Updated.

Following this post I recived a comment from an “Eric D” (see the comments section) that made me do a little more investigation into the group called the “Center For Consumer Freedom”. What i learned came as an eye-opener to me and made me realise how difficult it is these days to differentiate real research from propaganda being spread by advocacy groups.

In writing this update, I have not modified my original post’s content in any way (you can find that right below this update section) nor have I edited the comment.

According to Wikipedia and Source watch,

Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF), formerly called the Guest Choice Network, is a non-profit U.S. lobby group funded by the food and tobacco industries as well as “more than 1,000 concerned individuals,” according to its website. It describes its mission as defending the “right of adults and parents to choose what they eat, drink, and how they enjoy themselves.”

Anyone who criticizes tobacco, alcohol, fatty foods or soda pop is likely to come under attack from CCF.

The fact that the CCF is a lobby funded by the food/tobacco industry should raise some flags in us when we reference anything it publishes as fact. The CCF was set up by lobbyist Richard Berman with a $600,000 “donation” from tobacco company Philip Morris.

[…] Beltway’s most outrageous advocate, who goes by the name of Rick Berman. In recent months Berman has been in the news for placing full-page ads in major newspapers (funding sources unidentified) that gently compare America’s union leaders to Fidel Castro and like authoritarians. The unionists’ sin, Berman argues, is their support for allowing workers to join unions simply by signing affiliation cards rather than subjecting themselves to a National Labor Relations Act election process in which pro-union workers are frequently fired.

But Berman’s salvos against unions are just the latest in a line of attacks he’s leveled against drunk-driving laws, anti-smoking statutes, food safety ordinances and minimum-wage standards. He is, broadly speaking, the lobbyist for the Hobbesian state of nature.

Working chiefly under the aegis of his Center for Consumer Freedom, Berman has accused Mothers Against Drunk Driving and kindred groups (in the words of one of his Web sites) of “junk science, intimidation tactics, and even threats of violence to push their radical agenda.” Another Berman Web site was devoted to dismissing the dangers of mercury levels in fish.

-Via Washinton Post

In my original post I said that what the CCF says in terms of “extra calories causing weight gain” is true and I still stand by that. Infact, just the second line of the Harvard Research abstract itself states “Whether an association exists between SSB (sugar-sweetened beverages” intake and weight gain is unclear.”

Here is the bottomline as far I am concerned: I would not go so far to say I was “gullible” as the commenter claims, because when I published CCF’s analysis, I agreed with things that are indeed true. But the revelation that CCF is an advocacy group from the food industry is something I was not aware of and felt I should share with you so you can make an informed decision.

Remember, I concluded my original post by saying: “Don’t get me wrong. I am all for curbing the availability to sugary drinks in schools too (especially since they are so filled with High Fructose Corn Syrup), but let’s not talk only of sodas, because children need to understand the basics of nutrition. They should not assume that cutting sodas alone will make them healthy and then stuff themselves with so -called “fat-free” (but calorie-full) snacks. One important aspect should be increasing our activity (the other part of the equation).”

The final decision about any food you consume is certainly your own choice. The Harvard research suggests that, controlled for total calories, regular (non-diet) sodas lead to an inordinate amount of weight gain for the extra calories they contain (bad calorific payload). In contrast, the CCF people are claiming that sodas alone are not to blame, but to be fair, they are a food industry lobby, as I have just learned and disclosed.

Both sides do agree to the fact that frequent consumption of regular soda is bad for you. If that is all you take away from this post, I will consider my message conveyed. (The fact that soda alone is not to blame is known, but, I accept, irrelevant to the findings).

Original post:sodas

The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition has published a study by Vasanti S Malik, Matthias B Schulze and Frank B Hu, titled “Intake of sugar-sweetened beverages and weight gain: a systematic review (Abstract)” which finds that an extra can of soda a day can pile on 15 pounds in a single year, and that there is strong evidence that this sort of increased consumption is a key reason that more people have gained weight. More than 40 years of relevant nutrition studies were reviewed at the Harvard School of Public Health reviewed before reaching this conclusion.

Following the publication of this study, however, the Center For Consumer Freedom (a nonprofit group that aims to promote personal responsibility and protect consumer choices) questioned the study because it entirely misses the commonsense point that 150 extra calories of anything will cause people to gain weight (as always, It’s the total calories that count).

“It doesn’t take a Harvard Ph.D., let alone a high school diploma to realize that the more calories we eat, the more weight we’ll gain,” said senior research analyst J. Justin Wilson. “It’s a basic law of nutrition. Whether it’s an extra bowl of lima beans, shredded wheat or can of soda, eating more calories than you burn will always lead to weight gain.”

Wilson continued, “This report completely ignores the other side of the obesity equation: energy expenditure. From moving sidewalks in airports to electric staplers, Americans have engineered exercise out of their lives. This study does a disservice by providing a feel-good distraction that places the blame on a single food, but does little to address the fundamental changes in how we live.”

Someone needs to give this guy a microphone! Yes it is easy to blame sodas alone and indeed they could be one of several causes of weight gain in the country (if only because they are so easily accessible to everyone), but if you really stop and think about it, an attention grabbing headline like “a extra soda can a day will make you gain 15 pounds in a year” is jsut telling us something we have always known, albeit in a more sensational way. Forget sodas, an extra “anything” will make you gain weight if you are not going to burn it off (you haven’t forgotten our golden rule, already!)

In response to the valid claims that sodas alone are not to blame, Dr. David Ludwig, director of the obesity program at Children’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and a longtime advocate of curbs on soda, said that blaming other factors misses the point. “Could you imagine somebody saying we should ignore the contribution of hypertension to heart attack because there are many causes? It’s ludicrous. Yet this argument resurfaces with regard to obesity” Ludwig said.

No Dr. Ludwig, we are not asking you ignore the effect of sodas, all we are saying is to not to make such profoundly obvious statements as “extra calories will make you gain weight” and then point at sodas while saying it. If you are indeed serious about solving the obesity problem make sure you come up with more comprehensive solutions.

Don’t get me wrong. I am all for curbing the availability to sugary drinks in schools too (especially since they are so filled with High Fructose Corn Syrup), but let’s not talk only of sodas, because children need to understand the basics of nutrition. They should not assume that cutting sodas alone will make them healthy and then stuff themselves with so -called “fat-free” (but calorie-full) snacks. One important aspect should be increasing our activity (the other part of the equation).

Additional resources from the Center For Consumer Freedom:

These will you a much needed different perspective than those you read in the mainstream media.

Before we blame one type of food alone, let’s consider all aspects of the equation.

Technorati Tags: health, fitness, soda, weigth gain, obesity

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