I am very skeptical of all artificial sweetener. I don't think we should add natural sugar to our food either. I'm all about tasting the natural sweetness of food as sweet. The other stuff drastically distorts our sense of taste.
Here are some articles related to the concners with artificial sweetener:
2013 study review in Trends in Endocrinology & Metabolism ABSTRACT
Artificial Sweeteners Produce the Counter-Intuitive Effect of Inducing Metabolic Derangements
Susan E. Swithers
Cleveland Clinic Ohio Doesn’t recommend artificial sweeteners 10-2014
http://health.clevelandclinic.org/2014/10/3-reasons-you-should-kick-your-diet-soda-habit/
Splenda alters gut microflora and increases intestinal p-glycoprotein and cytochrome p-450 in male rats.
Abou-Donia MB1, El-Masry EM, Abdel-Rahman AA, McLendon RE, Schiffman SS.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18800291
Low-Dose Aspartame Consumption Differentially Affects Gut Microbiota-Host Metabolic Interactions in the Diet-Induced Obese Rat Marie S. A. Palmnäs mail, Theresa E. Cowan, Marc R. Bomhof, Juliet Su, Raylene A. Reimer, Hans J. Vogel, Dustin S. Hittel, Jane Shearer
Published: October 14, 2014
I have more but I figured I would post a few. Ultimately we all have to decide what we want to put in our body and if someone want to eat artificial sweetener- to each their own!
Several years ago I switched to flavored seltzer water. I grew up on diet pop but that stuff just doesn't taste good after you avoid if for a couple of months!