Russell de Souza is an Associate Professor, Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact, Faculty of Health Sciences at McMaster University. He earned his BA from Queen’s University and BASc from Toronto Metropolitan University before his dietetic internship at St. Michael’s Hospital. He holds an M.Sc. from the University of Toronto, and an SD (Doctor of Science) from The T.H. Chan Harvard School of Public Health. As a settler who identifies as a South Asian cis male with an academic title, he recognizes that he occupies a position of privilege in Canadian society. He wishes to use this privilege to learn about and dismantle barriers that people who are underserved face in accessing health care, and pursuing careers in nutrition and dietetics, and academia. His research program addresses diet and chronic disease prevention throughout the lifespan with a health equity lens, methodological issues related to study design, evidence synthesis, quality of evidence, and dietary measurement. He has 187 lifetime publications and an h-index of 59. He has mentored over 50 trainees at all levels. His vision is that any learner, regardless of background or ability, is supported in their academic ambitions respectfully and in a nurturing environment that allows their strengths to shine, and their voice to be heard. He is involved in knowledge translation activities with the WHO Nutrition Guidelines Advisory Committee, Health Canada’s Nutrition Science Advisory Committee, the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (Public Health England), and the Precision Medicine in Diabetes Initiative (American Diabetes Association).
In this presentation, I will review the concept of public health and why we need public health guidance around sugar and its non-nutritive replacements. I will briefly review safety and summarize major public health guidelines surrounding consumption of nonnutritive sweeteners, including the United States Dietary Guidelines for America (2015-2020), Canada's Dietary Guidelines, Public Health England's Eatwell Guide, and the WHO and International Agency for Research on Cancer. I will conclude with some of the limitations of public health guidance.