Aspartame

Question
I've just started on the Atkins diet.  So far, so good.  But I'm curious why I shouldn't use aspartame.  Atkins book says not to, but doesn't explain why.  Will it interfere with the basic mechanism of ketosis?  Or is it just the belief that its unhealthy in general.  I love diet soda with aspartame, have drunk lots of it everyday for many years, and never noticed any ill effects.  Its the one thing I'd have trouble giving up doing Atkins.  Can you explain why I should, or even if I can still lose weight on Atkins while using it?

Answer
Aspartame has mainly been linked to an increase in brain tumours, though there are indications that it does further neurotoxic damage, in other ways.

The standard Wikipedia page covers the whole aspartame controversy issue, mentioning the various side-effects:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy

http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/100.html

Of course you may wish to take the FDA view that aspartame is perfectly safe. However, see bottom of Wikipedia page to see why FDA might have been biased towards Aspartame due to finacnial inducements from the manufacturers(see FDA approval process section).

As for the other point, this study, among several others online, makes it clear that drinking diet-sodas makes it much more difficult to lsoe weight:-

http://tinyurl.com/yq6gv8

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