The World Health Organization (WHO)'s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is planning to declare 'Aspartame', an artificial sweetener used in chewing gum, cold drinks as a possible cancer causing substance or as "possibly carcinogenic to humans". There are four levels of carcinogens and here, aspartame is the third category/level.

The decision comes following a thorough assessment of published evidence by external experts, reported the Reuters. However, the assessment does not take into account how much a person can safely consume as there is very limited evidence.

The assessment comes from a separate WHO expert committee on food additives, the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (Jecfa).

“IARC has assessed the potential carcinogenic effect of aspartame (hazard identification),” an IARC spokesperson said to the Guardian.

“Following this, the joint FAO/WHO expert committee on food additives will update its risk assessment exercise on aspartame, including the reviewing of the acceptable daily intake and dietary exposure assessment for aspartame. The result of both evaluations will be made available together, on 14 July 2023,” he added.

The report stated that several consumer industry trade bodies - whose members use aspartame rejected the IARC’s assessment.

“The headlines could have a negative impact on sales volumes of lower-calorie sodas, which is really a function of how much attention the story garners," Garrett Nelson, senior equity analyst at CFRA Research, said.

This is not the first time IARC has declared something which is of utmost importance and cannot be avoided as cancerous.

Earlier, IARC put working overnight and consuming red meat and also using mobile phones as possibly cancer-causing.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had approved the use of aspartame for human consumption in 1981 and it has been reviewed again for several times and over 90 countries, including India, have approved its use.

In India, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has approved six artificial sweeteners, and out of them, aspartame is included.

In 1983, aspartame was approved for carbonated drinks and in 1996, it was approved as a general-purpose sweetener.

Aspartame is a low calorie sweetener which is used instead of added sugars. It is about 200 times sweeter than sugar and is consists of two amino acids—aspartic acid and phenylalanine.