Naturally you're wondering why I feel that way. Well, it's because we hardly ever see any food-based research results that are actually objective. Instead, we continue to see one example after another of articles that are little more than blatant infomercials. They appear to be scientific, but instead they're mostly smoke and mirrors, based on omissions and predetermined agendas. They're typically filled with half-truths and cherry-picked data that allows the authors to reach misleading conclusions. Here's one I ran across this morning, for example:
Incretin, insulinotropic and glucose-lowering effects of whey protein pre-load in type 2 diabetes: a randomised clinical trial
On the surface it appears to be a useful study that could actually be helpful for many people who are dealing with type 2 diabetes. But the truth of the matter is that they could have easily made it into a much more useful study, by expanding their protein selection. They could have shown that virtually any protein would have the same effect, and that information would have certainly been more useful to the many diabetics who might be sensitive to dairy proteins.
But nope, they couldn't make it into an objective study — they had to make it misleading, because:
The Israeli Ministry of Health and Milk Council funded the research.
But hey! Almost everyone is happy with the results. The Israeli Ministry of Health and Milk Council is surely happy, since they got what they paid for. The researchers are all happy, because the money allowed them to continue to put food on their tables for a while longer.
The only ones who didn't fare so well are the people at whom the research was directed — folks who have type 2 diabetes. All they got was a morsel, when they could have received some truly useful information.
But I suppose that's not surprising. The consumer is always the one who gets the short end of the stick.
Tex
