed that entire turkey club sandwich, but your brain thinks you’re starving.
Of course weight loss isn’t the only reason artificial sweeteners like sucralose are so popular — diabetics are reassured over and over that they’re perfectly safe for them to use.
But eight years ago I told you about research from Duke University that found sucralose can dramatically reduce levels of beneficial gut bacteria in laboratory animals — something that can cause a rise in blood sugar.
And that wasn’t the only study to turn up similar results. Research that was published in Nature two years ago detailed just how these fake sweeteners could alter our inner ecosystem.
In fact, what the researchers on that study discovered was so dramatic, they said it should trigger a “reassessment” of the “massive and unsupervised use of artificial sweeteners.”
Aside from overeating and upping your blood sugar, perhaps the scariest thing to come out about sucralose was a study earlier this year that found it was responsible for causing leukemia and other blood cancers in laboratory mice.
The research, done by a nonprofit watchdog group out of Italy called the Ramazzini Institute, discovered that the more sucralose the mice had, the more tumors they developed.
If you or someone you love is still using sucralose — or any of these test-tube sweeteners — the bottom line is that research is telling us they can end up doing much more harm than good.
And remember how those Splenda packets said “Made from sugar.” Well, Merisant, a company that manufactures Equal (aspartame) took Splenda maker McNeil Nutritionals to court over that claim.
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!
Turns out, by the time sucralose is finished, it’s closer to a pesticide than it is sugar. The two sides reached a confidential settlement in the case nine years ago, but not so confidential was another line that was added to the Splenda packages:
“But it’s not sugar.”
And now we know it’s not something that will help you lose weight, either.
Sources:
“Artificial sweeteners trick flies into thinking they’re starving” Lindzi Wessel, July 12, 2016, Stat, statnews.com
