We spoke to Dr Giles Yeo, Professor of Molecular Neuroendocrinology at the University of Cambridge to try and answer this question.
Firstly, to understand our modern obsession, and fear, of artificial sweeteners, we have to look backward. Let’s take a step back and look at why flavour is so important to us as humans.
“We taste flavours like sweet, bitter and salty for a number of different reasons. The two key reasons is that for one, you are trying to assess energy density, how worthwhile the risk of going after food is. Secondly, whether or not you can detect poison, in which bitter things tend to be more poisonous” says Dr. Yeo.
Dr. Yeo explains when we eat a sweet food, we have been roughly hard wired to understand that if I eat this food I will be getting in X amount of calories. Therefore your body prepares for it and is modelled so your consumption is the most efficient. The moment you taste something, your body begins to react even before any of the calories make it into your digestive system. This is to make yourself the most efficient.
However, you throw artificial sweeteners into the mix and things begin to change.
“The big scare mongering around artificial sweeteners is that they cause cancer. There are many things in a high enough dose that will cause cancer. I think you have to drink something along the lines of 100 litres of diet coke to cause cancer. It’s not a cancer issue.
“Let me declare my interest, I love drinking diet coke. I just prefer the flavour, when I drink full fat coke it’s too sweet for me. But I don’t mainline diet coke, I mostly drink water and then I drink diet coke when I want a diet coke.
“I think the issue lies in the disconnection between what you’re eating and the amount of calories that you are actually getting. The issue is, if you do it for long enough at a high enough dose, does the disconnection result in long term changes in our ability to handle sugar which could potentially lead to additional metabolic disease?
“Further research needs to be conducted, however, would I be surprised that if you had too many sweeteners then it begins to take away that equation? I wouldn’t be surprised.
“People ask, are artificial sweeteners bad for you? I guess the answer is compared to what? It’s like vaping, is vaping bad for you? Compared to smoking no. Compared to not vaping, yes. I don’t want to equate artificial sweeteners to smoking, but I think that’s probably where I sit.
“If you’re diabetic for example, do artificial sweeteners have a place for you? Then yes I would say so in a moderate dose.
“Again, we were never designed to drink our calories. Apart from milk, we have evolved to eat our calories. Therefore, we are breaking an evolutionary signifier, with artificial sweeteners in judging calorie density so it’s important to keep an eye out.
“I think it’s always a dosing issue, if we are changing artificial sweeteners for all sugars then no I dont think that’s the answer. There is a time and a place for it.”
Ultimately, Dr Yeo’s insights reveal that artificial sweeteners are neither the villain nor the hero. The fact that they cause cancer misses the mark entirely. The real issue is far subtler, rooted deeply in our evolutionary history. By separating sweetness from calories, we are arguably rewiring a biological equation that has kept us pretty well equipped for millennia.
While they remain an invaluable, life improving tool for diabetic, they were never meant to completely replace our natural diet.
It’s a dosing issue. Respect the evolutionary code, drink your water, and treat sweeteners as a tactical tool rather than a dietary staple!
