boutons_deux
09-12-2016, 12:56 PM
How Big Sugar Enlisted Harvard Scientists to Influence How We Eat—in 1965
The food industry has funded research in an effort to influence nutrition science and health policy for more than half a century, new research out Monday has found.
It's no secret that industry funds such efforts today: An investigation in June, for example, showed how the National Confectioners Association worked with a nutrition professor at Louisiana State University to conclude that kids who eat sugar (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/f9483d554430445fa6566bb0aaa293d1/ap-exclusive-how-candy-makers-shape-nutrition-science) are thinner than those who don't.
An article by University of California-San Francisco researchers, published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine, shows how far back such efforts go: In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation, the precursor to today's Sugar Association, paid Harvard scientists to discredit a link now widely accepted (http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-sugar-increases-the-risk-of-dying-with-heart-disease-201402067021) among scientists—that consuming sugar can raise the risk of cardiovascular disease. Instead, the industry and the Harvard scientists pinned the blame squarely, and only, on saturated fat.
Using correspondence from medical library archives as well as reports, symposia notes and other documents, the researchers traced SRF's concerns over sugar's link to heart disease to 1962, when its scientific advisory board issued a report concluding that "research developments in the [coronary heart disease] field should be watched closely."
By July 1965, after more research supporting the link had been published, SRF's research director John Hickson was knocking on Harvard's door, looking for scientists to refute the findings.
He found them.
That summer, Fredrick Stare, chair of the nutrition department in Harvard's School of Public Health and by then also an ad hoc member of SRF's scientific advisory board, began overseeing two Harvard colleagues in what was dubbed Project 226.
For a total of $6,500—or $48,000 in this year's dollars—paid by the SRF, those scientists would publish their own research, consisting of a review of the previously published research papers, hand-selected by Hickson, linking sugar to coronary heart disease.
A few days before submitting the draft of their review for publication, they sent it to Hickson, who was pleased. "Let me assure you this is quite what we had in mind and we look forward to its appearance in print," he wrote.
In 1967, their two-part review appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine. It concluded that there was "no doubt" that to prevent coronary heart disease, the only dietary precaution to take was to reduce consumption of cholesterol and saturated fat.
In other words: Don't worry about sugar.
To make their point, the Harvard researchers found fault with each individual study linking sugar to coronary heart disease, instead of focusing on the consistency of the findings across them all. One study, they said, should be discounted because it used greater doses of sucrose than found in a typical American diet. Another had found that substituting legumes for sugar led to major improvements in serum cholesterol levels—but the Harvard scientists argued such a move wasn't feasible. They discounted studies for using fructose or glucose instead of sucrose, or using rats instead of humans.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-12/how-big-sugar-enlisted-harvard-scientists-to-influence-how-we-eat-in-1965
and 35+ years ago, the corn industry, got BigFood to put HFCS into just about everything. America is one overweight, obese, decrepit country. btw, overweight causes cancer, as well as CVD, high blood pressure, kidney disease.
Corn "Refiners" Association? G M A F B
BigOil knew their industry caused AGW, kept it a secret.
BigTobacco knew their shit caused disease and cancer, kept it a secret.
The food industry has funded research in an effort to influence nutrition science and health policy for more than half a century, new research out Monday has found.
It's no secret that industry funds such efforts today: An investigation in June, for example, showed how the National Confectioners Association worked with a nutrition professor at Louisiana State University to conclude that kids who eat sugar (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/f9483d554430445fa6566bb0aaa293d1/ap-exclusive-how-candy-makers-shape-nutrition-science) are thinner than those who don't.
An article by University of California-San Francisco researchers, published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine, shows how far back such efforts go: In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation, the precursor to today's Sugar Association, paid Harvard scientists to discredit a link now widely accepted (http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-sugar-increases-the-risk-of-dying-with-heart-disease-201402067021) among scientists—that consuming sugar can raise the risk of cardiovascular disease. Instead, the industry and the Harvard scientists pinned the blame squarely, and only, on saturated fat.
Using correspondence from medical library archives as well as reports, symposia notes and other documents, the researchers traced SRF's concerns over sugar's link to heart disease to 1962, when its scientific advisory board issued a report concluding that "research developments in the [coronary heart disease] field should be watched closely."
By July 1965, after more research supporting the link had been published, SRF's research director John Hickson was knocking on Harvard's door, looking for scientists to refute the findings.
He found them.
That summer, Fredrick Stare, chair of the nutrition department in Harvard's School of Public Health and by then also an ad hoc member of SRF's scientific advisory board, began overseeing two Harvard colleagues in what was dubbed Project 226.
For a total of $6,500—or $48,000 in this year's dollars—paid by the SRF, those scientists would publish their own research, consisting of a review of the previously published research papers, hand-selected by Hickson, linking sugar to coronary heart disease.
A few days before submitting the draft of their review for publication, they sent it to Hickson, who was pleased. "Let me assure you this is quite what we had in mind and we look forward to its appearance in print," he wrote.
In 1967, their two-part review appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine. It concluded that there was "no doubt" that to prevent coronary heart disease, the only dietary precaution to take was to reduce consumption of cholesterol and saturated fat.
In other words: Don't worry about sugar.
To make their point, the Harvard researchers found fault with each individual study linking sugar to coronary heart disease, instead of focusing on the consistency of the findings across them all. One study, they said, should be discounted because it used greater doses of sucrose than found in a typical American diet. Another had found that substituting legumes for sugar led to major improvements in serum cholesterol levels—but the Harvard scientists argued such a move wasn't feasible. They discounted studies for using fructose or glucose instead of sucrose, or using rats instead of humans.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-12/how-big-sugar-enlisted-harvard-scientists-to-influence-how-we-eat-in-1965
and 35+ years ago, the corn industry, got BigFood to put HFCS into just about everything. America is one overweight, obese, decrepit country. btw, overweight causes cancer, as well as CVD, high blood pressure, kidney disease.
Corn "Refiners" Association? G M A F B
BigOil knew their industry caused AGW, kept it a secret.
BigTobacco knew their shit caused disease and cancer, kept it a secret.