Diet Coke: Refreshing Treat or Silent Killer?

**Discussion begins at 3:20**

Diet Coke is a sugar-free soft drink produced by The Coca-Cola Company. It's a variation of the classic Coca-Cola, but instead of sugar, it uses the artificial sweetener aspartame to provide a sweet taste without the calories.  Diet sodas became popular in the 1960s and 1970s, as consumers became more health-conscious, leading to a growing demand for low-calorie alternatives to traditional sugary sodas.  Diet Coke was introduced by The Coca-Cola Company on July 9, 1982. It was developed as a new brand rather than a diet version of Coca-Cola. The idea was to create a distinct product that would appeal to consumers looking for a low-calorie option.  The introduction of Diet Coke was a major success, and it quickly became one of the leading diet sodas in the market. Its success can be attributed to its distinctive taste, effective marketing, and the growing trend towards healthier eating and drinking habits.  For nearly half a century, Diet Coke has remained a popular beverage.  At the same time, however, it has been blamed for contributing to cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and dementia.   What is the truth?  Are the risks exaggerated, and if so why?  Or… Is Diet Coke merely a refreshing treat to be enjoyed in moderation?  

Transcript

Hey, guys.

Hey, guys, what's up?

Welcome.

It's the 2SchemeQueens today.

Sad day.

Yeah, where's our third?

Heard she's investigating a mystery, a mystery about Elvis.

Yeah.

She said, she's all shook up, ba-da-da.

What are you been up to, Kait?

Oh, you know, I'm living the life.

Megan, let me just tell you about my problems, my genetics, okay?

Are we going to have to talk about your labs?

Yeah, you're like, don't worry, Megan.

I'm like, I've not been worried.

You've been worried on the other end of this phone.

I'm like, ALT 40.

I just want to say that Megan, Colleen and I have a text thread.

It's not called any funny name, but like there's the three of us on a text thread.

So every now and then we'll have these like anxiety moments and we just have to like text each other our stream of consciousness of these like intrusive thoughts.

And yesterday I had all these intrusive thoughts and I texted them and I got it off my chest and it was like this anxiety swirl in my brain and I just like got it off my chest.

And then a little bit later I was like, wait, I just needed to say that.

She was like, guys, don't worry about it.

It's fine.

It's fine.

This is like I've talked to people.

It's fine.

And I said, yeah, I wasn't worried, Kait.

You were spinning.

No one else.

She was spinning over her lab work.

And yeah, we were like, that lab work is fine.

And she was spinning about it.

So speaking of lab work, we're going to talk a little about health today.

Yeah.

But before we get to that, we got to thank Cathy for buying us some coffee.

She says, love the variety of topics.

You're great.

I want to have drinks with you three.

Oh yeah.

Come on, Cathy.

Have some drinks.

Anytime.

Thank you for the cup of coffee.

Yeah.

Thank you for the support.

Yeah.

Kait, what should the people do if they want to support us?

Yeah.

They should scroll on down, leave us a five-star review.

Share us with your friends and family.

Share us on a text thread.

Text somebody that you think might like this episode after you listen to it.

So is it time for our drink check?

Drink check.

Guys, we've got a fun drink check today.

And by fun, I mean it's Diet Coke.

Yeah, pretty normal.

We've done so many Diet Coke drink checks, but it's important because today, we're talking about Diet Coke.

We are deep diving into if Diet Coke gives you cancer.

Yes, we're gonna talk about all of the alleged health issues associated with Diet Coke.

Yep.

And whether or not we believe it, so.

Well, I'd like to start out by saying I did believe it.

Before you researched?

Before I researched.

I would like to say also, I did not stop drinking Diet Coke.

Even though you believed it?

Even though I did believe it.

I was just like, yeah, this is probably a carcinogen.

I would say I have over the years, I've gone through periods of my life where I have been abstinent from Diet Coke.

And then periods of my life where I'm a heavy Diet Coke consumer.

And pretty much every time I take myself off it is when I would like read some study or article.

And mostly like dementia was what had me stressed out is like, does Diet Coke cause dementia?

Cause I already feel like, you know, I'm not as quick as I was a couple of years ago.

Leading into this episode before Kait said, this is what we should cover.

I was like, you know, I think it's all nonsense.

So yeah, she's been pretty anti Diet Coke gives you cancer.

I mean, I also I mean, full disclosure, I love Diet Coke.

I want a Diet Coke not to be bad for us.

I think the evidence I found supports that.

But I definitely was biased going into this.

So yeah, I mean, I, Megan and I both did some research on this episode.

And I also could not find any evidence that supported Diet Coke causing cancer.

Diet Coke is a sugar-free soft drink produced by the Coca-Cola Company.

It's a variation of the classic Coca-Cola, but instead of sugar, it uses artificial sweeteners like aspartame to provide a sweet taste without the calories.

Diet sodas became popular in the 1960s and 70s as consumers became more health conscious, leading to a growing demand for low calorie alternatives to traditional sugary sodas.

Diet Coke was introduced by the Coca-Cola Company on July 9th, 1982.

It was developed as a new brand rather than a diet version of Coca-Cola.

The idea was to create a distinct product that would appeal to consumers looking for a low calorie option.

The introduction was a major success, and it quickly became one of the leading diet sodas on the market.

Its success can be attributed to its distinctive taste, effective marketing, and the growing trend towards healthier eating and drinking habits.

For nearly half a century, Diet Coke has remained a popular beverage.

At the same time, however, it has been blamed for contributing to cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and dementia.

So what's the truth?

Are the risks exaggerated, and if so, why?

Or is Diet Coke merely a refreshing treat to be enjoyed in moderation?

I mean, I'm going to go with the latter.

I mean, I do enjoy Diet Coke, so.

I am the definition, I always say this, you know, like the memes where people are like, I went to a restaurant and ordered a Diet Coke and they only had Pepsi products, so I ordered a margarita instead.

I'm like, that is 100% me.

I mean, if they have Pepsi products, then it's not the same.

It's like, I guess I have to drink alcohol then because I can't have my refreshing treat.

Yeah, there's like, sometimes like, I just want a treat, and Diet Coke meets that need, you know?

And I think there are probably unhealthier treats you could be giving yourself.

So, that's all I'm trying to say.

Okay, so as we talk about these studies, I think we'll talk more about this.

Part of the problem is that any studies that have been done, that have not been great studies, do not really specify like, Diet Coke versus Coke Zero, for example, which we now have different artificial sweeteners.

Coke Zero has Splenda.

Sucralose.

Sucralose, which we allegedly may be worse for you.

Yeah, because like, Sucralose kills ants.

It's like an ant poison.

Yeah, okay.

I mean, we give rat poison to people.

Rat poison, Coumadin.

So, it's hard to, again, a lot of these studies don't really differentiate the beverage, the artificial sweetener, whatever.

But for the most part, a lot of the information we're gonna talk about is related to the artificial sweetener that is used in Diet Coke.

So it's Aspartame, because that is what a lot of people kind of alleges the culprit in what makes Diet Coke so bad for you.

Aspartame is also known as sweetenlal, in the pink packets.

So what is Aspartame?

It's a low-calorie artificial sweetener that is commonly used as a sugar substitute.

It's composed of three naturally occurring substances.

These three substances are actually foundations of proteins that are found naturally in milk, meats and vegetables.

So these are like naturally occurring substances.

But when they fuse these amino acids together in a chemical reaction, that's when they become, quote, artificial, right?

Artificial sweeteners.

So this result in chemical is about 200 times sweeter than sucrose or table sugar.

Justice for aspartame.

Justice for aspartame, right after justice for the female dolphins and justice for Lee Harvey Oswald.

Yeah, who can get it?

So again, lots of allegations about how unhealthy these are for you.

So we'll start with cancer is the big one that Kait touched on.

So aspartame has been linked to cancer since 2005, when a link was discovered between cancer in rodents and aspartame use.

Now, if you go back and read the story on which the WHO makes that conclusion, the scientists fed mice five times their body weight in aspartame and saw an effect that they went on to develop potentially liver cancer.

This has never been observed in humans.

We know that mice are more susceptible to cancer in general than humans.

So the study that has started all of this conversation, like not really a great study and not really realistic.

Right.

Who's going to drink five times their body weight in aspartame?

Yeah.

Rodents in general seem to have higher risk, I think, in all the studies of liver cancer in general.

Okay.

So the fact that they develop liver cancer is also.

Yeah.

It'd be coincidental.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There could be genetically predisposed.

Yeah.

Rodents over humans.

Yeah.

I mean, obviously, humans get liver cancer, but it just sounds like it's a cancer that more commonly affects.

Right.

Since this time, there have been additional large scale studies that have been unable to replicate the findings, and the FDA formally discredited the claim in 2013.

The American Cancer Society released a statement that there is no clear evidence that aspartame causes cancer.

Then in 2023, the International Agency for Research on Cancer declared that aspartame was possibly carcinogenic.

So again, this sounds scary, except when you look at how they rate things.

Okay, so the IARC rates things group 1 to group 4.

Group 1, it's carcinogenic to humans.

Group 2A, it's probably carcinogenic.

Group 2B, it's possibly carcinogenic.

Group 3, it is not classifiable as carcinogenic.

And then group 4, probably not carcinogenic.

So these are very vague ratings.

Very vague.

So where they rated this is to be right in the middle.

So it's possibly carcinogenic.

And this was again, rating was based primarily on these animal studies that we talked about.

And they did acknowledge that while there may be some correlation, we'll talk a little bit.

You can tell us as a fresh graduate about these different studies and observational studies and cause and effect versus correlation.

Right.

So there really have not been any cause and effect.

So even though we have multiple studies with kind of different results, any of these studies that are claiming to have a finding, it's more of an association, not a cause and effect.

Right.

So anyway, again, this classification of to be really just means that there's some indication so there could be a potential link, but the evidence is not definitive.

You know what, if you go by these IARC ratings, what they deem to be as carcinogenic as aspartame.

Oh, tell me.

Coffee, aloe, ginkgo biloba.

Do you take some ginkgo for your memory?

No.

I have at times in my life, but I am not good about consistently taking supplements.

And I have thoughts about supplements.

So go back and listen to Big Pharma, right?

I mean, I feel like you didn't really express your thoughts.

No, I feel like that was mostly you and Andrew.

Yeah.

I was trying to not be a negative Nancy, really.

And I was trying not to cause any drama as I talk about supplements and how little I believe in them.

But she doesn't believe in them.

Coconut oil.

It's probably something you use all the time.

So this is a bullshit list.

I'm calling bullshit.

Do you know what?

I know.

Well, that's the point.

Coconut oil?

That is the point is that this is the only, I'm gonna go through all these people who disagree, but this is the only group that has said like, there may be an effect.

And if you're following them, then we need to be cutting out coffee, aloe, ginkgo biloba, coconut oil.

You know what they've rated higher than 2B?

What?

Shift work and red meat.

So we're all gonna die anyway.

So enjoy your diet Coke, okay?

That's where some of these rumors come from, but let me just give you some responses from some other groups that you may or may not trust, like the FDA.

So the FDA has stated, quote, scientific evidence has continued to support the FDA's conclusion that aspartame is safe for the general population when made under good manufacturing practices and used under the approved conditions of use.

It is one of the most studied food additives in the human food supply.

To determine the safety of aspartame, the FDA has reviewed more than 100 studies designed to identify possible toxic effects, including studies that assess effects on the reproductive and nervous systems, carcinogenicity and metabolism.

The Joint FAO WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives is another body that assesses the safety of food additives.

And in 2023, they responded to this IARC classification saying that there was no convincing association between aspartame and cancer in people and did not change its recommended acceptable daily intake.

And we're going to talk about what that is because that's going to blow your mind.

Aspartame was the first sweetener that's not sugar.

I don't know that for a fact, but it would make sense because again, like this group is reiterating what I already told you that like aspartame is just substances that are already produced in other foods and they combine to make this artificial sweetener.

So it's not really like a chemical in a lab necessarily.

Right.

It's like, so it would make sense that it would probably in the 60s and 70s be one of the earlier.

Yeah.

I mean, I remember my great grandmother had diabetes and she loved her sweet and low.

Yeah, mm-hmm.

The European Food Safety Authority in 2013 came out and said aspartame and its breakdown products are safe for human consumption at current levels of exposure.

And isn't Europe like strict about their food regulations?

Europe is way stricter.

I think they have, I think it's like we allow like 10 times more chemicals in our foods and beauty products, like in comparison to Europe.

So like when I say 10 times more, there's like 70 in Europe versus 700 that we allow in America.

So if you don't believe the United States government, maybe believe the Europeans, you know?

So interesting, all of these groups that are like, you know what, we think it's safe.

They have released their recommendations for ADIs, which I think is like acceptable daily intake.

Okay, acceptable daily intake of aspartame.

And wait for it.

Wait for this recommendation.

Wait for it.

The FDA has set the ADI at 50 mgs per kig per day.

And then the 50 mgs per kig.

Yeah.

And I'm going to break that down for people about how much that is, cause that's wild.

The European Food Safety Authority and the Joint FAO WHO Expert Committee, they have recommendations that are slightly lower, but still kind of a massive amount of 40 mgs per kig per day.

So that means that a person weighing 130 pounds would have to consume 75 packets of aspartame a day to even approach the upper end of this acceptable daily intake.

And if we're breaking that down into like diet coke, that's over 14 diet cokes per day.

My gosh, more than a case.

And so what they're saying is that at these levels, if you consume 14 diet cokes a day, looking at that population, they have not been able to find an association between aspartame and cancer, like diet coke consumption and cancer.

Seems very definitive to me.

And I believe that aspartame has been researched a lot because, again, it's been around for a minute.

It's been around for so long, and they haven't been able to get it off the market.

You know, people love a no-cal sweetener.

Splenda was all the rage at first, and now I think people are catching on about sucralose.

I'm highly skeptical about any of the no-cal or sweeteners.

I typically am like, if I want to...

And that's because I don't like a lot of sweet stuff, so if I'm like, if I'm gonna have something sweet, I just want the sugar.

Diet Coke is a different story, because Diet Coke tastes better than regular Coke.

Agreed, 100%.

So like, there's...

I don't even think about...

You're not doing it to be healthy, you just find it more refreshing.

I just like it, yeah.

But I'm also not someone who sits there and like pounds Diet Cokes.

Like I got one and I'm good, you know?

But it's every now and then, and I don't buy it at home.

I just get it.

I love a Fountain Diet Coke.

Breach, girl.

A Fountain Diet Coke with Sonic Ice.

I was gonna say, let's do...

We've talked to this many times.

In a Styrofoam cup.

So your favorite place to get a Diet Coke would be a Sonic.

Yeah.

With a Styrofoam cup and ice pellets.

Yes.

Or like ice chips.

And the Sonic straw is good because it's like a wide straw.

They didn't like McDonald's patent their straw.

So it's like wider and it like improves the fizziness, but also they have very strict regulation on their syrup to like carbonated water ratio.

And that's why McDonald's is like one of the best.

Oh yeah.

McDonald's is good too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

I really like it in a Styrofoam cup.

I generally do like hospital ice pellets, but I will say that at work, we for a couple of months had a new ice maker in our lounge that gave like chipped ice.

Oh no, it was better than, it was better.

Really?

It was better than the pellet ice, but then it went away.

But yeah, mostly I think I'm like a, I mean, I do drink diet coke not at work, but I'm mostly a diet coke at work girl, and I try to make myself alternate.

I try to say like, you had a diet coke, you need to go drink an entire bottle of water before you can even think about an afternoon diet coke.

For me, it's like, I don't think about the water to diet coke ratio.

I think about, do I want the extra caffeine?

I feel like the caffeine in diet coke is minuscule.

It's minuscule, but like the extra caffeine for me is like, will keep me up at night.

You're so sensitive.

I'm just, yeah.

Do you ever think we need to like toughen up our bodies a little bit?

I have got, I've worked very hard at my sleep health.

Okay.

I have bad sleep.

I'm not like you where I can like fall asleep wherever.

I did kind of want it, because we are a Conspiracy Theory podcast.

So I did briefly before I go into a couple of the other things and then let Kait give us kind of her hippie perspective.

I did want to kind of talk briefly about why some people might have trust issues with like the FDA, which I think you touched on a little bit in Big Pharma.

But like some of these government groups that are coming out, they're like, oh, it's cool.

It's safe, fast, pertain, safe.

Follow the money.

So this might need, I think, probably a deeper discussion in an episode.

Your For You page is very similar to mine.

Do you get the things about the, the conspiracy about the food pyramid?

Okay, let me tell you, girl.

So in the 90s, the USDA came out with the food pyramid that we all know from, well, we know from our childhood, right?

It was like the food pyramid, and then it became like the plate.

Correct.

Yep, food plate was like the follow up.

So there were years of research spent kind of creating this food pyramid that was supposed to kind of be a visual representation and tell us like how many servings and everything we're supposed to have, right?

So at the base of the pyramid, it was carbohydrates, it was like whole grains.

Yeah.

And then it was like fruits, vegetables.

They didn't really break down sugars and fats between like good fats and bad fats.

Right.

But it was supposed to be like a visual representation of like what the majority of your intake should be and how many servings you have.

It was like 11 servings of whole grains a day or something.

Six to 11.

Yeah.

That's right.

Six to 11, which I think, can you imagine eating 11 servings of whole grains in a day?

That feels like a lot of food.

Well, how big is the serving?

I mean, I don't know, but still.

Megan's consumption of food and my consumption of food is different.

I'm like, 11 servings.

She's like, that's my snack on the drive home.

What are you talking about?

What do you mean?

Okay, so in 1991, they spend years working with all these nutritionists and developing this food pyramid.

And then in 1991, it gets sent off to be printed, to be released to the public.

But representatives for the National Cattlemen's Association saw this coverage.

They thought that it stigmatized their product.

It put beef in the same category as fats and dairy, kind of limited how much you can take in.

So then they get together with other groups like the National Milk Producers Federation, and they start protesting the pyramid.

So the National Milk Producers Federation and the National Cattlemen's Association get together.

They're like pretty upset about this.

So they complain, and the government says, you know what, we're going to pause this rollout, okay?

They spend a year revising the pyramid.

It cost almost a million dollars to the taxpayers, you know, to just revise this pyramid.

This is the biggest waste of tax money.

And so then like 93 or so, the updated version is released to the public, and the researchers who had initially helped create it were like, wait, this is not what our recommendation was.

There were much higher recommendations for grains, and there are much lower recommendations for fruits and vegetables.

And why?

Because they were trying to support the economy.

They were trying to support the farmers, right?

The cattlemen.

So wait a second.

So what you're telling me, Megan, is that we've all been lied to about nutrition for our whole lives.

Yeah.

Well, they're saying like, so the USDA, US Department of Agriculture, who released this, which is what we're all taught to follow, right?

Their primary mission is to make sure that the American agriculture industry is successful, right?

So should they really be giving us nutritional advice?

No.

If it conflicts with their mission?

No.

So they're just, it's like propaganda, right?

So the people over the years are like, there's so many issues with this pyramid.

Like, people blame it for contributing to obesity because we were taking in so many grains.

And again, I think there could be a deeper dive into this as a whole other episode.

But again, it kind of goes back to this whole, like, can we really trust these government entities?

Like, you know, who are they looking out for?

Yeah, we know, deep pockets.

Yeah.

So I just wanted to say, even though I'm like, oh, look at this, the FDA says aspartame's all good.

I just want you to note that we do have a history of-

Yeah, asterisked.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So then the other allegations I kind of wanted to go through, I've always heard like CAD, does it cause, can corneal artery disease be caused by diet coke consumption?

This one is a little bit tougher to tease out for me.

But again, all the studies that do exist are observational studies.

So Kait, so observational studies, tell us about those.

Observational studies are like studies that you look at, is it retrospective?

It can be.

Yeah.

They basically study the relationship between two variables.

Right.

So it can be like surveys, you can have people just filling out surveys.

You can be doing interviews, you can review medical records, you can just direct observational studies, and you look at all of these different variables and you find associations.

Right.

Like the patient, well, we now know this to be true, right?

We could say like this patient had both hypertension and CAD.

There must be an association between high blood pressure and coronary artery disease.

Right.

But it doesn't necessarily say the high blood pressure caused the coronary artery disease.

Yeah.

So what you can do is you can do these observational studies and then sort of find these relationships and these correlations between variables.

And then it can help you develop a study to help say this actually causes, you know, X actually causes Y.

That's kind of like where you get these.

You can get these studies from.

But my, and my takeaway is that we're not there.

We're at, so we haven't had any of these does X cause Y studies yet.

All we've had is observational studies have had very mixed results.

Some of them do seem to show correlation between CAD and Diet Coke, but many of them do not show a correlation.

So I think definitely more research here.

There's not enough evidence for me to be like, okay, I'm going to back off of my Diet Cokes because there could be.

Like, you know what else is correlated with CAD?

Diabetes.

You know who's drinking the Diet Cokes?

The Beats.

We're going to talk about that in just a second.

Okay.

Because the only other thing I want, the only study that I kind of was like, sort of found to be sort of interesting was that there was a more recent study that found that soda drinkers, meaning diet and regular, had a 10 percent increase in developing atrial fibrillation compared to non-soda drinkers.

Interesting.

So atrial fibrillation, Kait, you want to tell us about that?

Atrial fibrillation is just a fast heart rhythm in which one part of your heart doesn't work the way it's supposed to work.

Two parts of your heart kind of pump together, but when they start to pump separately.

One part of your heart, the electrical activity is just coming from all over the place instead of in one succinct pathway.

So that's AFib.

And then you can have a rapid response on the other side.

But this causes if your heart's quivering at times and not pumping effectively, you can get blood pooling, which can cause clots, and that's how we get strokes.

So AFib, that's kind of scary to be like, oh my gosh, this increases my risk of AFib.

Keep in mind, 5% of the population has AFib.

This is a pretty common rhythm issue.

We know it occurs more in people who get older.

We do know it occurs also in patients who have CAD and that kind of thing.

More problems with their heart.

Interesting.

So I was like, oh man, okay, well, that's maybe something to think about.

DAD equals coronary artery disease.

I keep trying to say it, sorry.

But interestingly, do you know what else causes the same risk of atrial fibrillation, that 10% increase?

Tell me about it, Maggie.

Four ounces of juice a day.

So like if you're supposed to cut out your Diet Coke, you better also be cutting out your cup of OJ in the morning with breakfast, you know?

Yeah, which apparently OJ is coming back.

It's a good thing to do in the morning.

Prevent that scurvy?

No.

It helps.

Or your adrenal glands overnight, they like, you know.

Your cortisol levels.

Yeah, cortisol levels.

They use a lot of vitamin C to make cortisol.

So if you get a morning orange juice, it sort of helps, you know, regulate those cortisol levels.

Cortisol levels help with your circadian rhythm.

Okay.

Okay.

So vitamin C people, it's good for you.

So, okay.

That's good.

Because we also know that, you know, high cortisol can cause coronary disease, right?

Sure can.

So you would circle back to diabetes though, right?

You had mentioned a lot of diabetics drink diet soda, and we know diabetes has an association with CAD.

Right.

Coronary disease.

And I think you're right.

I think that's kind of where we get it.

A lot of these is like, how can we say cause and effect?

And how do we know it's not like that was a sequence of events?

Right.

Right.

But I wanted to look into this also, because what I've always been told by people is diet soda is really bad for diabetes or can cause diabetes, can cause weight gain because your body thinks it's sugar.

Your pancreas releases insulin, causes a hypoglycemic reaction, causes your blood sugar to drop, which then makes you want to go eat something.

And so in fact, it's like potentially causing diabetes.

Yeah, these are the lies that shape magazines.

Yeah, I mean, this is definitely like things we heard growing up, right?

Fitness magazine.

Yeah, like all those magazines.

Fact checked, not true.

They fall people's glucose levels.

And there is no rise or decrease in glucose with the diet Coke that, you know, that would perpetuate this theory.

Now, actually, you're going to probably be like this because we're going to talk a little bit about the gut microbiome.

I love the gut microbiome.

So pretty much just to, I'm sorry, recount on the weight gain diabetes.

There's very mixed data between weight and diet soda consumption.

Again, there are some studies have been published have been like pay people who drank diet Coke or other like artificially sweetened beverages, had some improvements in body weight and like cardiometabolic risk factors.

There's other studies, again, like not causative correlation observational studies that like, no, maybe we see people who drink diet soda have a higher weight.

And again, it's hard to say, like you're saying, did they gain weight?

They're trying to like cut, they're trying to lose weight, say they cut out sugar.

Do they have diabetes?

Maybe you're overweight.

They're trying to.

Yeah.

So it's hard to say what is causing what, right?

The in 2023, who did advise against the use of aspartame for weight loss purposes because they just said there's low level evidence that it will help you lose weight.

But not a lot of evidence out there that like it's going to cause diabetes or baking.

Right.

So if there really is an association, then it might be less of a role with like your pancreas and your insulin release and more of a role with your gut microbiome.

So do you want to tell the people, this is really like your wheelhouse.

Do you want to tell the people what the gut microbiome is?

So the gut microbiome, your body has a natural microbiome in general.

Your skin has a microbiome, your mouth has a microbiome and your gut has a microbiome.

And microbiome is basically made up of bacteria, bacteria that live in your intestines.

And you can have yeast in there.

And anyway, there are all different types of organisms that make up the normal flora of the lining of your intestines.

And these new research is continuing to come out about the gut microbiome.

But what we're finding is a lot of these bacteria in our gut is actually like they're very beneficial to digestion.

And making sure that our food gets broken down and then different byproducts are good for us.

And there's a lot of evidence and supports, like your gut microbiome has this gut brain connection.

The gut brain connection is wild to me.

It's wild because some studies are like the gut is our brain because it talks so much to our brain about the different hormones that we need to.

So anyway, I will nerd out 100% over the gut microbiome.

I love the gut microbiome.

So tell me about the gut microbiome.

Well, and they talk about this.

Yes, there's an association with, we talk about the correlation with your brain and how your brain functions, your mental health, inflammatory diseases, autoimmune diseases.

So yeah, there's a lot happening there.

Now, okay, there was this 2014 study on mice and they were like artificial sweeteners may be altering their gut microbiome, microbiome, which could potentially affect a glucose metabolism and contribute to insulin resistance.

Now, I will say that the challenge looking for all these studies and trying to fact check them, again, as I mentioned at the beginning is like, none of these studies or very few of these studies actually differentiate between the type of artificial sweetener, what the type of diet soda is, if it's getting more specific and they're looking at diet sodas.

So like this study looked at saccharin.

That's equal.

Yeah, so it's like, this isn't even the same artificial sweetener.

So it doesn't have the same effect.

We don't know.

I will say that it's also hard to like...

And these are animal studies too.

We haven't even seen these.

We like, we don't know that necessarily because it happened in a rat, it means it's going to happen in a human.

Also, we don't, were these patients, were these mice or animals, like where their gut was, where their gut healthy?

To begin with?

Yeah, to begin with, exactly.

Also, they might have different bacteria in their gut than we do.

Yeah, that's what I mean.

I think, again, it's like, they do these little rat studies and they're like, up.

It's probably, I will say, it probably does alter our gut microbiome, but I don't think there's a lot of research in the gut microbiome because I think it's hard to study.

And then the final thing, before I turn it over to you also, I want to talk about some memory issues because this is, like I said, the one that kind of scared me the most.

In 2017, there was this Boston study that came out, and they had looked at over a decade, looked at 4,000 people, and they looked at how much diet soda they drank and found that patients who drank one or more artificially sweetened drinks per day were three times more likely to have a stroke or develop dementia than those who drank less than one per week.

And this is pretty significant.

These findings are still cited today.

Again, this was enough to make me go off diet coke for a while.

But the study has been criticized now because again, it showed a correlation, not a causation.

So we don't actually, we didn't actually prove that the diet soda was causing these issues.

The study didn't differentiate between the types of artificial sweeteners, didn't account for other potential factors, like other variables.

They didn't look at like, did we have equal distribution in this population of diabetes, of genetic risk factors, that kind of thing, right?

And there were numerous limitations, like it relied entirely on patient self-reported recall data.

So I think, again, we need like some good research studies before we can say aspartame is bad.

Yeah, we talked about in our FDA or our big farm episode that research is expensive.

So the conclusion from my research, again, trying to deep dive into some of these studies that have been cited out there, is that most of these studies have generally not found significant negative effects.

And again, we have no studies that demonstrate that diet sodas and other products have a consistent pattern of memory impairment, diabetes, stroke, coronary artery disease, cancer.

There is the, the evidence is not out there.

The literature is not out there.

And I love my literature.

So I'm gonna just keep enjoying my ice cold refreshing drink.

What other thoughts do you have, girl?

Okay, so I do have some thoughts.

I think that as a society, and as we're moving towards like, I think millennials are sort of moving towards like a more health conscious state, right?

We're watching our parents, you know, get sicker.

We're watching society get sicker.

We are slowly but surely running out of social security, Medicaid and Medicare.

Like, we are understanding the cost of health care, the rising cost of health care.

And so I think we're sort of trying to figure out, like, how can we prevent these chronic diseases, right?

So cancer is definitely up there.

Cancer has been the top two leading causes of death in the US for 75 years.

And according to the National Cancer Institute, 40% of Americans will be diagnosed with cancer in their lives.

I know it's scary.

So I think it's natural, because younger people are also getting cancer.

You know, we're hearing how these young girls are getting breast cancer, and it's scary.

And maybe, you know, you and I could be hearing about it more often, because of, you know, the line of work that we do.

But it is sort of out there, and at least on my For You page, it's out there.

So I think it's natural for people to sort of like look at the things that they're putting in their body, putting on their bodies and all the things, and sort of try and figure out like, okay, well, what are the environmental risk factors that I can eliminate to help prevent my cause of cancer, or prevent, you know, getting cancer?

I do want to, that was a scary statistic.

I will share another statistic for you.

In 2024, there were two million new cancer cases.

However, however, the mortality rate fell by 27.5%.

So that means that we're getting better at treating cancer.

And we're not at preventing it.

Yeah, and not at preventing it.

Maybe better at finding it.

Yeah, probably finding it earlier.

You know, there's new studies that are coming out that are saying screening, like lung cancer, for instance.

Patients who, well, Megan's laughing at me.

The things we fight about.

Yeah.

My friend, Rachel, who listens to the pod, she and I always bicker about appropriate recommendation for cancer screening.

Because there are some studies, not just on lung cancer, but in general, like they were talking about this with mammograms too, that maybe we over mammogram, that if you look, if we do too much screening, then we find benign things that then we worked up, which then we get complications from the work up.

And so it is like a risk benefit.

I think we have to weigh that.

But tell us what the literature shows.

Well, I mean, the literature is saying that we need to like, the recommendation is that if you have certain risk factors, like men and smokers have a higher risk for lung cancer.

So if you have, if you're a man and you've been smoking for X amount of years, you're over 50.

Yeah.

And you're over 50.

You're going to get a CT scan.

And they do it once a year.

And we're finding it.

So 27.5% decline in mortality is a great thing.

Yeah.

Let's celebrate that.

Let's celebrate that.

I want to speak to...

So you think that we're all, we, this is like in general in the world, cancer is a real problem we're facing and it's making us all anxious.

And so we are, that's why we're, people have like, people are just looking for things that they can impact.

Well, I think the idea, the theory is that all of these, all of these substances like preservatives in food, aspartame, like the idea is that if they're chemicals made in the lab and they're not naturally occurring, maybe the chemical that's being made in the lab is interfering with our, you know, natural biological processes.

And that sort of, I mean, we know that too much exposure to UV like can interfere with that.

Smoking is a huge, I think smoking is like the most studied carcinogenic.

I think Americans are trying to find sources of where they can prevent cancer.

And because of that study, what, in 2005, you can like, there's that guy that said, vaccines cause autism.

I mean, people like grasp on to that.

And then even when people come out and they go, it's been debunked, it doesn't matter, because people are like, this is something I can do to minimize my risk or my child's risk.

Right.

It's my control.

It's what I can control.

So I think it's fine if people don't want to drink Diet Coke because they want to decrease the risk for cancer.

I mean, but don't shame your friends who are enjoying a Diet Coke, okay?

I think that also Diet Coke, it was made in the 60s.

The 60s is when diabetes started to really come about as a chronic disease in America.

And it's also when the obesity trend sort of started trending up along.

And then in 1994, I was going to say the 90s, I feel like it was then we were like, everyone was on Weight Watchers, we were all going to the 2000s, right?

And we talk about like, and Jessica Simpson, I mean, the Jessica Simpson being overweight in that picture is like just what's wrong.

Really wrong with us.

Right.

Yeah, really wrong with our society.

In 94, the CDC declared diabetes type 2 as an epidemic.

So I think you're looking at all these things and Diet Coke was really just made as a marketing tool to continue to have consumers drink their product.

Coke wanted people to continue to drink their product.

So diabetes is a problem.

How can we fight?

People are afraid of sugar.

They don't want to gain weight.

They don't want to have diabetes.

Give them an alternative.

Right.

I'm going to tell you guys a little bit about what actually does cause cancer and then different ways you can prevent it.

We've got an educational moment.

Let's hear it.

Let's have an educational moment.

So cancer, the most indicative factor for cancer, age.

The older you get, the more likely you're going to get some sort of...

Makes sense.

You've been exposed to more things in your life.

Exactly.

And you know what?

All the processes, our body has like a normal process to try and...

You know, cancer is just a mutation that...

I know.

Every time I think about cancer, I just run up to you, I'm sorry, but every time I think about cancer on the cellular level, it's wild to me.

It's just like the DNA, you screwed up one time and just kept replicating.

Right.

Right.

And not only that, it bypasses all of the built-in...

Checks and balances.

Our checks and balances that our cells do.

And so it just becomes a bigger and bigger problem because the cell just had a little mutation in all the checks and balances.

Our body is so smart.

I mean, constantly, our body is recreating cells.

And then as that cell is going through the process of making sure it's all shiny and new and everything looks good, if there is a cell that doesn't look good, then our bodies typically kill that cell off.

And it just gets absorbed into the bloodstream and wasted out with our waste system in our bodies.

So, I think it's really interesting and really cool the way, and that's designed partly with our immune system.

So, as you age, your immune system gets more tired, as do other parts of your body.

And so, that is part of the reason why age is associated with cancer.

Your immune system is just not doing what it's supposed to do, or doing what it did as well as it did as you were younger.

Cancer is also genetic.

We know a lot of genes are associated with cancer, like breast cancer, ovarian cancer, pancreatic cancer.

Colon cancer is a big one.

All of those cancers, your doctor, this is why it's important to know, what is your family history?

So that your doctor can help better screen you and keep it on their radar.

You know, if you're starting to have these symptoms that could line up with some sort of cancer, they can screen you early and get treated early, which again is part of why our mortality rate is down.

It's because we're becoming smarter on how to, you know, treat cancer and look at screening for cancer.

Cigarettes, smoke and tobacco.

Those are like big carcinogens, infections.

We know like when you get HPV that causes cervical cancer, Epstein-Barr can cause some cancers, lymphomas, radiation.

If you are exposed to radiation for long, it's why, you know, when you're in the hospital, it's like what Megan says.

Like when you have to screen these people, you also have to get these people exposed to radiation.

And what is the cost benefit or what is the risk benefit in that?

Immunosuppressive medications like if you have an autoimmune disease, if you've been recipient of a transplant, those are all, again, this goes back to the immune system.

You're suppressing the immune system.

You're suppressing the, you know, checks and balances that your body has to sort of screen out that atypical cell.

And then the atypical cell becomes, you know, a mom and starts, you know, replicating.

There's also factors that may affect the risk of cancer.

So that's diet.

Alcohol has been shown to be, you know, associated with some cancer, physical activity, obesity, diabetes, which again, we could talk about.

Is it the diabetes is causing the cancer or is it the Diet Coke?

You know, and then environmental risk factors.

So these are all things that we know can cause cancer, not Diet Coke, not Aspartame.

And like Megan said, it is highly studied.

It is the oldest, like no calorie sweetener.

And I think if you want a Diet Coke, you can have a Diet Coke, you know?

Okay.

Okay, let's talk about preventing cancer.

So going back to the immune system, it's really important to help keep your immune system strong.

You know, it's really good for your immune system sleep, being on a normal circadian rhythm, but also like, right, aren't they saying now, women need like 10 hours of sleep a night?

Yeah.

When's the last time you got 10 hours of sleep a night?

I slept the other day until 930 in the morning, and I was like, oh my gosh, I slept so late.

Did you?

You didn't get the kids off to school?

Bourbon Boy slept till 8 a.m.

And he woke up and he was like, Joey was the only one on a patch who was still sleeping.

Like, we all slept in late.

I don't know, I forget what we were doing.

We must have been busy, because you know, I'm at that point in my life where my kids can get up without me.

It's great, highly recommend.

10 out of 10.

I'll never forget when Laurie, friend of the pod was like, all you have to do is get to the point where the kid can learn how to turn on the TV.

You know, I think stress is so high in the society and stress really does a number on your immune system.

So learn ways to manage your stress, cope with your stress.

That's very easy to say.

There's a lot of coping mechanisms you can adapt.

You just have to be able to continue to adapt to those coping mechanisms.

But bringing down your stress level is extremely important in taking care of your immune health.

We know some types of foods can help you, like foods that we've heard about, antioxidants, right?

Acai berries, blueberries, all types of berries, green tea, dark chocolate.

We love a dark chocolate.

Beans and legumes, spinach, grapes, broccolis, leafy greens, nuts and pomegranates.

Those are all really good things.

Antioxidants, so basically what antioxidants are is there's this idea that the more free radicals in your body, the more likely that those are carcinogenic, and the antioxidants will go and they'll bind to those free radicals and sort of neutralize them and help them to move on their way.

I think of it as a positive ion and a negative ion, and the negative ion is your free radicals, and then your positive ions are your antioxidants, and that's just to help become a neutral, a positive plus a negative, is it neutral?

Cancel each other out.

Cancel each other out, exactly.

Eating whole foods, so making sure your diet is rich in foods, again, that are not processed, whole foods.

Maybe do like a Whole30.

Maybe do a Whole30, you know?

Kate's the queen of the Whole30.

She does it whenever she feels like her body needs a little refresh.

Little zhuzh.

So eating Whole30, or eating Whole Foods, eating seafood, especially those rich in Omega-3s.

Girl, you know I love some seafood.

Yeah, Megan is the queen of seafood, especially salmon, mackerel and sardines.

Do you like sardines, Maggie?

No.

OK, so my great grandmother loved sardines and she always had a can on them.

And they're like coming back in the nutrition community.

Aren't they really salty?

Salty, though?

What comes in a little tin?

I feel like I've been to...

They both come in tins.

Yeah, I feel like people have brought those to wineries before.

Yeah.

For like a little charcuterie with a little cider.

OK.

Anchovies, they're very flavorful.

I mean, I've used an anchovy in cooking before because they like to disintegrate.

So they're like, you can put them in sauces and stuff and they disintegrate and they just become like flavor, but like, I like seeing it on a pizza.

I don't know.

I don't know.

You know, there's something about disintegration and it's just becoming a thing.

And then it just is eating.

You're just like eating it in the sauce.

You're eating the essence.

But like, no, I don't think so.

Okay.

So Omega-3.

So anyway, going back to the eating the fish, Omega-3 fatty acids are renowned for their anti-inflammatory processes or properties.

And we know that, you know, cancer is an inflammatory process.

An inflammatory process.

And then exercise, my big one.

You guys go move your body.

Exercise is so good for you.

It goes back to, it rejuvenates you.

It helps boost your energy levels.

It helps boost your immune system.

Getting that fresh air.

I mean, even just moving your body.

All of that, you know, you're turning over your toxins.

You're getting all that out.

You're sweating out things that don't need to be inside of you.

I mean, exercise is great.

It could be, you could go for a brisk walk.

You could do some yoga, do a little hit, do some CrossFit.

Maggie, you want to do some CrossFit?

She's a no, that's a no from her.

Not if you want to remain uninjured, okay.

Tai Chi, right?

Tai Chi, we say for the older people, if you can't go run a mile, just do some Tai Chi, my friend.

Good for your balance, decrease your fall risk, has health benefits.

It's like yoga, but like, it's like a martial art, but in yoga form.

Yeah, that's what Tai Chi is.

So yeah, those are some things you can do for cancer.

I would like to say that I am with the general population, that there's more things causing cancer.

Although Megan, I did do a deep dive on deodorant.

No, no evidence?

There's no evidence that supports.

Here's the thing, I respect, I have, because I do, I give Kait a lot of shit, okay?

And she just takes it like a good friend.

And sometimes I'm like, was that too much?

And she laughs, she's like, no, we're good.

But like, I guess I respect that you, I just, as we know, we're a couple girls with anxiety, okay?

And I respect that you can put the time and energy into shopping for your like hippie deodorant and your hippie laundry detergent and like checking all of your ingredient lists in the grocery store.

I just feel like there is already so much to worry about in life that I can't take on more things.

So then it like overwhelms me and stresses me out to hear you talk about it.

But if it makes you feel good, you do you.

Well, my whole journey with hippie deodorant is not based on cancer.

You know this, right?

Is it about break out your skin?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm just a sensitive Sally.

I know.

And I think maybe you need to toughen up.

Maybe we need to have some exposure therapy.

No, it hurts so bad.

I used to get burns, guys.

I used to get burns on my underarms from antiperspirant.

That's also because we both were on prescription.

That's true.

So what's the chemical in the prescription?

Aluminum?

Prescription?

Aluminum?

There is carcinogenic material that has been found in tampons.

And I use organic tampons.

Go look it up.

We're not sponsored.

But Cora, the best tampons on the market.

I love all of their products.

It's a female owned company.

You buy a box.

They also give boxes to people in underserved countries, women in underserved countries for menstrual products.

I love the company.

I want them to sponsor us, but Cora, go look them up.

They're at Target.

They're at CVS.

They're everywhere.

But they're my favorite.

Colleen loves them.

She would vouch for them too.

And I'm trying to get Megan on them.

But there is carcinogenic material in tampons.

But now, Bourbon Boy also uses the hippie deodorant, though, right?

Yes, he does.

Do you drive that?

Is that a cancer thing?

Is that a skin thing?

I actually don't remember.

I think he also started breaking out it with deodorant.

And I was like, I'll just get you some of mine.

And so he did.

And then it I mean, you don't stink.

So the deodorant I use, I will also you know what?

I'll just do a whole link sesh for you guys.

This is called Primally Pure.

It's one of my favorite companies.

It's also female owned.

They are again, Primally Pure.

They're very like organic, 100% ingredient list.

They try and source their ingredients from Fairtrade stuff.

So they started out small and they're getting bigger.

You can find them online at Primally Pure.

I love them.

Bourbon Boy uses the charcoal deodorant.

And I am using, I feel like the Bergamot one right now.

So, I like Blue Tansy too, Blue Tansy.

Anyway, go look them up.

Megan's just like staring at me, like I can't believe you're linking these.

Again, guys, there is no evidence that supports aluminum is like, I don't even think there's a correlation between aluminum and breast cancer.

I think breast cancer rates are just on the up.

But it makes me feel better.

And I don't use Hippy Dippy laundry detergent.

Oh, since when?

Since we're saving up?

Yeah.

Since we're watching our bank account?

Since Bidinomics.

Okay.

It's all about risk and benefit, right?

What are you going to risk and what are you going to benefit?

Why am I?

Bourbon Boy does our laundry, and he would only use goals.

But he used like regular detergent for himself.

And the kids.

And then like Hippy Dippy for you.

And I'm just like, okay, this is ridiculous.

Like, I don't need to do that.

I'm very particular, again, I'm particular about like my makeup.

My makeup's all clean.

I don't wear a lot of makeup.

My hair products are clean.

My, you know, body lotion's clean.

Everything's my face washes.

Like I use Manuka honey on my face.

I got some festive Halloween hand soap at Home Goods, and she had some at her cart.

And then she was like, you know what?

I don't want this.

I said, because it's not hippy.

And she was like, bingo, you know, hippy.

I got mine from Trader Joe's, though.

Yeah, Trader Joe's has really good Trader Joe's has really clean products that are also cheap.

So go look at the Trader Joe's stuff.

Okay.

Well, so final thought, enjoy all things in moderation.

Do what makes you happy.

We're going to keep drinking our Diet Coke.

I think really the idea is just like pursue health in whatever way you find you need to pursue health.

So, but I think it also it also goes back to like, we all do want to be healthier people.

And like you said, cancer is on the rise, but like going back to chemtrails, right?

And you were like, but don't like sit in your house because you're afraid to breathe with what's in the air.

I think we're saying you can do things that you can do.

You can make some adjustments in your life that you're comfortable with, that you think can make you a healthier person, but you're not really going to be able to avoid every potential trigger.

Right.

And don't lose sleep over that.

And also like you can use the same argument like, oh, the FDA is just trying to make money off of us getting sick, but also like these products that are like, quote, clean and you know, or like the out there that's like the radiation from our cell phones and the air pods and the, you know, all the things like that's just like based on theory.

And like, sure, like radiation will, like I said, it is a carcinogenic, but you can also like drive yourself crazy.

And then your stress levels get high and then you're lowering.

Yeah, exactly.

So like, just find your balance.

Find what you find is the most important thing to you.

You can't do everything perfect.

Because like Megan said, at the end of the day, we are all gonna die.

And you can do everything right and still be part of the 40% that gets cancer.

Yeah, or you could get, you know, hit by a car tomorrow.

So at least I enjoyed my Diet Coke tonight, you know.

Can't take it with you.

Yeah.

All right, Kait, what should the people do?

Yeah, so if you really enjoyed this episode, what I want you to do is pull out this, pull out your phone right now and text somebody this episode, say, you know what, I think you would really enjoy this, or you know what, I think this would really tick you off and you'd have a lot to say about it.

And you know what, I love a fight.

So bring it on.

And yeah.

And after you text somebody, you can scroll on down, leave us a five-star review, send us a little comment, share, find us on Instagram and share our profile.

And yeah.

Thanks for listening.

Thanks for listening.

And we'll see you next Tuesday.

See you next Tuesday.

Bye.