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Bangalore-based Rashmi Vasudeva's journalism has appeared in many Indian and international publications over the past decade. A features writer with over nine years of experience heading a health and fitness supplement in a mainstream Indian newspaper, her niche areas include health, wellness, fitness, food, nutrition and Indian classical Arts.
Her articles have appeared in various publications including Mint-Wall Street Journal, The Hindu, Deccan Herald (mainstream South Indian newspaper), Smart Life (Health magazine from the Malayala Manorama Group of publications), YourStory (India's media technology platform for entrepreneurs), Avantika (a noir arts and theatre magazine), ZDF (a German public broadcasting company) and others.
In 2006, she was awarded the British Print-Chevening scholarship to pursue a short-term course in new-age journalism at the University of Westminster, U.K. With a double Masters in Globalisation and Media Studies from Aarhus Universitet (Denmark), University of Amsterdam and Swansea University in Wales, U.K., she has also dabbled in academics, travel writing and socio-cultural studies. Mother to a frisky toddler, she hums 'wheels on the bus' while working and keeps a beady eye on the aforementioned toddler's antics.
The Sugar Industry's Subterfuge Unravels Further
The sugar subterfuge is unraveling itself and how! Those who have kept track of the sugar-fat fight know well now that most of our dietary guidelines were born after (or because) of the sugar industry’s suppression of research on the ill effects of sugar consumption. It is only now that these guidelines are in the process of undergoing some necessary radical transformation.
Newly released historical documents further confirm this large-scale deception. Researchers at the University of California published a new report recently about how the sugar industry, following in the steps of the tobacco and drug industries, has long mislead the public and protected its economic interests by, well, sugar-coating all bothersome research.
In 1968, a group called the Sugar Research Foundation conducted a study on animals to understand the connection between sugar and heart disease. When the research pointed to strong connections not just between sugar and heart health but also sugar and bladder cancer, the foundation hurriedly called off the study and never published the results.
An earlier article in NYT claimed the Sugar Research Foundation paid three Harvard scientists to publish a review (in which the studies were handpicked by the foundation) in a prestigious journal. The review minimized the link between sugar and heart health and cast doubts on the role of saturated fat.
This essentially led researchers astray for decades and, even to this date, nutrition science continues to debate hard on the relative harms of fat and sugar. Many scientists believe the obesity crisis was largely fuelled by people’s belief that consuming low-fat high-sugar foods is healthy.
The Sugar Association (which is what the Sugar Research Foundation is known as today) has unsurprisingly denied any such deceit and claimed the study was abandoned because it was delayed and went over budget.
This time around, though, not many are buying their assertions. Seems like the sugar-coating is finally wearing off.
