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FDA Complaints on NutraSweet

From: Betty Martini
Newsgroups: sci.med.nutrition
Subject: FDA Complaints on NutraSweet

There has been so much discussion on the symptoms caused by NutraSweet I thought perhaps it would be helpful to have the actual report from the FDA.

They did not want to release it and I had to file under Freedom of Information to get it. Also, in the Food Chemical News of June, the FDA says they will no longer compile a complaint file on aspartame. Dr. Kessler admits that only 1% report serious problems and, of course, many do not know to associate their neurological symptoms with aspartame, un- aware of the history or original lab tests that produced seizures and brain tumors.

 

The NutraSweet Company and the FDA both use the excuse that methanol occurs naturally in fruit. Here is the answer to that excuse from the report: ASPARTAME; METHANOL AND THE PUBLIC HEALTH, Dr. Woodrow C. Monte Journal of Applied Nutrition, Volume 16, Number 1, 1984

"Ethanol, the classic antidote for methanol toxicity, is found in natural food sources of methanol at concentrations 5 to 500,000 times that of the toxic. Ethanol inhibits metabolism of methanol and allows the body time for clearance of the toxin through the lungs and kidneys."

There is no ethanol in aspartame. The FDA and the NutraSweet Company knows this and their excuse is a smokescreen.

Dr. Monte goes on to say:" Methanol (methyl alcohol, wood alcohol), a poisonous substance, is added as a component during the manufacture of aspartame. This methanol is subsequently released within hours of consumption after hydrolysis of the methyl group of the dipeptide by chymotrypsin and in the small intestine. Absorption in primates is hastened considerably if the methanol is ingested as free methanol as it occurs in soft drinks after decomposition of aspartame during storage or in other foods after being heated. Regardless of whether the aspartame derived methanol exists in food in its free form or still esterified to phenylalanine, 10% of the weight of aspartame intake of an individual will be absorbed by the bloodstream as methanol within hours after consumption."

"Methanol has no therapeutic properties and is considered only as a toxicant. The ingestion of two teaspoons is considered lethal in humans."

"Methyl alcohol produces the Methyl alcohol syndrome, consistently, only in humans and no other test animal, including monkeys. There is a clear difference between "toxicity", which can be produced in every living thing, and the "toxic syndrome." .. "The greater toxicity of methanol to man is deeply rooted in the limited biochemical pathways available to humans for detoxification."

There has been a good deal of blindness from NutraSweet because the methanol converts to formaldehyde in the retina. Dr. Monte says: "The localized retinal production of formaldehyde form methanol is still thought to be principally responsible for the optic papillitis and retinal edema always associated with the toxic syndrome in humans."

Further: "If formaldehyde is produced from methanol and does have a reasonable half life within certain cells in the poisoned organism the chronic toxilogical ramifications could be grave. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen producing squamous cell carcinomas by inhalation exposure in experimental animals."

What Dr. Monte wrote back in l984 and saw coming is what we are seeing in the population. He said about chronic human exposure: "Many of the signs and symptoms of intoxication due to methanol ingestion are not specific to methyl alcohol. For example, headaches, ear buzzing, dizziness, nausea and unsteady gait (inebriation), gastrointestinal disturbances, weakness, vertigo, chills, memory lapses, numbness and shooting pains in the lower extremities, hands and forearms, behavioral disturbances, and neuritis. The most characteristic signs and symptoms of methyl alcohol poisoning in humans are the various visual disturbances which can occur without acidosis although they unfortunately do not always appear. Some of these symptoms are the following: misty vision, progressive contraction of visual fields (vision tunneling), mist before the eyes, blurring of vision, and obscuration of vision."

While this report was written in 1984 please note that the FDA admits they are receiving complaints on exactly what is mentioned in the above paragraph on its recent report. Please folks take it seriously.

To my private email I get case histories like the above and we have the classic ones we see over and over again listed on the auto-responder to warn the public. If you want instructions to the auto-responder please let me know by private email and I'll forward it with other information that is requested.

Prior to the flyers that Mission Possible started distributing worldwide about a year and a half ago many people did not know to associate their symptoms with this culprit. They keep on consuming aspartame and perished never knowing the problem. Today some of the 92 documented symptoms are listed and the diseases triggered. If you remember but one case history remember this one:

"Aspartame killed my wife. No words can express the agony and horror sweet Joyce endured. This poison destroyed her brain, ravaged all her organs and blinded her. She died at age 46 in 1991.

When we filed suit we were harassed and threatened. Our gung ho attorneys with a medically documented case suddenly seemed scared away. The case had to be dropped. Joyce deteriorated so quickly she would not have been able to participate in the legal proceedings anyway.

Don't listen to the paid Judas-goats and TV celebrities who say its safe. Save your life and those you love, and avoid the grief I endured. The makers of this poison considered her death an acceptable cost of business. I'm a man without a wife because the NutraSweet Company is as business without a conscience. April is Anti-Aspartame month. Take dead serious the warnings you will hear. The life you save may be your own." Richard Wilson (written in a local Atlanta paper in April, 1994)

I spoke to Richard only a couple of days ago. He lives in Stockbridge, Georgia. Joyce testified before Congress before she died hoping to ban this product from the marketplace so this wouldn't happen to another human being. The power of Searle/Monsanto (who bought Searle) and the FDA is too powerful. The only way we could warn the public was to go directly to the people.

In September Joyce Wilson's son married and on her empty chair was a long stem rose. On October 1 when MISSION POSSIBLE exposed the American Diabetic Assn. here in Atlanta for taking money from Monsanto and endorsing this for diabetics with full knowledge of the consequences, we dedicated the day to Joyce. Press packs were garnished with a single yellow rose and were covered with black lace for mourning.

Today the patent has expired and aspartame is in 5000 products and climbing. Be warned! As Richard said: "The life you save may be your own."

Betty Martini

11-21-00