THE THREE LETTERS ON ASPARTAME
THE EIB DIDN'T GET TO READ....
POSTED FOR THE WORLD TO READ

Posted: 06 January 2006

Ajinomoto, manufacturer of aspartame provided objections to the EIB's hearing to ban aspartame in July. Copies were mailed to appropriate parties as well as to H. J. Roberts, M.D., and Dr. Betty Martini who submitted answers to the Board in great detail. Mark Gold of the Aspartame Toxicity Center also submitted answers with important data. They were not allowed in evidence even though they clearly answered the objections. The hearing scheduled for July 2006 on banning aspartame was allowed but postponed another six months, and these necessary answers were not added into evidence for full understanding. Below are the refused submissions:

1. Mark Gold, Founder, Aspartame Toxicity Center

By Mark D. Gold to Comments by Ajinomoto
Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2005
Submission to Environmental Improvement Board: Answering Ajinomoto's objections to a hearing on aspartame

Please find below a short response to the Comments by Draft Orders By Ajinomoto Food Ingredients LLC.

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State of New Mexico Before the Environmental Improvement Board

In the Matter of Proposed Amendments to 7.6.2 NMAC, Food Service and Food Processing, Proposed Ban on Aspartame

December 30, 2005 EIB 05-11 (R)

Response by Mark D. Gold to:

Comments on Draft Orders By Ajinomoto Food Ingredients LLC

Claim: "The ten copies of Exhibits required is unmanageable. This will convert a multi-million page physical record into a multiple of ten millions of pages or a record of tens of millions of pages into hundreds of millions of pages."

Response: There are three reasons this claim holds no merit:

1. Ajinomoto's aspartame PR web page ( http://www.aspartame.net ) makes the following provably false claim: "[Aspartame] is made from two building blocks of protein just like those found naturally in many everyday foods such as meat, fish, cheese, eggs and milk. Aspartame is digested by the body in exactly the same way as these other protein foods and so does not bring anything new to the diet." But if they believe that the issue is so simple as what they claim on their web page, it would be a very simple matter to prove safety and would not take "millions" or "tens of millions" of pages.

2. Ajinomoto provided no evidence that they compiled and delivered millions or tens of millions of pages of documentation for other reviews that have taken place, particularly the recent review by the E.C. SCF that was mentioned in their comments. One would expect that they have already compiled these documents for past reviews and to prepare for future reviews. I believe one will find that Ajinomoto has never prepared or provided anything more than thousands of pages of documentation to governmental organizations reviewing aspartame.

3. Ajinomoto claims in their comments that there are "more than 200 studies in the files establishing the safety of aspartame." If one gives them the benefit of the doubt and assumes 1,000 studies at 20 pages per study average, that would only amount to 20,000 pages. The reality is that there are fewer aspartame studies relevant to safety and the average length is probably much shorter. While there are some government documents, it is ridiculous to claim that there are millions or tens of millions of pages of relevant documents.

Response: As mentioned above, Ajinomoto makes the provably false claim that aspartame is simply building blocks of protein and adds nothing new to the diet. If that were the case, they would easily be able to make there case with submitted documents and no more than one day of testimony. They desperately want to avoid a hearing because whatever the final decision, it will become obvious that many of the statements they make to the general public (and to the EIB) are inaccurate. It is true that one could spend days detailing how the manufacturer-funded aspartame research is designed and manipulated to avoid finding adverse effects as opposed to independently-funded studies which almost always finds adverse effects. But a sampling of the independent research and the issues related to manufacturer research would suffice for demonstrating the toxicity of aspartame.

Claim: "It will be impossible for the medical expert and the EIB to review all of the data that are submitted and be prepared for a hearing by July 17."

Response: It is possible for a medical expert to review the research by July 17. What Ajinomoto does not mention is that the SCF review was drafted by a single individual and that was passed on to the full Committee where no substantive changes were made. It is important to note that the SCF was made up of numerous persons who had employment and other financial conflicts of interest (e.g., industry consultants) and relied primarily on books and papers by the manufacturer and their paid consultants. See: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/scf2002.html

Before the aspartame review, the SCF had already been criticized in a medical journal for their conflict of interest. Nevertheless, Ajinomoto did not show evidence that they filed a protest with the SCF because the SCF document was drafted by a single individual.

Claim: "We believe it will be necessary to have more than one expert because the petitioner raises issues that would require the involvement of individuals with various areas of expertise, such as expertise in areas of toxicology, histopathology, neurology, and brain physiology, particularly on the blood brain/barrier...."

Response: Ajinomoto would like to have scientists with other specialties involved in the review. That could work as long as the scientists (and their lab/department) are completely independent and they have a history of working to protect the safety of consumers and Ajinomoto has zero input in the selection process. If the public relations claims of safety of aspartame were as simple as Ajinomoto makes them out to be, specialists would not be needed.

I believe that Ajinomoto simply wants to delay the process as long as possible and then kill the process of review altogether. The most time- efficient process might be for the EIB medical expert to consult with independent experts as needed.

Claim: "Aspartame Regulatory Timeline" attached to their comments.

Response: For a referenced Timeline that does not exclude nearly all negative FDA findings, please see: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/history.faq

The important question is, "Does Ajinomoto believe its own public relations statements about aspartame." If so, it would be a relatively easy and quick effort for them to prove those statements and it would give them an opportunity to allay and consumer concerns. The effort they are making to avoid a hearing at all costs seem to demonstrate that they do not believe their own public relations statements.

Respectfully submitted,

Mark D. Gold Aspartame Toxicity Information Center
http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame
12 East Side Dr., Suite 2-18
Concord, NH 03301
Phone: 603-225-2110

2. H. J. Roberts, M.D.

December 26, 2005
Honorable Patricia A. Madrid Attorney General of New Mexico
P. O. Drawer 1508
Santa Fe, New Mexico 87504-1508
Fax 505-827 5826

Re: Proposed ban of aspartame products (EIB 05-11)

Dear Attorney General Madrid,

I have just received a copy of the document by Dick Minsner, Esq., titled "Comments on Draft Orders by Ajinomoto Food Ingredients LLC," that was sent to the EIB on November 30.

As a corporate-neutral friend of consumers in New Mexico, whose health I regard as being threatened thereby, I request that the following comments be added as supplements to my previous communications to this Board and to the Pharmacy Board.

Let me preamble my opinions by stating that your State MUST assume the right to protect its inhabitants from a perceived imminent public health threat if it believes that federal agencies have failed to do so. A number of recent clinical observations and research studies extend and validate the serious reactions induced by this chemical that I have described in detail. They include hypertension and cancer.

To fault New Mexico for being "a relatively small and relatively poor state" in exercising this right - as indicated by Mr. Minzner - is a matter for you, your Governor, and other elected officials to deliberate.

Allow me to simplify the Board's agenda by focusing on the following issues that Mr. Minzner raises. I believe that they can be addressed convincingly in several days of hearings without requiring ana intimidating review of "tens of millions of pages,"

1. Alleged Determinations of Safety
   It is alleged that the FDA and over 130 countries have independently determined that aspartame products have been shown to be safe in humans. Demand copies of those that meet these criteria: studies by competent corporate-neutral investigations (that is, having no conflicting interests) on humans who were followed closely for at least three months while using real world aspartame products (relative to unknown duration of storage and temperature exposure).

2. Other Confounding Variables
   Other "well-designed studies" based on "the underlying science" - especially the use of controls - must guarantee against the concomitant use of placebos and other products that contain neurotoxic substances, such as MSG ... perhaps unknown to the investigators.

3. FDA Data
   The Board is entitled to up-to-date and already - stored information about the total number of complaints the FDA has received in which aspartame products were alleged to have caused illness, the nature of such complaints, the number followed up, and the number of complainants from New Mexico. Moreover, the Board should insist that these data are certified to be correct since there have been repeated allegations that "the FDA stopped keeping count." These data address the challenged assertion of Mr. Minzner that only "a tiny segment of the population" reacts adversely to aspartame products.

4. Corporate-Neutral Expert Witnesses
   The Board should demand that all experts who testify have no conflicts of interest. This term is specifically defined by many medical and scientific journals relative to accepting submitted manuscripts.

5. Limitation of other FDA-Approved Products
   The Board should not concern itself with whether its decision will invite litigation for other products.

6. Challenged Benefits of Aspartame-Products
   I challenge the alleged "health benefits" of aspartame products cited by Mr. Minzner - in particular, "combating obesity" and "making sweet products safe for diabetics." Even a cursory study of my books and other publications will indicate opposite adverse effects in patients.

7. Original Biased Approval
   The FDA commissioner who approved the use of aspartame for humans in l991 did so unilaterally and arbitrarily, disregarding the urging of FDA scientists, consultants for the General Accounting Office, and a subsequent Public Board of Inquiry - especially relative to the matter of brain tumors. The latter have now become an alarming public health issue. Furthermore, the Timeline entry relative to the GAO investigation failed to indicate that a majority of its consultants opposed the approval of aspartame.

8. Misleading FDA Statement
   I totally disagree with the statement cited in the l994 Timeline about the failure of the FDA to determine "any consistent pattern of symptoms that can be attributed to the use of aspartame..." I have detailed these hallmarks of Aspartame Disease in all my publications, particularly Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic. If you and your boards do not have this book, dealing with the first 1200 cases in my data base, I shall be pleased to provide copies.

May I request that you provide your staff, Governor Richardson, and members of the two Boards with copies of this supplemental correspondence? Thank you.

Sincerely,

Hyman J. Roberts, M.D., FACP, FCCP
hjrobertsmd@aol.com

(Note Dr. Roberts is author of Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic, http://www.sunsentpress.com or 1-800-827-7991, and can be seen in the aspartame documentary, Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World, http://www.docworkers.com )

3. Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum., Founder, Mission Possible International

Answering Ajinomoto's Objections to EIB Hearing on Aspartame Ajinomoto asserts the EIB Board "needs to devote several years ... to employ many people including many scientific experts" ... and "needs to hold more than five days hearing." For 25 years citizens, scientists and physicians have petitioned authorities to ban aspartame, but all efforts have been defeated, not by science but by bureaucratic fiat. Ajinomoto just wants to hang yet another scalp (New Mexico's) on their enormous bloody belt of duplicity.

At the beginning, Searle submitted fraudulent research reports to FDA that concealed cancers, hid brain tumors and resurrected dead animals, etc. So egregious was Searle's corruption that FDA asked the Department of Justice to prosecute them. Without any viable defense, their attorneys simply hired both U.S. Prosecutors, Skinner & Conlon, and the case died when the statute of limitations expired.

However, two honest FDA toxicologists, Doctors Adrian Gross and JacquelineVerrett exposed the dirty work in Congressional testimony. Dr. Gross testified that aspartame violated the Delaney Amendment which forbade adding carcinogens to food, since "Without a shadow of a doubt," aspartame can cause brain cancer, and FDA should not have set an allowable dose since none could be allowed. Also: "If FDA violates its own laws, who is left to protect the public?"

Dr. Verrett told Congress aspartame had never been proven safe, and that all studies were built on a foundation of sand and should be thrown out. These 1985 and 1987 Senate hearings confirmed the 9/30/80 action of the FDA scientific Public Board of Inquiry which REVOKED Searle's petition on the factual basis that aspartame was not proven safe and triggered brain tumors. FDA scientists never changed their position; aspartame approval was by power political fiat!

In original studies, it also triggered mammary, uterine, ovarian, testicular, pancreatic, and thyroid tumors. A 52 week oral toxicity study on 7 infant monkeys gave 5 grand mal seizures and killed another. This proved that aspartame gets in the blood stream, which the manufacturers deny, yet their own study proved it. Rao study: http://www.dorway.com/raoreport.txt

FDA's own report of 92 documented symptoms from 10,000 volunteered complaints, more than received on all other food additives combined, lists four different seizures triggered by aspartame and included death: http://www.dorway.com/badnews.html#symptoms

The late Dr. Adrian Gross, FDA toxicologist, wrote about Searle's antics and said they were a script for comedians.

"The views of the FDA's Center for Food Safety read like a script written for Abbott & Costello in the sense of their having perceptions inside-out and upside-down ...329 fetuses were examined in 2 days by a single person (a clear impossibility)."

Dr. Gross wrote letters to Senator Howard Metzenbaum in Oct. and Nov. l987 and quoted points from the Task Force:

"We have uncovered serious deficiencies in Searle's operation and practices which undermined the basis for reliance on Searle's integrity ...Searle has not submitted all the facts or experiments to FDA, retaining unto itself the unpermitted option of filtering, interpreting and not submitting information ...an attitude of disregard for FDA's mission of protection of the public health, conduct which compromises the scientific integrity of the studies." 14 test blunders are listed, including:

Substitution of animals (hiding deaths)
Using sick animals on drugs (unreported)
Incomplete examination, unreported tumors
Missing batch records
Mixing food so rats in the test could avoid the product
Destroying rats before they could be fully analyzed

The full frequency of brain tumors was not disclosed by Searle to the FDA. In l976, FDA Commissioner Dr. Alexander Schmidt publicly stated that FDA could not rely on Searle's studies. But the sloppy, incomplete, doctored and fraudulent "tests" with a little help from some friends, put NutraSweet on the market and let slip the hounds of disease and devastation upon an innocent unwarned American population. Then this approval was rubber stamped around the world in at least 130 nations.

Dr. Gross said: "It seems bizarre that essentially the same set of studies could provide a foundation for a decision that ...demonstrated the safety of aspartame.... Although the General Accounting Office expresses the view that FDA followed its required process, I sharply disagree ... although FDA may have gone through the motions such a "process" or dance represented no more than a farce and a mockery."

Jerome Bressler wrote an FDA audit of the fraudulent manipulations by the manufacturer in their failed attempts to show safety. http://www.dorway.com/bressler.txt

When I spoke to Jerome Bressler to thank him for exposing Searle he said the facts were much worse than the report showed because FDA retyped his results and removed the worst 20%. He personally confirmed this to Doctors H. J. Roberts and Russell Blaylock. Dr. Roberts asked his congressman to get Bressler's original, but FDA refused. Doctoring scientific reports is fraud by the FDA and displays their loyalty to commerce, not consumers.

For 16 years, FDA denied approval of the poison, but then Searle hired Don Rumsfeld to fix things. He joined Ronald Reagan's team, so the next day after Reagan took office we got a new FDA Commissioner, Arthur Hull Hayes. He approved aspartame, then bailed out while being investigated for conflicts of interest and took a fat 10-year consulting contract with Searle's PR Outfit. Aspartame was approved by a political pawn finagled into FDA to poison us. Political manipulation, not science, not upright public servants, cursed New Mexico and all America with this neurotoxin.

View the documentary Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World, http://www.docworkers.com See how Rumsfeld "called in his markers": http://www.soundandfury.tv/pages/Rumsfeld2.html

Ajinomoto is asking the EIB for a few extra years. Do they want to market another sweet poison because they can't fight the evidence that aspartame is poisonous. Meanwhile brain tumors breed, children are ruined and the hounds of horror & grief savage our people. They claim FDA examined aspartame for 30 years and decided it is a general purpose sweetener. Pardon while I laugh! Searle admitted aspartame isn't a general purpose sweetener in the secret trade information given to Congress 12/20/70. Herbert Helling of Searle detailed the planned psycho-manipulation Searle used on FDA:

"At this meeting, the basic philosophy of our approach to Food and Drug should be to try to get them to say "yes" and to rank the things that we are going to ask for so that we are putting first those questions we are likely to get "yes" to, even if we have to throw some in that have no significance to us other than putting them into a yes saying habit. We must create an affirmative atmosphere in our dealing with them. It would also help if we can get them or get the people involved to do us any sort of favor as this would also help bring them into a subconscious spirit of participation. ...I think that it's vital to point out to the Food and Drug people at this meeting that the sweetener is not suitable for all applications for artificial sweeteners."

The National Soft Drink Association protested to Congress that aspartame is unfit for carbonated beverages and violates federal adulteration statutes. Then, Hayes blessed it for soda pop in l983 so the bottlers sang to the ring of their cash registers and forgot insignificant things like health and tumors and staying alive. http://www.dorway.com/nsda.html

FDA said aspartame can't be heated, then approved it in '93 for baking. In '96 FDA Commissioner Kessler was about to approve it as an all purpose sweetener but needed to rid the complaints. Easy! FDA quit accepting them, then decided to change bookkeeping methods and threw away hundreds of existing complaints. I've sent FDA thousands of complaints, all ignored.

In Searle's secret trade information, climactic is the last paragraph: "With the spoon-for-spoon, we have no way of estimating maximum likely abuse and hence need to utilize data based on almost complete conversion to DKP. If we include this in the original FAP, we stand a good chance of ending up with nothing in the short run and nothing in the long run whereas the other approach would give us something in the short run and quite likely as much as we would ever get in the long run."

Based on this paragraph, Searle should have been put out of business and their execs sent to prison. DKP is a brain tumor agent. Searle, Monsanto, Ajinomoto, et al with full knowledge have been selling brain tumors for 25 years. They sacrificed people in poor villages in 6 countries in an 18 month studies, destroyed their brains and CNS, aborted a baby, induced seizures and triggered brain tumors and never published the results. I have the translator's affidavit. Usually it takes longer than this to grow brain tumors but the translator said they gave them "lots of aspartame". This confirms the recent 3-year Italian study that the cancers are dose related.

Ajinomoto serves death at every dinner table in a global plague! The just finished 3-year study by the European Ramazzini Foundation of Oncology showed aspartame caused lymphoma, leukemia, cancer of the kidneys and cancer of the cranial peripheral nerves. Only the rats fed aspartame got malignant brain tumors. In September, they declared aspartame is a "multipotential carcinogen." Of course, we've known it's a carcinogen for years.

The Italian study echoes the words of Dr. Gross in his summary to Senator Metzenbaum on Nov 3, l987:

"Quite aside from the remarkable significance of the increased incidence with dose of those brain tumors, the ADI of 50 mgm/kgm body-weight recently set by the FDA for the human consumption of aspartame is alarmingly dangerous in that it involves an extremely high, and therefore, a totally unacceptable upper limit on the risk for those consuming aspartame: between 1/1,000 and 5/1,000 population to develop brain tumors as a result of such exposure."

What else is this but a form of premeditated murder by the manufacturers!

Ajinomoto admits aspartame approval by other nations was based on FDA's approval, which was the work of Rumsfeld and his puppet Hayes! These nations knew nothing of aspartame's trail of blood & Rumsfeld politics.

Let's put this in prospective: In 1996 Ralph Walton, M.D. investigated aspartame's peer reviewed studies and correlated them with who paid for the work, funding. http://www.dorway.com/peerrev.html This was discussed on 60 Minutes when Dr. John Olney made world news on the brain tumor issue in l996. Dr. Walton found that 92% of independent scientific peer reviewed studies showed problems with the poison, and if one pro-industry summary and the 6 studies FDA had something to do with are deleted because they're loyal to industry the score is 100% of independent scientific peer reviewed studies show problems.

What does that say about industry-controlled/funded research? They make it a point to get what they pay for. The details of this treachery are at http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/abuse Read how aspartame manufacturers manipulate studies.

Mr. Minzner says in his letter: "it would be unfair and a denial of Ajinomoto' right to refuse to consider all of the relevant information." Ajinomoto has refused relevant information for too many years! The Public Board of Inquiry's revocation of aspartame approval, FDA's Bressler audit, and FDA's 16 years of evidence since it was discovered in the pre-Hayes period, together incriminate this poison. I'll happily provide whatever further evidence you need.

Minzner whines it would be extraordinary for New Mexico to reach a differing conclusion. In Ajinomoto's Board of Directors' minds the EIB should be behaving more like a bunch of rubber-stamping robots! In the UK a Member of Parliament, Roger Williams, on December 14th asked for a ban on aspartame throughout the UK. Several excellent actions are developing in far principalities, but they're not for Ajinomoto's ears yet.

Minzner makes the incredible claim: "aspartame opponents claim to have studies and science supporting their position. A careful analysis of their "science" is needed to identify the flaws in the underlying research." A Board of Inquiry of FDA's best scientists revoked the petition for approval based on the studies. An FDA audit exposed manipulation in studies. Experts said Searle's studies were hopelessly flawed!

Minzner says witnesses will have to explain much of the science in the millions of pages. Note that the aspartame industry funds the American Diabetes Assn, American Dietetic Assn, the MS people, and other professional organizations. They use such as "experts" to defend them as a representative of the American Diabetes Assn did in congressional hearings. Those responsible to solve the problem are the problem.

Aspartame has a front group to hand out "research" money, ILSI (International Life Sciences Institute). Reported in UPI's eight-month investigation. Dr. Richard Wurtman testified against aspartame to Congress http://www.wnho.net/congressionalrecord.htm He intended to do seizure studies but was told by a Searle VP that if he did his research funds would be rejected. Today Dr. Wurtman no longer speaks out on aspartame, but MIT continues to receive research funds. A TV station contacted Wurtman who said: "I renege on everything I ever said about aspartame". But he can't renege on his Congressional Record testimony, or his fine book, Dietary Phenylalanine and Brain Function. It was removed from MIT's library, but I have a copy. EIB needs to know this.

Minzner says if EIB concludes it has the legal right to proceed it should refrain as a matter of discretion. A thinly veiled threat to sue EIB; winning by intimidation! Minzner says the petitioner should raise his concerns with FDA. So they can build a bigger bonfire? FDA Commissioners come and go like bus tokens, three in 2005. In June 02, I filed a Citizens Petition for ban. Law requires an answer in 180 days, and we're in the fourth year and they won't respond. They wrote that they had more important priories. They can't answer without admitting FDA wrongdoing, and since they're a law unto themselves I'll never hear from them. http://www.wnho.net/citizens_aspartame_petition.htm

Minzner says other food additives have opponents who may bring them before the Board. Opponents of unsafe additives have the right to expose them, and New Mexico has the right to safe food and drugs. Minzner brings up mercury, failing to mention that it is a deadly poison banned in six other states as a vaccine additive. He request experts needed to testify on the blood brain barrier which he claims prevents the transfer of aspartic acid into the brain from the blood. For years many manufacturers said it doesn't get in the blood. Their own records prove that it does. Now they admit it. Will they now admit it's a drug? The law requires an additive be inert. http://www.wnho.net/answering_monsantos_denial.htm

Dr. John Olney, one of the most famous neuroscientists in the world, studied aspartic acid, 40% of the chemical. (Nature, Vol 227. No. 5253, pp. 609-610, August 8, l970. - Brain Damage in Infant Mice following Oral Intake of Glutamate, Aspartate or Cysteine). He found lesions in the brains of mice. For this reason, Olney fought approval of aspartame and testified to the Board of Inquiry aspartame will damage the brains of our children. The PBOI agreed with Dr. Olney, no doubt one of reason they revoked the petition for approval.

Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock in his book Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills relates in great detail how aspartic acid and glutamate damage the brain. Aspartic acid is an excitotoxin that stimulates the brain's neurons to destruction. James Bowen, M.D. said aspartic acid; the excitotoxic component of aspartame, is secreted into the cerebral spinal fluid by the choroid plexus located in the ventricles of the brain. There, in the brains lower area and upper terminus of the spinal is where Lou Gehrig's, Parkinson's Disease and Multiple Sclerosis damage is most prominent. These critical locations are bathed in the toxin as it removes from the blood. From the third to fourth ventricle there is a narrow canal called sylvian aqueduct, which fills with this secretion and washes the roof of the hypothalamus.

Minzner asks if the petitioner needs to establish the incorrectness of the federal determinations by some elevated standard of proof such as by "clear and convincing evidence" or by establishing that the federal rulings are "clearly wrong" or that they were obtained by fraud or collusion or undue influence?" That the FDA wanted the manufacturer prosecuted for fraud is established. A Nov '76 FDA memo to Carl Sharp from FDA toxicologist Dr. Adrian Gross:

"Let us put this matter in some perspective by establishing the basic facts here. The Searle investigation which started in the Fall of l975 can be viewed as an investigation "for cause" following the discovery of certain improprieties in the conduct of animal studies during preliminary inspections in l974 and in the first half of l975. The report of the Task Force submitted in March l976 in essence constituted a stinging indictment of Searle and it contained various recommendations for regulatory action including referral to the Justice Department for review of possible criminal violations of the law. "

"Undue influence"? Absolutely! Searle's lawyers, Sidley & Austin were making a deal for employment with both U.S. Prosecutors while they were supposed to be prosecuting their client!!!! Negotiations dragged out to let the statute of limitations expire? The Godfather hired the District Attorney! The Bressler Report discusses Searle's shenanigans with respect to studies.

FDA clearly did everything they could to prevent approval, but undue influence by powerful politicians pushed it through. From the documentary, Sweet Misery: A Poisoned World see Attorney James Turner tell how Don Rumsfeld got aspartame approved when the FDA had said no for 16 years. http://www.soundandfury.tv/pages/rumsfeld2.html

Mr. Turner also explains how Dr. Olney demanded Searle do studies in his lab so he could oversee them. Done honestly without manipulation, they showed aspartame causes brain damage. But Searle never gave the results to the FDA, nor published the studies done in 6 countries sacrificing humans, which also showed brain damage. Research at a university in Norway also showed aspartame destroys the brain, especially in the area of learning. Between this study, the unpublished studies in South and Central America and Dr. Olney's testimony, you can understand why ADD, ADHD and autism are so epidemic.

Minzner really put his foot in his mouth by opening the door to the very slippery slope of bringing up fraud and undue influence. President Reagan even wrote an executive order making the current FDA Commissioner powerless to do anything about aspartame until he could get an FDA Commissioner there to approve aspartame.

It's hard to believe an attorney would ask in his objections: "Is it relevant that aspartame has health benefits, such as combating obesity and making sweet products safe for diabetics and has been providing these benefits for more than 20 years?" There are no health benefits from this chemical poison! The epidemics in obesity and diabetes began with the introduction of aspartame. Dr. Wurtman gave an affidavit: Aspartame makes you crave carbohydrates so you gain weight. You'll find it in the protest of the National Soft Drink Assn on http://www.dorway.com

I have taken case histories for years from victims about these carbohydrate cravings. Here is Dr. Sandra Cabot's paper, Aspartame Makes You Fatter: http://www.dorway.com/cabotfat.txt Aspartame creates toxicity in the liver as proven in the Trocho Study in Barcelona. Here is a case that was published in the Townsend Letter for Doctors: http://www.dorway.com/tlliver.txt

Diabetes? There's an entire chapter in Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic by diabetic specialist Dr. Roberts on how aspartame precipitates diabetes, simulates and aggravates diabetic retinopathy and neuropathy, destroys the optic nerve and interacts with insulin. Sharon Fowler of the University of Texas did an epidemiological study linking diet drinks to obesity using 8 years of data: http://www.wnho.net/aspartamenews.htm

How much more evidence do you need? We are ready to provide everything you need.

Dr. Ralph Walton wrote: "Food seeking behavior and satiety are driven by an area of the brain known as the hypothalamus. Stimulation of the medial hypothalamus in a laboratory rat leads to eating. Stimulation of the lateral hypothalamus leads to satiety and cessation of eating. Placing a lesion in the lateral hypothalamus produces an obese rat. The lateral hypothalamus is drive by serotonin. There are many papers in the current literature demonstrating that antidepressants which increase serotonin (but not antidepressants which act on other neurotransmitters) are used in treating binge eating disorders. I believe that consuming large amounts of aspartame decreases the availability of serotonin and is thus analogous to placing a lesion in the lateral hypothalamus. Although much of this work is recent, clinical suggestions that aspartame can lead to a paradoxical increased appetite date back to Blunder's work of l986. An evolving view in modern psychiatry is that although depression, obsessive compulsive disorder, panic disorder, impulse control disorders and eating disorders have historically been viewed as separate entities, in fact they should be viewed as a continuum of disorders all involving some degree of dysregulation of serotonin. I believe that at this time there is overwhelming evidence that aspartame contributes to this dysregulation."

Attorneys for Ajinomoto insult New Mexico, your EIB and your intelligence. So Minzer has asked you to believe New Mexico is a poor and small state. It is in fact the 5th largest state and the oil and natural gas resources have created huge surpluses for state government. The cost of a five day EIB hearing is infinitesimal compared to the millions of dollars saved in health benefits and in prevention of neurodegenerative illnesses. I shouldn't have to be pointing this out to a former Majority Leader in the New Mexico House and a former Secretary of Taxation and Revenue.

Ajinomoto will do anything to stop a hearing. Their conniving manipulation and payoffs are legend. An excellent example would be the case of Dr. Woodrow Monte, author of the journal article, Aspartame: Methanol and the Public Health. He was very concerned about aspartame in Arizona because of the high temperature. Stack aspartame-laced pop in front of a gas station in Arizona temperature and you'll be drinking formaldehyde cocktails as in the Persian Gulf. Monte requested a hearing as it states in the UPI Investigation: http://www.dorway.com/upipaper.txt

In 1984, Searle parried an assault on the sweetener's safety from Arizona food scientist, Dr. Woodrow Monte after hiring Arizona Gov. Bruce Babbitt's former chief of staff as a lobbyist. Searle officers passed along campaign contributions of $2,000 to a key lawmaker, and the company soon had won passage of legislation crushing Monte's efforts to force tough state restrictions on the sweetener.

Dr. Woodrow Monte filed for reconsideration of his petition for a hearing in Arizona. He was granted a hearing scheduled for April 1985 (Gordon 1987, page 507 of US Senate 1987).

In April 1985, in an unusual and secret maneuver, the Arizona legislature removed the text in a Toxic Waste Bill and used it to pass a bill, which banned the regulation of FDA-approved food additives (Gordon 1987, page 508 of US Senate 1987). This bill scuttled the hearing that Dr. Monte had been promised. Talk about "undue influence"! Ajinomoto's frantic purpose is to paralyze New Mexico's elimination of its toxic abomination by threat, coercion, inducement, intimidation or any nefarious means it can employ to silence the people's voice.

The manufacturers of aspartame have for years, along with the FDA, tried to prevent independent unbiased studies. Gregory Gordon wrote an article on this subject. When Dr. Ralph Walton did an independent study, Monsanto, manufacturer at the time, refused to sell him the aspartame, after promising to do so, because they couldn't control the research. The study was stopped when the administrator had a retinal detachment, another suffered conjunctival bleeding, and some said they felt like they were being poisoned.

Their "reward system" is golden. It is also very provable by public record. In l996 when Dr. Olney made world news on the brain tumor connection, FDA acting commissioner Michael Friedman actually got on 60 Minutes and defended the manufacturer, saying aspartame didn't cause brain tumors. I asked Dr. Friedman when he was going to get his reward for lying. He didn't answer, but 3 years later Searle hired him as VP for a half a million dollars a year.

In Dr. Olney's testimony to Congress about the studies being riddled with fraud he ended by saying the studies need to be repeated by "independent" researchers of high integrity. http://www.wnho.net/olneyletter.htm That's been done now by the Italian researchers and peer reviewed by 7 world experts. One of the authors of the study, Fioralla Belpoggi, was quoted in the Guardian UK Newspaper as saying: "In our opinion, the results of our first experiment on aspartame call for urgent reconsideration of the rules governing its use as an artificial sweetener."

Deriving from my 14 years of taking the case histories of sick and dying aspartame victims, I must conclude by paraphrasing Dr. Olney, saying that the aspartame producers' participation in this issue has been riddled with manipulation, intimidation and threats. Their modus operandi is to accuse all opponents of being toxic terrorists, including physicians. Ajinomoto, in fact, are the toxic terrorists. Here is their whole sordid history: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/history.faq

After the Italian study came their whoppers: http://www.wnho.net/whoppers.htm

Read Ajinomoto, Aspartame and Brain Tumors: Recipe for Death, http://www.wnho.net/recipe_for_death.htm and see propaganda refuted with medical references, and my open letter to Ajinomoto. The Japanese government translated my letter into Japanese and asked Ajinomoto to answer me. Of course, they didn't answer.

The horrible reality is that your friends and families and fellow New Mexicans, and multitudes of innocent unwarned victims across the broad face of the earth are sickened and destroyed by this cumulative toxin. Aspartame interacts with drugs and vaccines, so nothing is safe as long as it continues to be marketed and consumed.

It's time for these toxic corporations to be held accountable for the damages and death they have caused by implementation of punitive and exemplary lawsuits. Freeing New Mexicans from this multipotential carcinogen is long overdue. Citizens have the right to due process, and the protection of their health. Everywhere I go, people tell me horror stories. The cases and stories of anguish are overflowing. Rumsfeld/Aspartame Disease will in due course be recognized as one of the greatest scandals in world history. May New Mexico be the first to knock down the toxic corporate domino!

Dr. Betty Martini
Founder, Mission Possible International
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
770-242-2599
http://www.dorway.com
http://www.wnho.net

Aspartame Toxiocity Center: http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

Be sure to read the Shocking Story of the World's Best Selling Sweetener. http://www.wnho.net/the_ecologist_aspartame_report.htm

Hopefully in 2006 aspartame will be banned in many nations.