Physician group’s Coke deal stirs outcry

CHICAGO —- Advice about soft drinks and health from one of the nation’s largest doctors groups will soon be brought to you by Coke.

The American Academy of Family Physicians has prompted outcry and lost members over its new six-figure alliance with Coca-Cola Co. The deal will fund educational materials about soft drinks for the academy’s consumer health and wellness Web site, www.FamilyDoctor.org.

Academy CEO Dr. Douglas Henley said Wednesday that the deal won’t influence the group’s public health messages and that the company will have no control over editorial content. He said the new online information will include research linking soft drinks with obesity and will focus on sugar-free alternatives.

But critics say the Coke deal will water down the advice.

“Coca-Cola, like other sodas, causes enormous suffering and premature death by increasing the risks of obesity, diabetes, heart attacks, gout, and cavities,” Harvard University nutrition expert Dr. Walter Willett said in an e-mail. He said the academy “should be a loud critic of these products and practices, but by signing with Coke their voice has almost surely been muzzled.”

Dr. Henry Blackburn, a University of Minnesota public health specialist, said the deal “will inevitably have a chilling effect on the focus of their message in regards to sweet drinks.”

Coca-Cola spokeswoman Diana Garza Ciarlante said that kind of criticism “misses the point of the partnership which is to provide education based on sound science.”

Dr. William Walker, public health officer for Contra Costa County near San Francisco has been a member of the academy for 25 years but quit last week. He said 20 other doctors who work with his local practice also quit because of the Coke deal.

In an announcement last month, the academy, based in suburban Kansas City, Kan., said the new Coke-funded material will be online in January.

The idea is “to develop educational materials to help consumers make informed decisions so they can include the products they love in a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle,” the academy’s president-elect, Dr. Lori Heim, said at the time.

The American Academy of Pediatrics received similar criticism seven years ago when it allowed an infant formula maker’s logo to appear on copies of that group’s breast-feeding guide.

The American Medical Association faced harsh reaction more than a decade ago with a plan to endorse Sunbeam appliances without testing them. The AMA abandoned that deal.