Is Splenda Safe?

It tastes like sugar because it’s made from sugar? Since I’ve been releasing the diet plans for men and women and getting a great response I thought I’d take a time out and look at one of the most successful artificial sweetners in the market…you know, the one in the yellow packet!

It’s called Splenda and has recently overtaken Nutrasweet’s Aspartame as the top seller in the market. But is it really ok to include Splenda in your diet or is it just more marketing hype disguising the real truth?

What is Splenda?

So is the marketing message actually true? Is Splenda really made from real sugar? Well the real answer is….a hesitant yes! Splenda consists primarily of the artificial sweetner Sucralose, and it also includes maltodextrin and dextrose to give it the white powdery feel.

So how is it made from real sugar? Sucralose is made from a chemical reaction whereby chlorination of sucrose (aka table sugar) creates this super sweet substance which is actually 600 times sweeter than sucrose. So yes it is made from sugar…but by an artificial chemical reaction!

Is Splenda really Zero Calories?

The answer, no! A 1 gram packet of Splenda actually contains 3.3 calories, mostly derived from the added dextrose and maltodextrin. They are able to get away with calling it a “zero calorie” sweetner because according to the FDA, any food containing less than 5 calories can be labeled as zero calories. The funny thing is if we compare this to a packet of regular granulated sugar, Splenda has 75% less calories, but if you add 3 or 4 packets to your coffee then it’s pretty much the same!

What About Safety? Is Splenda Safe?

You might not like this answer, and I’m going to ask you to take it with a grain of salt (pun intended!). From all the medical journals and extensive research I did on Sucralose I was not able to find any reliable sources which proved that Sucralose has toxicological or carcinogenic effects on mammals of any kind.

In fact, international experts from a variety of scientific disciplines, including toxicology, oncology, neurology, hematology, pediatrics, and diabetology all independently evaluated the safety of sucralose for human consumption in the studies that were done at that time and all agreed that it was safe.

The reason being that any sucralose that we ingest is almost entirely excreted by our bodies and is not absorbed by any of our cells, and most importantly not even our fat cells.

Some skeptics have stated that the chlorination of sucrose which makes sucralose leaves behind unwanted chlorine in our body which can lead to harmful side effects. However, I was not able to find any conclusive evidence of this in double blind independent studies.

Conclusion of Is Splenda Safe?

So is Splenda really safe? Well, as with anything artificial I would still try and limit your intake simply because long term studies are yet to be reported.

Is it possible that sucralose can react negatively with other chemicals and food additives that we commonly ingest? These answers are not yet completely clear, so why not avoid that risk if we can?

If you haven’t yet, I invite you to take a look at another “zero calorie” but natural sweeter in my article Stevia Sweetner – Good or Bad?. You might be a little more impressed with Stevia over Splenda!

What are your thoughts? Are you still going to include Splenda in your diet? Please leave a comment below…