Can diet soda possibly cause stroke?
There have been multiple amounts of studies conducted in
order to confirm whether or not diet sodas are the source of certain
diseases. The fact is, diet sodas have
been scrutinized due to the fact that it was designed to be a healthier
alternative to the sugary carbonated drinks.
Although diet sodas are supposed to help with weight loss, there is that
possibility that it could induce worse conditions. The alternate sweetener utilized in diet
sodas, also known as aspartame, has been shown to cause cancer. However, the
question is, can it cause stroke, which is a disruption of blood flow to the
brain?
During the American Stroke Association’s International
Stroke Conference in 2011, research findings were reported with the answer to
this question. 2564 participants were
divided into groups based on soda consumption: no consumption, regular soda consumers,
or diet soda consumers. There were other
groups formed: people who consumed both regular and diet soda moderately and
people who drank a mixed amounts of regular and diet soda everyday.
It was found that people who drank diet soda everyday had 48%
increased probability of having a stroke or other vascular event in a nine year
span. This is including certain
lifestyle factors and medical history.
It was found that people who drank diet soda suffered some sort of
vascular event including strokes, heart attacks and/or death.
Certain limitations to this study were
admitted. The data in this experiment
were self-reported, which in any experiment, can be somewhat biased. It was also found that the participants who did drink diet soda tended to have a high fat/high cholesterol diet which can be a high risk factor for any cardiovascular disease. This factor can skew the data by the simple fact that diet can be reason why diet soda consumers are suffering some sort of vascular incident. Another point that is a weakness in this article is the fact that they do not point out the reason why diet soda could be a cause of stroke. There is the possibility of the carbonation of the soda that could increase carbon dioxide in the blood, which could be detrimental for oxygen transport to the brain. It could also be aspartame which is the sweetener found in diet soda. Because it is found to cause cancer, it could also cause some other conditions within the body.
Overall, the lesson learned from this article is that we cannot be too careful as to what we put in our bodies. We may try to consume something as a healthier alternative, or to prolong survival, but overall we cannot be too sure of everything that we humans create. All that one can do is just cautious of the ingredients found in what we consume and hope that we are consuming foods that will benefit ourselves.
http://healthland.time.com/2011/02/11/diet-soda-may-lead-to-stroke-risk-really/
Before reading this article, I have heard many times from different resources such as television and through word of mouth that diet coke is a worse alternative because the sucrose substitute also causes health problems. In today’s society, we are addicted to sugar when it comes to snacks and drinks which gives rise to our high obesity in the country. So instead, people disregard all the other potentially bad ingredients that are probably also present in coke and our initial action is to cut the sugar all together and add an artificial sweetener. I feel as if these beverages are alternatives for diabetic and obese people because these artificial sweeteners attempt to provide the same taste and eliminate the calories they don’t want in their diet. As the article mentions, people who turn to diet coke possibly already have a diet with high fat intake and all these factors increase the chances of stroke. It’s interesting because in a school club, we teach a dental curriculum to elementary school that involves an activity where we have the kids scoop up how many teaspoons they think are in one can of coke. When we explain that there are ten teaspoons, the children are so shocked in the amount of sugar consumption. The best alternative to this situation is to not drink soda, as hard as it may be for some people. Coke and other sodas are already known to be unhealthy but it’s such a part of our culture.
ReplyDeleteI have also heard that diet soda is worse than regular soda because, other than the sweetener used, another difference between diet soda and regular soda is that diet has no calories. However, as Maileen said, people who are addicted to soda or even diet soda probably lack a healthy diet as well. There probably aren't many people who are willing to have a diet coke with their salad and these 2 factors alone can greatly increase the risk for type 2 diabetes and many types of heart problems, including stroke.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I think it is important to note that in the article, they only published the findings for those who drank diet soda every day to those who didn't drink any soda at all. The writers completely omitted the results for those who drank regular soda everyday and obviously, when comparing these, there will definitely be a difference in the health of the participants. I wonder whether the results for those who drank regular soda everyday would be similar to those who drank diet.
Diet soda was linked to cancer in a few animal experiments. But not all animal experiments that looked at effects of aspartame in animals concluded that there was a causal relationship to cancer. So the link between cancer and aspartame is still a controversial one, not only because these animals studies are not consistent, but also because there has never been any conclusive data in humans, observational or experimental. An epidemiology group in 2006 again observed through a questionaire (which offers some bias) and a long term study, up to 20 years, and illustrates no correlation between hematopoietic/brain cancers and aspartame (1).
ReplyDeleteAlso on that note, because of these ambiguous conclusions of aspartame related cancer, new products have been formed, such as splenda. These new artificial sweeteners are now used in soda as well, e.g. coke zero. And who knows what detrimental impact these will have.
In all, I believe a soda now and again wont have permanent ill effect, just like anything else in moderation.
references:
(1)Lim U, et al. Consumption of aspartame-containing beverages and incidence of hematopoietic and brain malignancies. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2006 Sep;15(9):1654-9.