2019 March Board Book

The same tactics used to confuse the public and policy makers in order to stall progress on smoking regulations and action on climate change are being executed in nutrition policy. But political pressure is growing to challenge entrenched nutritional wisdom. Following a request from Congress in 2015, America’s senior scientific body, the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, released two reports (found here and here ) raising sharp questions about the scientific rigor underpinning the government’s official Dietary Guidelines for Americans(DGAs). A 2015 investigation by the BMJ (formerly British Medical Journal) went further, revealing that the DGA Committee had failed to review, or chose to ignore, "much relevant scientific literature in its reviews of crucial topics and therefore risks giving a misleading picture. The omissions seem to suggest a reluctance by the committee behind the report to consider any evidence that contradicts the last 35 years of nutritional advice." Scientific consensus claims are misleading The EAT Lancet Commission report states that its macronutrient ("food group") targets were "reached through international scientific consensus, based on the latest available science, and are time-bound." The commission goes so far as to compare the international scientific consensus behind its dietary targets to the scientific consensus that underpins the climate targets set by United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The EAT-Lancet Commission’s authority, mandate, process, timeline, resources and membership were in no way comparable to the IPCC’s. Implying comparability is misleading and unethical. This false impression may lead consumers and policy makers to act based on the belief that the EAT-Lancet recommendations are grounded in an evidence-based consensus. It is not, at least not in regard to its nutritional targets. Nutrition science is undergoing a period of scientific enlightenment akin to what occurred in climate science 30 years ago. The old paradigm is falling away, and it is not yet clear what will replace it. In other words, a "scientific consensus" on what constitutes a healthy diet is simply not possible right now. The only real consensus achieved by the 19 members and 16 co-authors of the EAT- Lancet report is among themselves. Bias, transparency and unsettled science No contemporary researcher is more strongly associated with the original low- fat/high-carb nutrition paradigm than Dr. Walter Willett, an epidemiologist from Harvard School of Public Health. Willett was selected as the commission’s lead author. If this decision was a coincidence, it was a convenient one. Willett’s selection, and several decisions that followed, raise questions about whether EAT, the commission, its funders or individual members were using "public & planetary health" as cover for a number of other agendas.