Why is Big Food in bed with dietitians? Follow the money!

This is the second in a series on a global and an insidious public health risk: dietitians associations in bed with Big Food, accepting sponsorship from companies that produce unhealthy products – products so refined, processed, denatured, adulterated and far removed from their natural state, they don’t deserve to be called food. In the first of the series,Dietitians dishing you up a daily menu of unhealthy advice?, Sonia Mountford looked at conflicts of interest between the food industry and the Association for Dietetics in South Africa (ADSA).

Here, Mountford attempts to unravel the dynamics behind ties that bind many dietitians to Big Food in SA through their associations, and make them its proxies. What she has to say has global relevance, and while her focus is on Kellogg’s, as the company is particularly active in building relationships with dietitians, it is not the only one. Coca Cola is another, as Mountford showed in a post: Coke falls flat on health. And dietitians aren’t Big Food’s only proxies: many doctors buy into the food industries’ spin. At heart, there’s no big secret behind Big Food’s love affair with dietitians. A Fortune Special Report: The war on Big Food makes it clear: just follow the money. – Marika Sboros

More on this story here.

Eddie