BIG SUGAR vs MIRACLE FRUIT

  The Sweet Deception

In the shadow of the post-World War II sugar boom, a quiet battle brewed—one that pitted the mighty sugar industry against a humble West African berry with the power to upend America’s sweetener empire. This is the tale of Synsepalum dulcificum, known as the miracle fruit, and the murky suspicions that Big Sugar, with its deep pockets and deeper influence, conspired to bury it in the 1950s and 1960s. What follows is a story of ambition, intrigue, and a fruit that could turn sour lemons into candy—threatening an industry built on crystallized cane.

The Rise of a Sweet Threat

The miracle fruit wasn’t new to the world. Native to tropical West Africa, it had been savored for centuries by the Yoruba people, who chewed its red berries to sweeten sour palm wine and cornbread. Its secret? A glycoprotein called miraculin, which binds to taste buds and tricks the tongue into perceiving sour flavors as sweet—no sugar required. By the 1950s, as America gorged on sugar-laden sodas and sweets, this berry caught the eye of a visionary named Robert Harvey, a biomedical student turned entrepreneur. Harvey saw its potential: a natural, calorie-free sweetener that could revolutionize diets, especially for diabetics and a nation growing wary of excess.

In the early 1960s, Harvey founded the Miralin Company, aiming to bring miracle fruit to the masses. By 1964, he had secured investors and begun market tests—popsicles made with miracle fruit outperformed sugar-sweetened ones in trials with schoolchildren. The implications were staggering: a sweetener that didn’t just compete with sugar but could render it obsolete in countless recipes. Word spread fast, and by 1965, Harvey’s dream seemed poised to take flight. But as the miracle fruit ripened, so did the unease of Big Sugar.

The Sugar Empire Strikes Back

The sugar industry, led by groups like the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF)—rebranded today as the Sugar Association—was no stranger to flexing its muscle. In 1954, SRF President Henry Hass had already outlined a strategy to boost sugar’s image by promoting low-fat diets, leaning on emerging science linking fat to heart disease https://www.statnews.com/2016/09/12/sugar-industry-harvard-research/">STAT By the 1960s, this campaign escalated. Internal memos from 1964, uncovered decades later by researcher Cristin Kearns, reveal SRF Vice President John Hickson plotting to “refute” sugar’s detractors through funded research. That year, the SRF paid Harvard scientists—Dr. Fredrick Stare and Dr. Mark Hegsted—$6,500 (about $50,000 today) to downplay sugar’s role in heart disease, publishing their findings in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1967 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/13/well/eat/how-the-sugar-industry-shifted-blame-to-fat.html

But what does this have to do with miracle fruit? Enter the whispers of conspiracy. As Harvey’s Miralin gained traction, some speculate that Big Sugar saw more than just a rival sweetener—they saw a threat to their entire narrative. If miracle fruit took hold, why bother defending sugar’s health impacts when consumers could ditch it altogether? The SRF had the means—connections in Washington and a history of shaping science. Could they have extended their reach to stifle this berry?

A Mysterious Turn: The FDA’s Sudden Shift

By 1968, Miralin was on the cusp of launching miracle fruit products—tablets, extracts, maybe even a sugar-free soda revolution. Harvey had assurances, he later claimed, that the FDA would classify miraculin as “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS), a status befitting a fruit eaten safely in Africa for generations. GRAS approval would’ve fast-tracked its use. But then, disaster struck.

In a bizarre twist, the FDA abruptly reclassified miraculin as a “food additive” in 1969, demanding years of costly safety tests—far beyond Miralin’s budget. Harvey was blindsided. Offices were ransacked, with an “FDA” file left conspicuously open on the floor. Cars shadowed his team, snapping photos outside Miralin headquarters. Then, in 1970, Miralin filed for bankruptcy, its dreams crushed. Harvey pointed fingers at industrial sabotage, hinting at sugar’s influence—and another player: GD Searle, the firm pushing aspartame, led by a young Donald Rumsfeld in the early 1970s.

The Shadow of Donald Rumsfeld and Aspartame

GD Searle’s aspartame, a synthetic sweetener, was navigating FDA approval around this time. Approved in 1974 after a rocky process, it became a sugar rival—but one Big Sugar could coexist with, as it didn’t threaten natural sweetener dominance like miracle fruit might have. Conspiracy theorists murmur that Searle, perhaps with sugar’s tacit approval, leaned on FDA connections to kneecap Harvey’s berry. Rumsfeld, Searle’s CEO by 1977, had political clout—later serving as Secretary of Defense under Ford and Bush. Did he, or Searle, collude with sugar interests in the late 1960s? No hard proof exists, but the timing raises eyebrows.

The Aftermath: A Berry Buried

The Sugar Association denies any role in miraculin’s downfall, and the FDA claims it simply lacked safety data. Yet the mystery lingers. Why the sudden FDA pivot? Why the break-ins? By the 1970s, miracle fruit faded to obscurity—relegated to novelty status while sugar reigned supreme. Harvey’s vision dissolved, but the questions didn’t.

Was it coincidence—or a calculated strike by Big Sugar, perhaps with Searle as an unlikely ally, to protect a multi-billion-dollar industry? The truth remains elusive, locked in redacted FDA files and the silent fields of West Africa where the miracle fruit still grows, waiting for its moment.