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Subscribe to RSSA new study finding a potential cancer risk from the artificial sweetener aspartame is so weak that Brigham and Women’s Hospital -- a Harvard teaching facility -- is now apologizing for promoting the research. In other words, if you see a headline screaming, “Aspartame linked to cancer,” don’t believe it. But it may be too late; the situation is a great example of why the public often finds science confusing and frustrating.
Earlier in the week the hospital sent out a press release about the study with the headline “The truth isn’t sweet when it comes to artificial sweeteners.”
After being asked some hard questions – and just before the report was to be released -- the hospital changed its tune, issuing a statement that said: “Upon review of the findings, the consensus of our scientific leaders is that the data is weak, and that BWH Media Relations was premature in the promotion of this work. We apologize for the time you have invested in this story.”
Aspartame is one of the most studied food additives ever -- and with good reason. It is an ingredient in some 6,000 products, but its main use is to sweeten diet sodas. Americans drink an astounding amount of diet soda, the equivalent of 43 billion 12-ounce cans a year.
Most animal and human studies have given aspartame a clean bill of health. But in 2005 an Italian study showed a potential danger in rats that led epidemiologist Dr. Eva Schernhammer and her team at Brigham and Women’s Hospital to look through the records of more than 77,000 women and 47,000 men in their nurses and health professional’s studies. They concluded that those who drink a daily diet soda sweetened with aspartame could have an increased risk of leukemia, lymphoma or non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
But there are caveats: The results differed between women and men, and there also seemed to be a risk among people who drank mostly sugared soda. No one claimed that it meant more than further study was need.
Yet when lead author Schernhammer was asked whether the new research proves that aspartame is dangerous, she answered emphatically, “No, it does not.”
Not all science deserves publicity. Some is not done well. Some comes to equivocal conclusions and serves solely to alert other researchers of the need for further study. The research out Wednesday about a potential cancer from aspartame falls squarely in that second category. If such a study does get attention, it can often increase the confusion and anger that many people feel about science in general – and the study of possible risks and benefits of our diet, in particular.
The conclusion was so weak that the researchers had to submit it to six journals before they found a seventh, the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, that would publish it. Few reporters read that journal. If it was not for the frightening headline no one would have known about this study.
As Dr. Steven Nissen, chair of the Cleveland Clinic’s cardiovascular medicine department put it to me: “Promoting a study that its own authors agree is not definite, not conclusive and not useful for the public is not in the best interests of public health."
Now, the media department at Brigham and Women’s have come to believe they did exactly that.
Robert Bazell is NBC's chief science and medical correspondent. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
Correction: An earlier version of this report contained an incomplete name of the journal that published the research.
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Sad that this isn't going to shut up the conspiracy theorists about it, though.
People don't want to believe that something they've held as truth is not.
This one isn't conspiracy theory. That stuff makes my ears ring horribly, brings on a migraine even though I don't usually have them otherwise, makes me feel as if my head is full and really weird, and yes, this happens when there is a tiny bit in something and I didn't know it was in there. It is a horrible feeling, and I know lots of people who react to it. So whatever that study showed or not, that stuff is nasty stuff as far as I am concerned.
ram- aspartame may in fact do all of those things- but that does not necessarily mean that you are going to get cancer. I get ringing and stuffiness in my ears and my head feels really weird when I drink a glass of wine, but I don't leap to the conclusion that I am therefore going to get cancer from it. get the difference?
science can be bad or good, right or wrong; that is the nature of man's thinking ability.
I used so suck down about 2 liters of diet pepsi per day. UNTIL I was diagnosed with kidney cancer. You can't convince me that the aspartame wasn't a factor. I ought to send those Harvard folks my files from the Mayo clinic.
Science is self correcting. Instead of clinging to old ideas, they are tested again and again, and eventually the bad ones are weeded out.
@ Ram
I am with you. It took me a while to link artificial sweeteners to my migraines/pressure in my left temple, but once I cut them out of my diet they stopped within a week.
More and more studies are come out concerning the overall health effects diet soda has on the human body. If you thought drinking acidic water with corn syrup (i.e. regular soda) was bad, you should read the study that just came out about people who exclusively drank diet soda. They have a higher prevalence of diabetes and hormonal disorders. The basic reason is your body releases all these hormones to break down what it thinks is sugar, and the end result is they remain active in your body, causing you to overeat and throwing your insulin levels out of whack.
Drink water people! Diet soda tastes like crap anyway!
Gregorovich- You know that most people who have suffered from kidney cancer did not drink beverages containing aspartame. I'm am very sorry for your situation but you can not conclude from just your personal experience how your cancer happened.
I know I have a sensitivity to aspartame, it gives me joint pain. I felt alot better when I quit using it. But the point of the article is less about aspartame than it is about reporting on science. Really, a screaming headline when there's almost nothing to back it up??? Happens in journalism all the time, and it kills the public's faith in science faster than Creationism or Glen Beck could ever think about. I'm just pretty tired of reading about all the dire warnings of wheat, dairy, etc., can't they make up their minds??? Might as well quit reading about the health effects of food, and just eat what I want -- we're all going to die anyway, might as well enjoy myself in the meantime.
Here's a the guide I use for myself... (I'm in senior management in the software industry, but I'm self-taught in the bio sciences)
In science, how much stock I put into a given report is inversly proportional to the reliance upon statistics.
There must be clearly delinated biochemical pathways provided before I take anything in these reports as accurate.
A good mechanism of action is nice. Pretty much the only thing we have to go on are metabolites, since it is so readily metabolized. I've broken it down in other posts, so scroll on to see them.
This article is very typical of the junk science coming out of American medical schools. They, unlike academic institutions are full of MDs with no training, credentials, or skillset to design, conduct, or evaluate clinical studies. Most people think an MD is "equivalent" tpo a PhD. It most assuredly is not. The requirements for a PhD are far more stringent and demanding. Few MDs would even be able to get a high enough GRE to get into grad school in the first place. MD's are not equivalent to any academic degree and many/most physicians do not have any academic degree --- only a terminal vocational certificate.
As a result medical schools try to conduct research in such a way that unskilled people lead the research and expertise is "hired" to to the hard bits. What this yields is junk science where correlations equal causation and a press release (such as the one that caused the article) is equivalent to a peer-reviewed journal publication.
Even medical publications are in serious trouble. Primarily because they publish almost exclusively positive results and shun the equally important negative results. Here's a good TED Talk on the subject: http://www.ted.com/talks/ben_goldacre_what_doctors_don_t_know_about_the_drugs_they_prescribe.html
At this point about 71% of "medical research" being published in peer-reviewed medical journals cannot be replicated. In most liklihood, this means the data was "fudged" to get it published and the results cannot be duplicated legitimately. It also means that about 90% of medical research with a very much higher liklihood of being good research disappears into the "reject" bin.
And even that is not good enough for these medical school junk scientists. They insist on giving press releases to praise the very junk research that can't meet the incredibly low bar for publication. These count on physician's c.v.'s as MIPs or Mentioned In the Press and the number is actually used to calculate pay raises and promotions.
That's why you get so many cancer cures that never pan out and so many miraculous findings that are quickly forgotten. This sort of thing feeds not only the greedy pharmaceutical industry on one hand, but also feeds conspiracy theorists on the other hand. And Bob Bazell is among the worst of the pseudo-journalists for pushing this bogus science as though it were significant and accurate.
This is a system that badly needs reforming. There is just too much at stake for this sort of thing to continue because it takes research dollars away from legitimate research and funnels them into worthless black holes at medical schools where the money might as well be burned.
When I want to add sugar I use Stevia- (Nustevia brand) It is an herb and very sweet.........
But wait!!!! Aspartame leads to autism.
ROFL
And you MUST drink 6 glasses of water per day! Show me the science on that one...
You are all welcome to ingest as much aspartame as you want. Although the study did not lead some scientists to conclude that aspartame is dangerous, how many of them came out and said it was safe, based on the study ? We are still waiting for that data. Please feel free to defeat the " conspiracy theorists" by continuing to ingest this chemical. That will show them how smart you are.
Warning the air you breathe has contaminants that could cause cancer..
Warning, rats injected with water developed cancer.
Methanol (wood alcohol) is made into formaldehyde inside cells by ADH1 enzyme in 19 specific human tissues, causing 19 modern novel “diseases of civilization”, ranging from Alzheimers and MS to heart and blood vessel diseases to cancers to birth defects, autism and spina bifida.
Methanol sources: aspartame, E951 – smoke from wood, peat, cigarettes – fruits, juices, vegetables, especially tomatoes, sealed wet in cans, jars, plastics – many dark wines and liquors – fermented, smoked, spoiled foods – fresh tomatoes, black currants – jellies, jams, marmalades – some fresh coffees – chewing gum (often have aspartame) – bacteria in the colon – genetic flaws in metabolism – vehicle fumes – processed wood products of all kinds – factories making leather, paper, particle board and plywood, or using solvents – mobile homes –
As long as ethanol is in the blood, the ADH1 enzyme is preempted from turning methanol into formaldehyde right inside cells in 19 specific tissues – This explains why people who never drink suffer more from many chronic diseases than those who drink about one alcohol drink daily – WhileScienceSleeps.com 745 free online full text medical research references – TheTruthAboutStuff.com – Prof. Woodrow C. Monte, Food Science & Nutrition, Arizona State University, retired 2004
similar macular harm in multiple sclerosis as from formaldehyde made
by ADH enzyme inside retina capillary walls from methanol, Prof.
Woodrow C. Monte text "While Science Sleeps" 2012 Jan -- some quotes
re retina harm: Rich Murray 2012.05.10
rmforall.blogspot.com/2012/05/similar-macular-harm-in-multiple.html
health.groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1647
My one brief exposure to Aspartame was hideous, including drug like sleep, enormous appetite, swollen feet beyond belief, and a migraine; all because for two or three days I drank powdered instant tea, with no indication except in microscopic print, that it had anything but sugar in it, which it did. When I looked it up, all the symptoms that appeared when I googled 'dangers of aspartame', were the same as mine. Clearly some of us should not consume it, many of us in fact; and clearly, any food containing it should be labeled clearly to that effect.
It would appear to have been an allergic reaction. What you experienced, other people experience with food dye, medications, various foods etc. It just means you shouldn't partake of it, not that it's bad for everyone. As far as symptoms found on a web site, those anti-aspertame sites list every symptom known to man, so it's not surprising that you found yours there. Those sites push weak science to no science and really don't do anyone a favor, just like nbcnews being the first to scream the latests results of questionable studies.
@Rich,
Actually, Adh1 (methanol dehyrdrogenase) is found only in mice. The human equivalent is Adh3 and none of what you claim has been found to be true.
If only researchers would apologize for all the weak studies out there - and all the false ones and all the ones that are paid for by non-scientific concerns. I wonder if the aspartame lobby had some influence on this apology.
You bet they did!
Funny how this website also publishes pro-GMO articles.
Clearly completely biased towards their advertisers, which really is no surprise.
Reader beware!
And much like the article about 'organic food no more nutritious', they are pointing at one specific thing. Just because they didn't find a correlation to Cancer doesn't mean that aspartame is 'good for you'. I'm just glad I don't have any need for everything I eat or drink to be 'sweet'. It ticks me off no end that companies feel they have the job of sweetening everything. Sell it unsweetened and let the consumer doctor it (or not) as they desire with whatever sweetening product they are comfortable putting in their body. Everything doesn't have to be pre-sweetened. It's almost impossible to find completely unsweetened anything.
@Enough,
Exactly right. A lack of a correlation means onlky that there is a lack of correlation and nothing more. A corellation means that there is a plausible link and nothing more. We have known for around 3000 years that correlation does not equal causation, but word has not yet reached medical schools.
Read about the corn syrup industry and how/when it got started. It's all a scam, from top to bottom. They know what HFCS and aspartame does to the human body. They WANT all those side effects to happen! Why? So they can invite more doctors and nurses to school. It's all about the money machine, people.
Get smart. Take care of your body. Don't put anything manmade into it.
Uhm, did they decide the study was weak or were the paid off by the aspartame suppliers to say it was weak...you can call me a "conspiracy theorist" if you want, but, let's face it, there's so much dishonesty, corruption and greed in big business these days that the doubts are well deserved! And even if it doesn't cause cancer, aspartame is SO bad for so many other reasons that is should be taken off the market. They have taken far less dangerous things off the market, but there's so much money backing aspartame that they will have a hard time ever getting it pulled!
why don't you get a copy of the journal that they are going to publish it in, and read the study for yourself. then you can decide for yourself if it's a week study or not
It took the authors 7 journals before they found one that would publish it, that right there tells you that the the paper was junk.
We know by SWEET MISERY A POISONED WORLD available on the internet or a DVD purchased directly from the DOCUMENTARY CHANNEL that fmr. Secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld got the artificial sweeteners onto the market by hook or by crook trickery onto the FDA during the same time frame he was the President and CEO of the drug company that manufactured them. Now they are linked/correlated to untold thousands of deaths, that when ingested turns into wood alcohol which is a poison, rots holes in the brain, brain tumors, epidemic of multiple sclerosis, systemic lupus, fibromyalgia, spasms, numbness, cramps, vertigo, dizziness, blurred vision, memory loss, depression, tinnitus, joint pain, blindness, keeps blood sugar out of control in diabetes causing coma. And autopsies done on the rats fed the substance were done a year after they were deceased making the studies essentially worthless...........
I am very happy to see people post scientific truths about the dangerous nature of aspartame, especially those with full details of the chemical reactions. As I read somewhere, it is more difficult to convice some that they were lied to than it is to convince them of a lie in the first place. Also one key element to remember is that all chemical exposure in real life is cumulative, while lab studies consider their effects in isolation. Sure different things in tiny doses may have a minimal effect, but it all adds up.
All chemical exposure in real life is not cumulative, many lab studies do consider long time exposure to chemicals.
Aspartame does not accumulate in tissues. It breaks down into aspartic acid (an animo acid), phenylalynine (an amino acid), and methanol (wood alcohol). Methanol isn't good but it's also the smallest metabolite, occurring as less than 10% of the metabolites. And what you get from aspartame (which is in milligram amounts in soda) is extremely small.
If you're scared, consider that a major metabolite of grain alcohol, acetaldehyde, does extensive organ, tissue, and DNA damage, is known to cause cancer in pretty much any tissue it contacts, and we generally consume beverages that are 2 to 5% grain alcohol (beer and wine) or higher (spirits).
In other words, keep drinking your kook aid. Nothing here, we were just kidding. No neurotoxins or cancer in this product! Who paid off Harvard? This article was about aspartame, it did not discuss other fake sweetners such as Splenda. Remain skeptical and don't believe everything your read.
Long story short: aspartame isn't bad for you. There, I just summed up the article and all these posts for subsequent readers. You're welcome.
Sounds like they got threatened and they're trying to clean up the mess.
It only sounds like that if that's what you want to hear.
Perhaps the precious headline they put on the story was a clue as to how seriously one should take it (or not)? And perhaps Dr. Eva should not be given funding for her next "study"?
You must KNOW what your eating and drinking ... you can test these things out in your own body ... no need for millions of dollars and years of time only to come back and say ooooops ... and NO ONE is helped~ selah
These things I have learned ... My husband developed adult induced migraines many years ago ... I was shown why ... "white refined sugar" ... dramatically weakens your immune system (therefore FEEDS cancer) ... also it is in EVERYTHING under many names ... we cut it OUT ... he no longer get MIGRAINES and no longer takes expensive prescription meds like IMITREX, and running to the Dr.s contantly or ER ... he watches CLOSELY his "white refined sugar" intake and drinks plenty of "good" water if he ingests any wrsugar ... I also discovered in cutting this harmful substance out of our diets for a long while ... that our immune systems got stronger :) ... and with three school age children ... we all stopped getting colds, strep, flu, headaches ... #thatwasforFREE ... now for the monster Aspartame "chemical sweeters" "warning contains phenylalanine" on the packages ... all the sugar free products so falsely declared safe ... #it'sallaboutthebottomlineMONEY .... when we cut out white refined sugar ... and replaced them with natural things, and learning about theses things ... I tried sugar free products for one summer ... MAJOR MISTAKE ... I began to suffer at night and into the day at work from numbness and tingling in my hands ... then at night my hands and all the way up my arms extreme numbness and PAIN to the point I could not move them or use them ... one was worse ... tried hanging my arm off the bed for relief ... came to the point I could not sleep with the pain ... THEN ... one day my oldest daughter at the time 12, came to me saying her ankles and lower legs were getting numb at night ... I was already studing closely what we were eating ... INSTANTLY ... I knew what it was ... IMMEDIATELY I cut this out of our diet anything with this phenylalanine (a part of aspartame) in it ... IMMEDIATELY the pain began to get better .... and the numbness ... it took weeks/months for all the numbness to leave ... but it was so much better that I knew it was the aspartame ... but I was left with some nerve damage in my hands ... I no longer have any problems with the damage unless I eat this chemical sweetner ... I do not need any medications, I just cannot EAT this SUBSTANCE :) .... this stuff collects in your extremites ... hands/arms, feet/lowerlegs, BRAIN .... VERY Dangerous ... people are being diagnosed with all kinds of things like MS, RLS, or fibromyalgia etc. etc., or carpal tunnel in both hands, having surgery and NOT any BETTER :( (sound familiar) ... I look at what I eat if I am having any strange symtoms and I CUT it out. I eat foods only the most natural I can find that have been eaten for thousands of years by mankind. #hopethishelpsYOU #thisismystory #andIhaveMORE:) like where do those bleeding sores on your face come from ??? ALL THOSE ADDITIVES ... CUT THEM OUT ... and your sores will HEAL #thatwasforFREEtoo:) #GodwantsusWELLselah
I eat and drink lots of refined sugar and I'm fine. So do millions of others. It's the same for Aspartame.
I guess you guys are just medical oddities.
You have just failed at science. a sample size of one is not only statistically insignificant, it's impossible to control.
So you stopped eating meat? Dairy? Beans? Eggs? Peanuts? Because all of these things have phenylalanine in them. It's an amino acid. Additionally, intolerance to phenylalanine isn't something you just develop as you age. It's a genetic disorder you have from birth and it's a very difficult life of watching what you eat if you have this disorder. If you give a baby with this disorder breast milk or formula, it will cause brain damage or kill the baby.
I won't attack your individual experience because I can't speak to that. But I know you didn't do your homework at all, otherwise you'd know it was an amino acid you've eaten every day of your life.
As a diabetic, I say, "Go Stevia."
My mom uses that and raves about it. But it's natural, and can't be patented and mass produced in a warehouse, so they'll find something that can - aspartame!
I dunno Man. Sugar is natural and it can be mass produced. And it makes a lot of money.
Stevia is a perfectly fine no-calorie sweetener, but tastes vary. Everything I've ever tried with it has been all kinds of gross to my taste buds. I actually retched after taking a big swig of a stevia sweetened root beer. Ugh!
The reason aspartame is more widely used is probably two fold: cost and taste. It's cheap and more people taste it as sweet.
aspartame turns into formaldehyde in the lower intestines and ingesting formaldehyde can cause cancer
A can of Diet Coke has 180 mg of aspartame in it. 10% of that is metabolized into methanol. So 18 mg of methanol. Methanol is metabolized about 50:50 into formaldehyde and formic acid. So 9 mg total of formadehyde from a single can of Diet Coke.
A 16oz amber ale beer has about 10 mg of methanol in it. A 10 oz glass of wine has up to 96 mg of methanol. And a shot of whisky has 51 mg of methanol. But that's not what causes cancer in alcoholic beverages. It's the acetaldehyde, found in the beverages themselves and as a metabolite of ethanol (grain alcohol).
"After being asked some hard questions..." Meaning, some Government agency said STFU or else.
"It is an ingredient in some 6,000 products, but its main use is to sweeten diet sodas. Americans drink an astounding amount of diet soda, the equivalent of 43 billion 12-ounce cans a year."
Mmhmm...so then keeping the Cancer possibility a secret just MIGHT have something to do with money. Perhaps.
"Aspartame is one of the most studied food additives ever" And this means what? That because they studied the begezzus out of it means they must tell 100% of the truth about it's findings? Since when has that ever been a common practice?
Nice backpedal Harvard...you bunch of weenies.
My doctor calls my reaction an allergy, but he says that's just because it hasn't been ruled anything else. All I know is that even a taste of something with aspartame in it gives me a severe migraine. I am not allergic to anything else. If you think we are in the minority, do your own survey by asking those around you. I think you might be surprised how many people suffer this one symptom whether they have discovered a link to the cause or not. My mother didn't believe me either, but after 2 years of telling her that her diet soda was causing her headaches, she stopped drinking them and surprise...they disappeared. The only problem I have with aspartame today is that SO many products contain it. Thank God I'm not a diabetic, because almost all sugar free products have some in it.
"Thank God I'm not a diabetic, because almost all sugar free products have some in it."
Diabetics don's have it rough. They have it lazy. All they'd have to do is just stop eating prepackaged food! Eat natural whole foods instead.
And it took a high goverment official to get the FDA after many years of denying acceptance to approve the NEURO TOXIN . It may have a weak testable connection to cancer ,but it causes many problems . Also a diet soda a day increases heart problems by 43% .
We do not need any refined sugars whatsoever in our diet. The body makes its own sugar from complex carbohydrates. We get natural sugars from milk (lactose), fruit (fructose) and vegetables. Using refined white sugar (sucrose), refined white flour, refined white rice, other refined products increases our need for more complex carbohydrates. These are the "ANTI-NUTRIENTS"..... source Lendon Smith, M. D. Refined carbohydrates causes malnutrition, deficiency, slow starvation. Or just eating a potato without the skin causes the same thing. In other words the more refined carbs. people are using the faster they are starving to death from the chemicals lost in the refining process. So eat up your candy bars, white bread, pizza made with white flour, cookies, cake, the faster you people are starving to death. What on earth do you think breast cancer and hair loss is all about? The hair is designed to last over 100 years, the breast is designed to last over 100 years if it has the nutrients it needs.
The MULTI-BILLION sugar and bread (white flour) corporations have bambozzled the world solely for profit covering up the deaths of millions of people for well over 150 years or ever since they invented refined carbohydrates.
I wish I could Like your post a thousand times over.
Thumbs up! Eat WHOLE foods.
Bean, seed, and nut sprouts are awesome for the body. sproutpeople.com is where I get all my goodies. Easy. I grow most of my own 'green' veggies and they're a hundred times healthier than the stuff I get in grocery stores.
typo correction...........BAMBOOZLED...................
Gee, I had migraines from the age of 12, that got better when I was in my late twenties. Tests show I still have the migraines especially in my eyes, I just don't have the pain. It is a physical defect in a cluster of blood vessels. I will probably die of a stroke like my mother in my eighties. Milk except from a certain kind of cow makes me sick and leaves a horrible taste in my mouth. I avoid all but lactose free milk ( some of my distant ancestors did not have cows). We used huge amounts of sugar when I was growing up. I stopped using it when I got pregnant and now I get giddy if I eat things with a lot of sugar. I haven't had a soda in forty years but I still got fibromyalgia and I never drank sugar free sodas. Red wine gives me a headache, other wine and liquor does not. I need a high protein, very low carbohydrate diet to control my weight (lots of red meat).I used aspartame during my last two pregnancies. My children were totally healthy and are very smart. Certain herbs and spices like basil leave a horrible taste in my mouth. I don't use them. Uncooked apples put me to sleep. No one knows why.
The fact is that due to many factors including genetics, foods affect us differently. If it doesn't agree with you, don't ingest it. Aspartame has been tested and tested and no link to cancer or any other disease has ever been found. If you must have sweets and aspartame doesn't agree with you, use something else or do without. It is possible to live well without sweets.
The difference between scientists and politicians:at least scientists admit errors. Then scientists repeat their studies until multiple studies become conclusive. People who deny science use all of the modern technology that comes from basic science and are hypocrites.
It is amazing how a story like this attracts the conspiracy nuts and those whole seem to be unable to eat or drink hardly anything! Aspartame has been studied to death. The real issue is that it is always impossible to prove the negative. The negative in this case is that aspartame has no adverse health effects.
All foods and drinks are labelled as to their content of artificial sweeteners. It is a free country (well somewhat free), eat and drink what you wish. For me, I'm going to be active and drink my diet sodas (until 5 pm, then I'll have a glass or two of red wine! :-). I'm retired, old, and loving it.
It says a lot about NBC journalism that it originally reported on this "weak" study ("7 Awful things Diet Soda Does to your Body"), one that was rejected by 5 journals and finally published in an obscure one that "few reporters read...if it was not for the frightening headline no one would have known about this study." What ever happened to fact-checking? And then, when news that the study's findings are dubious comes out, NBC releases a new report, but leaves the original misleading one online for people to find and use as proof the stuff is bad for you -- and includes the original story as a follow-up link to the new one! That's just very sloppy.