PepsiCo announced on Monday that its bottled and canned Diet Pepsi products are now aspartame free. Diet Pepsi, Diet Pepsi Wild Cherry and Diet Pepsi Caffeine Free are now sweetened with sucralose, a common artificial sweetener better known as Splenda, instead.
"An aspartame-free diet cola has been the number one demand from consumers," Elisa Baker, a PepsiCo spokeswoman, told The Huffington Post.
The change is already in effect; shoppers should be able to find aspartame-free marked cans at all retailers. Baker said that PepsiCo is working on updating its fountain soda formulations, and will rid them of aspartame by early 2016.
"Aspartame is the No. 1 reason consumers are dropping diet soda," Pepsi vice president Seth Kaufman told The Associated Press in April. For years, aspartame has been scrutinized for allegedly causing heath problems, including cancer. Even though the National Cancer Institute says there's no scientifically sound evidence that FDA-regulated artificial sweeteners can cause cancer or other dangerous health issues, a 2012 analysis of social media showed that 91 percent of posts about aspartame are negative.
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