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Comment by ranger_danger | Hacker News Reader

Where's the proof that drinking Diet Coke causes literally any health issue that is a direct relation to the aspartame itself specifically? Because I don't think that has ever existed because it's not actually harmful in this way... meanwhile your post reads like FUD.

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You can start here: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-h...

Diet sodas with aspartame contain a warning for this reason. Now of course, most of us do not have this condition.

But how do we know if it is safe? I decided 20+ years ago that artificial sweeteners were a crutch with no nutritional value and unknown risks, so I stopped consuming them.

Considering that sugar and excess consumption of carbohydrates is the number 1 health problem around the world, is it possible that the risks of low calorie sweeteners are not sufficient to outweigh the benefits of low calorie sweeteners?

I was just explaining this to my wife while we've been on keto. Yes, artificial sweeteners are bad, let's try to avoid them if possible, but if consuming some aspartame in jello helps us stay on keto and lose belly fat, then the benefits outweigh the risk.

Artificial sweeteners may[0] adversely affect the gut microbiome.

However, other studies suggest that artificial sweeteners break down so quickly that they never reach the gut.

It needs more research, but personally I choose to favor sugar over sweeteners, and just limit my consumption of sugar.

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8156656/

Where's your proof that gravity exists and that we fully understand all of its effects?

Science doesn't work that way. Meanwhile aspartame has been linked to many health problems.

"Linked" doesn't mean anything because correlation is not causation.

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