As a registered dietitian, I specialized in wellness & prevention during my 50+ years as a nutrition and health educator.  I have always tried to teach my patients, clients and readers the very top accepted health information from the federal government who was supposed to be pushing Effective Strategies for Keeping America Healthy until…the Covid-19 pandemic arrived in America.

Once we learned we had been duped about Covid-19 and the Covid-19 vaccines, more information started coming out about Corporate Capture by all the federal government health agencies and then in associations like the American Medical Association and the Academy of Nutrition & Dietetics.  Heck, I didn’t even know what Corporate Capture was. Who knew the Federal Government agencies were bought by corporations to ensure their products were included in their United States Dietary Guidelines and pushed by the Center for Disease Control (CDC), not me!!

According to the CDC, “Chronic diseases account for most illness, disability, and death in the United States and are the leading drivers of health care costs…90% of the nation’s $4.5 trillion in annual health care expenditures are for people with chronic and mental health conditions…1 in 10 Americans have at least one chronic disease, and 4 in 10 have two or more chronic diseases. Many preventable chronic diseases are caused by a short list of risk behaviors: smoking, poor nutrition, physical inactivity, and excessive alcohol use.”

The Status of American’s Health in 2024*

1. 74% of American adults are dealing with being overweight or obesity.
2. Close to 40% of children are overweight or suffer from obesity.
3. 52% of American Adults have prediabetes or type 2 diabetes.
4. 30% of teens have prediabetes (this was 11% in 2002).
5. 1 in 36 children are on the autism spectrum (up from 1 in 150 in the year 2000). The number is 1 in 22 in California.
6. 34% of young adults have a mental, emotional or behavioral disorder.
7. Incidence of early-onset cancer have increased by 79% in recent years.
8. Nearly one in two Americans is predicted to get cancer in their lifetimes (6% chance). This is the first year America is estimated to have over 2 million new cases of cancer.
9. Autoimmune diseases are rising rapidly, with some studies showing a 3-12% rise annually.
10. 18% of teens have fatty liver disease.
11. 20-25% of women are on anti-depressant medication.
12. Early onset dementia and Alzheimer’s disease have tripled since 2013.
13. American girls are starting puberty earlier than they were in prior centuries and are starting earlier than any other continent in the world.
14. Infertility is rising rapidly and unsustainably, with sperm counts declining 1% per year and infertility rates rising 1% per year.
15. The US has the highest infant and maternal mortality rate of all high income countries, despite spending the most.
16. Life expectancy is seeing a sustained decline in the United States driven by Covid-19, chronic liver disease, heart disease and suicide.
17. 77% of young Americans are not able to qualify for the military service due to health problems or drug use.

*List compiled by Casey Means, MD.

Corporate Capture

But nowhere does the CDC admit that corporate capture which pushes the high intake of ultra-processed breads and cereals full of health destroying food colors and additives is at fault for most of the chronic diseases Americans are experiencing today. It took a few true renegades like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, Casey and Callie Means, MD, Mark Hyman, MD, Robert Lustig, MD, Marty Makary, MD, Senator Ron Johnson, to name only a few.

I remember going to the American Dietetic Association meeting now called the Academy Nutrition & Dietetics and the major sponsors were Kellogg’s and Kraft. I never really thought about how these corporations managed to ensure the US Dietary Guidelines pushed their products i.e. the Food Guide Pyramid which had at the Food Guide Pyramid base:  breads, grains, etc. 6 to 11 servings per day with many items coming from ultra-processed foods because they were cheaper to manufacture.

Illness Industrial Complex

Through research done by a large number of physicians & public health advocates inside the system, the idea of the Illness Industrial Complex: Big Pharma, Big Food and Big Ag, are keeping America Sick for profit has emerged!

Big Food creates cheap ultra-processed foods, uses food additives like food dyes to make the ultra-processed foods look more appetizing which can cause lots of long-term health issues.

Big Ag sprays farmland with harmful pesticides & feeds their livestock foods that have harmful effects, hormones, GMOs, which can be passed onto Americans who eat these meats.

Big Pharma develops drugs that can fix all the health problems that have been created by Big Food and Big Ag: obesity drugs, diabetic drugs, anti-depressants, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, cancer drugs, etc. Many of these drugs require Americans to stay on them for a lifetime.

I am Mad as Hell about the FOOD SCAMS

As a registered dietitian I always embraced what the CDC, US Dietary Guidelines, USDA, NIH promoted until I learned about CORPORATE CAPTURE and the Sick Industrial Complex: Big Pharma, Big Food & Big Ag & how the Sick Industrial Complex were keeping their big profits going by pushing cheap ultra-processed foods, cheap food additives, sugar substitutes, preservatives, food dyes and/or thickeners, many of whom caused an addiction with the FDA approving of all these items.

These additives should have been scientifically tested by approved researchers to ensure they DO NO HARM FIRST like what happens in countries like the UK.  But because the FDA is bankrolled partially by the Sick Industrial Complex, they looked the other way.  Now we find a massive amount of evidence these additives, food dyes, plastics, thickeners, have helped to lead to America’s health crisis! The corporations were doing their own research or so we were told indicating all these additives and dyes were healthy.

When I worked in research, our lab collaborated with NIH and the USDA in the 80s. I would have never ever thought these agencies were compromised but…fast forward to today and now we know they are.

Back to the Basics

The plan by President Trump’s Make America Healthy Again is to get back to the basics to help stem the $4.5 trillion/year healthcare costs as well as help make Americans live a long and productive life instead of live a lifetime of taking drugs and sickness.

Mark Hyman, MD has written a number of books which can help get you on track like the 10-Day Detox Diet, has developed a website called Food Fix, https://www.foodfix.org/ can help you understand how food is medicine and can actually help to guide you back to health.

Casey Means, MD has written an excellent book, Good Energy, with her brother Callie Means which contains a lot of really great nutrition and helpful information, you can use to begin your transition to a healthier life.

Strolling Down Memory Lane

Remember when the Federal Government agencies said:

1. Saturated Fat caused heart disease…it didn’t. They outlawed butter in favor of margarine which contained trans-fat through the hydrogenation process of taking oil to the solid state. The researcher, Mary Enig, PhD, who found out trans-fat in margarine caused heart disease was bashed by the margarine companies in the 80s. I knew actually Dr. Enig. She was a researcher at the University of Maryland while I was getting my masters in clinical nutrition. I met her at a nutrition conference in DC. Dr. Enig told me about trans-fat & how the Fleishman’s Company banned her research. She quit Maryland and went onto create her own lab & finally in 2015 the FDA banned trans fats.

Note: Early on, Dr Enig argued against medical consensus by stating, “heart disease has been correlated most consistently with consumption of sugar and an excess in polyunsaturated oils”. She denied studies linking heart disease to red meat consumption. She opposed the use of processed foods such as pasteurized milk, sugar, vegetables oils and white flour. Dr. Enig claimed butter and coconut oil are good for heart health.

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/us-bans-artificial-trans-fats/

2. Any foods that contain cholesterol caused your blood cholesterol to be elevated, so eggs were effectively banned as well as some seafood.
3. Then carbohydrate made you fat then it was Round 1 of the Dr. Atkins diet.
4. Then, we were told by the Federal Government Health agencies Fat Made You Fat & unhealthy the message was Count Your Fat Grams & then food technologists developed Fat-free foods like fat-free brownies, fat-free chips, fat-free ice cream, fat-free cheese, etc.
5. Americans were told foods containing carbohydrate should the basis of a healthy diet when the Food Guide Pyramid was launched.
6. Americans were told fasting destroyed your metabolism but…

https://www.cdc.gov/chronic-disease/data-research/facts-stats/index.html

https://rodaleinstitute.org/

Sick People led the Charge Back to Health

Taking their health in their own hands, many Americans decided to become their own health investigators and advocates. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) organized an American Health Crisis Roundtable with doctors like Casey Means, MD, Marty Makary, MD, Chris Pamler, MD, Jordan Peterson, PhD, other health professionals like Jillian Michaels, and a group of outspoken consumers, Vani Hari, Food Babe, Alex Clark, Culture Apothecary, who have had their health compromised by today’s recommended diet but they became their own health investigators & advocates. Some of these health advocates presented data and information about their passionate travel back to health at this Health Crisis Roundtable.

One such health advocate is the Food Babe, Vani Hari, who has been a healthy food advocate since 2011 and finally she is getting the pat on the back to open Americans eyes to the pitfalls of food dyes, food additives, and other health pitfalls that can occur by eating today’s American diet. Vani’s website is an excellent resource and she has done an incredible amount of investigation work into American food.

Another health advocate is Alex Clark. Alex Clark has an excellent YouTube channel, Culture Apothecary, which has pointed out lots of problems in the Sick Care mentality with lots of health professionals detailing some effective fixes.

https://www.youtube.com/live/2iWE465RCOk?si=AAkFv0nEbrG5uvmq

www.FoodBabe.com

https://www.youtube.com/@RealAlexClark

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxx4kcMvHrwIFMnpmdY0_KgH93XIWsQ6j

You are What You Eat

My nutrition instructor in college was Mrs. Kelly. She introduced a nutritionist by the name of Adele Davis who coined the phrase “You are what you eat.” Mrs. Kelly said nutritionists bashed this idea but she believed that was a true statement. I never forgot that phrase and fast forward to today…you are what you eat!

I have been pushing the idea Foods are Medicine for more than 30 years…but I must admit the diet I had been pushing was the one the US Dietary Guidelines had set forth not knowing about Corporate Capture.

Become a Food Fix Expert

Mark Hyman. MD head of the Institute for Functional Medicine has led the charge along with Robert F. Kennedy and others to Make America Healthy Again by focusing on the ideas Foods are Medicine.  

This ten-minute lesson provides key information policymakers need to know about the challenges we face today in America’s food system. The 10-short videos on www.FoodFix.org is an excellent resource to help you to understand how we can begin the process to Make America Healthy Again.

https://www.foodfix.org/become-an-expert

https://www.cdc.gov/chronic-disease/data-research/facts-stats/index.html

https://www.foodfix.org/

https://rodaleinstitute.org/

Make America Healthy Again

The next focus on my life is to champion the Make America Healthy Again agenda. It’s for my children, my grandchildren & their children. LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLE!!