The FDA’s phony nutrition science: How Big Food and Agriculture trumps real science .......
from Salon:
The FDA’s phony nutrition science: How Big Food and Agriculture trumps real science — and why the government allows it
Sugar and corn syrup have been pumped into the food chain, causing a dramatic increase in illnesses. Here's why
Richard Jacoby and Raquel Baldelomar
Excerpted from "Sugar Crush: How to Reduce Inflammation, Reverse Nerve Damage and Reclaim Good Health"
Lie: The U.S. Department of Agriculture Knows What Should Be on Your Plate
You know by now that sugar has been pumped into the food chain over the last fifty years, especially in the form of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). As a result, there has been a dramatic increase in a whole range of illnesses that manifest in different parts of your bodies, depending on your own genetic profile. All are caused by the same underlying impact of inflammation from sugar, and the resulting nerve damage and compression. Medical professionals can be blinded by the bias of their specialties and miss the important connections linking these seemingly unrelated conditions. But like us, they’re hampered by information linked to the partnership between the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Big Agra complex.
When the Government Took an Interest in What You Eat
In 1916, the USDA began a well-intended nutrition education program consisting of two publications, “Food for Young Children” and “How to Select Food.” These plans established guidelines for groups and households to provide “protective foods.” Then, in 1992, after several successive programs, the USDA established the familiar Food Guide Pyramid, with its six basic food groups. The base of the pyramid, as we all recall, consisted of the Bread, Cereal, Rice & Pasta Group. Americans were advised that in order to be healthy, they needed to consume 6–11 servings of these foods per day! The pyramid then stacked foods in descending importance: fruits and vegetables, meats and dairy products, and finally, fats and sweets to be used sparingly. A modified MyPyramid Food Guidance System was initiated in 2005; it added the concept of exercise and stressed moderation in food choices rather than specific daily servings.
The latest incarnation, established in 2011, is a dinner plate icon called MyPlate, which advises us on the percentages of foods we should consume daily: 30 percent grains, 40 percent vegetables, 10 percent fruits, and 20 percent protein, with a small, side portion of dairy.
And yet the official government dietary guidelines for healthy eating are dangerously wrong in almost every respect. Like the old food pyramid in its various incarnations, the new food plate is the product of the marriage of politics and Big Agra lobbying—actual nutrition has very little to do with the recommendations. As they stand today, and have for decades, the official recommendations of the USDA are determined by the commercial interests of agribusiness. They’re also the primary reason why two-thirds of all Americans are overweight. They’re why 29 million Americans have type 2 diabetes, another 19 million have it but don’t know it, and 79 million people have prediabetes. They’re also why I never lack for patients suffering from diabetic peripheral neuropathy.
So, what’s wrong with MyPlate? Almost everything. Specifically, the USDA officially promotes a diet that is far too high in carbohydrates and far too low in healthy fat. In other words, your government is promoting a diet that will make you obese, give you a whole slew of illnesses, and kill your nerves. ........................(more)
http://www.salon.com/2015/04/12/the_fdas_phony_nutrition_science_how_big_food_and_agriculture_trumps_real_science_and_why_the_government_allows_it/
= new reply since forum marked as read
... everything from vegetarian diets to arctic fishing and hunting diets.
Even things like alcoholic beverages or high fructose corn syrup soft drinks are not horrible if consumed in moderation.
But things get rotten fast when our mass media and big ag start pushing their products on us.
I look at diet as a largely environmental problem. Many environmentally destructive agricultural processes are bad for the human diet too.
"Factory farm" meat and dairy products are especially troublesome, encouraging the evolution of antibiotic resistant bacteria. It turned out the "healthy" aspect of hydrogenated vegetable oils was a blatant lie; people were better off eating "old fashioned" fats and oils like lard, butter, and olive oil.
I never got into the soda or fast food habit as a kid, mostly because our family didn't have money. This was before the "miracle" of modern factory farming made these foods among the least expensive sort of calories. The most common meat in our household was ocean fish my dad caught, often with the help of me and my siblings. This was back when the ocean still had abundant fish. That these fish were full of DDT and other chemicals, and toxic enough that the brown pelicans and bald eagles nearly became extinct, is another example of the unforeseen and later active cover-ups of Big Ag innovations gone bad.
I confess my own diet is horrible. Mass-market beer (never "light beer!"
is too much of my calorie intake and I like salty foods.
My wife pays much more attention to her own diet and is a vegetarian, largely because she has the Southwest Native American heritage that turns a typical "modern" American diet into excess weight and diabetes. Some of her cousins have already passed away from such problems.
My own grandfather didn't live as long as he might have because he ate too much factory farmed fatty meat and empty carbohydrates. Well "marbled" steak and potatoes, bacon with eggs and potatoes fried in the bacon fat, that sort of thing. He liked sweets too. Glazed donuts, pastries... He didn't like doctors so his type II diabetes was poorly controlled. He gradually went blind, which was a terrible thing for someone who was an avid reader and maker of small machines. In a different "dietary environment" his years as a retired engineer might have been happier.
