Financial Conflicts of Interest, Food Industry Funding, and Evidence on Sugar-Sweetened Beverages and Weight Gain

The longstanding influence of food industry funding on nutrition research, researchers, and professional societies threatens the credibility of nutrition science. So much research is sponsored by industry that health professionals and the public may lose confidence in basic dietary advice. A good example is the report on financial industry funding for the corporate food industry sponsorship for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Similarly, a 2013 article in the journal Public Library of Science (PLOS) Medicine examined whether  disclosure of potential conflicts of interest influenced the results of published systematic reviews (SRs) conducted in the field of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and weight gain or obesity. Not surprisingly, they found significant differences between those reviews supported by food industry funding and those that did not have food industry funding. The authors state that they “identified 17 SRs (with 18 conclusions). In six of the SRs a financial conflict of interest with some food industry was disclosed. Among those reviews without any reported conflict of interest, 83.3% of the conclusions (10/12) were that SSB consumption could be a potential risk factor for weight gain. In contrast, the same percentage of conclusions, 83.3% (5/6), of those SRs disclosing some financial conflict of interest with the food industry were that the scientific evidence was insufficient to support a positive association between SSB consumption and weight gain or obesity. Those reviews with conflicts of interest were five times more likely to present a conclusion of no positive association than those without them (relative risk: 5.0, 95% CI: 1.3–19.3).”