The food industry pays ‘influencer’ dietitians to shape your eating habits

Registered dietitians are being paid to post videos that promote diet soda, sugar and supplements on Instagram and TikTok

By Anahad O’Connor, Caitlin Gilbert and Sasha Chavkin
September 13, 2023 at 5:00 a.m. EDT

As the World Health Organization raised questions this summer about the risks of a popular artificial sweetener, a new hashtag began spreading on the social media accounts of health professionals: #safetyofaspartame.

Steph Grasso, a registered dietitian from Oakton, Va., used the hashtag and told her 2.2 million followers on TikTok that the WHO warnings about artificial sweeteners were “clickbait” based on “low-quality science.”

Another dietitian, Cara Harbstreet of Kansas City, reassured her Instagram followers not to worry about “fear mongering headlines” about aspartame because “the evidence doesn’t suggest there’s a reason for concern.”

In a third video, Mary Ellen Phipps, a Houston-area dietitian who specializes in diabetes care, sipped from a glass of soda and told her Instagram viewers that artificial sweeteners “satisfy the desire for sweetness” without affecting blood sugar or insulin levels.

What these dietitians didn’t make clear was that they were paid to post the videos by American Beverage, a trade and lobbying group representing Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and other companies. ... In all, at least 35 posts from a dozen health professionals were part of the coordinated campaign by American Beverage. The trade group paid an undisclosed amount to 10 registered dietitians, as well as a physician and a fitness influencer, to use their social media accounts to help blunt the WHO’s claims that aspartame, a mainstay of Diet Coke and other sodas, is ineffective for weight loss and “possibly carcinogenic.”

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By Anahad O’Connor
Anahad O'Connor is a columnist on The Washington Post's Well+Being desk, where he writes about food and nutrition. Twitter https://twitter.com/anahadoconnor

By Caitlin Gilbert
Caitlin Gilbert is a Well+Being data reporter at The Washington Post, where she uses data analysis and statistics to report stories. Before joining The Post, she worked as a U.S.-based data journalist at the Financial Times. Twitter https://twitter.com/caitlinsgilbert

By Sasha Chavkin
Sasha Chavkin is a correspondent for the Examination. He has previously written for ProPublica and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.