The safety assessment of aspartame performed by JECFA-the FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives-may have been conditioned by Coca-Cola and Big Soda.
The nonprofit U.S. Right to Know denounces the conflict of interest of nearly half the members of the panel called to judge the carcinogenicity risk of the synthetic sweetener. (1)
Aspartame, the influence of the Coca-Cola and Big Soda lobbies.
U.S. Right to Know’s investigation stemmed from JEFCA’s July 13, 2023, position on the safety of aspartame:
- soon after the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC, WHO), in light of new scientific evidence, listed the molecule as a probable human carcinogen, (2)
- the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) confirmed the daily intake of aspartame (40 mg per kg of body weight) declared ‘safe’ back in 1981. (3)
U.S. Right to Know notes that ‘at least 6 out of 13 JECFA panel members have ties to ILSI, a long-standing front group for Coca-Cola. Both the chairman and vice chairman of the JECFA committee have ties to ILSI. Consequently,‘because of this conflict of interest, JECFA’s conclusions on aspartame are not credible and the public should not rely on them.’
The transverse pressure group
ILSI (International Life Sciences Institute) – founded in 1978 by Alex Malaspina, then vice president of The Coca-Cola Company, who remained linked to the bubbly giant until 2021 – presents itself as a group that leads ‘science for the public good‘ e ‘Improves human health and well-being and safeguards the environment‘.
Instead, investigations by independent researchers and investigative journalists show how ILSI is a pressure group that protects the interests of the food and chemical industry, not public health. In 2019, even the New York Times revealed its meddling in global food policy.
Million-dollar financing
The investigation conducted by U.S. Right to Know reconstructs the multimillion-dollar funding paid to ILSI by industrial giants:
– Big Food
. Mars, Mondelez, General Mills, Nestlé, Kellogg, Hershey, Kraft, Dr. Pepper, Snapple Group, Starbucks Coffee, Cargill, Unilever, and Campbell Soup,
– Big Soda
. Coca-Cola and PepsiCo,
– Big Ag, Big Chem. Pesticide and GMO monopolists, as well as chemical giants. CropLife International, Monsanto, Syngenta, Dow Agrisciences, Pioneer Hi-Bred, Bayer CropScience and BASF. (4)
Exemplary, among the documents collected by U.S. Right to Know, is an email exchange where an ILSI board member proposes to use the institute for‘credible, consensus-based scientific generation on the problems plaguing the industry,’ with particular regard to‘the safety of sweeteners. Such as precisely aspartame.
Conflicts of interest in research
The revolving door system is at home between Coca-Cola and ILSI. U.S. Right to Know recalls the journey of Rhona Applebaum, lILSI president, who in 2015 ‘retired from his job as Coca-Cola’s (and ILSI’s) chief health and science officer after the New York Times and Associated Press (AP) reported that Coca-Cola had funded the nonprofit Global Energy Balance Network to shift the blame for obesity away from sugary drinks‘.
Numerous researchers have in turn collaborated for decades — even for a fee, in some cases — with the lobby group disguised as a research institute, with speeches at conferences and scientific studies, in defiance of basic conflict of interest rules. (5)
Among the 13 researchers on the JECFA committee that confirmed the daily dose of aspartame considered safe 42 years earlier, as many as 6 appear to be linked to ILSI:
– Sue Barlow, former member of the ILSI International Food Biotechnology Committee,
– Diane Benford (chair of the JECFA Committee on Aspartame), former member of an ILSI Europe expert working group,
– Richard Cantrill (vice-president), former ILSI Europe panel member,
– Jean-Charles Leblanc, former member of an ILSI Europe expert working group,
– Josef Schlatter, former board member of ILSI Health and Environmental Sciences Institute (HESI),
– Michael DiNovi, former ILSI Europe expert working group member.
The Poison Lobby
ILSI’s tentacles are sinking everywhere.
Sugar. In 2016, an ILSI-funded study argued that recommendations to reduce sugar were based on weak and unreliable evidence. Marion Nestle, a New York University professor who studies conflicts of interest in nutrition research, explained to the Times that the ILSI study ‘comes straight out of the tobacco industry’s agenda: it questions the science. This is a classic example of how industry funding distorts opinion. It is shameful‘.
Tobacco. The report of an independent committee of the World Health Organization (2020), in outlining the techniques used by industry to undermine WHO’s tobacco control efforts, cites ILSI as a case study.
Glyphosate. The May 2016 statement by Alan Boobis – vice-chair of ILSI Europe and at the same time chair of the FAO-WHO Committee on PesticideResidues (Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues, JMPR) – that cancer risk from dietary exposure to glyphosate (patented by ILSI funder Monsanto) is unlikely is famous.
And again, U.S. Right to Food reports cases in which ILSI has infiltrated:
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, (CDC), the US federal public health agency,
- Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, an advisory group to the U.S. government on dietary recommendations,
- Indian government, to forge nutrition policies on the Coca-Cola style (‘more physical activity to fight obesity‘), downplaying the role of sugar and diet.
Enough!
Marta Strinati
Notes
(1) Gary Ruskin. Did a Coca-Cola front group sway a WHO review of aspartame? U.S.Right to Know. 19.7.23 https://usrtk.org/sweeteners/coca-cola-front-group-who-review-of-aspartame/
(2) Marta Strinati. Aspartame is a possible carcinogen, according to IARC. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 30.6.23
(3) Aspartame hazard and risk assessment results released. WHO, press release. 14.7.23 https://www.who.int/news/item/14-07-2023-aspartame-hazard-and-risk-assessment-results-released
(4) Stacy Malkan. International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) is a food industry lobby group. U.S. Right to Know. 10.7.23 https://usrtk.org/pesticides/ilsi-is-a-food-industry-lobby-group/
(5) Marta Strinati. Nutrition research diverted by Big Food lobbies. New study. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 27.1.21
Professional journalist since January 1995, he has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and periodicals (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). She is the author of journalistic surveys on food, she has published the book "Reading labels to know what we eat".
