LETTERS OF TESTIMONY TO THE HAWAII HOUSE COMMITTEE ON HEALTH CONCERNING ASPARTAME



From: Anne McCord, M.A., LMFT


To Rep Josh Green, Vice Chairman Rep John Mizuno, and Members of the House Committee on Health:

As a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in this state, I wish to make my voice heard by testifying in favor of HB 2680, banning aspartame (Equal, NutraSweet).

The major media will not educate the people about what is going on here; those of us who know must act. I have tried, in my practice, to help people understand that their use of diet sodas, for example, can have an extremely unbalancing effect on their emotions and health. There is also an addictive component to aspartame, as can be discovered with minimal research.

This neurotoxin was tragically foisted on an unsuspecting public for corporate profit, and has caused untold misery ever since, most notably among regular users. Countless testimonies exist from those with poor health who have experienced dramatic improvement after stopping the use of this toxic substance.

An ( http://www.dorway.com/peerrev.html ) analysis of peer reviewed medical literature using MEDLINE and other databases was conducted by Ralph G. Walton, MD, Chairman, The Center for Behavioral Medicine, Professor of Clinical Psychiatry, Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine. Dr. Walton analyzed 164 studies which were felt to have relevance to human safety questions. Of those studies, 74 studies had aspartame industry-related sponsorship and 90 were funded without any industry money.

Of the 90 non-industry-sponsored studies, 83 (92%) identified one or more problems with aspartame. Of the 7 studies which did not find a problem, 6 of those studies were conducted by the FDA. Given that a number of FDA officials went to work for the aspartame industry immediately following approval (including the former FDA Commissioner), many consider these studies to be equivalent to industry-sponsored research. This amounts to almost 100% of non-corporate-affiliated studies showing potential health dangers from use of aspartame!

We the concerned and informed citizens cannot allow this great subterfuge to continue to rob the health of our people. You our valued and honorable lawmakers have the power to begin to overturn an immense and disgraceful corporate fraud perpetrated at the expense of all of us.

Please do the right thing for the citizens of Hawaii, and pass this important legislation, HB 2680. In the worldwide battle against conscienceless corporate greed, Hawaii can be proud to set an ethical legislative standard for the entire United States. Most importantly, the better health of our belatedly informed citizens will be our overriding reward.

With sincerest ALOHA,

Anne McCord, M.A., LMFT