Source: La Leva Archimede
Morando Soffritti, an Italian researcher with the Ramazzini Foundation in Bologna is known for his publication of a study that found aspartame, the artificial sweetener consisting of two amino acids and a methanol binding agent, caused multiple cancers in rats. Soffritti was in New York on Monday, 23 April, to accept a prestigious academic award and to talk about a second study his institute is conducting with lower doses of aspartame. Although results have not yet been published, the study appears set to confirm the findings of the first study and the researchers are finding negative health effects even at very low dosages of aspartame, comparable to the intakes of people who are regularly using diet drinks.

In a move designed to head off yet more negative publicity for the toxic sweetener, the FDA issued a press release on Friday – just days before Soffritti’s talk at the Mount Sinai Medical School – re-stating the FDA’s earlier contention that there is “No evidence the sweetener causes cancer”. In this way, the press was induced to carry the FDA’s denial in numerous variations and Soffritti’s talk last Monday was no longer considered “newsworthy”, although there IS a new study in progress and it certainly adds to emerging knowledge about the effects of the artificial sweetener. It is of interest to see PR at work here and one should should note how well the technologies of public communication are being used by Big Pharma and its supposed “regulator”, the FDA. The two, it seems, will soon be joined in an incestuous ‘marriage’, if a recent bill proposed by Senator Kennedy finds the approval of US lawmakers.