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The food industry enjoys influential positions in surprising places. The American Dietetic Association (ADA), the world’s largest association of nutrition professionals, is, in its own words, devoted to “improving the nation’s health.” They promote a series of Nutrition Fact Sheets. Who writes them? Industry sources pay $20,000 per fact sheet to the ADA and explicitly take part in writing the documents; the ADA then promotes them through its journal and on its website. Some of these fact sheets are “What’s a Mom to Do: Healthy Eating Tips for Families” sponsored by Wendy’s; “Lamb: The Essence of Nutrient Rich Flavor,” sponsored by the Tri-Lamb Group; “Cocoa and Chocolate: Sweet News” sponsored by the Hershey Center for Health and Nutrition; “Eggs: A Good Choice” sponsored by the American Egg Board’s Egg Nutrition Center; “Adult Beverage Consumption: Making Responsible Drinking Choices” in connection with the Distilled Spirits Council; and “The Benefits of Chewing Gum” sponsored by the Wrigley Science Institute. I didn’t know Wrigley’s had a science institute.

In 2008, the ADA announced that the Coca-Cola Company had become an “ADA Partner” through its corporate relations sponsorship program. The ADA “provides partners a national platform via ADA events and programs with prominent access to key influencers, thought leaders and decision makers in the nutrition marketplace.” The ADA’s press release also pointed out that “the Coca-Cola Company will share their research findings with ADA members in forums such as professional meetings and scientific publications.”

Did you know there are no harmful effects of different Coca-cola beverages on rat testicles? Was that even a concern? Thou doth protest too much, methinks.

When the American Academy of Pediatrics was called out on their proud new corporate relationship with Coke to support patient education on healthy eating, an executive vice-president of the Academy tried to quell protest by explaining that this alliance was not without precedent. The American Academy of Pediatrics has had relationships with Pepsi and McDonald’s for some time. Reminiscent of similar types of relationships in the past.

The fact that the Academy of Pediatrics was also collaborating with Pepsi and McDonald’s didn’t seem to placate the critics. So the exec continued, even the American Dietetic Association has made a policy statement that “There are no good or bad foods.” Indeed, that’s the ADA’s official position. Classification of specific foods as good or bad is overly simplistic.

The ADA has taken a strong stand that there are no good foods or bad foods, a position that the food industry has then exploited. In its early years, the tobacco industry sounded a similar theme: smoking per se was not bad, only “excess” smoking.

Is this what family doctors have been reduced to? To justify an unholy financial alliance we hide behind what others say and do and deny that there are actually unhealthy “bad” foods? I wonder how much money the ADA receives from the Coca-Cola Company and other food and beverage companies to have come up with their “no good or bad foods” philosophy?

In 2012, the American Dietetic Association changed their name to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Did their policies change at all? A landmark report last year from one of my favorite industry watchdogs, found that they continue to take millions of dollars in corporate sponsorship money every year from meat, processed junk, dairy, soda, and candy bar companies, and in return offer official educational seminars to teach dieticians what to say to their clients. So when you hear the title “registered dietician,’ this is the group they are registered with.