Health for life

You’ve heard of it. Maybe in a magazine. Maybe in a Michael Pollan or Marion Nestle talk. Maybe on a recent newscast about the lawsuit leveled at Coca-Cola over VitaminWater.

But what is Nutritionism? Why does it get a bad rap? Who is affected by it? What does it cost us? How does it affect our health?

There are many answers to these questions, and well try to address them as best we can here. As always, if you have more to say or I get something wrong, the comment section is wide open.

WHAT is Nutritionism?

According to food guru/Omnivore’s Dilemma author Michael Pollan, who picked up the term from scientist Gyorgy Scrinis, Nutritionism is, “the widely shared but unexamined assumption that the key to understanding food is indeed the nutrient.”

In other words, it dismisses a whole food’s composition to focus on its individual components, which are assumed to be most important to your body. A tomato isn’t necessarily valuable because it’s a tomato. It’s valuable because it’s a vessel for lycopene.


WHY is Nutritionism a not-so-good thing?

In many cases, there’s little research showing these nutrients are beneficial when found outside their native whole foods. The tomato is a complex structure, see, with its own biology and ways of interacting with other produce, grains, and meats. Take the lycopene out, stick it in a supplement, and theres scant evidence to show how it might affect you.

Have doubts? It’s understandable. Billions of dollars are spent telling us how wonderful certain nutrients are, no matter the form. Just remember, as Pollan highlights: “Indeed, in the case of beta carotene ingested as a supplement, scientists have discovered that it actually increases the risk of certain cancers.” Yikes.

Beyond that, there’s another issue. Manufacturers add nutrients to otherwise nutritionally bet foods, which entice buyers to believe those products are healthier. The Lucky Charms with Calcium and Vitamin D? Likely do jack-all for your wellbeing. In fact, now that you’re eating Lucky Charms every morning, you’re probably worse off.

[Apropos of nothing, as much as I dig Jamie Lee Curtis for A Fish Called Wanda (and adore her husband), I’m pretty sure Activia is just yogurt with a weak laxative.]


WHERE can I find evidence of Nutritionism?

All over the supermarket, man. Specifically in the center aisles. More specifically, on the labels of processed food: “probiotic yogurts; whole grain cookies that are high in fiber; orange juice with added calcium, and so on,” as Kerry Trueman of The Green Fork puts it.


WHO’S pushing Nutritionism?

With apologies to Don Draper, marketers and advertisers.

Why? Well, buyers will pay more for processed food they believe to be healthy, whether or not it’s actually so. The food industry takes advantage of this like you wouldn’t believe.

Consider the granola bar.

Your everyday Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain bar, no health promises included, costs $3 for a box of eight. The ingredient list is gigantic, and four of the top seven are some form of modified sugar.

Across the aisle, Kellogg’s Fiber Plus Antioxidants Chewy Bars costs $2.50 for a box of five. With a name like that – all those nutrients! – you’d expect a healthier snack, right? Here’s what you’re paying 33% more for:



Mmm … Partially defatted peanut flour.

(All prices and ingredient lists taken from Peapod.com on 8/11/10.)


HOW are they getting away with this?

Federal regulation of food labels is misguided at best, and at worst, damn negligent. Otherwise, how can you explain VitaminWater?

Essentially, it boils down to this: while the FDA is a little cautious about labels making outright health claims (i.e. “Cheerios prevents cancer!”), it’s generally okay with labels that list food contents (i.e. “Pop Tarts! 20% Daily Value of Fiber!”). So consumers are tricked into thinking an item is healthy, when really it’s the nutritional equivalent of wall insulation.

Not to mention, according to Pollan, “The American Heart Association charges food makers for their endorsement.” So there’s that.


WHEN will Nutritionism change?

I don’t know.

I’m not trying to be flip there. Awareness is on the rise, MObama’s programs are receiving a lot of positive attention, and the FDA is trying to do better. So labeling changes may occur in the near future.

How effective will they be? Will they help spawn greater initiatives? Can concern for the greater good overcome the money thrown into advertising? Those questions are harder to answer.


HOW can I avoid being snowed by Nutritionism?

There are three big ways you can avoid the dubious health claims and high prices associated with Nutritionism:

1. Buy whole foods. They’re healthier and cost way less.
2. Read a product’s ingredient list, rather than the flashy claims on the front of the box.
3. Enact change in a positive way. Cook for your friends. Talk to your school boards. Start sentences with, “Oh! You know what I read about CalciPuffs? They’re 0.1% added calcium and 99.9% recycled atomic cardboard.”

_http://cheaphealthygood.blogspot.com/2010/08/nutritionism-your-health-and-your-money.html

You’ve heard of it. Maybe in a magazine. Maybe in a Michael Pollan or Marion Nestle talk. Maybe on a recent newscast about the lawsuit leveled at Coca-Cola over VitaminWater.

But what is Nutritionism? Why does it get a bad rap? Who is affected by it? What does it cost us? How does it affect our health?

There are many answers to these questions, and well try to address them as best we can here. As always, if you have more to say or I get something wrong, the comment section is wide open.

WHAT is Nutritionism?

According to food guru/Omnivore’s Dilemma author Michael Pollan, who picked up the term from scientist Gyorgy Scrinis, Nutritionism is, “the widely shared but unexamined assumption that the key to understanding food is indeed the nutrient.”

In other words, it dismisses a whole food’s composition to focus on its individual components, which are assumed to be most important to your body. A tomato isn’t necessarily valuable because it’s a tomato. It’s valuable because it’s a vessel for lycopene.


WHY is Nutritionism a not-so-good thing?

In many cases, there’s little research showing these nutrients are beneficial when found outside their native whole foods. The tomato is a complex structure, see, with its own biology and ways of interacting with other produce, grains, and meats. Take the lycopene out, stick it in a supplement, and theres scant evidence to show how it might affect you.

Have doubts? It’s understandable. Billions of dollars are spent telling us how wonderful certain nutrients are, no matter the form. Just remember, as Pollan highlights: “Indeed, in the case of beta carotene ingested as a supplement, scientists have discovered that it actually increases the risk of certain cancers.” Yikes.

Beyond that, there’s another issue. Manufacturers add nutrients to otherwise nutritionally bet foods, which entice buyers to believe those products are healthier. The Lucky Charms with Calcium and Vitamin D? Likely do jack-all for your wellbeing. In fact, now that you’re eating Lucky Charms every morning, you’re probably worse off.

[Apropos of nothing, as much as I dig Jamie Lee Curtis for A Fish Called Wanda (and adore her husband), I’m pretty sure Activia is just yogurt with a weak laxative.]


WHERE can I find evidence of Nutritionism?

All over the supermarket, man. Specifically in the center aisles. More specifically, on the labels of processed food: “probiotic yogurts; whole grain cookies that are high in fiber; orange juice with added calcium, and so on,” as Kerry Trueman of The Green Fork puts it.


WHO’S pushing Nutritionism?

With apologies to Don Draper, marketers and advertisers.

Why? Well, buyers will pay more for processed food they believe to be healthy, whether or not it’s actually so. The food industry takes advantage of this like you wouldn’t believe.

Consider the granola bar.

Your everyday Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain bar, no health promises included, costs $3 for a box of eight. The ingredient list is gigantic, and four of the top seven are some form of modified sugar.

Across the aisle, Kellogg’s Fiber Plus Antioxidants Chewy Bars costs $2.50 for a box of five. With a name like that – all those nutrients! – you’d expect a healthier snack, right? Here’s what you’re paying 33% more for:


Mmm … Partially defatted peanut flour.

(All prices and ingredient lists taken from Peapod.com on 8/11/10.)


HOW are they getting away with this?

Federal regulation of food labels is misguided at best, and at worst, damn negligent. Otherwise, how can you explain VitaminWater?

Essentially, it boils down to this: while the FDA is a little cautious about labels making outright health claims (i.e. “Cheerios prevents cancer!”), it’s generally okay with labels that list food contents (i.e. “Pop Tarts! 20% Daily Value of Fiber!”). So consumers are tricked into thinking an item is healthy, when really it’s the nutritional equivalent of wall insulation.

Not to mention, according to Pollan, “The American Heart Association charges food makers for their endorsement.” So there’s that.


WHEN will Nutritionism change?

I don’t know.

I’m not trying to be flip there. Awareness is on the rise, MObama’s programs are receiving a lot of positive attention, and the FDA is trying to do better. So labeling changes may occur in the near future.

How effective will they be? Will they help spawn greater initiatives? Can concern for the greater good overcome the money thrown into advertising? Those questions are harder to answer.


HOW can I avoid being snowed by Nutritionism?

There are three big ways you can avoid the dubious health claims and high prices associated with Nutritionism:

1. Buy whole foods. They’re healthier and cost way less.
2. Read a product’s ingredient list, rather than the flashy claims on the front of the box.
3. Enact change in a positive way. Cook for your friends. Talk to your school boards. Start sentences with, “Oh! You know what I read about CalciPuffs? They’re 0.1% added calcium and 99.9% recycled atomic cardboard.”

HOW can I learn more about Nutritionism?

First, read Michael Pollan’s "Unhappy Meals" article in the New York Times. He explains things far, far more thoroughly than I ever could. Then, check out any of the journal pieces written by Gyorgy Scrinis, a huge influence on Pollan, and the originator of this whole Nutritionism thing. Finally, head over to Marion Nestle’s Food Politics blog, which discusses the relationship between advertising, Nutritionism, and our health almost everyday.

And that’s it. Readers, what do you think? Did I miss anything or make any errors? (Please tell me if it’s the latter.) I’d love read comments.

~~~

If you dig this piece, you might also enjoy:

• Angus Anguish: Is Angus Beef Worth the Money?
• COOL (Country of Origin Labeling) for You and Me
• The Junk Food Tax: Reader Ideas, Opinions, and Solutions

And were back for part 3 of the AHS talk.  Again, thats the Ancestral Health Symposium, not the American Hemerocallis Society, the American Helicopter Society, nor the American Headache Society, all of which come up ahead of Ancestral Health Symposium in a Google search.  That needs to change.  On to the discussion...


Two Ways of Looking at a Food: Nutritionism vs. A Whole Foods Perspective
This wasnt a topic that was covered specifically at the symposium, but some of the presentations touched on it, and that made it a frequent topic of discussion with my friends and I (Amanda at Inspired. and Matthew at whatever-he-will-call-his-new-blog.com).  First there was Mat Lalondes talk about his new system for measuring nutrient density, in which he made bacon look pretty darn nutritious.  Cool with me.  I liked it far more than the ANDI score system used at Whole Foods, or the NuVal system used at conventional grocery stores, but it was very apparent by the end of his talk that there is no perfect system to quantify the nutrient density of food.  Then there was Peter Ballerstedts talk about grass-fed meat, his main point being that the nutritional differences between grass-fed and grain-fed meat are negligible.

So these two talks generated some discussion about this reductionist perspective of nutrition.  Or "nutritionism", if you will.  You can measure the nutrients in a food and try to rank its healthiness, but what ultimately matters is the effect this food has on your body as a whole.

A couple of examples... Firstly, I appreciated Dr. Ballerstedts point, that the nutritional difference between grass-fed and grain-fed meat is insignificant.  He mainly focused on the difference in omega-3 fatty acids.  And he may be right, there isnt that much more omega-3 in grass-fed meat.  But does it matter?  A 2011 study, for example, found that eating grass-fed beef significantly increases the composition of omega-3 fatty acids in plasma and platelet, while eating grain-fed beef actually reduced their omega-3 content (1).

Then theres the whole grain thing, which I blogged about recently.  Despite being high in antioxidant nutrients (vitamin B6, folate, selenium, zinc, magnesium, and cysteine), whole grains have zero effect on your bodys total antioxidant capacity (2). 

So, you can talk all day about a food being more nutritious or less nutritious than another, but at the end of the day youre guessing.  Okay, thats not quite fair.  Its an educated guess.  But nutrient composition isnt everything.  We dont really know how food acts in our bodies until we study it.  Nutrient density can be a great guide, but its not the end-all-be-all.



Denise Minger is Hilarious/Adorable/Really Super Smart
Denise Minger was great as always.  No blogger makes me laugh like Denise does, and I think I nearly died of laughter during her AHS presentation.  She brought up the cholesterol-fed rabbit model, which many of you are probably familiar with.  A study from the early 1900s fed rabbits cholesterol and observed a rise in their cholesterol levels.  But rabbits dont eat cholesterol; theyre herbivores. 

Do rabbits eat carrots?  Or babies?

Point made.  Anyway, Denises presentation was about the negative aspects of meat consumption.  Many in the paleo world tend to assume we can eat as much meat as we want, but hopefully Denises presentation will bring us back to earth a bit.  She brought up a few ways meat can be harmful, including overcooking, but the most interesting part to me was on organ meats.  Ive been thinking about this a lot lately, so this presentation came at a perfect time.

If you really think about it, its just common sense that we should incorporate organ meats into our diet.  In hunter-gatherer times, we would have eaten plenty of organ meats, and in fact, traditional societies always place a high value on foods like liver.  We eat far too much muscle meat, and too little organ.  Denise explained that muscle meat is very high in the amino acid, methionine, which can be problematic.  Foods like liver, heart, and bone broths are higher in glycine, and apparently we should avoid an imbalanced intake of these amino acids.  This is something Ill be researching more in the near future, for sure.  And in the mean time, Ill be eating more organ meats!  Heres a little stew I made recently with beef heart and marrow bones:

Mmm, coronary arteries...

Terry Wahls and Multiple Sclerosis
Terry Wahls is just an inspiration.  Long story short, just a couple years ago she had debilitating MS, to the point where she could barely walk, and only with the assistance of two canes.  Since adopting a strict paleo diet, not just any paleo diet, but one with a very high intake of leafy greens and specific micronutrients, she has improved her symptoms so much that she recently biked 17 miles.  Absurd.  And whats more, she is currently conducting research on others with MS, putting them on the same diet she eats, and the preliminary results are astounding.  I was not able to get any pictures of the data, since she asked us not to, but when this information is published it will definitely be groundbreaking.  You can check out her TED talk here and learn all about her story.




Phew, thats it!  The end of my review of the 2012 Ancestral Health Symposium.  I may write another in the coming days talking about what it meant to me to be able to attend this amazing event.  And maybe Ill talk about the paleo movement as a whole and how excited I am for the future.  But until next time, ciao!