The common-sense wisdom about the most widespread artificial sweetener on the market, aspartame, is that it's perfectly safe. The substance laces more than 6,000 products and is added to diet versions of Coke, Pepsi, Sprite, and Dr. Pepper. It is also sold under the brand names NutraSweet and Equal. It represents a multi-billion-dollar industry.Popular pieces across the internet in recent years have declared that concerns about aspartame are just a bunch of hype. A pediatrician and writer for The New York Times defends aspartame and says he regularly gives it to his kids. Vox dismisses concerns about the sweetener and includes a video about how safe the stuff is.These are reputable news outlets. Yet unlike what their headlines suggest (see, among many others: The Evidence Supports Artificial Sweeteners Over Sugar or Sugar-Free Soda is Safe), the scientists I spoke to for this story are not comfortable making such bold statements. They say there truly is no definitive data to show that aspartame is safe. "I certainly would not be saying it is safe," says Robert Lustig, a pediatric neuroendocrinologist at the University of California, San Francisco, who has written extensively on the subject. "We just don't have the data."Continue reading on Tonic.