Add diet soda to the list of things to avoid while pregnant

[ensho]

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/health/la-heb-diet-soda-pregnancy-20100818,0,2658318.story


-snip-

There are so many things you're not supposed to eat or drink when you're pregnant -- sushi, Caesar salad, blue cheese, lox, coffee and, of course, alcohol. Now researchers have added a new item to that list -- diet soda.

It seems that regular consumption of carbonated beverages made with artificial sweeteners significantly increases the risk of preterm delivery (defined as giving birth after fewer than 37 weeks of pregnancy). Women who drank at least one diet soda per day were 38% more likely to have their baby early compared to women who abstained. For women who drank at least four diet sodas each day, the increased risk was 78%, according to a study published in the September issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

-snip-
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nobody should drink diet soda! and it should never enter a kid's body.

[Vincardog]

1. nobody should drink diet soda! and it should never enter a kid's body. It accumulates in your brain

[ensho]

2. I do believe the brain is part of the body

nt

[Vincardog]

3. It is not one of the parts I want gummed up with indigestible goo

[Fumesucker]

5. Umm.. Which parts *do* you want gummed up with indigestible goo?

Enquring minds want to know..

:)

[Vincardog]

12. Let me rephrase "it is the part I least want gummed up with indigestible goo"

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

13. indigestible goo gets pushed out the pooper.

so unless you got your brain in your pooper...

[Vincardog]

19. The goo in diet beverages is not eliminated by the body it accumulates in the brain. Drink all you

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

23. If it gets out of the intestine, into the blood stream, and into the brain....

then unless you're suffering from some pretty big ass ulcers, then it's probably getting ingested.

Of course, if a person's reading all that crazy anti-nutrasweet stuff on the internet instead of actually looking at the science, maybe their brain's in their pooper after all.

[Vincardog]

31. You can bath in it for all I care.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

43. I'll be sure to avoid that dangerous hydroxic acid.

[Roland99]

4. My last soft drink was last Monday

No more aspartame in any product either!



edit: Oh, I'm not pregnant, though. lol

[AsahinaKimi]

6. I have gone two weeks without a diet soda

I have switched to Chinese and Japanese tea. I check the labels now on the teas that come in a bottle. Mostly, I am making my own tea now.

[ensho]

9. Simpson and Vail have a good selection of loose green tea

loose tea by the pound is cheaper and better then store tea bags. they are online. have a look.

[AsahinaKimi]

11. Thats great but

Since I live in San Francisco I have access to Chinatown and Japantown, and can by imported teas from Japan. One of the teas I love is very expensive, like 35 dollars a tin, but I bought two of them a while ago, and go through them slowly.



The best Teas I use for my Ice tea is from:
Prince of Peace Enterprises, Inc
Hayward California.

They make a wonderful Pu Erh tea, as does also TenRen (http://www.tenren.com) and they also feature some wonderful Oolong and Green teas as well.


San Francisco has a ton of Chinese tea shops
http://www.aklehr.com/TenRenTea+Ginseng10.jpg

[Phentex]

7. Doctors told me this 15 years ago...

they also mentioned sausage and stuff with nitrates and fish because of the mercury.

[BadgerKid]

8. From the scientific paper

because popularized news articles sometimes have their faults.

Background: Sugar-sweetened soft drinks have been linked to a number of adverse health outcomes such as high weight gain. Therefore, artificially sweetened soft drinks are often promoted as an alternative. However, the safety of artificial sweeteners has been disputed, and consequences of high intakes of artificial sweeteners for pregnant women have been minimally addressed.

Objective: We examined the association between intakes of sugar-sweetened and artificially sweetened soft drinks and preterm delivery.

Design: We conducted prospective cohort analyses of 59,334 women from the Danish National Birth Cohort (1996–2002). Soft drink intake was assessed in midpregnancy by using a food-frequency questionnaire. Preterm delivery ( lt 37 wk) was the primary outcome measure. Covariate information was assessed by telephone interviews.

Results: There was an association between intake of artificially sweetened carbonated and noncarbonated soft drinks and an increased risk of preterm delivery (P for trend: le 0.001, both variables). In comparison with women with no intake of artificially sweetened carbonated soft drinks, the adjusted odds ratio for women who consumed ge 1 serving of artificially sweetened carbonated soft drinks/d was 1.38 (95% CI: 1.15, 1.65). The corresponding odds ratio for women who consumed ge 4 servings of artificially sweetened carbonated soft drinks/d was 1.78 (95% CI: 1.19, 2.66). The association was observed for normal-weight and overweight women. A stronger increase in risk was observed for early preterm and moderately preterm delivery than with late-preterm delivery. No association was observed for sugar-sweetened carbonated soft drinks (P for trend: 0.29) or for sugar-sweetened noncarbonated soft drinks (P for trend: 0.93).

Conclusions: Daily intake of artificially sweetened soft drinks may increase the risk of preterm delivery. Further studies are needed to reject or confirm these findings.

The main strengths of our study are its prospective design with a large number of pregnant women. Furthermore, a previous validation study from this cohort suggested that exposure risk associations for preterm delivery should not be biased because of nonparticipation (24). As with all observational studies, we cannot exclude that our findings may be a result of unidentified and unadjusted confounders. The different association observed for sugar-sweetened and artificially sweetened soft drinks with preterm delivery implies that such confounders would have to be specific for women who drank artificially sweetened soft drinks. Despite careful covariate adjustment, residual confounding cannot be excluded either. Given that a mixture of artificial sweeteners are used in the production of soft drinks, the lack of studies with respect to pregnancy complications, and the controversy surrounding the health effects for some of those sweeteners (9, 35), the replication or rejection of our findings in other independent data are warranted.

In conclusion, our findings suggest that the daily intake of artificially sweetened soft drinks may be associated with an increased risk of preterm delivery. The relative consistency of our findings for carbonated and noncarbonated soft drinks and the absence of an association for sugar-sweetened soft drinks suggest that the content of artificial sweeteners might be the causal factor. However, the replication of our findings in another experimental setting is warranted.

One missing factor might be artificial sweeteners in food. It would be consistent with this study that women who avoid artificially sweetened soft drinks might be avoiding artificial sweeteners in general. I don't know how more "natural" food is in Denmark, but Europe is generally more cautious not to add additives, dyes, etc., to food. Maybe someone can shed some light on this.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

10. Pregnant women should also avoid correlating the causations.

[tammywammy]

14. Everyone should avoid diet drinks

Artifical sugars just aren't good for you. And the same goes for soda in general. It's okay to have one every now and then, but I know people that don't drink anything except soda. I have one every few weeks, I do love a Cherry Coke. Most of the time I drink water or unsweetened iced tea.

[hugo_from_TN]

16. I drink soda water. Please give me an exception.

[tammywammy]

18. LOL

That's just carbonated water. It when you add the sugars and other crap that makes it not so good for you. :)

On a side note, I've been trying out stevia, and they have flavored kinds. Someone recommended to me adding like the vanilla flavor to soda water.

[valerief]

36. Try stevia. It's great in lieu of sugar and that artificial crap. nt

[valerief]

15. Why do they have to call it diet soda when they really mean artificial sweetener?

I mean, sugar-free soda with stevia is not a problem, yet it would still be diet soda.

[MattBaggins]

17. Why is stevia ok? Just because it is so called "natural"?

As a diabetic I am sticking to my Splenda and avoiding that toxin known as sugar.

But I don't care for soda so I'm good there.

[valerief]

22. Stevia IS natural. It's from a plant, has been used for centuries, and is used all over the world.

The artificial sweetener lobby muscled out stevia via legislation.

http://www.stevia.com/Stevia_Article.aspx?Id=2269

http://www.stevia.net/history.htm

[MattBaggins]

29. That is all true

You should have the choice to purchase Stevia products just as I can purchase my Splenda products.

X is OK because it's natural statements are still silly though.

[tammywammy]

24. You can use stevia as a diabetic

And part of the reason I like it more than Splenda, is because it's natural and not an artificial sugar. I like the Truvia brand.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/40146/using_stevia_with_diabetes.html?cat=5

[MattBaggins]

26. Stevia tastes like ass

I'll stick to my splenda

and my kids too

[tammywammy]

28. The Truvia brand doesn't "taste like ass." n/t

[valerief]

33. There has been some poor quality stevia in the US but since

Truvia and Purvia have been introduced, it tastes better. Too bad the US isn't allowed to have it in their baked goods like the rest of the world.

BTW, even the good stevia tastes like crap in my coffee, but it's great in my tea and on my cereal.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

20. When the media says "diet soda" they mean "OMG freak out, read our story!"

When the scientists say "diet soda" they mean they've found a correlation, which may or may not mean causation.

It's rather complicated, do in part to things like caffeine, for which there is more solid epidemiological evidence for risk for pregnant women.

[valerief]

25. And yet they COULD say artificial sweetener just as easily and get the same results.

However, that would piss off artificial sweetener lobbyists.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

30. You're not interested in rational discussion.

Are you?

[valerief]

34. I don't get your point. Really. What was it? nt

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

41. You see the cartoon I just posted?

You see the grandma in tin foil hat? With the deely boppers?

[valerief]

47. What is your point? Can you say it in a sentence? nt

[another saigon]

21. Do Not be fooled by SUCRALOSE either

aka: Splenda..


http://www.tuberose.com/Sucralose.html

Splenda, the brand name for sugar-derivative sucralose, is converted from cane sugar to a no-calorie sweetener. It isn’t recognized as sugar by the body and therefore is not metabolized. Splenda is marketed as a “healthful” and “natural” product since it is derived from sugar. However, its chemical structure is very different from that of sugar and sucralose is actually a chemical substance. Sucralose was discovered in 1976 by researchers working under the auspices of Tate & Lyle Ltd., a large British sugar refiner. Sucralose is made from sucrose by substituting three chlorine atoms for three hydroxyl groups to yield 1,6-dichloro-1,6-dideoxy-BETA-D-fructofuranosyl-4-chloro-4-deoxy-alpha-D-galactopyranoside. This is accomplished in a five-step process. Prolonged storage, particularly at high temperatures and low pH, causes the sucralose to break down into 4-chloro-4-deoxy-galactose (4CG) and 1,6-dichloro-1,6-dideoxyfructose (1,6 DCF).

In 1980, Tate & Lyle arranged with Johnson & Johnson, the world’s largest health care company, to develop sucralose. Johnson & Johnson formed McNeil Speciality Products Company in 1980 to commercialize sucralose. In 1991, Canada became the first nation to approve the use of sucralose. In April, 1998 the US Food and Drug Administration granted approval for sucralose to be used in a variety of food. Diet RC cola was the first US product with sucralose, introduced in May 1998. Sucralose is not yet approved for use in most European countries, where it is still under review.

In the United States, the FDA has granted approval for the use of sucralose in 15 food and beverage categories:

· Baked goods and baking mixes

· Chewing gum

· Confections and frostings

· Fats and oils (salad dressings)

· Fruit and water ices

· Jams and jellies

· Processed fruits and fruit juices

· Sweet sauces, toppings and syrups

· Beverages and beverage bases

· Coffee and tea

· Dairy product analogs

· Frozen dairy desserts and mixes

· Gelatins, puddings and fillings

· Milk products

· Sugar substitutes

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

27. LOL

Not chemical substances! Anything but chemical substances!

:rofl:

[MattBaggins]

32. You can have my Splenda when you pry it from my cold dead hands

[valerief]

35. Cigarette smokers have said something like that, too. nt

[another saigon]

38. yep

some folks just do not give a shit.

[MattBaggins]

39. And stevia users may be saying it as well no?

[valerief]

48. I don't think anyone attacks stevia except artificial sweetener lobbyists. nt

[tammywammy]

40. I don't care if you use Splenda

Splenda tastes way better than Equal or Sweet N Low. I get I, but there's nothing wrong with people also pointing out other alternatives as well. :shrug:

[MattBaggins]

45. I want folks to have the choice as well

I just think it's OK to point out the "Stevia is natural so it's safe and good for you" fallacy.


"The Center for Science in the Public Interest (non-profit consumer agency based in Washington, DC) lists stevia in the AVOID category in their report on food additives. They note that Canada has not approved stevia and a European Community scientific panel declared stevia unacceptable for use in food. “Studies found that high dosages fed to rats caused reduced sperm production and an increase in cell proliferation in their testicles.” CSPI also notes that pregnant hamsters fed large amounts of a derivative of stevia had fewer and smaller babies. Lab studies have suggested that stevia can be converted into a mutagenic compound, possibly promoting cancer by causing mutations in the cells DNA, according to CSP"

The highly vaunted Europeans won't allow Stevia. The FDA was accused of keeping Stevia off the market yet are now accused of approving it without the required number of animal studies.

[tammywammy]

46. I think there will always be controversy surrounding any sugar substitute.

I just don't see that changing.

[MattBaggins]

37. "However, its chemical structure is very different from that of sugar

and sucralose is actually a chemical"

Missed that first time around. That is a stupid and nonsensical statement.

[mrs_p]

42. well, with all this nausea

nothing on the forbidden list sounds good anyway. water - only water taste good these days...

[GreenPartyVoter]

44. It's a little late now. I drank tons of the stuff while preggers with both my guys. :^(