re: You Are What You Eat (Twin Experiment) - Netflix

quote:

---

Imagine if Cargill Meats launched a center at, say, Dartmouth University, designed to “realize the positive benefits of a carnivore diet” and “identify the animal-based foods to replace plants” for the betterment of all. The initiative is led by a professor who has been a carnivore for 40-plus years and whose most recent study—showing that a carnivore diet prevented heart disease by citing highly selective cholesterol criteria—was funded by a billionaire’s philanthropy devoted entirely to carnivore-related projects. Among them was a hit Netflix film promoting a carnivore diet, to which the billionaire had donated upwards of $1 million. The Dartmouth study publication discloses its foundation grant but says nothing about the philanthropy’s carnivore bias or the fact that the entire Dartmouth center itself is a Cargill Meat venture. (The carnivore professor does, however, report receiving funds from Cargill “outside the submitted work.”)

Surely a media take-down of such industry interference in science would ensue, noting these meat-industry conflicts and the surprising failure to disclose them by the meat-funded scientists.

---

quote:

---

Because Gardner and PBDI simply assume the health benefits of plant-based eating, they are no longer engaged in the scientific question that should interest us most: whether a vegan diet can be a healthful option for human health in the long term. For PBDI, science is evidently relegated to providing a fig leaf of legitimacy for the center’s advocacy objectives.

The fact that human health is not among PBDI’s priorities should ring alarm bells throughout the world of nutrition. The field already suffers from a lack of trust, as Gardner himself pointed out, due to the influence of food and pharma funding. Now, we learn that one of its most prominent scientists has acknowledged that his research on food is principally inspired not by health concerns– hence, fulfilling his obligation as a nutritionist -- but by animal rights, the environment, and labor issues. That this left turn into advocacy has not roused the interest of the media or top public health officials is perhaps because Gardner’s beliefs are aligned with their own. Still, Gardner was right in 2020: we should be troubled by the basic integrity of nutrition science and the obvious financial conflicts of interest present here. Should Stanford support a Beyond-Meat funded advocacy center masquerading as science, and should Gardner be deciding the U.S. Dietary Guidelines for the entire nation? We think not.

---