Sporting events should ditch nutritional supps and sports drinks sponsorship

22-Sep-2014

Contact: Emma Dickinson
edickinson@bmj.com
44-020-738-36529
BMJ-British Medical Journal
@bmj_latest

Potentially misleading public about health benefits of these products which remain unproven

Such sponsorship could mislead the public into thinking these products work well and/or are good for health—for which there is no strong scientific evidence—suggest Simon Outram and Bob Stewart of the Institute of Sport, Exercise, and Active Living, in Melbourne, Australia.

Two years ago, research published in BMJ Open reached similar conclusions.*

Outram and Stewart accept that nutritional supplements and rehydration drinks don't compare with the unhealthiness of fast food, tobacco, or alcohol, all of which have been associated with major sporting events.

But the very fact that these products are marketed as beneficial or essential for sporting prowess and/or general health, when the evidence has so far failed to substantiate these claims or justify their cost, is likely to make it harder for the public to judge the value of these products objectively, they suggest.

"Successful sponsorship campaigns remove or minimise any scepticism about the product (a common reaction to advertising)," they write. "A form of seamless or hidden product association is created whereby such products come to be seen as integral to sport—the sports supplement or sports drink," they say, adding that celebrity endorsement helps to promote that idea.

"It is for good reason that nutritional supplement and sports drinks companies invest heavily in sports sponsorship," they write. "Such sponsorship—together with associated product endorsements and advertising—conveys the message that their products are integral to sporting engagement and achievement."

But they warn: "Sport may have found itself lending unwarranted credibility to products which would otherwise not necessarily be seen as beneficial for participation in sports and exercise or as inherently healthy products."

The issue has already prompted some degree of disquiet among sporting authorities about the perception that they might be seen to be endorsing nutritional supplements and sports drinks, suggest the authors.

The Australian Institute of Sports has voiced concerns about this, while the American Dietetic Association, Dieticians of Canada, and the American College of Sports Medicine have issued a joint statement, which among other things, questions the manufacturers' claims for the effectiveness of these products.

And the World Anti-Doping Agency has highlighted the potential inclusion of undeclared and banned substances in these products as a result of global differences in labelling and manufacture.

"If sport authorities, teams, and sports personalities distanced themselves from supplement and drinks company sponsorship, ways would have to be found to cover the financial gap created," admit the authors.

But they add: "Lessons can be learnt from the history of tobacco sponsorship and its gradual restriction, which did not lead to the wholesale collapse of sport."

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-09/bmj-ses091814.php

Ja-mak-in me crazy : Fun fact of the day

Fun fact of the day: chocolate milk was invented in Jamaica in the 1400s, it wasn't introduced to the Europeans until it was brought back in the 1700s by explorers.

Food for Thought - Pregnancy

25-Aug-2014

Contact: Sonia Caprio
sonia.caprio@yale.edu
203-785-5692
Diabetologia

Ever growing number of women with gestational diabetes suggests future will be filled with children with early diabetes

New research published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes) shows that children exposed to gestational diabetes in the wombs of their mothers are themselves around six times more likely to develop diabetes or prediabetes than children not exposed. 

The research is by Dr Sonia Caprio, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, USA, and colleagues.

With the increase in gestational diabetes (GDM), there is a growing need to understand the effects of glucose exposure on the newborn in the womb, at birth and later in life. The risk of developing impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) (prediabetes) in individuals exposed to diabetes in the womb has not, say the authors, been adequately investigated. Thus in this new study, the authors examined the risk in obese youths of developing IGT after exposure to GDM in the womb. The authors say: "We hypothesised that prenatal exposure to GDM in obese children with normal glucose tolerance (NGT) would be associated with development of altered glucose metabolism over time, driven by an impairment of beta cell secretion relative to the insulin sensitivity."

255 obese adolescents with a normal glucose tolerance were selected for the study. All of them were investigated for in utero exposure to GDM and underwent an OGTT, which was repeated after approximately 3 years. The authors found that 210 (82%) participants were not exposed to GDM (called the NGDM group), and 45 (18%) were exposed to GDM (the EGDM group). In the NGDM group, only 9% (n=18) developed either IGT or type 2 diabetes compared with 31% (n=14) of the EGDM group who developed either IGT or type 2 diabetes, with both results statistically significant.. "Exposure to GDM was the most significant predictor of developing IGT or type 2 diabetes, with an increased risk of almost six times for those children exposed to GDM in the womb," say the authors.

At baseline, the EGDM group showed a reduction in beta cell function (the cells that produce insulin), and, at follow-up, they also displayed a reduction in insulin sensitivity compared with the NGDM group.

"Our study demonstrates that obese normal glucose-tolerant children of GDM mothers have pre-existing defects in beta cell function," say the authors. "This is in turn a strong risk factor for these children to develop prediabetes or diabetes."

They add: "The ever growing number of women with gestational diabetes (18%) suggests that the future will be filled with children with early diabetes at a rate that far exceeds the current prevalence."

They conclude: " Offspring of GDM mothers ought to be screened for IGT and/or impaired fasting glucose (another form of prediabetes), and preventive and therapeutic strategies should be considered before the development of full clinical manifestation of diabetes. While we cannot use this analysis for development of definitive screening guidelines, we strongly suggest that, among obese children and adolescents exposed to GDM, specifically if additional risk factors are present—such as severe obesity or being of ethnicity minorities at higher risk—oral glucose tolerance tests should be performed at baseline (specifically in mid-pubertal adolescents) and potentially repeated based on clinical judgement. Furthermore, the need for studies aimed at unravelling the role of genetic or epigenetic factors and environmental postnatal factors that might be causing functional defects in the beta cell has never been more urgent."

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-08/d-egn082114.php