One of the most absurd news this week? Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics partner PepsiCo is set to launch organic Gatorade.
Highlights via health advocate and Forbes contributor Nancy Huehnergarth:
- “My impression is that they are seeking to attach an organic health halo to a product that causes obesity, diabetes and other chronic diseases in order to boost sales, “ Jim Krieger, MD, MPH, executive director of the Institute for Healthy Food . “I doubt there are any health benefits to organic sugar, relative to conventional sugar, and even if there were, they’d be too small to counterbalance the negative health effects of the sugar itself.”
- “The New York State Attorney General investigated Gatorade in 2014 for branding water as the enemy of athletic performance in a mobile game app. The company agreed to not make any other app or electronic game that disparages water.”
Gatorade is largely overhyped. Despite their ubiquitous marketing, sports drinks are unnecessary for the majority of people.
If this is PepsiCo’s attempt at improving its reputation with health professionals, organic sugar water completely misses the point.
Why and how AND has a financial partnership with PepsiCo remains a mystery to us, especially considering that PepsiCo has spent millions of dollars actively lobbying against public health policy.
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