Department of Health / EPA
“If they kill the grass, they must also kill cancer cells.” Donald Trump has defended his consumption of sugar-free soft drinks, suggesting it can help prevent cancer, as Mehmet Oz revealed in a recent interview with the president’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.
First of all: no, sugar-free soft drinks they don’t do anything to prevent cancer, all (or almost all) doctors note. But, apparently, Donald Trump have a different opinion.
“Your father argues that sugar-free soft drinks are good for him because they kill the grass if you drop them on the grass, and so must also kill cells carcinogens inside the body,” said Mehmet Ozknown as “Dr. Oz”, on the podcast , hosted by the President’s eldest son.
Oz, cardiothoracic surgeon and television personality that Donald Trump from the USA, describes in the podcast a recent moment aboard Air Force One.
“You know, we were at Air Force One the other day, and I go in there because he wanted to talk about something, and he had an orange soda on the table. There was a Fanta on the desk”, said Oz.
“And I say, ‘Are you kidding me?’ Then he starts to smile, a little embarrassed, and says: ‘You know, this is good for me — it kills cancer cells‘” Oz also recalled that Trump toyed with the idea that Fanta, made with orange juice from concentrate, It couldn’t hurt to be “squeezed on the spot”.
Don Jr responded by suggesting that Maybe there was some basis on his father’s habits: “But Maybe he even understands some of this. Because I tell you one thing: I know a lot of men approaching 80, and there aren’t many with the level of his energy, memory and resistance”.
These remarks about Trump’s diet come as the Health Department works to update U.S. nutritional guidelines, including a food pyramid review to emphasize “real food”, notes .
Trump has long defended his preference for sugary drinks and fast food like part of your way of staying healthy. “He doesn’t want to get sick, so he eats junk foodbut food made in large, reputable chains, because they have quality control”, said Oz on the podcast.
Most sugar-free soft drinks are sweetened with aspartamea low-calorie artificial sweetener that is about 200 times sweeter than sugar.
The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has classified aspartame as “” (group 2B). This classification is based on limited evidence that point to a potential link to cancer, particularly liver cancerin humans, as well as limited results from animal studies.
IARC classifications reflect the robustness of evidence about whether a substance can cause cancer, and not the probability of this happening in practice. Group 2B is the third of four levels and generally indicates either limited evidence in humans or sufficient evidence in animals, but not both. In other words, there is evidence of a link, but the evidence is weak.
In 2022, one carried out in France, with more than 100 thousand participants, analyzed the relationship between artificial sweeteners and cancer risk. The results indicated that aspartame is associated with .
However, the study did not establish a direct relationship of cause and effect, and the results may have been influenced by other factors, such as participant behavior, confounding variables, or chance.
As for the “level of energy, memory and resistance” that Donald Trump Jr thinks his father has, they are inconsistent with the questions that have been raised about — with some saying that the “sending” of a hospital ship to Greenland, in February, is the “”.
