By Dr. Jason Fung, a neurologist.  For more see bottom of page for links to his documentaries

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  I was reading Dr. Eenfeldt interesting recent post on www.dietdoctor.com, about a clip of the great crusader Dr. Aseem Malhotra showed at the recent LCHF summit in Cape Town and was reminded of one of the great truths of our time.  You cannot be betrayed by those whom you do not trust.  While we often blame Big Food for obesity, we never really trusted them, so cannot really be betrayed.

  But, we have been betrayed.  By whom?  The story is even worse then you suspect….

  Big Food wants to make more money. That’s no secret.  They created an entirely new category of food, called “snack food,” and promoted it relentlessly. They advertised on TV, print, radio and Internet.

  But there was an even more insidious form of advertising called sponsorship and research. Big Food sponsors large organizations such as the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Coca Cola General Mills, Kellogg Company and Pepsi are found among its “Premier” sponsors. At its annual meeting, a sponsor could hold a “nutritional symposia.” In 2014, for example, the Coca Cola Company would teach dieticians about Coaching Your Clients Toward Lasting Weight Loss.” The $50,000 Gold Sponsorship allowed the company to spread the message that sugar is not harmful to children. Thanks, Coca Cola.

  Michele Simon, in her scathing report “And Now a Word from our Sponsors” uncovers how corporate giants like Coca Cola and McDonalds ‘educates’ health professionals.

  And don’t forget the medical associations. In 1988, the American Heart Association decided that it would be a good idea to start accepting cash to put its Heart Check symbol on foods of otherwise dubious nutritional quality. The Center for Science in the Public Interest estimates that in 2002, the AHA received over $2 million from this program alone. Food companies paid $7,500 for one to nine products, but there was a volume discount for more than twenty-five products! Exclusive deals were, of course, more expensive. In 2009, such nutritional standouts as Cocoa Puffs and Frosted Mini-Wheats were still on the Heart Check list. The 2013 Dallas Heart Walk organized by the AHA featured Frito-Lay as a prominent sponsor. The Heart and Stroke Foundation in Canada was no better. As noted on Dr. Yoni Freedhoff’s weightymatters blog , a bottle of grape juice proudly bearing the Health Check contained ten teaspoons of sugar. The fact that these food were pure sugar seemed not to bother anybody.

  The researchers and academic physicians were not to be ignored either. These were key opinion leaders in the medical community. In 2013, Dr. Allison wrote a prominent article in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine entitled “Myths, Presumptions and Facts about Obesity”. Among his list of ‘facts’ of obesity, he writes, “Diets (i.e., reduced energy intake) very effectively reduce weight, but trying to go on a diet or recommending that someone go on a diet generally does not work well in the long-term”. Funny. How can a diet be effective, but generally not work? Isn’t that the very definition of ineffective? Also, Dr. Allison is declaring plainly that doctors should not even recommend diets. Forget about eating a whole, unrefined natural foods diet. Forget about reducing added sugars and refined starches like white bread.

  Instead, his recommended treatments for obesity included meal replacement bars/ shakes, drugs and surgery. That’s certainly odd. Obesity is a dietary disease and requires a dietary cure. Instead, he favors meal replacements? These are amongst the last things that I would ever consider recommending.

  Consider the ingredient list of a popular meal replacement shake “Ensure Plus”. This is the sort of ‘food’ that Dr. Allison feels is highly beneficial to you. It also happens to be a highly profitable item. The first five ingredients are: Water, Corn Maltodextrin, Sugar, Milk Protein Concentrate, Canola Oil. This nauseating blend of water, sugar and canola oil does not really meet my definition of healthy. Why would Dr. Allison strenuously recommend this garbage? Things become a little clearer when you read the financial disclosures. Dr. Allison reports receiving payment for:

  Board membership from Kraft Foods; receiving consulting fees from Vivus, Ulmer and Berne, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton, Garrison, Chandler Chicco, Arena Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, National Cattlemen’s Association, Mead Johnson Nutrition, Frontiers Foundation, Orexigen Therapeutics, and Jason Pharmaceuticals; receiving lecture fees from Porter Novelli and the Almond Board of California; receiving payment for manuscript preparation from Vivus; receiving travel reimbursement from International Life Sciences Institute of North America; receiving other support from the United Soybean Board and the Northarvest Bean Growers Association; receiving grant support through his institution from Wrigley, Kraft Foods, Coca-Cola, Vivus, Jason Pharmaceuticals, Aetna Foundation, and McNeil Nutritionals; and receiving other funding through his institution from the Coca-Cola Foundation, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Red Bull, World Sugar Research Organisation, Archer Daniels Midland, Mars, Eli Lilly and Company, and Merck.

  He was clearly not going to bite the hand that fed him. That he should be allowed to write in such an influential journal is criminal. But this is far from an isolated case.

  Dr. Sievenpiper, in a 2012 Annals of Internal Medicine paper wrote a spirited defense of fructose. He passionately argued that there was nothing wrong with fructose. The good name of fructose was unfairly being slandered. Reviewing all the available literature, he acknowledged that the vast majority of the data were poor. However, this did not stop him from boldly concluding that, “Fructose does not seem to cause weight gain when it is substituted for other carbohydrates in diets providing similar calories.”

  This was odd. In nutrition science, virtually the only universally agreed-upon fact is that excessive fructose intake is very bad. Yet here was this doctor arguing the exact opposite. Things become much clearer after reading the financial disclosures.

  Dr. Sievenpiper: Grant (money to institution): Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Calorie Control Council; Support for travel to meetings for the study or other purposes:The Coca-Cola Company; Consultancy: Abbott Laboratories, International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) North America, Archer Daniels Midland; Grants/grants pending (money to institution): The Coca-Cola Company;Travel/accommodations/meeting expenses unrelated to activities listed (money to institution): The Coca-Cola Company, Pulse Canada, Canadian Diabetes Association; Other: Director of BDSK Consulting.

  Dr. Sievenpiper was receiving money from, among others, Coca Cola, Archer Daniels Midland (a huge corn grower) and the Calorie Control Council – a food industry association. The Coca Cola Company was funneling rivers of cash, not only to the doctor, but also to his greedy institution, St. Michaels Hospital in Toronto. The doctor, the hospital and the university were all on the take. Providing unbiased, helpful dietary advice is obviously not the top priority here. The common sense approach of reducing added sugars for weight loss needed to be discredited. The Coca Cola Company knew just the doctors to do it.

  Funding sources have enormous implications on study results. In a ­­­ study that looked specifically at soft drinks, Dr. Ludwig found that accepting funds from companies increased the likelihood of a favorable result by approximately 700 percent! This finding is echoed in the work of Marion Nestle, professor of nutrition at New York University. In 2001, she had found it “difficult to find studies that did not come to conclusions favoring the sponsor’s commercial interest.”

  The fox was now guarding the hen house. A shill for Big Food had been allowed to infiltrate the hallowed halls of medicine. Influential doctors had scientifically prostituted themselves to the highest bidder. Push fructose? No problem. Push obesity drugs? No problem. Push artificial meal replacement shakes? No problem. While doctors enjoyed their blood money, patients suffered the indignities of obesity and diabetes. Meanwhile, honest physicians read these highly circulated and respected journals. Trusting the “experts” within their pages, they would naively pass on these lies to their own patients.  While doctors, hospitals and

  research institutions counted their cash, patients went on dialysis, went blind and had their feet chopped off from diabetes complications.

  But the obesity epidemic couldn’t very well be ignored, and a culprit had to be found. “Calories” was the perfect scapegoat. Eat fewer calories, they said. But eat more of everything else. There is no company that sells “calories.” There is no brand called “Calories.” There is no food called “Calories.” Nameless and faceless, it was the ideal stooge. “Calories” could now take all the blame. They say that 100 calories of cola is just as likely as 100 calories of broccoli to make you fat. A calorie is a calorie. Don’t you know? But show me a single person that grew fat by eating too much steamed broccoli. I know it. You know it.

  I am not angry at Big Food.  Their job is to sell food.  I am not angry at Fast Food.  Their job is to sell food.  No, they cannot betray us because we never trusted them.  We knew their motives and made the appropriate adjustment.

  Who betrayed us?  Who sold us down the river?  None other than our own medical associations, our own doctors.  We have seen the enemy, and it is ourselves.  We trusted these medical associations to have our best interests at heart.  They repaid us with the ultimate betrayal.  For shame.  For shame.

  In the same way, Big Tobacco could never really betray us about the effects of smoking because we never trusted them.  But the doctors who supported Big Tobacco – they were the ultimate traitors to our profession.  We fight this battle again with the sugar pushers and the drug pushers.

This article is by Dr. Jason Fung, who has done extensive research on diet and type-2 diabetes.  He is a nephrologist and gets to treat many of the worst cases, since advanced type-2 diabetes is associated with kidney failure.  His clinic’s dietary approach has cured his patients of type-2 diabetes and its co-factor obesity. 

For his lectures on diabetes and on obesity:

Diabetes: 

***** How to Reverse Diabetes Naturally, 35 min, 306,000 views, Dr. Jason Fung, on treating the symptom high sugar instead of the disease insulin resistance. Very important way to break the reliance on drugs with diet and exercise, with testimonials, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAwgdX5VxGc  excellent

§***** Insulin Toxicity and How to cure Type 2 Diabetes, 61 min, 56,000 views Dr. Fung; on insulin, diabetes; failure of drugs; & cure with intermittent fasting & low carbs--to an audience of doctors.  Clinical trials prove that high insulin--not glucose--is the problem.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oZ4UqtbB_g  excellent  

***** The Two Big Lies of Type 2 Diabetes 54 min,10,5000 views, Dr. Fung, latest lecture 11/14, similar to the first two diabetes video and with two patients re-accounting their experience on alternate-day fasting.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcLoaVNQ3rc  excellent

***** Richard’s story—How I bet Diabetes, 9 min, 13,000 views, a testimonial by a couple which covers what to expect when following the traditional low-carb dietary cure for type-2 diabetes, the wife without diabetes lost 40 pounds on the diet I recommend at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyUwiF4Zoc8 excellent

Dr. Jason Fung on dietary issues, high quality lectures using research to argue the issues and with plenty of slides with graphs and tables--in plain language for educated audience.  Dr. Fung gives lip service to cholesterol, but is actual critical in Part 6 of his series.  He convincingly argues that high insulin, caused by carbs, is at the heart of health disaster.  Low carbs with alternate day fast will cause fat burning and cure type-2 diabetes and obesity.  At his blog is a link to the clinic he runs.  They work with patient through their doctors  in setting up his program and monitor progress, at http://intensivedietarymanagement.com/.   See Diabetes section below for 4 more lectures. 

Dietary Villains: Part II, Salt Scare: 30 min 2,700 views, Dr. Jason Fung.  Shows how population studies can be misleading and that salt has little effect upon death and CVD rates.   He explains the biological effects of salt that counterbalance each other https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAGrUwE8zpY  very good 

Aetiology of Obesity Part 1 of 6 parts: a New Hope: 59 min, 48,300, Dr. Jason Fung, academic lecture sugar consumption its history then goes into major flaws in the standard dogma on obesity.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpllomiDMX0   Very good

The Aetiology of Obesity Part 2:  The New Science of Diabesity:  61 min, 34,200 views, Dr. Jason Fung; lets the evidence prove his points, insulin cause https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d  imP7IdM2Og very good

***** The Aetiology of Obesity Part 3:  Trial by Diet:  81 min, 7,900 views, Dr. Jason Fung; insulin drive fat storage, though refined carbs, and insulin resistance, Atkin’s diets came out best (note: new Atkins diet is better—not covered here).   Ends with follow the dollar as to physicians’ lectures in continuing education and American Heart Association indorsement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbnshVO4PRM Excellent

***** The Aetiology of Obesity, the Fast Food Solution (Part 4 of 6): 84 min, 27,000 views, Dr. Fung’s biology behind obesity and the biology behind alternate-day fasting, which is a sure way to cure type-2 diabetes and obesity. Explains it’s parallel to bariatric surgery cure.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pG89j432w-Y   Excellent

***** The Aetiology of Obesity Part 5 of 6: Diet and Disease: 60 min. 13,300 Dr. Jason Fung, views; on the causes of the Western diseases with high insulin level, high sugar and high glycemic load.  In primitive societies CVD, obesity, diabetes, colorectal, prostate, and breast cancers are quite low, even with native high carbs.  He ends with an account of food corp. funding diet education.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QetsIU-3k7Y  xcellent

*****The Aetiology of Obesity Part 6 of 6: Dietary Villains - Fat Phobia: 76 min. 15,300 views, Dr. Jason Fung; a review, lays to rest the fat phobia--more fat entail living longer, and cholesterol is good for you as you age, while low cholesterol is strongly associated with death, also that high dietary cholesterol doesn’t raise lipid level.  High glycemic index through insulin spike is associated with heart disease, as does pro-inflammatory  omega-6 fatty acids from polyunsaturated oil.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QetsIU-3k7Y Excellent 

NOTE MORE BY Dr. FUNG IN DIABETES SECTION; and his blog is excellent with link to his diabetes clinic.

Not listed are the money spent for services and the political donations?  To rely on a company’s revelations has its limits.    In our capitalist system everything is for sale. I call it tobacco ethics.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/09/heres-are-groups-and-people-coca-cola-spent-1186-million-fund

What Coca-Cola Is Doing With Its Money Right Now Is Actually Kind of Genius

Coke finally made its charitable donations public—so we asked renowned nutritionist and soda industry expert Marion Nestle to explain its giving strategy.  —By Kiera Butler  | Thu Sep. 24, 2015

Coca-Cola has had a bad summer. Last month, the New York Times revealed that the soda giant funded scientific research suggesting that people who want to lose weight and improve their health should focus on exercise instead of cutting out high-calorie items—like soda—from their diets.

Consumers were outraged, so in the wake of the investigation, Coca-Cola CEO Muthar Kent vowed in a piece in the Wall Street Journal's opinion section to publish a complete list of people and organizations that the company has funded. Earlier this week, Coca-Cola did just that.

The list—which includes a breakdown of the $118.6 million in donations that the company has doled out over the last five years—is sprawling. To make sense of it, I spoke to Marion Nestle, a professor in New York University's Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health. Nestle's new book, Soda Politics: Taking on Big Soda (and Winning), uncovers how soda companies like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo became some of the most powerful corporations in the United States. Their success, Nestle argues in the book, comes in no small part from their strategic alliances with a diverse range of communities—from minority groups to doctors to physical fitness organizations.

Sure enough, those very groups are well represented in Coca-Cola's list. Here's a quick guide to the main kinds of organizations that Nestle noticed—and the strategy behind Coke's decision to give to them:

Professors and university research centers, including the University of South Carolina's South Carolina Research Foundation (more than $1 million), the University of Alabama Birmingham Educational Foundation (more than $1 million), and the University of Colorado ($1.25 million): "This is a big part of what Coke does, funding university research centers to incentivize them to do work that makes soda look not quite so bad," says Nestle. "I was particularly interested in the list of health professionals and scientific experts. The soda industry is very interested in these people, who tell people in hospitals what to drink."

Minority group organizations, including 100 Black Men of America Inc. ($350,000), the NAACP ($550,000), and the National Association of Hispanic Nurses ($671,000): "The soda industry deliberately markets to African American and Hispanic communities," says Nestle. "They're sending the message, 'You're part of mainstream America. You're like this sports figure.'" Interestingly, Coca-Cola has a troubled history with the African American community. In her book, Nestle chronicles how, from the time of the civil rights movement through the early 1980s, Coca-Cola faced criticism for hiring few black employees in its Atlanta headquarters. The company has spent decades repairing its relationship with black Americans.

Sports and fitness groups, including the National Foundation for Governors' Council on Physical Fitness ($4 million), and the National Recreation and Park Association ($2 million): "That's part of this concerted effort to make people think that if they're physically active, they don't have to think about what they're drinking," says Nestle.

Youth organizations, including Boys & Girls Clubs (more than $6 million), the American Academy of Pediatrics (nearly $3 million) and Girl Scouts of the USA ($1 million): Nestle explains that soda companies have pledged not to advertise to children under the age of 12 on TV—and they have largely kept their promise. But "there are lots of other ways in which they can market to children," she says—and donating to charitable groups that support kids is one of them. That strategy "gets these children's organizations not to make drinking less soda a priority. And if they're using sodas around their place, it keeps the brand visible. It buys silence." Nestle sites the example of when, in 2013, the soda industry trade group American Beverage Association spent millions to defeat a proposed soda tax in Philadelphia—and, at the same time, gave a $10 million grant to the city's children's hospital.

Medical professionals groups, including the American Academy of Family Physicians (more than $3.5 million), the American College of Cardiology ($3.1 million), the American Dietetic Association (more than $1 million), the American College of Sports Medicine ($865,000), and the Preventative Cardiovascular Nurses Association ($383,500): "The soda companies have a very big presence at medical professional meetings," says Nestle. "They sponsor specific sessions, as well as the meetings in general. They choose the lecturers, or they appoint people to choose the lecturers. You can bet that these people are not going to be saying very much about the need to drink less soda, even though the evidence suggests that's the best advice."

Disaster relief funds, including Mercy Corps ($150,000), and the Global Disaster Response Fund ($150,000): "This one is a no brainer, because these groups bring bottled water in," says Nestle. (Coca-Cola owns leading bottled water brand Dasani.)

Food banks, including Atlanta Community Food Bank, Inc. ($570,000) and the San Antonio Food Bank ($300,000): Nestle explains that one metric by which food pantries are often evaluated is the overall weight of the food they provide. "Sodas are very heavy, so food banks love sodas," she says.

Parks, including the National Park Foundation (more than $2 million) and Chicago's Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance ($3 million): Some public park groups—including the National Park Foundation—are trying to cut down on plastic litter by banning the sale of bottled water on park premises. "So it makes sense that Coke is supporting parks to keep bottled water in," says Nestle.

Really tiny organizations, including many local chapters of the YMCA, the Boys & Girls Club, and Police Athletic Leagues: Coca-Cola's list includes some donations in the millions, but most of the contributions that the company has made are smaller—$50,000 or less. "It doesn't take very much to form a good impression," says Nestle. "I bet the Portland After-School Tennis & Education at St. Johns Racquet Center was very happy with their $25,000. You can bet that small groups that get any donation at all are not going to be really motivated to get Coke out of their offices."