Splenda - Is it What It's Cracked Up To Be?

Weight Loss Reviews

Splenda – Not the Zero Effect it is Cracked Up to Be

Can Stevia Check Mate King Splenda?

Hi Folks,

B. Lohan here… your online personal fitness guru. Time to talk about sweeteners.

We are all looking for ways to cut calories and stay in shape. The market today is saturated with products that all have one claim or another to reduce calories, reduce fat, and slim you down. I admit, the phrase “zero calories” has sucked me in more times than I can count. Even if I am not interested in the product to begin with, don’t need it, don’t use it, I’ll still look at it. Heck, I’ll probably even buy it. And why not? If I can find a product that replaces something else I am using and give me NO calories, why shouldn’t I use it? The bigwigs know this. Because THEY know WE know that they can’t just SAY zero calories unless it is actually true.

SPLENDA – THE MAGICAL SUGAR REPLACER

Splenda is one of those products. It’s “made from sugar so it tastes like sugar” is what they say. Zero calories. Bam, SOLD to the sucker on the right. I have tried other artificial sweeteners before, we all have. I just couldn’t get past the taste they all left in my mouth. You all know what taste I am talking about, it is that metallic bitter taste that is a constant reminder that you are doing what you are doing in the essence of health and fewer calories. After I tried those products in my coffee, there was no WAY I was going to destroy perfectly good baked goods with them. Splenda was different though. Zero calories, tastes like sugar. My coffee actually tasted the way it does with sugar. Ok, not EXACTLY the same. But I didn’t feel like I was ingesting a soda can in liquid form either. Splenda did so well with me, they earned a repeat customer.

And not just me either apparently. Splenda is doing so well that it is surpassing all of its competitors and quickly becoming American’s top-selling artificial sweetener with 20% of American households using this product. Sales in a one year period were reported at $177 million and swept their not so “Equal” counterparts $62 million away. Pretty impressive, everyone is using it, zero calories, what’s not to like.

WHAT EXACTLY IS SPLENDA?

Well then I stumbled across some information that made me rethink how splendid this product really is. Splenda is actually a brand name for a chemical called sucralose. That’s right, this is now a chemical, and not a natural product. Splenda is marketed as natural because it comes from sugar, but it’s not sugar. Sucralose is converted from sugar cane into the zero-calorie chemical version. Because of this conversion process, the body does not recognize it as sugar, and thus does not metabolize it. That’s where the zero calorie part comes in. Well…I couldn’t help but wonder. If the body is not metabolizing it, what the heck happens to the chemical I just drank in my coffee? I needed to look into this.

I was initially comforted by Splenda’s marketing company that stated over 100 studies have been performed to prove Splenda’s safeness. That was until I found out that only 6 of those studies were actually performed on humans, and one of those six studies was studying Splenda’s effect on tooth decay. Further, of the other 5 studies, a combined total of 36 subjects were studied, and the longest one reported was only four days long. Now, I am no rocket scientist, but I am thinking, if you want to know if a product has ill effect on someone, should you not wait a little longer than 4 days to determine this? Also, if you are going to make something available to millions of Americans, maybe you should study more people than would fill a grade school classroom? That’s just me though.

SAFETY STUDIES WERE NOT DONE ON HUMANS

So what went on with the other 94 studies? Well, you won’t hear much about them. But if you look into it you will see that they were all done on animals. And **whispering** Splenda really doesn’t want to talk about those results. The research in animals showed a staggering amount of ill effects: 40% shrinkage of the thymus glands, diarrhea, enlarged kidney and livers, decreased fetal and placental body weights, breakdown of the lymph follicles in the spleen and thymus, spontaneous abortion of pregnancies, reduced growth rate and development, hyperplasia of the pelvis, and overall decreased red blood cell count. The studies further indicated that as much as 15% of the sucralose gets absorbed by the digestive system and stays in the body.

Because of all of this hoopla, the sugar industry is suing Splenda’s marketing company, McNeil Nutritionals for implying that Splenda is a natural product. At this point I was convinced that my days of being sucked in by marketing companies were over, as were my days with my splendid coffee. But that does not mean my days of healthy coffee are over.

ARE THERE ANY ATERNATIVES TO SPLENDA?

There is an alternative no calorie sweetener that has been used for centuries. It is called Stevia, and it is a South American herb traditionally used by the Guarani Indians. The leaves of this plant have a taste that has the potential to be thirty times sweeter than sugar and offers no calories. Not only does it offer no calories, but it is non-toxic (i.e. all natural), and is also useful for digestion. Some research has also shown it to decrease overall blood glucose levels.

ONE TEASPOON OF STEVIA = 3 CUPS OF SUGAR!

How powerful is Stevia? One full teaspoon of the extract can replace 3 cups of sugar. Think about how much healthier this is for your family when you’re cooking up a great desert or drinking tons of iced tea in the summer.

Stevia was very popular in the 1980’s in America as it was used by Celestial Seasonings for their herbal teas. However the FDA put a stop to this claming that as a food additive Stevia was not safe. This despite the fact that many countries are making Stevia available as an additive. The theory floating around out there is that the sweetener companies had something to do with this as they did not want a natural product competing with their aspartame. Just a theory, but an interesting one no less. Currently Stevia is not allowed to be used in America as a food additive, but it is and can be sold as a dietary supplement.

The American Herbal Products Association currently has a petition active with the FDA to get this sold not as a food additive, but as a food itself with a record of safety hundreds of years long. FDA has not acted yet on this. The bottom line with Stevia though is that it is calorie free, all natural and used all over the globe. In Japan, Stevia has cornered 41% of the sweetener market and is used in Japanese Diet Coke. But the FDA is not addressing this fact, nor the fact that no reports of toxicity with Stevia exist and yet it is consumed by millions of people daily.

But you CAN purchase Stevia as a dietary supplement. If you poke around on the Internet it will not take you long to find some good sources for it. All natural, calorie free? I know I am sold.

OK, SO WHERE CAN YOU GET IT?

You can find Stevia in health food stores or try Google and you’ll find many places that sell it. I use the ‘NOW’ brand and buy the one pound extract bottle so that I can use it in cooking.

Products Reviewed:

Splenda

Available Everywhere

Stevia

Available Online – Google it.

Best Wishes,

Splenda Review

Health Reviews

B. Lohan

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