Dark Chocolate is not a Superfood

this episode is supported by policy genius you could save 50 or more on life insurance by comparing quotes with policy genius head to policygenius.com healthcare triage to learn more there are a handful of foods on which a health halo of sorts has been bestowed these are so-called superfoods like avocados quinoa and chia seeds the evidence for these as for most nutritional claims is scant but one thing we do know is the candy's not a health food right but thanks to some typically poor nutrition data media hype and crafty marketing dark chocolate has somehow escaped the candy stigma to join the ranks of health food in the public mind what is up with that that's the topic of this week's healthcare triage [Music] if you type is dark chocolate good for you into the google search bar the results will likely have you believing that dark chocolate is the new kale and while i don't know if kale is a superfood either it at least has the benefit of being a vegetable healthline.com touts the 7 proven health benefits of dark chocolate while webmd says dark chocolate is healthy chocolate given the evidence we have that excessive sugar is bad for us and given that most chocolate makes fast friends with added sugar something's up with these claims so what happened how has this narrative become so embedded in public perception group over at vox did a deep dive on this issue starting with how a large number of chocolate related scientific grants and studies have been funded by major chocolate producers like nestle mars and hershey's perhaps not surprisingly the majority of these studies reported outcomes that could be used favorably in these companies marketing campaigns to transform their product into a health food in the public mind's eye and beyond funding and conducting chocolate studies these companies endowed shares at various research institutions and sponsor research conferences that focus on subjects related to chocolate and health i'd say these were genius moves if i weren't more horrified by the deception than i am impressed by the marketing outcomes some of the claims supported by all this chocolate funded research that now seem to be ubiquitous in public circles are that chocolate is good for cognitive outcomes like mood and memory and cardiovascular outcomes like blood pressure and cardiovascular disease risk the media plays a large role in the spread of these claims mainly because these are the kinds of things people want to read headlines promising that a daily dose of chocolate will stave off age-related memory decline or attractive the content underneath these headlines is rarely devoted to examining the quality and or funding of the research that prompted it and most of that research is low quality and or can't be easily translated to relevant human outcomes sometimes that's because it was funded and or conducted by chocolate companies sometimes it's because the research came from animal studies and rats just aren't humans the studies could be observational nutrition studies we've talked extensively about how problematic these are or other issues like including way too few people looking at short-term or overall irrelevant outcomes or playing dirty with statistics but none of that's communicated to the public at least not well and definitely not often the vox article points out there are some studies of reasonable quality not funded by industry that have found associations between chocolate eating and cardiovascular health but as mentioned these are observational meaning none of the evidence directly links chocolate to a lower risk of cardiovascular events there are so many things that could account for this association and without running a large randomized controlled trial we can't know for sure what's actually going on there is one of those in the works right now it's called cosmos and it's investigating daily supplements of cocoa flavonols participants just ended their pill taking in december of 2020 so data should be forthcoming but we should mention that mars did have a hand in funding this study along with pfizer and the nih and we should emphasize that cocoa flavonol supplements shouldn't be equated with eating chocolate though they often are that is a big issue that rarely if ever gets mentioned a lot of the research linking chocolate to health is actually based on research with flavonols compounds with a high presence in plant foods that are thought to have antioxidant and other potentially beneficial properties but even in studies using chocolate rather than supplements no one mentions that a significant loss of flavonols occurs in the processing required to decrease the bitter taste of cocoa a lot of chocolate has been subject to treatment with alkali a process also known as dutching one study conducted on natural cocoa powder found that lightly dutched cocoa retained about 40 percent of its flavonol antioxidants medium dutch cocoas retained only 25 percent and heavily dutched cocos retained only 10 and since you aren't likely to find information on how heavily dutched your cocoa is or what the actual flavonol content of your chocolate is keep in mind the cocoa content is not a good indicator of that your guess is as good as mine on whether you'll be getting any useful flavonol levels in your dark chocolate okay fine you say i'll just choose dark chocolate that hasn't been processed with alkali and such options are definitely available to you but to reduce that seriously bitter flavor chocolate generally has to be as one scientific article puts it aggressively processed and adulterated with other flavors making the health claims pretty dubious if you've had the opportunity to taste chocolate without all these additives you'll know what i mean when i say it ain't no hershey bar as an editorial on the lancet points out the devil in the dark chocolate is all the fat sugar and calories it contains to make it tasty so even if you consume flavonol rich dark chocolate you're also likely over consuming calories and sugar both of which are culprits and many negative health conditions the vox article has a handy chart of how much chocolate you need to eat for a heart-healthy dose of flavanols for dark chocolate this is about four and three quarter ounces which is 750 calories if you're aiming for about a 2000 on average calories per day that nearly five ounces of chocolate accounts for almost a fourth of your caloric intake in a day a fourth and if you eat four and three quarter ounces of a dark chocolate hershey's bar which is almost four servings you'll be eating around 67 grams of sugar that is somewhere around 16 teaspoons of sugar and is far more than any adult should be eating in a day let alone in your mid-afternoon chocolate snack so the overall message here is that there is no high quality research to support the claim that dark chocolate has long-term health benefits let me emphasize high quality because as we've pointed out there's a lot of studies making the connection mostly in the short term but none that i'd place any bets on and even if there are potential benefits the amount of sugar fat and calories consumed would quickly outweigh them thanks again to policy genius for sponsoring this episode why do we spend so much time and energy and money on things like superfoods it's because so many of us are searching for ways to improve our health outcomes and ultimately extend our lives while no one food can change the fact that human beings are mortal life insurance is one way to plan for the inevitable and policy genius makes getting life insurance easier you could save 1300 or more per year by using policy genius to compare life insurance policies policy genius is an insurance marketplace not an insurance company in minutes you can work out how much coverage you need and compare personalized quotes to find your best price and since their license experts work for you not the insurance companies you can trust them to offer unbiased advice you could save 50 or more on life insurance by comparing quotes with policy genius and then you can spend those savings in all the dark chocolate and avocados and vitamin d supplements you want head to policygenius.com healthcare triage to learn more hey do you enjoy this episode you might enjoy this recently completed series funded by the nihcm foundation on vaccines we'd also appreciate it if you'd like and subscribe to the show down below and consider going on over to patreon.com healthcare triage where you can make the show bigger and better even during a global pandemic we'd especially like to thank our research associates james glasgow joe sevitz josh kister and michael chin and of course our surgeon admiral sam