Jump to content

Is diet caffeine-free soda dangerous?


tain

Recommended Posts

It does contain some questionable ingredients such as aspartame, sodium benzoate, phosphoric acid and citric acid.

Could I be endangering my health?

You also forgot carbolic acid. I don't think it reacts well with teeth in the long run.

With regular sodas, and in particular 'Mountain Dew', you have a problem with the sugars that end up hanging around the base of your teeth. People who drink large quantities have what dentists call 'Mountain Dew Mouth'. The teeth are rotted around the base.

The next thing you might want to look at is 'acid reflux disease'. This is hearsay from a dentist, but he said 'look at the increase in soda consumtion and the increase in acid reflux.' Apparantly, they follow the same path on a chart.

Bottoms up,

DL

Link to comment
Share on other sites


does anyone else agree that almost all junk food should just be taken away? i could care less about the economy. who cares about money when everyone is dying because they are so obese? to me people who would say no to that question are just being selfish.

To a point, I agree with seriously reducing the quantity of junk food available, but at the same time when I sometimes get home late evening/early might-times, I'm glad of summat quick to munch and pizza sure tastes good pizza.gif

This is where I get controversial a bit...... laugh1.gif

If folks are dying because they are so obese, well I doubt very much that I'll miss 'em. OK, if they do have a medical ailment that they can't control their weght orr seriously trying to lose weight, then that's another matter, but for the 'couch potato' gluttony mentality, then they're Darwin Award nominations, personally. worms3.gif

Sorry if that sounds a bit arrogant or overly cynical, but...... OldDuffer.gif

Saying tat though, back to the original topic, I really do miss drinking root-beer or a strong ginger-beer, there's nowt like it on a hot summer's day laugh1.gif

Edited by WereBo
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello to all.

TAiN, instead of drinking 2ltrs of soda a day why don't you try a 6pk jolt or jolt x 2 cola.

This was my fix during those long night when I was in college working on

all sort of projects and needed a something better than coffee to give me a buzz.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

well, two years ago i used to slam down cans of Coke C2, and other low sugar drinks, and now that i think back to those days, its probably whats caused most of the issues i have today with joints, and such...lately, water and orange juice have become my main drinks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To get to the point.

Dr Pepper

Sprite

The New 7up

Dr Pepper

Coke-Ca Cola

Pepsi

Moutain Dew

Any other Soda drink out there is not healthy. While there is many drinks I will stand behind I just don't get how carbonated water itself is healthy after seeing senors drink it down and proclaiming they can't live without it. The Carbon in water kills the protein in meat or makes it undigestible ( I forget what it waas correct still ) and that is why I do not drink soda unless I am desperate to stay cool.

Another thing the truth is we are limited to a water supply and that is why we have Alcohol, Soda, and Contetrated drinks. These are your enemies when drinking anything. False products that does not offer anything in return.

You should only be drinking.

Purified Water

Fruit Juice

Tea

Liquid protien or food based products

And while I can't stand behind alcohol it is a usefull medical item.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

what makes the soft drinks you listed so good?

if its going to be a liquid, it should be healthy, orange juice, lemonade [and not the mixes you can buy, from concentrate or hand squeezed] milk, water. thats about all thats truly easily gotten and healthy...you have your "health drinks" but they cost and arm and a leg.

no soda is healthy, some are just less evil than others.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

now really, why do we have soda? the government should really think about abolsihing certain food items if they are so worried about health issues. especially fast food. i dont care if you dont have time to make dinner, mcdonalds and kfc should not be allowed at all! its horrible for everyone. whenever a friend asks me if i want to go to mcdonalds i say hell no! i dont eat that crap. i just cant beleive that families go out and have mcdonalds for dinner, i know families that do. i just dont get it. what is so fun about clogging your arteries?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest ytrewq

Too much carbonated drinks is surely a bad thing.

I do have mountain dew mouth, and it sucks. Mainly because of cola, but fruit juice is no better for the most part. Still sugary and very acid.

whats better, cancer, or sugar?

Hard to say. Extra sugar in most people's diets (getting rid of aspatame altogether would mean LOTS more sugar) will lead directly to weight gain, which in turn will lead to far higher risks of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, osteoarthritis and all that (it even increases risk of some cancers AFAIK).

Between being fat (unhealthy in general, unattractive, lower self-esteem, lower energy, etc), high risks of cardiovascular problems and diabetes (and eventually dying of it), or having a higher risk of dying from cancer, I just might pick the latter.

The answer seems to be more along the lines of reducing the intake of sweet-tasting stuff altogether.

now really, why do we have soda? the government should really think about abolsihing certain food items if they are so worried about health issues. especially fast food. i dont care if you dont have time to make dinner, mcdonalds and kfc should not be allowed at all! its horrible for everyone. whenever a friend asks me if i want to go to mcdonalds i say hell no! i dont eat that crap. i just cant beleive that families go out and have mcdonalds for dinner, i know families that do. i just dont get it. what is so fun about clogging your arteries?

I have to disagree here. Don't get me wrong, you won't see me there eating a couple greasy burgers with gigantic fries. But we've stopped there a couple of times, and we had their salad with grilled chicken. Nice mix of greens and some protein. Of course you must not put all the vinaigrette they give you (there's at least twice what one should use).

Besides, even if people willingly make unhealthy choices every now and then, it's not so big a deal. A greasy burger or some pizza once a month isn't such a big deal. The problem is with people willingly making those unhealthy choices *all the time*, with total disregard to their health and weight.

Should they abolish such places because some people make bad choices? I don't think so. That wouldn't mean just closing some burger joints (already can't see that happen), but LOTS more restaurants (I've seen some pretty darn greasy chinese restaurants!) And pulling LOTS of things off the shelves in grocery stores too. And no matter if they do that, some people would still not eat right. Depriving everyone of some pleasurable stuff because some people have no control or don't care about what they eat nor their health? While they're at it, they should make tobacco illegal. It's long been proven to be real bad, but lots of people are still smoking.

There's just too much stuff that's considered as bad/unhealthy nowadays. Aspartame. Sugar. Saturated and trans fats. MSG. Stuff with too much starch/not enough fiber/too much fat/etc. Pesticides and wax and such used on most fruit/veg. You name it. Then there's the folks who think/say meat is bad for us (we're not made to digest it or whatever) and we should all be vegans. And those saying milk is bad you you (only babies were meant to drink milk). Eventually, if we listened to all these folks, removing everything that's supposedly bad for us, we'd be having a few organic celery sticks and tofu along with a tall glass of water for dinner. Perhaps we'd be extremely healthy and live to be 150, but I don't think it's such a great option either.

Personally, I find it sickening to see how much ketchup (a.k.a tomato-tasing bottled sugar -- 1/3 of it is sugar) is sold/eaten nowadays. And when people don't use ketchup, they seemingly use BBQ sauce instead... That, and how much high fructose corn syrup and such (dextrose, sorbitol, ...) made its way into an awful lot of things. It's pretty easy adding more flavor without adding too many calories (alternatives to ketchup and such). Lots of herbs and spices. I love adding lots freshly cracked peppercorns on my steak. That and cumin. Not many calories there. Yummy, especially served with a nice big sald and some more veg.

We all make different unhealthy choices (bad food, smoking, soda drinks, not exercising, etc). But I don't think anyone should be allowed to make those choices for you (can't eat this, can't do that, etc), nor force you do things good for yourself (like force you off the couch watching TV while drinking your beer and to the gym).

The solution is making people aware of it all. And making them take charge of their own healths, their habits and what they eat. Everything in moderation!

Edited by ytrewq
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Let me address the original question. "Is diet caffeine-free soda dangerous?"

The caffeine free aspect is not dangerous, but what took the place of good ol' SUGAR to make it Sugar Free (DIET) ???

There are thousands of testimonials all over the internet about how dangerous "Aspartame" is. That's the preferred sweetener used in almost all Diet Sodas. (Coke does have one diet soda with Splenda.)

At one time, Aspartame was declared "Poison" by the USDA, then in the dark of night a few years back, it all of a sudden became OK. Can you say, "Big PayOff!". :whistle:

Being a Diabetic, my options for flavorful soft drinks is somewhat limited.

The Coke with Splenda is way too sweet for my taste.

Diet Coke with Lime is real tasty, (and makes a good mixer for Whiskey or Southern Comfort) but drinking a lot of it puts way too much Aspartame into my system.

I've recently removed that from my diet all together.

So recently I've come up with a workable solution. (no pun intended)

I buy unsweetened "Kool Aid" and sweeten it myself with Splenda.

No Caffeine, NO poisonous Aspartame and NO sugar.

Plus, I can change the flavor with each pitcher, so I don't get burned out on just one taste.

I'm having some right now......mmmmmmmm! Delicious!

I'd rather have a cold beer, but that blows my blood sugar levels right through the roof!

But, beer is actually its own food group.

It's really very nourishing and could actually sustain life all by itself.

Just too much sugar for us diabetics. (although, I still have one or two, occasionally)

cheers3.gif

cheers.gif

Cheers Mates!

B)

Edited by Andromeda43
Link to comment
Share on other sites

ytreq - you bring up some good points. but my point is that when there are multiple fast food places within a mile of any location, it just promotes going to them. its soo easy and convenient to go to one. so many people are lazy. if alot of them were taken away, people would go to them less. we should encourage good eating habits, not poor ones. it is just too hard for people to take responisbility and do the right thing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://www.redicecreations.com/specialreports/sucralose.html

splenda is no better.

no artificial sweetener is good, so saying you'll sweeten it yourself with spenda, no better than buying it with aspartame.

just have water.

as for beer. messes with your head, kills your kidneys...absolutely unattractive. don't know the goodness of fermented grapes, don't want to know.

as for hitting the actual topic, caffeine-free is one thing. low/no sugar drinks pose a gigantic problem. always be choosy about you drinks, and if you come to something you cant choose between, just get water. its a universal antidote. as much as i like lemonade, i have to be choosy, most mixes contain aspartame...when i want lemonade, i think lemon, i don't want to become vegetable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Man, I'm always so disheartened when I go out "among the people" online and see just how much scrambled, uncritical thinking there is out there. Many of the comments in this thread are from people putting too much stock into their own half-justified opinions that come from very sloppy thinking. If our society is ever going to get better, you need to get that critical thinking part of your brain into shape, people! You can't win marathons by eating junk food, and you can't become shrewd off network tv and other brain dead activities!

For instance, so many of you have such a loving affection for the health food industry and a lot of you offer links to supposed evidence of the cancerous effects of aspartame with such unabashed faith in the accuracy of these claims and evidence. I can understand why people would be a little suspcious that corporate america is willing to hide the bad health effects of their food products just to make a buck...I get that. But it is not therefore true that the other rather hefty corporations that sell "health" food are any more decent just because they are on the opposite side from the junk food sellers. Maybe they're both full of crap...in fact, they are. Much of the health info that circulates around the Internet is the product of both the junk food companies and the health food companies spreading each their own propaganda. Very few websites are legitimate medical science. In fact, I'd say most of you probably haven't seen a legitimate scientific analysis of most health issues because legitimate science papers are long, tedious reads and aren't full of nice illustrations, dramatic, simple-minded claims, or slick, entertaining presentation. It would be too boring for most of you to actually read the science, so you stick to the simple websites designed more to convince you with style over substance rather than to inform...and you eat it up (like junk food).

I really find it silly that someone on this thread referred to their sisters as "experts" in health matters because they "worked in a health food store." To think that makes someone a health expert is somewhat ridiculous. I will say though that their heads are probably full of the health food industry's propaganda.

Also, as for anecdotal evidence...another person on this thread blames his present day aches and joint problems on his "heady" younger days of consuming too many junk beverages...well, maybe those beverages did mess you up, who knows. But maybe you're just a person who drank beverages and who independently just happens to be predisposed to joint problems. Maybe there is no one to blame other than fate and/or genetics. You're just one person. Your "evidence" alone is useless for drawing conclusions. Personally, I'd like to blame something other than fate for my profusion of body hair...should I blame aspartame or sodium benzoate? Or just sugar? (actually, there is some weak evidence that sugar diabetes can cause excessive body hair, but I don't have diabetes...or that much hair).

In order to really know if certain food additives are causing problems, you need to see the results of a clinical or epidemiological study. The long term effects of ingested substances on health are usually statistical, so you have to take a large group of people who consume a substance and compare it to a large group who don't consume that substance. You must observe if there are significantly more people who develop a problem (say, cancer) in one group vs. the other. And the relative difference in the numbers must, as I said, be SIGNIFICANT. Unfortunately, many clinical studies are crap funded by industry with shady interpretation of results, which is a a betrayal of ethics and the scientific principle. However, there's no other way to know the health effects of certain chemicals without a clinical or epidemiological study. And many times, such studies (even the proper ones) show no correlation between a substance and a health problem, but that won't convince many people because they know their uncle burt drank diet cokes and got a face tumor, so it must be connected....

Truth is, some chemicals may be unhealthy, some may not be. And just because something is natural or not natural says nothing about it's health risk. There is much evidence out there that indicates that the claims of aspartame dangers are way overblown, and based on sloppy research. However, there is some evidence that some people are very allergic to it. Those people should probably avoid aspartame. But most people won't be harmed. While that should be some comfort, I'm afraid it isn't a comfort to some. Some people are even dissappointed because they wanted to be able to identify that magic "poison" in their food that they could cut out and then live forever...but, really, sometimes things aren't so simple. Just exercise 3-5 days a week to live 40% longer, but 8-9 days a week to live forever.....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

and to Andromeda43....

The FDA never declared aspartame "POISON." There was some concern by SOME researchers back in the 80's that it might be causing brain tumors...but statistical flaws were later discovered in the study. There was an increase in brain tumors observed just a few years after the introduction of aspartame onto the market...but it was later discovered that this increase was mostly in the elderly, which points away from aspartame because and they weren't the largest demographic that started consuming aspartame. Also, the kinds of tumors that saw an increase were in large proportion the slow growing types that had must have been growing since BEFORE the introduction of aspartame. So, the controversy blew over and the FDA never re-regulated aspartame.

Andromeda43, I think what you may be thinking of instead of aspartame is saccharine. this was marketed as Sweet'N'Low. The FDA started requiring very strong warnings on the label that it caused cancer in lab rats. However, as the old cliche goes, they were giving them a human equivalent dose way in excess of what a person could realistically eat per day. Later studies that were more realistic showed very little danger, prompting the FDA to downgrade the threat level on Sweet'N'Low. As for the insinuation of bribery being involved in the decision: though there is probably much corruption in the FDA, I think in this case there was probably no "pay off" because the issue was so public and high profile. It was likely just a matter of tempering an initial overreaction.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...