Coca-Cola Funds Scientists Who Shift Blame for Obesity Away from Bad Diets

coke contains virtually no calories.

and a large coke from mac ds about 100% of your rđa of sugar.

then people wonder why so many people have diabetes - an inability of your body to process sugar...

My solution for when I don't feel like drinking. Fizzy water with a lime in it, people assume its a vodka tonic.

sounds like the social situation needs to change, not the explanation.

assuming you're in your 20s now... don't worry, by age 35 there's less explaining and less criticizing.

i used to think the same way, but you'd be surprised how quickly people accept that you don't drink (soda or alcohol). and if you're continuously getting harassed for it it's a sign you should shed those people as quickly as sugar.

you can pretend that you are a recovering alcoholic and that you are using your tremendous willpower to stay away from alcohol, even in a bar. People might applaud and respect you for it and leave you alone :p

I have moved to Coke Zero, which tastes just fine (although it somewhat depends on the country where you buy it). I don't think there is much wrong with that, so I don't quite understand why Coca-Cola doesn't promote it more instead of denying that sugar may be a problem.

My excuse, when I decide I need one is "I'm just not feeling like I want to drink today." If anyone tries to put the thumb screws on me (which only occasionally happens), I say "I've never folded in front of peer pressure before, it's unlikely I'm going to fold today. I don't feel like drinking today." Usually that's enough to get people to drop the subject. If they still continue to the point that I've had enough, I leave. If my friends can't respect my decisions without fighting me on it, I don't want to be around them. They'll have way more fun getting drunk without me anyway, so I'll leave them to it and see them another day when either I do feel like a drink or they don't feel the need to coerce me into drinking against my will.

>One thing with the beverages is that if you choose to not drink them, you will most likely be the weird one in most social situations. Especially if you cut on alcohol.

Totally disagree, nobody cares if you have 2 beers vs 8 beers.

> One thing with the beverages is that if you choose to not drink them, you will most likely be the weird one in most social situations.

Why are you so preoccupied with what people think about you?

Just get a glass of water. If they ask, say you don't drink. That will be the end of it. Trust me, you're not the only one. Many people don't drink soda/alcohol/etc.

> go explain that to people every time you are drinking water in a pub

That's like going to a whorehouse and saying you're abstinent. Of course people are going to give you weird looks.

Don't go to establishments that primarily serve alcohol. If you're going out with friends or co-workers, go to a establishment where the primary focus is on food. Then get yourself a glass of water.

Most people hate making decisions, including where to go. So speak up and tell them where to go.

You can just say you don't like the taste.

Anecdotally, I don't know anybody under the age of 30 that regularly drinks soft drinks anymore. They aren't terribly good and they are about the worst thing you can put into your body—a can of coke has more than 40gs of sugar.

Alcohol might be a tough one to kick. It's so intertwined with social life I don't see it going away anytime soon.

What do you do if you don't like the taste of water? Fruit juice is pretty high in sugar as well.

I've had that reaction on occasion. More often lately, however, I get a look of shame and the response, "I wish I didn't drink". I suspect people probably do not need a whole lot more prompting than "have you really never regretted getting drunk?" to realize your choice is wise.

>>go explain that to people every time you are drinking water in a pub

Don't go to pub.

Pub: A public house where beverages, primarily alcoholic, may be bought and consumed.

It depends on the social situations. In my experience (yay, anecdotes) you only need to assert your preferences once or twice (maybe less with soft drinks, maybe more with alcohol, depending on the situation and people involved).

Anyway. You shouldn't be surprised if people react incredulously when you're not just deviating from the social norm but opting out of entire categories. "I only drink water" is no different in that regard than "I'm a vegan" or "I only eat raw food". It's a perfectly fine preference, but you're going to be an exception and exceptions tend to stand out.

I'm German but don't like beer and feel rather dispassionate about football (or "soccer" to Americans). It used to take some explaining when I was younger (i.e. teens and early 20s) but at 30 I find that barely anyone[0] cares about it -- simply because they've learned that they don't have to agree with everyone about everything to be friends.

[0]: Except die-hard football fans who can't imagine anyone not at least enjoying the sport or uber-machos who think drinking beer is a requirement for being a man. But those traits tend to be obnoxious enough on their own.

Standard XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1534/

I have a colleague who completely avoids alcohol. No particular reason for it other than one day he decided to do it because his friend wanted to do it. His friend didn't keep it up, but he did for ~30 years now. I have nothing for or against alcohol and I like some drinks now and then (mostly avoid beers, just don't like the taste).

I have to respect this guy that he keeps it up so long, even though he has nothing to gain or lose from it. I would have figured at least one day, what the heck, it's not a big deal, not doing anything bad or anything. But he decided he won't drink, so he doesn't. Mad respect.

Alcohol is a social lubricant which, yes, we shouldn't rely upon. But there are a great many things we should do that we don't - I don't see alcohol as a huge problem in that regard (unless, you know, it becomes a huge problem for you personally).

I also have friends who don't drink, including some when I was at university (a high time for most people's blood alcohol levels) - few people cared. Though my one suggestion to you is to drink something other than water, even if it's just club soda. Aside from anything else, getting something that costs money will likely make the pub staff friendlier.

I stopped drinking alcohol completely about 5 years ago. I was drinking a lot of pop everyday and couldn't figure out why I couldn't lose weight. I was still playing soccer four times a week and working out at the gym the other day. I had changed my diet pretty drastically and still no major weight loss.

Then I started cutting back on pop so as not to experience caffeine withdrawal. Within a few weeks, I was down to one can a day. After two months, I lost 10 pounds, almost all because I stopped drinking so much pop.

It's pretty amazing how many calories and sugar pop has and how negatively it affects your body.

Another side of this, is that if you buy/drink sugary beverages a lot outside of those social situations, you're also likely to get criticized about this. Every other peer tries to remind how unhealthy coke is, how one can clean rust with it and so on. And this is not out of health concerns, but just the same case of social situation conformance stereotypes - one's expected to drink while partying, but don't they dare to do the same alone at home.

The industry really should adapt. I've been drinking this "Pure Leaf" Peach sweetened tea that has almost half the calories of the Lemon tea, and I don't think has artificial sweeters. It tastes really good, I don't even notice it doesn't have the same amount of calories.

Right around when I got this, "Gold Peak" appeared in the supermarkets and that is so sweet it is sickening.

Companies are pure capitalistic enterprises that respond to market demand right? Right?

I stopped drinking alcohol a while ago for several reasons, an increased exercise regimen being one of them (though not the most important one). Now when people "ask" I just say I'm an athlete (which has become more true since then), gets them off my back pretty quick.

Apparently being healthy is frowned upon for anyone who doesn't need it (semi-)professionally.

>Now, that's the logic, and it's a sound logic

Some people like the taste of soda or the effects of alcohol. That's the logic, and it trumps the fact that "useless" calories are being consumed. We aren't rational automatons.

idk about bars, but here's a tip for house parties: finish a beer bottle, and keep refilling it with water thereafter.

there is nothing wrong with drinking alcohol in small quantities every day - red wine can prevent all sorts of diseases - most of the world drinks a beer or two on a daily basis.

drinking coke and pepsi contains no health or nutritional benefits - you ideally dont drink them ever (drink water or at least the diet version)

You can always say that you're the designated driver, which at some bars will get you, ironically, free soda.

I don't drink soda, and I've never had anyone comment.

Regarding alcohol: I kind of understand the skepticism about people who don't drink. Drinking usually puts you in a more honest, less controlled, and less guarded condition, which makes drinking with other people almost a trust exercise. Not drinking at a pub is kind of like bringing your sword into a gathering where everyone else agreed to leave theirs' at the door.

>go explain that to people every time you are drinking water in a pub

Why do you feel a need to explain it? I've never had any reaction at all with 'no thanks, I'm good'. You don't have to say 'I'm on a diet' 'I don't drink' 'that crap will kill you' or anything else. Just no thanks. If someone does ask about your water, say 'I'm taking it easy' or 'I'm good'. Or get a club soda and lime.

>Now, that's the logic, and it's a sound logic, go explain that to people every time you are drinking water in a pub and they go: "ehm, uh, you don't drink?". Which, by the way, if not explained properly can seem like you are a recovering alcoholic

I find it amazing that people think asking why you don't drink is acceptable, no one stops drinking for fun.

We're living in an alcoholic beverage renaissance.

Try a craft beer or have a glass of wine.

A drink a day is good for you anyway.

Just ask for a white dolphin on the rocks (water over ice) :)

It is all about the glass shape, most people will assume you are having vodka soda.

What's wrong with seeming like you are a recovering alcoholic? Many people are, and if someone judges you for that, they're not a good person. Many people also don't want the excess calories, and if someone judges you for NOT joining them in drinking alcohol, again, they're not a good person.

Same goes if they think you're a food/diet nazi. Who cares? It's your body. They shouldn't be so judgmental of your life choices, especially something as personal as how you decide to fuel your body and stay alive. And if they are judging you, in my experience, it's usually because they're working through their own issues and would rather it not be pointed out how unhealthy their choices are, and they want you to join them in their maybe-not-so-great decisions.

Agreed. However, I would argue that this is older than science itself. Before it was governments and religions who claimed to know better than science. Its about control, and hijacking science is a way to get "credibility". But I've got hope that real science will always win out eventually. It just takes time.

You might be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Science, as a method, works. Science, as a field, has areas where it doesn't work very well. Diet, in particular, is probably one of the worst. The good thing with Science, the method, is that it is predicated on improvement by iteration. Dietology itself is getting a bit better (though there's a lot more to do), so unfortunately, until we find a better method, we have to work on human time. No need to discard every reasonable scientist's work just because of some (many?) bad apples. They are nowhere near the majority.

On the plus side, this abuse of science is being reported in a major newspaper - which is the way most of the public would consume such a scientific study anyway.

> that deplete what little faith I have remaining in "science."

I'm not keen on using the word science like it's some sort of faith that you choose to passively agree or passively disagree with. You shouldn't have faith in science or institutions based on science, because that is antithetical to the whole premise of science.

Science is a methodology and framework for investigating the world around you. There are broadly accepted scientific bodies of work, but they're supposed to be continually tested and verified and challenged. You're not supposed to accept studies or peer reviewed papers at face value. You're not even supposed to accept the current body of knowledge as fact. Even the most tested laws are just theories where the error bars are very small. Don't get me wrong, laws should be respected, but until the margin of error becomes 0, it can be challenged. We award the Nobel Prize to people who have convincingly challenged the current body of science. Einstein isn't revered because he sealed Newton's laws as immutable truths. We revere him because he added dimension and new ideas that we could test and explore.

Companies and institutions have been undermining science with self-serving research, press releases and books since the beginning. People will always execute scientific research poorly and others will always do despicable things to undermine it. Fortunately, scientific thinking comes with some error correction mechanisms. They're not perfect and sometimes it takes longer than we'd like, but typically our body of knowledge gets better over time. Nutrition in particular is a very difficult subject to study, so it's especially ripe for junk science. I suspect as our tools for research get better, our knowledge of nutrition will get better.

Science doesn't work when people accept a scientific body with faith. Faith has no place in science, because faith teaches people to accept ideas without challenging them. We want each generation of scientists to question every link in the chain of arguments, so they can add testable theories and new dimension to today's "infallible" theories.

If you want to reinvigorate your "faith in science", start by changing your expectations about science. The scientific method is a great tool, but it doesn't solve the problems of corruption and incompetence. Practicing science is messy and error fraught, propagating accurate scientific knowledge can be incredibly slow. It's always been this way, but if we persist, sometimes we get really lucky and we're inundated with new knowledge and insights, better tools, and lots of testable ideas.

The primary metabolic disorder in society right now is driven by an excess of sugars in our diet, particularly fructose. Fruit juices and processed foods are swimming in fructose.

Drink less soft drink and need less exercise = less money for beverage and exercise industries.

Keep drinking soft drink, exercise more = more money for both industries.

I don't think they care about difference in willpower, only money. They will say almost anything to get it from you.

> For one thing, Wilkin believes he has discovered another form of "compensation", similar to Timothy Church's discovery that we reward ourselves with food when we exercise. Looking at the question of whether it was possible to change a child's physical activity, Wilkin's team put accelerometers on children at schools with very different PE schedules: one which offered 1.7 hours a week, and another that offered nine hours.

> "The children did 64% more PE at the second school. But when they got home they did the reverse. Those who had had the activity during the day flopped and those who hadn't perked up, and if you added the in-school and out-of-school together you got the same. From which we concluded that physical activity is controlled by the brain, not by the environment – if you're given a big opportunity to exercise at one time of day you'll compensate at another."

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/sep/19/exercise...

Sweeteners keep your body addicted to the taste of sugar, but if all you eat is sweeteners, then you won't actually consume more sugar.

> Combine that with the meta study that showed exercise was not something to take up as part of a weight reduction regime http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/.... and you can begin to understand how important it is that Coca Cola need to push this message.

One, it is not a "meta study"; it is an editorial[1]. One which provoked an almost immediate contrary response from other doctors, both mentioned in the very article you posted and in the BJSM[2].

Two, Malhotra's editorial does not say "exercise was not something to take up as part of a weight reduction regime". It said exercise doesn't contribute to weight loss. It specifically said exercise reduces the risk of numerous conditions that are frequently comorbid with obesity.

[1] http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2015/05/07/bjsports-2015-0...

[2] http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2015/06/10/bjsports-2015-0...

> Your body knows what to do with glucose, releases insulin preventing fat from being burnt and enables your cells to use glucose. Fructose is converted into fat by your liver but cannot be used until the insulin subsides. Fructose really is "bad". Sweetners do not help either as they keep your body addicted to sugar. It also looked at the impact sugar had on brain function. Note that in the film he kept to similar calorie intake, just swapped out his good fat sources with low fat "healthy" choices. He gained 8kg primarily around the waste within 40 days.

Ok but the insulin does subside and you do use the fat created from fructose provided you aren't eating a caloric surplus. There may be minor differences but calling any macro or micronutrient category "bad" is missing the forest for the trees. There is quite simply no way he gained nearly 20 lbs in a little over a month without significant increasing his calorie intake or decreasing his calorie output.

> The reality is, added sugar products need taxation which is then ring-fenced to support healthy eating education and healthy transport schemes (Walking, cycling and public transport). We need to recognise that added sugar, in particular fructose, has to be treated on the same level as smoking is.

The reality is that sugar is completely healthy for many people, and that the idea that sugar is "poison" is completely incorrect. It's dose dependent, like any other food. If you are sitting around all day doing nothing and you eat a lot of sugar you will gain unhealthy body mass, but for many atheletes, for instance, sugars are an extremely important part of performance quality. Protein or fat when eaten in excess will also make you fat. What separates sugar from cigarettes is that there are doses at which sugar is completely fine (even good) for you, and there is no dose at which a cigarette is good for you.

Read more about the "science" in the Sugar movie and you may not be so quick to cite it:

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_exa...

Careful with this being fair, though. It feels like the same rhetoric as acknowledging that other factors contribute to climate change.

Yes binging and eating too fast is a real issue. You should never eat watching tv or browsing the internet. Always eat mindfully, chewing properly and thoroughly, and you can lose that habit.

This suggests that our primary focus should be on portion size, right?

I think the problem with processed food is that it allows combinations of nutrients which don't occur in nature, which our bodies are not well adapted to.

It's not so much processed foods - obviously you can have processed foods which are healthy too. But if people with very unhealthy diets cut out the kinds of processed foods they eat it would probably go a long way towards making them healthier.

And you're right that capitalism is the root cause - the incentives are skewed towards making foods more addictive and moreish, to help with sales, which leads to making them worse for us. Big food companies even have labs to help them optimise this: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/magazine/the-extraordinary...

"processed food" has a very specific meaning. Basically, anything that comes in a factory sealed bag or wrapper. So, not a burrito from Chipotle, but a cliff bar or a twinkie or anything that has a long and confusing ingredients list.

"Food science" has advanced to the point where companies explicitly try to hack tastebuds and desire receptors (dorritos optimizing for salty+sweet to induce more hunger while you eat) thereby increasing desire for their product and, they hope, reducing self-action of restraint towards their product.

I think its the size of food.

The old time coke bottles where 8 fl oz (.23 liters). Then cans at 12 oz. Now the single serve bottles are typically 20 oz (.6 liter)

I was in NYC which labels calories in restaurants. Was a little bit of an eye opener. oversize bagels and muffins making breakfast approach half your daily caloric intake.

That depends who you ask... they've probably been peer reviewed by other biased peers who are on Coca-Cola's payroll... or at least peers who favour these big food companies. So technically, yes, they're peer reviewed. Does it make them any more valid? Draw your own conclusions.

There are two possible things happening in the article and neither are explored (yay NYT!).

Case A: the school already had this research happening. Coke saw the research could help their arguments and decided to pay them to do more of their already existing projects.

Case B: Coke started from a marketing perspective, interviewed scientists at different universities, then commissioned the studies and created the departments themselves using the "shadow funding."

I'm of three minds about this.

OT1H, it shouldn't matter who writes something if it holds up to scrutiny.

OTOH, no system, no matter the safeguards, can withstand constant attempts to subvert it by ordinary members. The scientific process can stop sporadic fraud, but not deliberate fraud by the majority of participants.

OT3rdH, it's also playing with fire to tell an organization it can't defend itself, even against a scientific consensus, by bankrolling research that tends to favor itself. I for one wish we would have had more of that from Big Fat to resist the "less fat, more carbs" dogma we heard for decades.

> I think people would be greatly surprised to find out a calorie is not simply a calorie as is often suggested and that sugar has a lot more impact on obesity than fats.

I would be throughly shocked considering everything I have read is to the contrary. The much more likely issue is the soda drinker would feel compelled to eat/drink something sugary after a short period where as the person eating almonds would be satisfied. Interestingly you touch on this with your rat experiment and then somehow come to the conclusion "calorie is not a calorie".

In the end a calorie is a calorie in terms of the potential to expand your waistline, but a calorie is not a calorie in terms of putting the fork down and feeling satisfied. Maybe I misunderstood and that was your point.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/is-a-calorie-a-calorie.htm...

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/79/5/899S.full

Companies that produce junk foods tell us the dietary information we need to ensure we consume responsibly is printed on the packet or bottle.

They don't explain how their products and accompanying advertising are designed to subvert our logical minds by appealing to our biological desires.

Their techniques have been honed over time and have become rather powerful. Over-consuming may not be a problem for you but not everyone is so resilient.

Just because some people can not resist and drink responsibly, why should the company take the profit?

Sugary diets do not cause obesity any more than starchy diets do. A lot of obese people only consume diet drinks yet they still gain weight from the chips, the bread, the beer, etc.

Having visited Europe recently another thing I noticed is that the car wasn't nearly as ubiquitous there. I don't think people there specifically ate less, they are just less sedentary.

I've also noted folks who spend significant time on both in big cities with public transport, and also significant time in car-centric cities, their weight fluctuates appropriately (about 15% less weight when decent public transport is available).

About one month ago, I dropped Mountain Dew (and all pop/soda) cold-turkey. The only time I DO have pop, is when I have a mixed drink, and that's 7up/Sprite, about 3 cans per week. I used to drink 2 20oz Mountain Dews per day, for 20 years. Yes, I'm obese. I hope I start to see the effects soon of the drastically reduced sugar/fructose intake. After 1 month, I haven't noticed anything yet. (My wife's a health nut, and makes me eat pretty well also)

> 20 years ago there were 10oz bottle in vending machines, then 12oz cans, now also 20oz bottles, thus, those consuming a bottle a day today now consume 52 lbs of sugar per year compared with 26 lbs 20 or so years ago.

Portion sizes for everything are so incredibly out of whack; it's ridiculous. If you convince people people that a 3 gallon smoothie is "regular" size, you move more product and make more money - who cares if everyone gets fat as a side effect.

Right. I am no fan of Coca Cola sugar water, but it's probably true that your weight gain is determined by the totality of how much you eat, not necessarily drinking coca cola per se. So, taxing soft drinks extra rather than, say, all of junk food extra, seems somewhat arbitrary.

Europe has essentially the same economic changes, although with subtle and probably significant differences (Plus the British and Germans are porking out to an alarming degree)

Well fructose was a rarely part of the human diet and is converted to fat by your liver. Sugar is 50% glucose and 50% fructose. When your body get's a hit of glucose it releases insulin that tells your body not to burn fat but use up the glucose. So that fructose gets stored away. Ironically healthy fruit smoothies are exceptionally bad :D

Yes a country's transport policy has an impact. Netherlands has an obesity rate of 1.6% in boys vs 16% in the UK. So getting your kids cycling/walking to school is of massive benefit to the long-term health of your nation.

You still need to deal with the wrong type of calories being delivered into your population.

And as follow-up to my unpopular comment above, here's someone else coming out and declaring it basically nonsense with distorted science. No surprise there.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-you-lose-weigh...