In mid-March, USA Today carried an article questioning the safety of increasingly popular sugar substitutes, which, according to author Karen Weintraub are being “added to everything from sodas to toothpaste, lip balm, to snack items.”
It’s a great article in which Weintraub tells it like it is, presenting industry’s claims of artificial sugar safety as well as noting that studies are now raising concerns about the health effects of these substitutes. But as I read, my mind wandered, and it seemed as if I was reading about glutamic acid in flavor-enhancers, because the words that Weintraub quoted sounded just like the industry propaganda used by the Glutes to convince consumers that flavor-enhancers like MSG are harmless. Words such as:
“healthy alternatives…”
“one of the most thoroughly researched ingredients in the world…”
“have been proven safe by global regulatory bodies for decades.”
“also accepted as safe in Europe and by the World Health Organization…”
Do you think anyone could convince Weintraub to tell the story of excitotoxic – brain damaging – glutamic acid (in MSG) and aspartic acid (in aspartame). She could go over the industry claims of safety as well as noting that for over 50 years independent researchers have raised concerns about the adverse reactions and the brain damage caused by MSG, and more recently about aspartame.
I’ll bet that Weintraub could get her readers to realize that flavor-enhancers and protein substitutes, all loaded with brain-damaging free glutamate, will be found without limit in processed and ultra-processed foods.
There’s nothing in her article suggesting that she has even a clue to the fact that aspartic acid is an excitotoxic – brain damaging – amino acid that causes brain damage and adverse reactions identical to those caused by the manufactured free glutamic acid in flavor-enhancers and protein substitutes (which, by the way, the FDA also says is safe for use in food).
To date, the Glutes have managed to suppress any suggestion that free glutamate might be harmful. What a breakthrough — an event — it would be if Weintraub found it in her heart to share the facts about the toxicity of manufactured free glutamate. And greater yet if she could convince USA Today to carry her story.