Currently browsing posts about: Sponsored-research

Potatoes, a source of rapidly absorbable starch, have such a bad reputation that some nutritionists advise against eating them.  I am not one of them.  I enjoy eating potatoes and think their blood sugar-raising effects depend on how they are prepared and how muh of them you eat.

The potato industry, alarmed about advice not to eat potatoes, funds research to prove they are healthy, or at least do no harm.  Hence:

Djousse L, Zhou X, Lim J, Kim E, Sesso HD, Lee IM, Buring JE, McClelland RL, Gaziano JM, Steffen LM, Manson JE. Potato Consumption and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: A Harmonized Analysis of 7 Prospective Cohorts. J Nutr. 2024 Oct;154(10):3079-3087. doi: 10.1016/j.tjnut.2024.07.020.

• Results: In the primary analysis, total potato intake was not associated with T2D risk:…In secondary analyses, consumption of combined baked, boiled, and mashed potatoes was not associated with T2D risk, whereas fried potato consumption was positively associated with T2D risk:.
• Conclusions: Although consumption of total potato is not associated with T2D risk, a modest elevated risk of T2D is observed with fried potato consumption.
• Conflict of interest: LD received investigator-initiated grant from the Alliance for Potato Research and Education (as principal investigator).
• Funding: This project was supported by a grant from the Alliance Potato Research and Education (principal investigator: LD).  A lengthy list of other funders, including NIH and Mars Edge, follows.

Comment: This potato industry-funded study did not find potatoes to be associated with type 2 diabetes, which must be a huge relief to this industry. But the study did find a weak association (barely statistically significant) beween fried potatoes and type 2 diabetes.  The Potato Alliance ought to be delighted with this result.   I’m guessing the result is real (it’s what I would have predicted), but I’d be happier with it if it had been conducted by investigators independent of industry funding.  As it is, it looks like the potato industry got what it paid for.

A reader, Bart Peuchot, writes:

I would be very interested to have your view on this new publication for Nature.

As you taught me, I checked the competing interests and it seems to be a perfect industry-funded publication.

And then ,I ran across this Tweet (X) from @Stuart Gillespie:

New paper concluding “more research needed”
…brought to you by Nutrition Foundation of Italy…
…which in turn is brought to you by
…..@Nestle @McDonalds @CocaCola Ferrero, Barilla, Danone et al…

Well.  What  is this about?

I went right to the paper: Visioli, F., Del Rio, D., Fogliano, V. et al. Ultra-processed foods and health: are we correctly interpreting the available evidence?. Eur J Clin Nutr (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-024-01515-8

Aha! Another attack on the concept of ultra-processed foods.  The article concludes

the available evidence on how different UPFs have been associated with health, as well as the results of studies examining specific food additives, call into question the possibility that ultra-processing per se is the real culprit. It is possible that other unaccounted for confounding factors play an important role. Future, urgently needed studies will clarify this issue.

The Italian food industry has been especially active in opposing NutriScore labels and anything else that might discourage sales of foods high in sugar, salt, and saturated fat.

But it is not alone in pushing back against the concept of  ultra-processed foods—an existential threat to junk food manufacturers.

Here, for example, is Hank Cardello,  the Executive Director of Leadership Solutions for Health + Prosperity at Georgetown’s Business School writing in Forbes:: New Report Highlights The Sweet Side Of Ultra-Processed Foods.

With ultra-processed foods (UPFs) replacing “junk food” as the new bogeyman for public health advocates, a new study published by  the Georgetown University Business for Impact Center (full disclosure: I am one of the authors) reveals that all UPFs are not created equal. The report spotlighted that candy in particular was the exception, since that category contributes only 6.4% of added sugars and less than 2% of our calories. The most surprising discovery is that the “healthiest of the healthiest” consumer cohort in the study purchased candy 26% more frequently than the general population.

The report: New Consumer Insights on Ultra-Processed Indulgent Foods: How Confectionery Products Are Different.

Candy behaves differently from other ultraprocessed indulgent products. New NMI and NHANES data re-confirm that candy is different and should not be lumped together with other indulgent products. Consumers do not overconsume  chocolate and candy, so targeting these foods will not impact obesity. An approach that focuses on product categories that consumers with the highest BMIs eat and drink the most will be more effective.

OK, readers: Take a guess at who paid for this.

Funding for this paper was provided by the National Confectioners Association.

As I keep saying, you can’t make this stuff up.

The walnut industry must be desperate for greater market share.  Walnuts are great and make a terrific snack if you don’t eat too many of them (calories!).  But this is one-food research.  Can one food really make an important difference to health (yes, if you are seriously deficient in essential nutrients but most Americans are not).

One-food research has to be about marketing more than science.

To wit:

A Cross-Sectional Study on the Association of Walnut Consumption with Obesity and Relative Fat Mass among United States Adolescents and Young Adults in NHANES (2003–2020).  2024 Current Developments in Nutrition.  DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cdnut.2024.104407

Conclusions: For adolescents girls and young women, dietary intake of walnuts combined with other nuts has the strongest inverse association with measures of obesity.

Funding: This study was funded by the California Walnut Commission.

Comment

The study does not find an association between eating walnuts and obesity in adolescents.  I would not expect it to.  People do not eat that many walnuts.  They get most of their calories from fast and ultraprocessed foods.

The California Walnut Commission would like you to think the calories in walnuts do not count.  In a press release, it points out

Nuts, including walnuts, are nutrient dense and considered a key component of many recommended dietary patterns, including the Mediterranean and vegetarian diets. They are also recommended for daily consumption in the latest U.S. Dietary Guidelines.³ Despite the recommendations, nuts remain under-consumed by the U.S. population,³ perhaps due to nuts being calorie dense, leading to potential concerns that including nuts in the diet could promote weight gain. But new research suggests people, especially Gen Z and millennials, should reconsider nuts, like walnuts.

All true, but nuts in general, not specifically walnuts.  This is about increasing the market share for walnuts as opposed to other nuts.

I saw this announcement in Food Navigator: Study: Nutrient dense formula could improve cognition and behaviour in infants.

My immediate question: Who paid for this?

I went right to it.

The study: Schneider N, Hartweg M, O’Regan J, Beauchemin J, Redman L, Hsia DS, Steiner P, Carmichael O, D’Sa V, Deoni S. Impact of a Nutrient Formulation on Longitudinal Myelination, Cognition, and Behavior from Birth to 2 Years: A Randomized Clinical Trial. Nutrients. 2023; 15(20):4439. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu15204439

Conclusions: The results suggest that brain development may be modifiable with brain- and age-relevant nutritional approaches in healthy infants and young children, which may be foundational for later learning outcomes.

Funding: This study received funding from the Société des Produits Nestlé S.A.

Conflicts of Interest: This study received funding from the Société des Produits Nestlé S.A. The funder had the following involvement with the study: study design, study monitoring and oversight, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, and preparation of the manuscript.

Comment: Some of the authors of this study are employed by Nestlé (no relation).  Their disclosure statement is unusually candid: the funder was totally involved in every aspect of the research.  It’s refreshing to see that dislosed.  But the underlying issue still holds: industry-funded reseach all too often produces results favorable to the commercial interests of the funder.

The concern here is that promoting infant formula as better than breast milk is a marketing strategy, as described in reports from the World Health Organization.  And see my previous post on this.

Last year, the Egg Nutrition Center offered free continuing education credits for dietitians.

This year, I received an e-mailed press release: EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE: 8:00 a.m. ET, Thursday, March 28, 2024

Fortified Eggs Did Not Raise Cholesterol in Modest-Sized Cardiology Study

Further study needed to investigate secondary findings.

…A study presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session and led by researchers at Duke, offers new evidence on fortified eggs, which are eggs enriched with various vitamins or nutrients. In a modest-sized randomized trial, researchers found that fortified eggs did not have a negative impact on bad cholesterol (LDL cholesterol) or good cholesterol (HDL cholesterol) over the course of the four-month study.

The study was sponsored by Eggland’s Best, a company that makes and sells fortified eggs. It also provided the eggs used in the research.

The egg industry funds research in collaboraion with the USDA.

Example: Mott MM, Zhou X, Bradlee ML, Singer MR, Yiannakou I, Moore LL. Egg Intake Is Associated with Lower Risks of Impaired Fasting Glucose and High Blood Pressure in Framingham Offspring Study Adults. Nutrients. 2023 Jan 18;15(3):507. doi: 10.3390/nu15030507.

Conclusion: This study found that regular egg consumption as part of a healthy diet had long-term beneficial effects on blood pressure and glucose metabolism and lowered the long-term risks of high blood pressure and diabetes.

Funding: These data were originally collected with funding from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (Framingham Study contract N01-HC-25195 and HHSN268201500001I). These analyses were also supported by a small grant from the American Egg Board’s Egg Nutrition Center of the U.S.Department of Agriculture.

Comment: Regardless of recommedations about dietary cholesterol, the advice has always been that one egg a day is OK.  That’s 365 a year.  According to the USDA’s per capata availability data, the average is only 275 (in 2021).  The egg industry wants you to eat more eggs and is working hard to get you to do that.

This one was sent to me by a reader: Animal vs. Plant Protein: New Research Suggests That These Protein Sources Are Not Nutritionally Equivalent: Scientists found that two-ounce-equivalents (oz-eq) of animal-based protein foods provide greater essential amino acids (EAA) bioavailability than the same quantity of plant-based protein foods. The study challenges the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGAs) which suggest these protein sources are nutritionally equivalent.

I went right to the study: “Effects of Consuming Ounce-Equivalent Portions of Animal- vs. Plant-Based Protein Foods, as Defined by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans on Essential Amino Acids Bioavailability in Young and Older Adults: Two Cross-Over Randomized Controlled Trials” by Gavin Connolly, Joshua L. Hudson, Robert E. Bergia, Eric M. Davis, Austin S. Hartman, Wenbin Zhu, Chad C. Carroll and Wayne W. Campbell, 25 June 2023, Nutrients. DOI: 10.3390/nu15132870

Oh.  It’s in Nutrients, a journal that might as well be called “The Journal of Industry-Funded Research” (authors have to pay for publication of their articles in this journal–2900 Swiss Francs).

The study was designed to demonstrate that protein from animal sources is better than protein from plant sources, immediately raising the question: Who sponsored this study?

Funding: This research was funded by the Pork Checkoff and the American Egg Board—Egg Nutrition Center. The supporting sources had no role in study design; collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; writing of the report; or submission of the report for publication.

Do the authors report conflicts of interest?  Yes, they do:

Conflicts of Interets: When this research was conducted, W.W.C. received research funding from the following organizations: American Egg Board’s Egg Nutrition Center, Beef Checkoff, Pork Checkoff, North Dakota Beef Commission, Barilla Group, Mushroom Council, and the National Chicken Council. C.C.C. received funding from the Beef Checkoff. R.E.B. is currently employed by Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM); the research presented in this article was conducted in a former role and has no connection with ADM. G.C., J.L.H., E.M.D., A.S.H. and W.Z. declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.

I’m not going to bother going through the methods, results, or other details.  The point here is that industry-funded research has a high probability of producing results favorable to the sponsors’ interests, as happened in this instance.  The statement that the sponsors had no role may or may not be true; it’s hard to know without further investigation, but research on this question demonstrates that the statement is not always accurate.  Funding exerts influence, whether recognized by researchers or not.

A reader who wishes to remain anonymous forwarded this email she received from Kristen Hicks-Roof PhD, RDN, LDN, FAND , Director of Human Nutrition·National Pork Board.

Growing Strong: Animal-Source Foods’ Role in Childhood Development and Sustainable Food Systems

Childhood and adolescence are critically important periods for growth and development. These periods are also key for establishing healthy dietary patterns that can influence eating behaviors and health into adulthood.

During these stages, animal-source foods provide critical nutrients — such as high-quality protein, iron, zinc, choline, and B vitamins — that are not easily replaced from other sources.

In this webinar, Dr. Adegbola Adesogan will:

– Present evidence on the role of animal-source foods in childhood development and impact on future health outcomes

– Review how animal-source foods are a source of key nutrients that support health in children and adolescents

The CPE activity application for this webinar is pending review by the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR) and approval for 1.0 CPEU.

Comment

Presumably, the CDR will approve this for continuing education credits required for dietetic licensing.  Also presumably, participants will not learn about the polluting effects of Pork CAFOs or the community lawsuits against them for obnoxious odors and other offenses.  Or the way the pork industry fights back against such complaints.  Or the welfare issues about farrowing crates.  Or complaints about Pork Checkoff programs.

As I’ve noted previously, dietitians are able to fulfill all requirements for continuing education credits from industry-funded courses like this one.

Conflict of interest, anyone?

The title of this article triggered my usual question: Who paid for this?  I cannot think of any reason other than marketing this supplement for doing a study like this.

Multi-nutrient supplementation of astaxanthin, vitamin E and grape juice improves episodic memory, cognitive performance – RCT:  A study has found that 12 weeks of multi-nutrient supplementation, comprising astaxanthin, vitamin E and grape juice extract, resulted in improved episodic memory and several biomarkers associated with cognitive health…. Read more

The study: Lopresti AL, Smith SJ, Riggs ML, Major RA, Gibb TG, Wood SM, Hester SN, Knaggs HE. An Examination into the Effects of a Nutraceutical Supplement on Cognition, Stress, Eye Health, and Skin Satisfaction in Adults with Self-Reported Cognitive Complaints: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial. Nutrients. 2024; 16(11):1770. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu16111770

Method: adults aged 40 to 70 years with subjective memory complaints were randomized to take a supplement containing vitamin E, astaxanthin, and grape juice extract daily for 12 weeks or a matching placebo.

Outcomes:  Changes in cognitive tasks assessing episodic memory, working memory, and verbal memory., speed of information processing, attention, and self-report measures of memory, stress, and eye and skin health.

Results: “Compared to the placebo, nutritional supplementation was associated with larger improvements in one primary outcome measure comprising episodic memory (p = 0.037), but not for working memory (p = 0.418) or verbal learning (p = 0.841). Findings from secondary and exploratory outcomes demonstrated that the nutraceutical intake was associated with larger improvements in the Everyday Memory Questionnaire (p = 0.022), increased plasma brain-derived neurotrophic factor (p = 0.030), decreased plasma malondialdehyde (p = 0.040), and increased skin carotenoid concentrations (p = 0.006). However, there were no group differences in changes in the remaining outcome measures.”

Conclusions: “The results from this 12-week study provide some support for the cognitive-enhancing effects of a nutraceutical containing astaxanthin, vitamin E, and grape juice extract in adults with self-reported memory complaints. This was demonstrated by improvements in one primary outcome measure (episodic memory) but not working memory or verbal learning.”