Nutrition
NGO Blasts Whole Foods Market for its Vegeterian Agenda
Has
the Upscale Market Outlived Its Usefulness?
WASHINGTON,
DC. February 3, 2010: Whole Foods Markets has launched
a nationwide "Health Starts Here" marketing scheme
that endorses a lowfat, vegetarian diet, with promises that
the diet will "improve health easily and naturally."
The plan promotes the books and private business ventures of
Joel Fuhrman, MD, and Rip Esselstyn, both of whom worked with
Whole Foods to formulate the new guidelines. Customers now receive
a pamphlet urging them to adopt a lowfat, plant-based diet and
to cut back or completely eliminate animal foods. Many Whole
Foods stores no longer sell books advocating consumption of
meat, eggs and dairy products.
The plan will feature new Aggregate Nutrient Density Index (ANDI)
labels for foods in the store; the index is designed to make
plant foods to appear "nutrient dense" by favoring
various phytonutrients in plants and ignoring many vitamins
and minerals essential to health. "Whole Foods has stacked
the deck against animal foods by choosing ANDI parameters that
do not include a host of key nutrients, such as vitamins A,
D and K, DHA, EPA arachidonic acid, taurine, iodine, biotin,
pantothenic acid, and vital minerals like sodium, chloride,
potassium, sulfur, phosphorus, copper, manganese, boron, molybdenum
and chromium," says Sally Fallon Morell, president of the
Weston A. Price Foundation. "Many of the phytochemicals
that Fuhrman includes in the index he developed for Whole Foods
play no essential role in the body and may even be harmful."
"Animal foods like meat, liver, butter, whole milk and
eggs contain ten to one hundred times more vitamins and minerals
than plant foods," says Fallon Morell. "Plant foods
add variety and interest to the human diet but in most circumstances
do not qualify as 'nutrient-dense' foods."
"For years before becoming deathly ill, I followed the
dietary suggestions in the Whole Foods plan," said Kathryne
Pirtle, author of Performance without Pain. "I ate large
amounts of organic salads, vegetables and fruits, lots of whole
grains, only a little meat and no animal fat. I had chronic
pain for twenty-five years on this diet, then acid reflux, then
a serious inflammation in my spine followed by chronic diarrhea.
Without switching to nutrient-dense animal foods, including
eggs, butter and whole dairy products, not only would I have
lost my national career as a performing artist, I would have
died at forty-five years old! I am not alone in this story of
ill health from a lowfat, plant-based diet, which does not supply
a person with enough nutrients to be healthy and can be very
damaging to the intestinal tract."
"Consumers can send a message about Whole Foods' misinformed
scheme by voting with their feet," says Fallon Morell.
"Most major grocery store chains now carry basic organic
staples and a larger array of organic fruits and vegetables
than Whole Foods markets. And citizens should purchase seasonal
produce and their meat, eggs and dairy products directly from
farmers engaged in non-toxic and grass-based farming. It's not
appropriate for Whole Foods to promote a scheme that has no
scientific basis and that bulldozes their customers towards
the higher profit items in their stores." The local chapters
of the Weston A. Price Foundation help consumers connect with
farmers raising animal foods in humane, healthy and ecologically
friendly fashion.
"The growing emphasis on plant-based diets deficient in
animal protein also serves to promote soy foods as both meat
and dairy substitutes," says Kaayla T. Daniel, PhD, CCN,
author of The Whole Soy Story: The Dark Side of America's Favorite
Health Food. "Soy is not only one of the top eight allergens
but has been linked in more than sixty years of studies to malnutrition,
digestive distress, thyroid dysfunction, reproductive disorders
including infertility, and even cancer, especially breast cancer."
"Low fat patients are my most unhealthy patients,"
says John P. Salerno, MD, a board certified family physician
from New York City. "The reason we are spiraling into diabetes
and obesity is because of the lowfat concept developed by the
U.S government decades ago. Lowfat diets have a low nutrient
base, and phytonutrients in vegetables cannot be properly absorbed
without fat."
Fallon Morell cites recent studies from Europe showing that
lowfat diets promote weight gain in both children and adults,
and also contribute to infertility. A meta-analysis published
January, 2010 in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
found no significant evidence that saturated fat consumption
is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
"Whole Foods CEO John Mackay has stated that eating animal
fats amounts to an addiction. But in fact, animal fats are essential
for good health," says Fallon Morell. "The nutrients
in animal fats, such as vitamins A, D and K, arachidonic acid,
DHA, choline, cholesterol and saturated fat, are critical for
brain function. In the misguided war against cholesterol and
saturated fat, we have created an epidemic of learning disorders
in the young and mental decline in the elderly."
"Perhaps the vegetarian diet has affected the thinking
powers of Whole Foods management," says Fallon Morell.
"It's time for the stockholders to insist on leadership
devoted to increasing customer base, not promoting a personal
vegetarian agenda."
The
Weston A. Price Foundation is a 501C3 nutrition education foundation
with the mission of disseminating accurate, science-based information
on diet and health. Named after nutrition pioneer Weston A.
Price, DDS, author of the book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration,
the Washington, DC-based Foundation publishes a quarterly journal
for over 12,000 members, supports 400 local chapters worldwide
and hosts a yearly conference.
The
Foundation headquarters phone number is (202) 363-4394, westonaprice.org,
info@westonaprice.org.
Comments
about the Whole Foods Health Starts Here scheme can be emailed
to customer.questions@wholefoods.com.