Dietary exposure to artificial sweeteners and associated factors in the Portuguese population

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the risk of the Portuguese population’s exposure to six non-nutritive intense sweeteners (NNIS) and their main associated factors. A tiered approach was used to estimate the usual exposure to the NNIS obtained from two 1-day food diaries among children and two 24-hour recalls among adults in the Portuguese national dietary survey (IAN-AF 2015–2016; age: 3–84 y; n = 5005). The tiers considered were the following: Tier 2.1 represents the most conservative tier, in which all foods reported were matched with the respective maximum permitted levels (MPLs); in Tier 2.2, the MPLs were attributed only to the foods for which the brand’s label information identified the presence of an added NNIS; finally, Tier 3 was identical to Tier 2.2, but analytical NNIS occurrence data were used, instead of MPLs. The usual exposure of the Portuguese population to each NNIS was very low in all tiers across all age groups, as was the estimated prevalence of exposure above the acceptable daily intake. Soft drinks were the main source of exposure for most sweeteners, and acesulfame K and aspartame were the most consumed NNIS. The odds of exposure to at least one NNIS were higher in more highly educated adults and elderly, obese elderly, women, and people with lower healthy diet scores. The estimated risk of exceeding the safety levels of NNIS intake was very low in all evaluated population groups, even when considering the most conservative approach.

Keywords:

• Exposure assessment
• risk assessment
• sweeteners
• Portuguese population

Acknowledgements

The IAN-AF 2015–2016 had institutional support from the General Directorate of Health, the Regional Health Administration Departments, the Central Administration of the Health System, and the European Food Safety Authority (CFT/EFSA/DCM/2012/01-C03). The researchers acknowledge these institutions and all people involved in all phases of the survey, as well as the participants.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work received funds from the EEA Grants Program, Public Health Initiatives (PT06 - 000088SI3); the Operational Programme Factors of Competitiveness–COMPETE from FEDER and national funds from the Foundation for Science and Technology–FCT (Portuguese Ministry of Education and Science) under the project “FOCAcCIa” (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-031949); the Epidemiology Research Unit (UIDB/04750/2020, POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006862); the LAQV-REQUIMTE (UIDB/50006/2020); and the FCT doctoral grant [SFRH/BD/146078/2019] (CC). The funding institutions had no role in the design, analysis, or writing of this article.