| Allan I. Abolafia, D.D.S. |  |
Allen W. Ackerman, D.D.S. |
| THE TOOTH TRIBUNE |
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Diet Soda, No Favor to Your Teeth
The worst offenders were the lighter colored drinks, like non-cola sodas and canned iced tea. These were two to five times more harmful than darker sodas. The lighter colored drinks were up top 180 times as bad as plain tap water.
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University of Maryland dentists released research findings in December of 2004. The results indicate that flavor-enhancing acids in
soft drinks, including the low-calorie varieties, can actually be worse for your tooth enamel than sugar. Enamel is the hard coating
that protects your teeth from decay fared really poorly under “attack” from those acids.
The results are fairly straightforward. The fewer flavor additives a drink contains the less harmful it is. Of all
the flavor-enhanced drinks, root bear was the least harmful. If you are one of those people who
simply cannot give up drinking the harmful stuff, you can somewhat mitigate the bad effects on your teeth by gulping
down the drink rather than drinking it slowly. Slow sipping gives the acids more time to remain in contact with your teeth
and, as result, to cause more damage. Drinking with a meal, drinking with a straw and rinsing your mouth with water
after drinking are all ways in which to reduce the potential damage to your teeth.