HOW sweet it is to be let off the hook. Six months after reports that the widely used artificial sweetener aspartame caused cancer in rats, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) declared on 5 May that the controversial research was flawed.
The rat study, by the Ramazzini Foundation, not only linked the sweetener to cancer, but claimed that it could be caused by half the World Health Organization’s acceptable daily intake of 40 milligrams per kilogram of body weight (New Scientist, 6 May, p 40).
Because the study was done by a respected cancer institute, several national food safety…
