FoodFacts.com ran across some very important information today that we wanted to share with our community. It’s especially pertinent for diabetics or anyone with diabetics in their family or circle of friends and warrants attention.

Many diabetics and folks who know and love them have considered diet food products as an answer to keeping their sugar levels down. In addition to understanding how carbohydrates affect their disease, and adjusting their diets accordingly, they can also consider sugar-free diet, light, or low fat food products acceptable choices. After all diabetes is a disease that is directly related to sugar … right?

There’s been new research released that point to two additives in foods that can actually cause an increase in fasting blood glucose levels and have been found to be linked to the onset of type 2 diabetes. This is the most common form of the disease, affecting anyone from young children to older adults. And it turns out that the foods that some people think may actually be safe to eat for diabetics really may not be at all.

The study involved mice and its results showed that both aspartame and MSG are actually increasing fasting blood glucose levels and reducing insulin sensitivity … not a good combination for folks with dietabetes.

The presence of aspartame as a product ingredient was shown to have both these effects. When both aspartame and MSG are included in product ingredients a dual effect was discovered – both the spike in fasting blood glucose levels and reduced insulin sensitivity along with weight elevation. As double whammy for diabetes.

This study is fairly ground breaking as it is the first one published that illustrates a hyperglycemic effect from chronic exposure to a combination of food additives that are incredibly common in the food supply. Just take a look at products labeled “sugar-free”, “diet”, “light”, “low-calorie” or “low fat”. And it’s especially important to remember that looking for MSG isn’t just a simple search for monosodium glutamate on an ingredient list. MSG is hidden in many ingredients that are added to processed food. The dual effects described in this study show that this combination can actually spur the development of diabetes.

As with all studies, more research is needed. But since FoodFacts.com understands how many of the products in stores across the country contain both of these ingredients, we felt it especially important to inform and educate our community. Whether you have diabetes or there’s someone in your family who does, it’s more important than ever to read and understand the ingredients of food products. Once again, the ingredient list can tell us what we need to know to keep our families safe and healthy.

Read more: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22697049