Ecologist: Chewing Gum Contains Potentially Toxic Ingredients: Behind the label: Chewing Gum - including Aspartame - Pat Thomas

January 13, 2010

Many may remember Pat Thomas' outstanding cover

story in 2005 on Aspartame. We've used in every

case dealing with legislators with the idea of

banning it, as in New Mexico and Hawaii, and even

in New Zealand. Here is all 17 pages:

The Ecologist

http://www.mpwhi.com/ecologist_september_2005.pdf

Here is Dr. H. J. Roberts paper having to do with

gum.

http://www.wnho.net/aspartame_absorption.htm In

2004 a suit was filed against Wrigley's gum

because they had been told for years of the

danger of aspartame in gum. While they got out

of the suit, they arrogantly tuned around and put

aspartame in all their gums except two. Many

people like Bart Puckett, Mission Possible North

Dakota, had used the kind with sugar like Juicy

Fruit for years and didn't realize it had been

changed. Because aspartame is so poisonous it

causes chemical hypersensitization, so when

victims accidently get some they can react

severely. In Bart Puckett's case who almost died

on aspartame, and was even on life support, he

chewed some Juicy Fruit and reported he almost

went over a cliff. Wrigley's probably got a lot

of flack because we've written so much so they

sold to Mars. In one TV expose in Atlanta a

woman who had never used aspartame was given one

stick of aspartame gum and had a grand mal seizure.

Also, here is the Abby Cormack story ( New

Zealand ) who was using aspartame

gum: http://www.mpwhi.com/abby_cormack_story.htm

What Doctors said about Abby's

case: http://www.mpwhi.com/experts_on_aspartame_and_abby_cormack.htm

Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum, Founder

Mission Possible International

9270 River Club Parkway

Duluth, Georgia 30097

770 242-2599

www.mpwhi.com, www.dorway.com, www.wnho.net

Aspartame Toxicity Center, www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

Aspartame Information List, www.mpwhi.com scroll down to banners

Read on from outstanding journalist, Pat Thomas:

Chewing gum contains potentially toxic ingredients

Behind the label: chewing gum

Pat Thomas

12th January, 2010

For whatever reason you choose to chew it, this

plastic, potentially toxic mish-mash of

ingredients is bad for the environment and bad for us

Football managers chew it to keep their nerves

and emotions under control. Lovers chew it to

keep their teeth white and their breath kissing

fresh. Kids chew it to look cool and - if they're

young enough - practice blowing bubbles. Some

people even chew for medicinal purposes - for

instance as a substitute for smoking or to get a caffeine 'energy' hit.

Humans have chewed gum for millennia but it's

only recently that it has become the hi-tech

plastic, minty 'treat' choc full of preservatives that it is today.

The ancient Greeks chewed mastiche - a gum made

from the resin of the mastic tree; the Mayans

chewed chicle which is the sap from the sapodilla

tree; North American Indians chewed the sap from

spruce trees and passed the habit along to the settlers.

After World War II, chemists learned to make

synthetic rubber, which eventually replaced most

natural rubber as a chewing gum base. Today the

ubiquitous ingredient 'gum base' is label

shorthand for an alphabet soup of potentially toxic ingredients.

Because of the vagaries of chewing gum ingredient

labels most of us continue to chew in ignorance -

and in vast numbers. Americans consume 40 percent

of the world's gum. Across Britain, France,

Germany, and Spain for instance almost 50 per

cent of adults aged 15 and above use chewing gum.

In Britain we spend around £325m a year the on

the stuff. Globally just two companies - Wrigley

and Cadbury - control 60 per cent of the chewing

gum market which is estimated to be worth upwards of £10 billion a year.

Toxic or not?

When a market is this profitable, regulators tend

to look the other way and questions about

long-term safety can get pushed to the bottom of the agenda.

In 2008, however,

<http://www.canada.com/topics/bodyandhealth/story.html?id=06e4fd58-ebb9-4bd3-b23\

9-d0f87b743155>Canadian

regulators did stick their heads over the parapet

by publishing a draft list of 17 substances that

they felt were toxic and therefore should not be

allowed in products like chewing gum. Vinyl

acetate, which is used to manufacture the

polyvinyl acetate in gum base, was one of these.

Canadian concern was raised because of

<http://monographs.iarc.fr/ENG/Monographs/vol63/mono63-19.pdf>research

from the International Agency for Research on

Cancer (IARC), the World Health Organization's

cancer research arm, which produced some evidence

suggesting that vinyl acetate caused tumors in rats.

The IARC believed that trace amounts of vinyl

acetate could make it into the gum base material

and the Canadian regulators suggested that a

'precautionary approach' could be justified.

The proposal caused a furore amongst gum

manufacturers who argued that even if they did

make their gum from vinyl acetate none - or only

minute amounts - would remain in the finished

product. In 2009 the Canadian regulators backed down.

Sweet talk

Chewing gum does however contain other

ingredients that you may wish to think twice

about before putting in your mouth. One of these

is the preservative butylated hydroxyanisol

(BHA.) According to the

<http://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/roc/eleventh/profiles/s027bha.pdf>11th

and most recent report on carcinogens issued by

the US National Toxicology Program (a US

Government funded programme) based on sufficient

evidence of carcinogenicity in experimental

animals, BHA is reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen.

And then there are those artificial sweeteners

such as aspartame and acesulfame K.

Aspartame is an artificial sweetener made from

the amino acids aspartic acid and phenylalanine

and methyl alcohol (find out more about the

health concerns over sweeteners

<http://www.theecologist.org/investigations/health/268699/aspartame.html>here;

for academic references click here).

All regulatory authorities believe aspartame is

safe. Nevertheless it has been dogged by health

concerns from the outset. During storage and when

heated is quickly breaks down into its component

parts, each of which is considered toxic.

Aspartame’s two major constituents, phenylalanine

and aspartic acid,

<http://www.wnho.net/aspartame_brain_damage.htm>can

cause brain damage in very high doses. Even at

the low levels permitted in foods, aspartame can

be toxic to people with the disease

phenylketonuria (PKU), which is why the UK’s Food

Standards Agency

<http://www.food.gov.uk/safereating/chemsafe/additivesbranch/sweeteners/55174#h_\

5/>requires

food containing aspartame to be labelled 'contains a source of phenylalanine'.

Aspartame is

<http://www.wnho.net/fda_92_symptoms_on_aspartame.htm>believed

to cause or worsen epileptic seizures,

fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis (MS), lupus,

attention deficit disorder (ADD), diabetes,

thyroid problems, Alzheimer's disease, chronic

fatigue, depression and eye conditions such as

macular degeneration, diabetic blindness and glaucoma.

Acesulfame K has been

<http://www.sweetpoison.com/aspartame-sweeteners.html>shown

to cause cancer in animals, which means it may also be a cancer risk in humans.

These days a few gums also contain

<http://www.theecologist.org/green_green_living/behind_the_label/396637//investi\

gations/health/268764/life_after_aspartame.html>sucralose.

One of the few sweeteners to be derived from

sugar itself, sucralose tastes more like sugar

than other artificial sweeteners and contains

about one eighth of the calories and

carbohydrates of sugar. However it is produced by chlorinating sugar.

<http://ec.europa.eu/food/fs/sc/scf/out68_en.pdf>Animal

studies, conducted by the manufacturers, have

found a range of problems at high doses including

shrunken thryroid glands and kidney and liver

problems.

<http://ec.europa.eu/food/fs/sc/scf/out68_en.pdf>Human

studies suggested a dose at half the current

approved level over 6 months could raise blood

glucose levels. It is widely used in soft drinks,

desserts and confectionery and as a table top

sweetener, and consumer reports suggest a wide

range of adverse effect from regular ingestion of

sucralose including gastrointestinal upsets, cramping, and bladder problems.

Laxative effects

Chewing gum stimulates saliva production, which

helps to neutralise the effect of acids that

follow meals and, in particular, gum containing

the sugar alcohol xylitol can help counteract

tooth decay. But sugar alcohols such as zylitol,

mannitol and sorbitol also have a laxative effect.

The regulatory authorities classify sugar

alcohols as GRAS (Generally Recognised As Safe),

but they may cause diarrhoea, bloating and

stomach pain in high doses over 1 gram. This is

because they are more slowly digested and remain

longer in the intestinal tract, rather than being

absorbed into the blood. The non-absorbed

carbohydrates create an osmotic effect that pulls

water into the intestines. Also when the

non-absorbed carbohydrates reach the colon,

normal bacteria metabolise them to gases and short-chain fatty acids.

Some people may be more sensitive than others to

this effect and there are case reports of people

chewing large amounts of gum (20 sticks a day)

becoming ill with gastrointestinal problems, and experiencing a drop in weight.

Environmental impacts

Love it or despise it, gum chewing isn't going to

disappear anytime soon - and this may be as bad

for the environment as it is for us. Ancient gums

broke down with time. The modern chew is non-biodegradeable.

Most local authorities consider chewing gum to be

a litter issue, rather than an environmental

hazard. It's certainly a nuisance and in

Singapore in 1992 it became such a problems that

it was a, for more than a decade, banned

(although that ban was partially lifted in 2004

as <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5066384>part of a

trade deal with the US. Since 2004, chewing gum

of therapeutic value, for instance gums which

claim to strengthen tooth enamel, is allowed into the country).

The problem lies in that the properties that make

the 'best' chewing gum base (stickiness, ability

to retain properties like taste and provide a

long-lasting chew) also make it very difficult to clean up.

Certainly major manufacturers are looking for

viable 'non-stick' gums. In fact it's a potential

R & D goldmine. Some are looking to zein, a protein

by-product of corn-produced ethanol (though

little information exists to say whether this is

GM corn or not). But as the

<http://www.ewg.org/reports/beautysecrets>Environmental

Working Group has noted, most of the current

patents for non-stick gum reply on a base of

dimethyl, diethyl and dibutyl phthalate - hardly

a healthy substitute (though having been banned

from the toys children chew on, chemical

manufacturers are naturally looking to sell their

products into other less discerning markets).

<http://www.ewg.org/reports/beautysecrets>Animal

studies show that exposure to very low levels of

the phthalates dibutyl phthalate (DBP) and

diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) in the womb causes

a number of birth defects, primarily to male

offspring, including testicular atrophy, reduced

sperm count, and defects in the structure of the penis.

All this does make one wonder, whether better

hygiene - simply brushing your teeth properly

twice a day with a

<http://www.theecologist.org/green_green_living/behind_the_label/396637//www.the\

ecologist.org/_tag/4683/0/0/25/colgate>non-toxic

toothpaste - wouldn't be a whole lot easier, and

a whole lot safer than chewing on this plastic,

potentially toxic mish mash of ingredients.

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Ecologist: Chewing Gum Contains Potentially Toxic Ingredients: Behind the label: Chewing Gum - including Aspartame - Pat Thomas

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