Dietitians in every single place launch a collective sigh each time Netflix releases a vitamin documentary, and with good motive: traditionally, these docs are stuffed with bias, unhealthy knowledge, and sensationalism…none of which really helps anybody take change of their well being.
Like I all the time say, misinformation doesn’t empower anybody. Simply the alternative, really.
After I heard that You Are What You Eat was directed by the identical one who directed The Sport Changers, I knew I wanted to observe and evaluate it.
Learn my Sport Changers Overview right here.
On this You Are What You Eat evaluate, I check out Netflix’s newest vitamin documentary.
The doc focuses on the execution of the Stanford Twins Research. This 8-week research, which was simply printed on the finish of 2023, used 22 pairs of twins to find out the cardiometabolic results of a vegan weight loss program versus an omnivore weight loss program.
Twins are genetically similar, which afforded researchers the uncommon alternative to realize beneficial perception into how every weight loss program might affect one twin versus the opposite. In keeping with Christopher Gardner, vitamin scientist and one of many research’s investigators, people reply in another way to the identical meals, so getting people who find themselves genetically the identical eliminates this confounder.
Twins have the identical genetic make-up, making them the right controls for each other.
Over the course of the 8 weeks, investigators will monitor indicators of cardiovascular well being, metabolic standing, and intestine microbiome by way of poop and blood samples.
They inform viewers that they’re trying peoples’ organic clock, physique composition, microbiome, and mind. The precise research, which I speak about within the final a part of this evaluate, doesn’t point out the microbiome, mind, or organic clock. I’m questioning if these elements are upcoming.
You Are What You Eat Netflix Overview
In Episode Certainly one of You Are What You Eat, we meet a few of the specialists that had been concerned within the research, together with 4 units of the research’s twins.
Within the first 4 weeks, every twin is randomized to both a vegan or omnivore weight loss program. The whole lot they eat is made for them and delivered, so there’s no guesswork, and researchers can management every part about every weight loss program. Each diets had been deemed to be ‘wholesome’ by scientists.
After the primary 4 weeks, the twins stay on their assigned weight loss program, however are left to prepare dinner their very own meals.
The twins even have a coach, who they work out commonly with.
It was straightforward to see the place this documentary was going when Dr. Michael Greger, physician and recognized promoter of a vegan weight loss program, pops up on the display screen. He was additionally in The Sport Changers and What The Well being, each Netflix documentaries whose overarching message was selling a plant-based weight loss program and mainly scaring individuals about consuming animal merchandise.
I’ve talked about Dr. Greger in my writing earlier than, basically calling him out for twisting information and blowing up claims to swimsuit his agenda.
He rapidly does the identical factor in You Are What You Eat, telling viewers how an excessive amount of dairy will increase threat for Parkinson’s illness and prostate most cancers (with out citations or proof, naturally). He lets us know that ‘the #1 reason behind dying within the US is the American Food plan’ (based on the CDC it’s coronary heart illness, really, however there are various components that contribute to this), and what we put in our mouth is extra necessary than anything.
That is basic Greger, making claims which might be overblown and completely with out nuance.
Dr. Michael Greger
We additionally meet a ‘plant primarily based dairy innovator’ named Miyoko Schinner, who tells us that cheese is ‘biologically addicting,’ which is ridiculous and never factual. She follows up by trotting out the vegan calling card that ‘milk is for child cows, not people.’
She tells us that ‘most populations on the earth didn’t eat meat and dairy, besides in very small quantities if in any respect.’
Once more, we’ve got an ‘skilled’ who’s clearly biased to in direction of a vegan weight loss program. I’ve nothing towards the vegan weight loss program, in fact, however in a documentary, it’s all the time good to symbolize each side of an argument.
I stored ready for somebody with out a plant-based agenda to be revealed as an skilled, however SPOILER: I used to be disenchanted.
Because the documentary progresses, we study meals deserts and concrete farms.
Right here’s why we don’t all have the identical 24 hours in a day.
Tracye McQuirter, a Public Well being Nutritionist and self-proclaimed ‘vegan activist,’ explains learn how to create a balanced vegan plate. whereas speaking about meals apartheid for African Individuals in city centres.
This can be a actually beneficial lesson, and it’s correct – meals deserts do exist, particularly in radicalized communities. They’re intimately linked with poor well being outcomes, and we most positively must do one thing to enhance entry to wholesome meals in North America.
One other good lesson we get is across the conflicts of curiosity among the many dietary pointers committee, and the way agricultural lobbyists affect the verbiage within the pointers. That is additionally an issue, and the rationale why Well being Canada refused to have meals trade on the desk when creating the newest meals pointers.
The remainder of You Are What You Eat, sadly, looks as if an advert for a vegan weight loss program.
We be taught in regards to the animal agriculture trade. We’re taken inside manufacturing unit farms. We hear how soiled they’re, how the animals are injected with antibiotics, and the way hog feces and urine are sprayed throughout adjoining fields. We see somewhat injured rooster and contaminated ponds.
Dr. Greger pops in to inform us that extra antibiotics are fed to livestock than are utilized in all of human medication to advertise progress and stop illness in a hectic, unhygienic surroundings. ‘Lifesaving, vital medication are being squandered simply to make cheaper meat.’
Or, possibly there are much more animals than people, which accounts for these numbers?
Nonetheless, it’s authorized to make use of antibiotics in cattle for progress promotion and illness prevention (right here and right here)
Ought to the typical particular person be involved?
I’m undecided, as a result of we had been solely offered with one aspect of the argument. The common particular person will most likely take that unchallenged aspect as reality, which is problematic. I’d have appreciated to listen to from an unbiased farmer and scientist about this, and about, nicely, the whole documentary.
We hear a rooster farmer who clearly hates what he does, speak about how disgusting the odor and filth of the rooster barn is. That birds are bred to have such massive breasts, that their organs and skeletal system can’t sustain. The birds scratch one another, leaving wounds which might be infested with micro organism.
We see an environmental activist lawyer speaking about antibiotics in meat, and Pat Brown, the Founding father of Unimaginable Meals, who tells us that ‘each time you eat a steak, somewhat puff of smoke goes up within the Amazon. That smoke is the ‘second hand smoke out of your burger.’
George Monbiot, an creator, journalist and environmental activist tells us how the meat trade is mainly killing the planet. ‘the agricultural trade is among the biggest sources of greenhouse gases on earth.’
We’re proven a graphic that states that greenhouse gases from the agricultural sector are 31%, versus 14% for the transportation sector.
I believed these quantity regarded a bit bizarre, so I went in search of the stats.
Seems, the EPA has some completely different numbers:
Transferring from the horrible risks of meat to what’s terrible about farmed fish, we’re launched to extra activists, one being Don Staniford, who campaigns towards salmon farms. He tells us that ‘if individuals realized the total horrors of salmon farming they’d keep away from it just like the proverbial plague.’
Hyperbole appears to be certainly one of You Are What You Eat’s nice strengths.
We see Don telling the twins how corporations dye their fish pink to cover the truth that it’s farmed. He says that this synthetic shade has been ‘linked to human well being issues,’ though we don’t get any particulars about which issues.
He talks about how farmed salmon is way fattier than pizza and bacon. And, lest you consider that farmed salmon incorporates wholesome fat, he provides us the rubbish take of ‘these aren’t good oils, they’re omega 6s.’
Please Don, cease speaking. The twins choose up on his concern mongering, calling the farmed salmon ‘diseased meals’ and throwing it into the precise rubbish.
Are seed oils dangerous? Learn my put up right here.
We’ve gone from speaking about meals deserts and entry to nourishing meals, to throwing a superbly good piece of fish into the rubbish. Disgusting.
Alexandra Morton, Biologist and activist, tells us that tons of waste is ‘pouring out of those farms’ and reveals us disturbing photographs of diseased fish. She claims that greater than 98% of the samples fish she purchased in supermarkets and sushi eating places had been contaminated with a salmon blood virus, though she admits that there’s no analysis on how these pathogens affect people.
I’m not going to say that these points the activists are speaking about are false, however with none counterbalance, all of it comes off as individuals pushing an agenda. As somebody with vital considering abilities, this makes me very suspicious of their information.
As somewhat sidebar, Eric Adams, the Mayor of New York, talks about how weight loss program reversed his diabetes with Complete Meals Plant Based mostly weight loss program. He tells us that his endocrinologist didn’t study weight loss program and diabetes in medical college, so he took issues into his personal fingers.
I discover the ‘medical doctors don’t know in regards to the worth of weight loss program’ tactic to be a very disappointing, lazy method to flip individuals towards standard medication and suggestions.
What did the Stanford Twins research discover?
After all the effort, did the Twins research final result favor a vegan weight loss program?
It did, in some methods.
As you possibly can see within the graphic under, the vegan twins had a higher discount in LDL-C, the ‘unhealthy’ ldl cholesterol. However, their HDL or ‘good’ ldl cholesterol additionally went down greater than the omnivores,’ and the vegans’ triglycerides ended up far greater than the omnivores’.
In actual fact, the one metrics that had been vital between the 2 teams had been LDL-C, insulin, and weight, though each teams misplaced weight.
It’s necessary to notice that the research was quick and small, and the topics had been predominantly girls. The second week was not managed, so theoretically, every group might have strayed from their diets in weeks 5-8, confounding the outcomes. We additionally haven’t any longer-term follow-up.
Within the research conclusions, did admit that the vegan weight loss program fed to the twins was restrictive, and that “clinicians ought to enable sufferers to make knowledgeable decisions that help them to decide on which dietary method is best suited for them.
At a inhabitants stage, wider adoption of a culturally applicable dietary sample that’s greater in plant meals and decrease in animal meals can promote well being and environmental advantages.”
As a dietitian, my suggestions gained’t change due to this documentary. Eat as many vegetation as you possibly can. Purchase what you possibly can afford. Watch out for concern mongering ‘specialists’ who clearly have an agenda. Know that Netflix vitamin documentaries are low-bar and deceptive.
You Are What You Eat evaluate, in brief:
You Are What You Eat is a basic Netflix vitamin documentary, flawed from the start with clearly biased ‘specialists’ and activists going unchallenged all through the movie.
Whereas I do help a plant-forward weight loss program, I feel it’s insulting and weak to not give a balanced perspective. Why not give viewers ALL of the data earlier than permitting them to make their very own determination? Isn’t that what a documentary ought to be about?
The one a part of You Are What you Eat that I believed was easy, was the messaging round meals fairness. Till all sides are represented and all information are certified by a mixture of specialists, You Are What You Eat is sensationalized vegan propaganda at its very most interesting.
Let’s eliminate these vitamin and weight loss program tendencies in 2024. Learn right here.
