Diet Drinks Match Water for Weight Loss, Trial Finds — SkimNews
Get the Health newsletter
Daily health & science — research, biotech, public health, the studies worth knowing. Free.
- SWITCH trial randomized 493 adults with overweight or obesity to drink either water or diet beverages daily for 104 weeks within a behavioral weight management program, finding weight loss was statistically equivalent (−4.8 kg vs −3.7 kg).
- University of Liverpool researchers led by Professor Joanne Harrold, with Professor Jason Halford of the University of Leeds, published the peer-reviewed results in the British Journal of Nutrition.
- The American Beverage Association funded the study, though the researchers stated the team operated independently and retained full control over analysis and reporting.
- Participants in both groups maintained weight reductions through the second year without continued program support, and showed similar improvements in waist and hip circumference, body composition, blood pressure, and cholesterol.
- Sweetener intake in the NNS group remained well within European Food Safety Authority safety thresholds, and sugar intake fell in both groups, with a slightly larger reduction among diet-drink participants.
- WHO guidance advising against non-sugar sweeteners for weight control is directly challenged by the trial's randomized long-term evidence, which researchers hope will inform future global recommendations.
Why it matters: The SWITCH trial is the longest and most rigorous randomized test of non-nutritive sweeteners to date, and its equivalence finding directly challenges the WHO's 2023 conditional recommendation against using NNS for weight control. For the 493 participants, both strategies delivered comparable 2-year results within a behavioral program, but the American Beverage Association's funding role gives the beverage industry a peer-reviewed counterweight to the WHO advisory it publicly opposed.
Ask SkimNews
