Washington, DC Low-Carbohydrate Lifestyle Meetup: Food Entrepreneurship within a Desolate Industrial Food Landscape

2018.08.14 Washington Low-Carbohydrate Lifestyle Meetup, Washington, DC USA 05627
2018.08.14 Washington Low-Carbohydrate Lifestyle Meetup, Washington, DC USA 05627 (View on Flickr.com)

If you don’t like the news, go make your own / the future doesn’t create itself / the future has to start somewhere and it’s usually here.

Thank you David Birsen & Nadine Calderon, founders of Washington, DC based Revol Snax (@RevolSnax) and part of Washnington, DC’s Union Kitchen Accelerator (@UnionKitchenDC) for presenting at the Washington Low-Carbohydrate Lifestyle Meetup.

They discussed food entrepreneurship & positioning healthier options within an otherwise desolate industrial food landscape. What is fascinating to me is that entrepreneurs in this space need to think carefully about positioning because fat is still demonized in the food world, despite the fact that international experts have agreed that this era is over. (see: Photo Friday: Narrative Art and Exploding Myths in the era of Diabetes Reversal)

This comment by @ZoeHarcombe is appropriate here: Could we agree to demonize processed food, not saturated fat? | The BMJ

Thanks also @WeWork Apollo, in Washington, DC, for providing the space.

More photos from the discussion below. I will never tire of seeing/listening to the voices of human beings taking control of their health and life destinies. It’s what we came to health care to do.

Reminder of my statement of independence and (lack of) conflict of interest:

2018.05.29 Low Carbohydrate Meetup Washington, DC Presentation  453
2018.05.29 Low Carbohydrate Meetup Washington, DC Presentation 453 (View on Flickr.com)

7 Comments

Dear sir,

Already friends to whom I’d spoken of low-carb are asking me about this new Lancet Public Health article. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(18)30135-X/fulltext

The CNN Sanjay Gupta piece is here https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/17/health/low-carb-high-carbohydrate-diet-risk-of-death-intl/index.html CNN being CNN, I don’t attach much value to it. But, as they say, people are talking, and I’d welcome your informed thoughts when you have a chance.

Given how many studies were identified as flawed (philosophically or otherwise) in Big Fat Surprise, I’m instantly wary of any conclusions drawn from a meta-review of them. But I know these things can be subtle and you know more about this than I do and I value nuanced views, so I’m asking.

I also dearly wish every author’s funding mix was attached to their name!

Hey Dave,

Looking forward to others views. Walter Willett’s presence plus the drug company ties make me wary.

Either way, we are not here to declare a winner, we’re here to know the truth, as well as not to favor dogma over data,

Ted

Hey Dave, I’ve reviewed. So they are looking at food frequency questionnaires from the late 80’s/early 90’s. FFQ’S have major methodological problems as it is + we can’t know exactly what a lower carb diet in 1989 was or the type of lifestyle associated with it. I will also say that several statements in the paper reveal a bias towards the results presented. I will wait for the next series of PURE papers, Ted

Thank you. Totally agreed about “not here to declare a winner,” which is why I didn’t ask “who’s right?”

I had searched in Big Fat Surprise for several authors’ names, but did not seek Willett’s. For the record, he pops up 149 times in the book, for his unstoppable evangelism – one passage cites a scientist observer at one meeting: “Walter Willett is a very articulate, persuasive guy, until you really stop and say, to what extent do his data firmly support his conclusions? My impression was that he articulately and enthusiastically ran past his own data.”

Teicholz, Nina. The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet (Kindle Locations 4661-4662). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition.

What do you see about “drug company ties” that I don’t? I see that Dr Cheng receives “personal fees” from Novartis and Zogenix, and the lead author has funding from the CA Walnut Commission & Dairy Management.

Thank you again for your eternal generosity!

Those count as drug company ties. I will review the full study and post my thoughts.

Ted Eytan, MD