Diet soda's effect on teeth similar to that of meth, cocaine

From left is mouth of a methamphethamine user, and that of a soda drinker

Diet soda deterioirates tooth enamel as methamphetamine or cocaine do, a study showed.

Dr. Mohamed Bassiouny compared the teeth of a diet soda drinker and two drug addicts, and found similar dental erosion among all three.

He wrote the details in the March/April 2013 issue of the journal General Dentistry.

"You look at it side-to-side with 'meth mouth' or 'coke mouth,' it is startling to see the intensity and extent of damage more or less the same," Bassiouny, a professor of restorative dentistry at Temple University's Kornberg School of Dentistry, reported HealthDay.

The three participants included a woman in her thirties who drank two liters of diet soda daily for three to five years, a methamphetamine addict, 29, and habitual crack cocaine addict, 51, according to the case study.

All three came from similar socioeconomic backgrounds and lived in urban areas with fluoridated public water.