Nina Teicholz, PhD Profile picture
Science journalist, Ph.D. in nutrition, author of The Big Fat Surprise, which argued that saturated fats not bad for health but seed oils/carbs are.
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Nov 6 5 tweets 3 min read
Whatever your views on the election, now is the time to reverse chronic disease in America. We have a chance. @RobertKennedyJr @NicoleShanahan
The single most important thing we can do is to fix the US Dietary Guidelines for Americans--by far the most powerful lever affecting what Americans think is healthy (and what is fed in schools, on military bases, and all federal programs)
The Guidelines have failed us:Image The Dietary Guidelines have clearly not protected our health. We don't need to assess why.
The National Academies of Sciences has already studied the problem (mandated by Congress, with a $2M allocation). They found that the guidelines "lacked scientific rigor," do not use a "verified methodology," and are not "trustworthy."
nutritioncoalition.us/the-process-of…Image
Aug 21 5 tweets 2 min read
Want to know a lie bigger than Biden being “sharp as a tack”?
The one that red meat causes diabetes
A new study is the latest to make this claim. (NYTimes reports)
Like 2+2=5, this claim is unhinged from fundamental facts 🧵 Image Fact #1: This inconvenient truth Image
Mar 5 5 tweets 2 min read
One year ago, dozens of headlines splashed news about a "keto-like" diet causing heart disease
This came from a press release by the Amer. College of Cardiology, on data that had been presented at their conference but not published--not even a pre-print; study not registered 1/
@ACCinTouchImage I wrote about this at the time:
All links, statement from ACC, attempts to interview the researchers here.
(need to scroll half-way down the article) 2/shorturl.at/myzGT
Feb 29 11 tweets 4 min read
Gemini AI doesn't just have a "woke" problem. It's also engaged in making harmful, (libelous/defamatory) statements about people like myself, who challenge a status quo narrative. Should this not be of concern to @GoogleAI?

In my case, Gemini falsely asserts that I have ties to the meat and dairy industries. It tries to substantiate these claims with innuendos and fallacious arguments

When corrected, Gemini says, 'I'm learning,' yet if you ask again, it just repeats the same false information 1/Image The whole conversation on me is here:
2/
Image
Oct 18, 2023 8 tweets 3 min read
I'm having trouble believing that the @nytime cares about the health of its readers.
Here's a featured recipe from this week. A stack of pancakes with syrup that will send your blood sugar sky high and is one of the worst possible ways to start the day. Image And ICYMI, here's what the Times recommended in the middle of the pandemic, when we knew that obesity, diabetes etc vastly increased the risk of worsened outcomes and death from Covid Image
Apr 27, 2023 6 tweets 3 min read
The American Heart Assn (AHA). just came out with a diet-rating list that tanks low-carb/keto due to saturated fat. Why is the AHA the last to get the news that these fats don't cause heart disease? 1/
nbcnews.com/health/heart-h… This authoritative "State of the Art Review" in a top journal written by authors including 5 former members of the US Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committees concluded there should be no more caps on saturated fats. Evidence does not support it.
doi.org/10.1016/j.jacc… Image
Apr 26, 2023 6 tweets 2 min read
New paper: shows how a low-carb diet could be a viable, affordable option for the US Dietary Guidelines.
USDA needs a low-carb option, because its current 3 "dietary patterns" are 52-56% of calories as carbs.
What would a low-carb option look like? 🧵
frontiersin.org/articles/10.33… --Far fewer grains. Grains just turn to sugar in the body
--No refined grains (duh)
--Far less dairy (this surprised me)
--Much more protein (the current amount in the guidelines is a bare minimum but not enough for kids, elderly and other groups) Image
Mar 14, 2023 8 tweets 3 min read
Is the next generation of MDs getting smarter about food for health?
An informal poll of med students at Harvard, Yale, Tufts, others (# students=41) is encouraging.
Poll organizer-a student who read ⬇️ thread
(chart is not a joke). Poll results-this 🧵
2. Above chart is data from "Food Compass," a food profiling system developed by Dean of Tufts School of Nutrition
Poll Q: What's healthier--Reeses Puffs or an egg?
-Students-->100% say eggs
-Food Compass-->Reeses Puffs scores 71 vs. 54 for cooked egg (100 is perfect score) Image
Mar 2, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
Makers of Froot Loops, Lucky Charms sue FDA to give their cereals "healthy" label. Says corporate 'free speech' is deprived if they can't tell you sugar is good for you.
“Sugar plays a role in foods beyond palatability... 1/
theintercept.com/2023/03/01/fda… ...[sugar] it controls water activity, creates texture, adds bulk, and also contributes to flavor complexity,” says company brief.
What next?! Eat your "healthy" Hershey's bar?
These companies are shameless.
Thanks to @lhfang for reporting this
Jan 19, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
Harvard advises mostly plant-based diets for longevity even tho the diet lacks essential nutrients like B12. Could not have even been an option until supplements were invented in mid-1900s. And how come some longest-living people daily ate bacon & eggs? 1/
mindbodygreen.com/articles/harva… This 116 year-old Guiness record holder for oldest person says she ate bacon every day. Had a bacon cake for her 116th birthday 🥓😂 2/
eonline.com/news/704230/ol…
people.com/food/worlds-ol…
Dec 14, 2022 11 tweets 5 min read
My latest: "A short history of saturated fat: the making and unmaking of a scientific consensus"
Do saturated fats cause heart disease? The science was always weak. Fear of these fats was started by American Heart Assoc. in 1961 based on a flawed study🧵
journals.lww.com/co-endocrinolo… 2. At the time, Heart Assoc had a major undisclosed conflict of interest: it had basically been launched by funding ($20M in today's dollars) from Procter & Gamble, maker of Crisco Oil
Heart Assoc then promoted veg. oils by selling them as "heart healthy," safer than sat fats Image
Nov 1, 2022 6 tweets 3 min read
Quite a bit of #misinformation in this article on protein by the @washpost with Walter Willett, an anti-meat activist who has been saying "no amount of meat" is best since 1990. Why are his biases not disclosed? washingtonpost.com/wellness/2022/… 1/ Willett has been richly funded by food industries that benefit from elimination of meat. HIs bias against meat goes back 30y at least and is reflected in his many papers on meat + related topics. His views do not reflect prevailing science on protein. 2/ scribd.com/document/39760…
Sep 28, 2022 4 tweets 2 min read
White House conference on hunger, nutrition & health was supposed to start 15 min ago. The lead-up to this event has been last-minute, secretive, and apparently still is. 🤪...you can watch here 1/
Detailed agenda with names of panelists was released....yesterday.
I don't see any of the known published experts in nutrition and disease here, but there are no bios, so hard to tell. 2/
health.gov/our-work/nutri…
Jul 23, 2022 20 tweets 6 min read
I'm delighted to be an author on this paper, just published, in a journal of the Nat'l Academies of Sciences. A deep-dive analysis of US Dietary Guidelines (#DGA),🧵on findings
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/adva… 2020 USDA "Dietary Patterns" (main diet advice) are based on systematic review of science from 2012-13. I.e., 8-9 yrs out of date when 2020 report issued.
Law says guidelines should reflect science that's "current at the time the report is prepared"
Guidelines not in compliance
Apr 19, 2022 4 tweets 2 min read
Hard to believe, but the US Dietary Guidelines now recommend even more carbohydrates as % of calories than they did in the last go-around (I just did the math on this).
Currently: Image 5 years earlier in the last iteration of the guidelines: Image
Apr 4, 2022 6 tweets 3 min read
Congress gave $2.5M for White House Confrence on Nutrition-a big deal!
Aims to solve "nutrition insecurity"-getting people the essential nutrients (vitamins +minerals) needed to prevent disease
Sounds good, but Is the conf a give-away to Big Food? My op-ed
agri-pulse.com/articles/17470… Big Food prefers you get essential nutrients from their products.
Refined grains are legally required to be enriched in nutrients.
Enriched, refined grains are the food industry’s way to launder processed foods into nutrient-rich ‘health foods’
How we got the "Vitamin Donut"!
Feb 25, 2022 6 tweets 3 min read
For optimal health, I have only 3 Food Rules
1. Minimize sugars + things that turn to sugar upon digestion. Wear a CGM (continuous glucose monitor) if you don't know what these foods are. This rule applies especially to people w/ diabetes, obesity + other metabolic diseases. 1/ CGMs work well bc they reveal to people which foods spike their blood sugar. CGMs allow people to take control of their health.
Two recent studies on this.
This pilot study saw 67% of group reverse T2 diabetes diagnosis in only 3 mo.
2/
diabetes.jmir.org/2022/1/e34465
Feb 8, 2022 5 tweets 3 min read
.@NYCMayor also launched the "most comprehensive expansion of Lifestyle Medicine programs in US..w/ emphasis on plant-based diet"

Does he know the Am Coll of Lifestyle Med is basically an arm of the 7th Day Adventist Church?
Religion-as-public health 😱

www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-… 7th Day Adventist Church promotes a vegan/vegetarian diet as part of a religious belief--and has actively proslytized this globally mdpi.com/2077-1444/9/9/…
Feb 3, 2022 4 tweets 2 min read
Restaurant trash on a NYC street.
These are cans of soybean oil--used by nearly all restaurants for their cooking and frying--bc soybean oil is cheapest. Heated oils produce hundreds of oxidation products(some known toxins). Excerpt from my book on this westonaprice.org/health-topics/… 1/ This is-sadly-why it's not so safe to eat in restaurants, and esp. not the fried food which absorbs a lot of oil. The degraded oxidation products made by heating the oil cause oxidation and inflammation in the body. Lead to heart disease and other health problems 2/
Jan 7, 2022 27 tweets 9 min read
.@usnews "Best Diet" issue is once again completely disconnected to the science.
Monster 🧵
health.usnews.com/best-diet/best…

To start:
Med diet is #1
Yet the single major clinical trial on this diet showed only a .02% absolute reduction in heart-disease risk--see⬇️ This figure is from that largest, longest Med-diet trial PREDIMED: diabetesjournals.org/care/article/3…
Analysis is by @DrFeinman
Nov 27, 2021 4 tweets 1 min read
Important article: says WHO should treat Big Food like Big tobacco, w/ "critical measures to firewall industry’s profit-making interests from influencing policymaking for the health and wellbeing of public and to hold industry liable for harms caused" 1/ link.springer.com/article/10.105… Cites FAO (Food & Ag Org), multinational group that invited in junk food multinationals as 'stakeholders.' This can easily lead to corporate agendas taking over.
Eg. a partnership between FAO and CropLife International, an international pesticide association 2/