Are Artificial Sweeteners Bad for You?

The Flexible Dieting Lifestyle Podcast

Show Notes/All Resources from Episode:

https://www.flexibledietinglifestyle.com/podcast-show-notes/

In today’s episode, we’re talking about artificial sweeteners, what we actually know, and giving you an unbiased opinion to what they actually are. We start off by explaining what artificial sweeteners, also referred to as non-nutritive sweeteners, are (1:21) and what the biggest advantage to consuming them is (2:43). Keeping everything we’ve talked about thus far in mind, it’s important to understand the nutritional hierarchy of importance - calories in vs. calories out (3.58).

Since we’ve covered the basics of artificial sweeteners, we go into explaining the three different types. First, we have aspartame (5:56), which is the most common sweetener in diet beverages and is made up of 2 amino acids. The maximum amount that the FDA says can be consumed is 50 milligrams per kilogram of body weight per day. However, this recommendation is 10x less than what they actually think is the maximum dosage and that is to protect themselves (7:56). Second, we have sucralose (10:15). Sucralose is made to imitate table sugar in its taste and is used in the majority of your protein powders, bars, etc. The FDA recommends no more than 5 milligrams per kilogram of body weight per day, but keep in mind that “per day” is over the span over a long period of time. And lastly, we have stevia (17:43), which is an extract from the stevia leaf. Stevia is sweeter than sucralose and the FDA has approved 4 milligrams of killiograms of bodyweight per day.

At the end of the day, your body doesn’t see the various artificial sweeteners differently (21:52). In fact, it has no idea what specific ones you’re consuming so it is okay to have them in moderation (23:33). Now to wrap this episode up, we explain what meta analysis (25:04) is and dive deeper into detail in regards to the studies done on artificial sweeteners, as well as discuss what we know about artificial sweeteners in the microbiome (34:05).

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