Research Gone Wild: Yogurt Wars — Pacific Standard
Chemistry Is Hard
Dannon led an injunction to stop the ads, but Chobani doubled down in court, suggesting that sucralose’s safety is still up for debate. Judge David N. Hurd was not convinced, ruling that the sweetener is “an unusually well-studied compound repeatedly determined to be safe for ordinary consumption.” The judge’s decision bars Chobani from making claims about the safety of sucralose in Dannon products in the future, but the company can continue to market its products in a way that implies natural ingredients are inherently better or healthier than artificial ones — a legally, but not scientifically, sound position.