OPEN LETTER TO EU FOOD SAFETY AUTHORITY ABOUT ASPARTAME

Dr. Betty Martini
Mission Possible World Health International
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
Telephone: 770-242-2599
E-Mail: BettyM19@mindspring.com



Posted: 29 December 2006


To the European Food Safety Authority

Since Dr. Soffritti, lead Scientist in the 36 month aspartame study on rats rebutted EFSA's bizarre criticism of his impeccable work there has been nothing but silence. The Ramazzini study was peer reviewed by 7 world experts, who unquestionably know that respiratory disease is part of the normal dying process. Dr. Soffritti's rebuttal explains:

"As reported in a previous paper (Soffritti et al. 1999), one of the most important issues in environmental and industrial carcinogenesis is how to deal with diffused carcinogenic risks, to which most of the planet's population may be exposed. These carcinogenic risks are represented by a) agents that are slightly carcinogenic at any dose; b) low or extremely low doses of a carcinogenic agent of any kind; or c) mixtures of small doses of carcinogenic agents.

"Epidemiologic and experimental studies are fundamental in the identification and quantification of diffused carcinogenic risks, but they must be designed and conducted to be as powerful as possible with adequate methodology. In the case of experimental studies, it is not sufficient to follow the standard protocol used in ordinary experiments. Instead, it is necessary to conduct studies that may be defined as "mega-experiments," using a vast number of animals (at least 2001,000 per experimental group) in order to express a marked difference in the variation of effects, and exposing the animals in all phases of development to allow the agent to express its full carcinogenic potential.

"It is based on this rationale that the European Ramazzini Foundation performed a mega-experiment on 1,800 rats and demonstrated that, in our experimental conditions, aspartame is a multipotential carcinogenic agent (Soffritti et al. 2005; Soffritti et al. 2006).

"The results of our study (Soffritti et al. 2005; Soffritti et al. 2006) attracted the attention of the scientific community, consumer and industry associations, and the national and international agencies responsible for food safety. Among various comments, the opinion expressed on 5 May 2006 by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA 2006) and the general interpretation of an epidemiologic study conducted by the National Cancer Institute (NCI 2006) necessitate comment on our part.

"In examining the raw data of our study, the EFSA (2006) observed a high incidence of chronic pulmonary inflammation in males and females in both treated groups and in the control group. Based on this observation, it was concluded that "the increased incidence of lymphomas/leukemias reported in treated rats was unrelated to aspartame, given the high background incidence of chronic inflammatory changes in the lungs . . . ." In my opinion, this conclusion is bizarre for the following reasons:

"First, the EFSA (2006) overlooked the fact that the study was conducted until the natural death of the rodents. IT IS WELL KNOWN THAT INFECTIOUS PATHOLOGIES ARE PART OF THE NATURAL DYING PROCESS IN BOTH RODENTS AND HUMANS.

"Second, if the statistically significant increased incidence of lymphomas/leukemias observed were indeed caused by an infected colony, one would expect to observe an increased incidence of lymphomas/leukemias not only in females but also in males. The EFSA (2006) did not comment on this discrepancy in their logic.

"Finally, in support of the hypothesis regarding the safety of aspartame, the EFSA (2006) cited the negative results of recent carcinogenicity studies carried out in transgenic mice by the NTP; the ESFA did not mention that, because the NTP studies on genetically altered mice were performed using a new experimental model, the NTP subcommittee unanimously agreed "there is uncertainty whether the study possessed sufficient sensitivity to detect a carcinogenic effect" (NTP 2005).

"Interestingly, the same scrutiny applied to our study has not been applied to a recent abstract published by Lim et al. (2006) from the NCI diet questionnaire survey (NCI 2006) in which self-reported aspartame consumption showed no increases in either leukemia/lymphomas or in brain cancer. These results have been used by industry, the EFSA, and others to argue that aspartame is not a risk for humans, in spite of our animal study results. Without specific information on each individual's consumption rate and duration it is difficult to assess the power of the survey, in spite of the large number of participants. The second related issue is whether aspartame is an early- or late-stage carcinogen. If it is an early-stage initiator of cancer, then reporting the lack of effects in older individuals who have not consumed aspartame since early childhood would be expected to show little or no increased cancer (Hoel 1985).

"The safety-in particular, the noncarcinogenicity-of today's most widely diffused artificial sweeteners and their blends is largely based on studies conducted decades ago. I second Karstadt's nomination of acesulfame K for further study; however, I add that it should be evaluated using a long-term mega-experiment.

"The author declares he has no competing financial interests."

Morando Soffritti
Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center
European Foundation of Oncology and Environmental Sciences
"B. Ramazzini"
Bologna, Italy
E-mail: crcfr@ramazzini.it

__________________

These are part of comments on a release on acesulfame potassium, another unsafe sweetener that triggered cancer and leukemia in original studies, that also summarize the Ramazzini Study, and the EFSA's bizarre rebuttal.

Dr. Koeter, your statement" "The expertise required [to judge any new study on whether aspartame causes cancer] almost inevitably means having a previous involvement." You also said, "Eliminate the scientists who had worked in the area before or who had worked for industry and there would be no scientists left. The panel had been "fully impartial." These statements are an abomination. You would try to make the world believe there are no independent researchers in Europe who are capable of reviewing an aspartame study?

If your statement had any basis for truth, which it doesn't, an impartial committee would look to researchers who had done "independent" research with no financial ties to aspartame manufacturers. Dr. Ralph Walton, for example, is an independent researcher who did a study on aspartame. It is titled: "Adverse Reactions to Aspartame: Double-Blind Challenge in Patients from a Vulnerable Population: http://www.mindfully.org/Health/Aspartame-Adverse-Reactions-1993.htm Monsanto said they would provide the aspartame and then refused. Obviously, they knew it was independent and they couldn't control it. You simply can't test a deadly addictive excitoneurotoxic carcinogenic drug like aspartame and not have adverse findings. And sure enough the institution had to stop the study after one man (administrator of the hospital) had a retinal detachment (lost his vision in one eye), one person had conjunctival bleeding, and others reported they were being poisoned. So when Dr. John Olney, one of the most renowned neuroscientists in the world today who founded the field of neuroscience called excitotoxicity, made world news on the aspartame brain tumor association, Dr. Walton appeared with him on 60 Minutes. He did research on scientific peer reviewed studies and funding. http://www.dorway.com/peerrev.html You will note that 92% of all independent scientific peer reviewed studies on aspartame show the problems. And Dr. Walton notes if you remove 6 studies the FDA had something to do with because of their controversy having to do with aspartame manufacturers and one pro-aspartame summary, 100% of scientific peer reviewed studies by independent studies show the problems aspartame causes. So what does that say about studies controlled and funded by aspartame manufacturers? To ask the question is to answer it. How do they fix the studies?

Scientific FAQs - Articles that detail toxicity effects from aspartame and why industry studies find no problems.

Heavily referenced articles.

http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/abuse/methanol.html
http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/abuse/seizures.html
http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/abuse/migraine.html
http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/abuse/parkinson.html

We expected the EFSA to sell out our health as predicted in 2005 by Mark Gold of the Aspartame Toxicity Center, http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame We've been seeing these sell-outs for a quarter of a century, standard aspartame manufacturers tactics.

"As part of a SCF 2002 review postscript I wrote late 2005, I stated the following:

"The European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) has stated that it will review the study linking aspartame ingestion to lymphomas and leukemias "...as a matter of high priority, in the context of the previous extensive safety data available on aspartame." If that quote doesn't give one a clue as to what the results of their review will be, I will be more clear: The review by EFSA (industry consultants) will find no problem with aspartame. That is a guarantee. You read it here first."
[ http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/scf2002-postscript.htm ]

- Mark

We're talking about the health of the world, and what goes on with power of the aspartame manufacturers to keep this deadly chemical poison on the market. In fact, when the European Union was making a decision on aspartame safety I thought it was important enough to fly to Brussels to give them all the damning research. The first thing that happened was I locked up for 3 1/2 hours by Immigration asking me questions like "If we let you in England how many people will find out about the dangers of aspartame?" They confiscated everything on aspartame I had in my luggage but were forced to return it.

After doing many lectures throughout England I flew to Brussels to bring the European Union all the damning research on aspartame during a two hour meeting. I expected they would eliminate all the serious results and use industry fixed studies and propaganda. But they didn't know I was wired. Here is the rebuttal to their report:

http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/scf2002.html

The FDA knew aspartame was a carcinogen a quarter of a century ago when Searle was caught excising brain tumors from rats, and then putting them back in the study, and when they died they resurrected them on paper. They were also caught filtering out neoplasms in an attempt for the FDA not to see them. See the Bressler Report or FDA audit on http://www.dorway.com Aspartame triggered brain, mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, pancreatic and thyroid tumors.

The Ramazzini Study just reaffirms what the FDA said themselves from the beginning. Since a lie was used as an excuse and since EFSA did not apologize you see the report to the International Court of Justice, United Nations and World Health Organization. World health is at stake with millions consuming a deadly carcinogen. We want it off the market and we want an apology from the European Food Safety Association for protecting industry instead of the people.

Dr. Koeter, after writing this I see you have now owned up to the politics involved in this article: "EU's food agency battles attempts to hijack science."

http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?n=70720-efsa-health-claims-antibiotics

It says: "Science and politics make poor bedfellows. Just ask Herman Koeter, deputy executive director at the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which has felt the push and pull of national politics ever since the agency began operating four years ago." Aspartame was mentioned when it said: "Hot decisions that had political repercussions included a review of a controversial aspartame study" .

Now do something about it. Simply admit the truth and have aspartame banned. It has been known that aspartame is a multipotential carcinogen since the beginning. Dr. Adrian Gross, FDA toxicologist, told Congress aspartame violated the Delaney Amendment, which says if a product causes cancer in animals it can't be put in food. He said further without a shadow of a doubt aspartame can produce brain tumors and brain cancer. Nothing has changed in a quarter of a century except millions have perished from the neurodegenerative diseases and cancers and other horrors outlined in Dr. Roberts medical text, Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic. Dr. Soffritti confirmed what the FDA already knew in one of the most precise studies ever done. An apology is owed to Dr. Soffritti and to the world.

Below my signature is the report.

Dr. Betty Martini
Founder, Mission Possible Wolrd Health International
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
770-242-2599
E-Mail: BettyM19@mindspring.com
http://www.wpwhi.com
http://www.whno.net
http://www.dorway.com

Aspartame Toxiocity Center: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame


REPORTING on The EUROPEAN FOOD SAFETY AUTHORITYS LIES ABOUT THE RAMAZZINI ASPARTAME TOXICITY & CANCER STUDY

To The United Nations, International Court of Justice, World Health Organization, and Parliament:

I'm reporting gross conflicts of interest by the European Food Safety Authority using panel members connected to aspartame manufacturers to judge a study adverse to the chemical. Then EFSA lied to the world by declaring aspartame safe for human consumption.

In original studies aspartame was identified as a trigger of brain tumors and cancer, therefore the FDA Board of Inquiry revoked the petition for its approval. Don Rumsfeld, then CEO of aspartame producer G. D. Searle Co, became Reagan's Secretary of Defense, and the day after Reagan's inauguration a new FDA Commissioner was appointed who approved aspartame after years of FDA rejection. See the clip from the aspartame documentary, Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World.

http://www.wnho.net/fda_petition1.doc

Aspartame triggers mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, pancreatic and thyroid tumors. In Ramazinnis 3 year study on 1,800 rats only those fed the chemical developed malignant brain tumors. It further triggered leukemia, lymphoma, cancer of the kidney, urethra and bladder and peripheral nerves, especially cranial. In September of 2005 at a conference, Dr. Soffritti, Director, declared aspartame a multipotential carcinogen, confirming the basis for FDA rejection a quarter of a century before. After Rumsfeld manipulated to put it on the market the FDA reversed and has been the lackey of aspartame producers ever since, pushing pro-poison propaganda, disregarding thousands of consumer complaints...

We have a paper trail of official documents including the Bressler Report, an FDA audit exposing Searle's chicanery. FDA toxicologist Jerome Bressler declared the studies were so bad that FDA removed 20% of his report before releasing it. Between the FDA, the aspartame industry, their front groups hired members of the EFSA evaluating the toxicity of their chemical.

The Guardian on 5/15/06 quoted EFSA Executive Director of the EFSA, Dr. Herman Koeter: "Dr Koeter said, he wanted to clear up misunderstandings about "conflicts of interest" among his advisory panel overseeing the review. MEPs complained last month that the scientist who chairs the advisory panel, Dr Susan Barlow, works for the International Life Sciences Institute, a body funded by sweetener manufacturers and major aspartame users such as Coca Cola, PepsiCo and Nestle, and Monsanto.

EFSA's conflicts of interest: One scientist in the review had a research grant from Ajinomoto, the leading Japanese aspartame producer. Other panel members were linked to food processors using aspartame. But to say these scientists have conflicts of interest was misunderstanding, Dr Koeter explained to the Rome conference.

"The expertise required [to judge any new study on whether aspartame causes cancer] almost inevitably means having a previous involvement." Eliminate the scientists who had worked in the area before or who had worked for industry and there would be no scientists left, he said. The panel had been "fully impartial"

He insults our intelligence. Are we to believe there are no scientists in Europe capable of conducting this study except those paid the aspartame industry? The one thing Dr. Koeter didn't get from the advisory panel was impartiality. They could have mailed in their approval on the way to cash aspartame checks.


The panel blamed the Ramazzini cancers came from respiratory disease. Dr. Morando Soffritti responded: "CHRONIC PULMONARY INFLAMMATION IS COMMON IN THE NATURAL DYING PROCESS. MOREOVER, INFLAMMATION WAS OBSERVED IN BOTH ANIMALS WHO WERE TREATED WITH ASPARTAME AS WELL AS IN THE CONTROL GROUP.

"The European Ramazzini Foundation conducts what are known as lifespan mega-experiments, meaning that large groups of rodents are allowed to live out their natural lifespan and are examined for histopathological changes upon spontaneous death. This model is in contrast with most laboratories where rodents are sacrificed at 110 weeks of age (representing about 2/3 of the lifespan). The Ramazzini study design closely mirrors the human condition in which persons may be exposed to agents in the industrial and general environments from embryonic life under natural death. "Since 80% of cancer is diagnosed in humans over the age of 55, it is of paramount importance to observe how an agent affects laboratory animals in the last third of their lives."

Two European Parliamentarians petitioned WHO to declare sudden death a syndrome in order to track the cases. They couldn't understand why people are just dropping dead. Aspartame triggers an irregular heart rhythm, interacts with cardiac medication (all drugs for that matter), damages the cardiac conduction system and causes sudden death.

http://www.wnho.net/aspartame_msg_scd.htm

The European Food Safety Authority will never apologize for protecting the aspartame industry and convincing us to consume this carcinogen. Dr. Soffritti said, "Slides of previous carcinogenesis studies on aspartame were not reviewed by the AFC panel, ... this action should have been obligatory in light of the European Ramazzini Foundation's results, at the very least those involving haemopoietic and lymphoid organs and tissues." At the highest dose level tested in the Ramazzini study, 25% of female rats bore lymphomas-leukemias compared with 8.7% in the control.

"Because of the globalization of the industrialized diet and the ever-increasing use of artificial sweeteners among billions of people in both industrialized and developing countries, the European Ramazzini Foundation considers its work on sweeteners to be of the highest priority for the protection of public health, in particular the health of children and pregnant women who are among the most vulnerable populations."

Read the report to the Board of Inquiry of the FDA by world renowned neuroscientist, Dr. John Olney, on how aspartame destroys the brain of the fetus and children: http://www.wnho.net/dr_olney1.doc This explains why children all over the world are suffering from autism, ADD, ADHD and Tourettes, just for starters. Aspartame is an abortifacient and teratogen causing birth defects and mental retardation.

The Ramazzini study results show aspartame is a carcinogen, induces malignancies at dose levels lower than the current acceptable daily intake for humans (40 mg/kg of body weight in the EU, 50mg/kg of body weight in the US). Twenty years ago FFA toxicologist, Dr. Adrian Gross, testified to Congress that FDA should not have set an allowable dose because it causes brain tumors and cancer.

http://www.wnho.net/cancer_study_obligates_recall.htm

Ajinomoto has been slithering to hide the cancer issue from the beginning:

http://www.wnho.net/recipe_for_death.htm

Aspartame was once listed with the Pentagon in a list of potential chemical warfare weapons.

http://www.wnho.net/the_ecologist_aspartame_report.htm

A recent laughable campaign to discredit the flawless Ramazinni work proclaimed that a 10-year old "What Did You Eat Last Year" survey sent out by AARP that mentioned it once in 56 questions proves its safe. Mother Goose! It got tremendous press, after all who gets their advertising dollars?

http://www.mpwhi.com/project_recall_aspartame.htm

Three congressional hearings. Medical texts like Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic by H. J. Roberts, M.D., http://www.sunsentpress.com and Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills by neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock, M.D. explain in technical and irrefutable detail the symptoms of this global plague. Google has 3 million web sites, most exposing aspartame dangers.

The Idaho Observer has just released their dynamite Save our Children! Document for parents, educators, Boards of Education, Pediatricians & OB-GYN's exposing this deadly threat to our children's futures and survival on Aspartame Awareness Weekend, Sept 9th and 10th, and Save the Children. http://www.idaho-observer.com Aspartame Disease will be known as one of the great plagues in history with millions of unwarned innocent victims slowly and inevitably damaged and destroyed. It skews DNA, threatening our race. We ask you to help by distributing the school brochure to educators and public organizations in your area.

Herman Koeter and his comprised panel must resign. Demand the truth for yourself and the world. The 90 minute aspartame documentary is perfectly named: Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World.

Dr. Betty Martini
Founder, Mission Possible World Health International
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
770-242-2599
E-Mail: BettyM19@mindspring.com
http://www.wpwhi.com
http://www.whno.net
http://www.dorway.com

Aspartame Toxiocity Center: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame