If you’ve had a protein bar that wasn’t inedible, it’s probably because of erythritol. Erythritol is a low-calorie sweetener that has found its way into a wide variety of pre-packaged foods in recent years. It’s a convincing enough replacement for sugar, especially in health foods that typically remind you that healthiness usually tastes like misery.
It’s just too bad that it might give you a stroke.
Scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder have found that erythritol can alter how blood vessels in the brain function, potentially increasing the risk of stroke. In lab experiments, researchers exposed human brain blood vessel cells to an amount of erythritol equivalent to a single serving of a zero-sugar beverage. Within hours, the cells began to shift in ways that were concerning.
This Popular Sugar Substitute Might Give You A Stroke
They produced less nitric oxide, which helps blood vessels relax, and more endothelin-1, which causes them to constrict. At the same time, oxidative stress increased significantly, with higher levels of damaging free radicals. That can be hard to follow, but the short version is that erythritol is doing several things to your body that, combined, create the perfect storm for inciting a stroke.
Things only get worse when it comes to blood clotting. The study found that erythritol reduced the cells’ ability to produce a compound that naturally dissolves clots, making your body less efficient at breaking them down, which is a major cause of strokes.
This isn’t a one-off finding, either. This study helps explain earlier research that was a part of a 4,000-person study that linked higher blood levels of erythritol to increased risks of heart attack and stroke within three years. That first rather large study established a correlation, and now this study from the University of Boulder is one step closer to establishing a firm link between erythritol and strokes.
There is still more research to be done before that link can be firmly established. Some researchers point out that erythritol is also produced naturally by the body, especially during metabolic stress such as obesity or diabetes, which means elevated levels might reflect an underlying health issue rather than a diet issue alone.
But for now, it seems like the science of it is at the very least mildly suggesting that while erythritol might not be immediately dangerous, it may not be wise to call it harmless either.
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