Nutritional Quackery

Quackery is a term that refers to the fake practitioner, as well as a worthless product and the deceitful promotion of that product. These products make untrue, misleading statements that deliberately and fraudulent claims about health that can be harmful to you and the economy. While you might be thinking this is associated with sleazy individuals selling patent medicine from a covered wagon, you're wrong. Nutritional quacks are SUPER SALESMEN - using questionable scientific information to give their products a sense of authenticity and credibility, by using sophisticated advertising and marketing techniques. Quack products are on the shelves and you might be buying them.


Quackery is a huge business. It's estimated that over 25 billion dollars a year are spent on questionable health practices in the US. Most of this has been spent on unnecessary nutritional products. The biggest outlet for quackery, unfortunately, is today's media (no offense to my media friends - just be more careful please). The media is the consumers' leading source of nutrition information, but news reports for nutrition are inadequate: they do not provide enough depth for consumers to make informed and wise decisions. Headliners are the most deceiving.

Before the passage of the 1994 Dietary Supplements Health and Education Act (DSHEA), many extravagant health claims were made by some unscrupulous companies in the food supplement industry. Although the DSHEA was designed to eliminate fraudulent health claims, dietary supplements appear to have more leeway than packaged foods to infer health benefits. While labels on dietary supplements are not permitted to display scientifically unsupported claims, many companies make general claims like "boosts the immune system". Federal agencies are understaffed and cannot litigate EVERY case of misleading or dishonest advertising. Unsuspecting consumers will be lured into buying expensive health-food supplements that have no scientific support!

Nutritional quackery is prevalent in athletics because of the following: (1) Eating behaviors of individuals are modeled after athletes who are successful in any given sport; (2) many coaches suggest foods/supplements to their athletes which they think are essential to success; (3) misinformation is found in magazines and books, which present information based on questionable research; and (4) direct advertising of nutritional products are marketed at athletes!

What can you do to avoid quackery? Think about the following things:

1. does the product promise quick improvement in health or physical performance? 
2. does it contain some secret or magical ingredient or formula? 
3. is it advertised mainly by use of anecdotes, case histories or testimonials? 
4. are currently popular personalities or star athletes featured in the advertisements? 
5. does it take a simple truth about a nutrient and exaggerate the truth in terms of health or physical performance? 
6. does it question the integrity of the scientific or medical establishment?
7. is it advertised in a health or sports magazine whose publisher also sells nutritional aids? 
8. does the person who recommends it also sell it? 
9. does it use the results of a single study or date and poorly controlled research to support its claim? 
10. is it expensive, especially when compared to the cost of equivalent nutrients that may be obtained from ordinary foods? 
11. is it recent discovery not available from any other source? 
12. is its claim to good to be true? odes it promise the impossible?

You can find sound nutritional advice or information from either your doctor or the following sources:

1. Books from reputable sources
2. Government, health professional, consumer or commercial organizations (see www.mhhe.com/williams)
3. Scientific Journals
4. Popular Magazines whose articles are written by doctors or credentialed authors
5. Consultants

Be smart people: there is no miracle drug for getting thin and fit and being fabulous. You have to work at it, end of story. Eat healthy - give up the chips and nachos and eat some fruit.


-Leave it all on the Field
-Sources from blog are from Nutrition for Health, Fitness and Sport (Melvin Williams).