‘Act on Mouth Health’ now and improve your overall health and well-being

The International Sweeteners Association (ISA) supports World Oral Health Day (WOHD)

Brussels, 20th March 2019: Committed to helping raise awareness about the importance of optimal oral health and about good oral hygiene practices, the International Sweeteners Association (ISA) supports FDI World Dental Federation in celebrating today World Oral Health Day, and in spreading the message that “if you Act on Mouth Health it will also have a positive impact on your general health and well-being”.1

Unfortunately, today dental caries remains the most common chronic disease and a major global health challenge with oral diseases affecting 3.9 billion people worldwide and with untreated tooth decay impacting almost half of the world’s population. Dental caries is also the most common childhood disease.

With the right care, oral diseases are largely preventable!

Maintaining good oral hygiene habits can help reduce oral disease risk and associated health complications. These habits include regular tooth brushing; getting rid of unhealthy lifestyle habits such as smoking and high alcohol consumption; regular dental check-up; and, last but not least, eating a healthy diet, low in sugar and high in fruit and vegetables.

Low calorie sweeteners can fit well within a tooth-friendly diet!

Low calorie sweeteners are sweet-tasting ingredients that are added in foods, drinks and are used as table-top sweeteners to replace sugar. They provide us with desirable sweet taste with no or very few calories and no added sugar. In addition, and unlike carbohydrates, low calorie sweeteners are not broken down by oral bacteria and thus do not contribute to, nor cause, tooth decay. Used in place of sugar in foods and beverages, low calorie sweeteners have therefore an important role to play in oral health and in the prevention of oral diseases.2-5

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) also concluded in a scientific opinion in 2011 that: “Intense sweeteners maintain tooth mineralisation by decreasing tooth demineralisation if consumed instead of sugars”.6 This is an authorised health claim in the EU Register of nutrition and health claims.7

Promoting Actions on Mouth Health

In its new animated video, the ISA supports World Oral Health Day 2019 in spreading key messages around oral health worldwide and the importance of good oral hygiene. Watch the video below or by clicking here, and find out more about the role low calorie sweeteners can also play in maintaining optimal oral health.

We also invite you to download the related ISA infographic for World Oral Health Day 2019 and to share it further. Click here to access the infographic. For more general information about oral health and the role low calorie sweeteners can play in this, please download our infographic on oral health by clicking here, or visit the dedicated page on our website here.

Oral health is multi-faceted and includes the ability to speak, smile, smell, taste, touch, chew, swallow and convey a range of emotions through facial expressions with confidence and without pain, discomfort and disease of the craniofacial complex.”8 This definition, from the FDI World Dental Federation, clearly demonstrates that oral health not only affects our mouth but also our overall health and well-being.

So, “Act on Mouth Health” now to protect your mouth, body and mind!

Follow the ISA on TwitterFacebook and LinkedIn, and join the conversation around World Oral Health Day on social media by using the dedicated hashtags: #ISA4WOHD#WOHD19#SayAhh.

  1. http://www.worldoralhealthday.org/
  2. Gupta P, et al. Role of Sugar and Sugar Substitutes in Dental Caries: A Review. ISRN Dent. 2013:519421
  3. Roberts MW and Wright TJ. Nonnutritive, low caloric substitutes for food sugars: clinical implications for addressing the incidence of dental caries and overweight/obesity. Int J Dent. 2012: 625701
  4. Van Loveren C, et al. Functional foods/ingredients and dental caries. Eur J Nutr (2012) 51 (Suppl 2):S15–S25
  5. Gibson S et al. Consensus statement on benefits of low-calorie sweeteners. Nutrition Bulletin 2014;39(4):386-389
  6. EFSA Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies (NDA); Scientific Opinion on the substantiation of health claims related to the sugar replacers. EFSA Journal 2011;9(4):2076. [25 pp.]. Available online: https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/pub/2076
  7. Commission Regulation (EU) No 432/2012 of 16 May 2012 establishing a list of permitted health claims made on foods, other than those referring to the reduction of disease risk and to children’s development and health.
  8. https://www.fdiworlddental.org/