Nutritionally Unsound Fad Diet Endorsed By AND

I admit the last three weeks have not been good for my blood pressure. Again, my anger is fired by another group telling people with diabetes what they should be doing. This time it is the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (AND) that is endorsing a fad diet based on white rice and fruit. White rice is not a food that is good for diabetes and causes our blood glucose to spike to high levels because the glycemic index is very high. The right fruit can be beneficial for diabetes, but certainly not all fruit as this fad diet proclaims.


Amy Jamieson-Petonic, a registered dietitian and a spokeswoman for AND is promoting the Rice Diet as nutritionally sound. The AND supports the Rice Diet, with few concerns such that it is difficult to follow and that it is low in vitamin D and calcium.


“There are so many weaknesses with this diet that it’s difficult to know where to start.

• First, the reason people lose so much weight is that dieters consume only 1200 calories per day—many of which are empty calories.
  
• The diet is low-fat and low-protein, even though healthy fats and proteins are essential for maintaining health.
  
• Despite the fruit, it’s low in micronutrients (vitamins and minerals), and this may accelerate the degenerative diseases of aging.
  
• White rice is extremely high on the glycemic index, which means that rice is rapidly digested and absorbed, resulting in dramatic fluctuations in blood sugar levels—the very things that can develop into type 2 diabetes or for those with type 2 diabetes, make it more difficult to manage.
  
• Too much fructose in fruit can be dangerous as well. While it’s better to have fructose in the form of whole fruits, people with diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol should be careful to limit fructose to 15 grams per day or less and even healthy people should probably not exceed 25 grams a day. One way to assess your fructose sensitivity is to have your uric acid levels tested.”
  

Given these reasons, I have to seriously wonder why people are determined to follow the AND way of nutrition when they have many companies in the processed food industry and companies such as Coca-Cola sponsoring their activities. The AND is continuing to press state legislatures and the federal agencies to allow them to be the only group educating people about nutrition. Then after getting many states to pass the legislation, they seek to criminalize degreed nutritionists who actually promote good nutrition.