A new health scare erupted over soft drinks last night amid evidence they may cause serious cell damage. When it comes to beverages, consider more healthful alternatives, and save the sodas for weekend treats.

• The first artificial sweeteners used in diet soda were cyclamates (often synergistically with saccharin). While many say these cyclamate-sweetened soda had a more pleasant taste than the diet soda that followed them, in 1970 the Food and Drug Administration banned cyclamates in the United States on evidence that they caused cancer in lab rats. Cyclamates are still used in many countries around the world, including for diet soda.
• The Diet Soft Drink Information Center is an information portal offering a variety of resources all related to diet soft drinks. The diet soft drink ingredients such as citric acid, caffeine, low-calorie sweeteners and more.
• Pop is sweetened, acidic, often caffeinated carbonated drink. There is "regular" pop that is sweetened with different kinds of sweeteners and "diet" pop that is sweetened with artificial sweeteners. The pH of regular and diet pops ranges from 2.47-3.35. 
• Aspartame has had anything but a sweet run, since it was approved by the American Food and Drug Administration in 1981. Aspartame is a low-calorie sweetener, which was invented in 1965. Weight for weight, it is about 200 times sweeter than sugar. The acceptable daily Intake is about 50 mg/kg of body weight per day. For a 75 kg person, this works out to 20 cans of diet drink per day.
• Coca-Cola and Britvic's Pepsi Max and Diet Pepsi all contain sodium benzoate. Their makers and the British Soft Drinks Association said they entrusted the safety of additives to the Government.
• Diet Mountain Dew - Mountain Dew is one of the most popular citrus soft drinks. Both diet and regular have the same amount of caffeine. In countries outside the USA - Mountain Dew has either reduced amounts of caffeine (or no caffeine at all).