Industry-funded study of the week: Mulberry leaf

I saw this on NutraIngredients.com, one of those newsletters I read regularly: Study: Mulberry extract shrinks blood sugar spike by 40%.  

That headline was all I needed: Who paid for this?

Fortunately, the study was readily available: Mulberry leaf extract improves glycaemic response and insulaemic response to sucrose in healthy subjects: results of a randomized, double blind, placebo‑controlled study.  Pariyarath Sangeetha Thondre Helen Lightowler, Lis Ahlstrom,  Andrew Gallagher.  Nutr Metab (Lond). .2021 Apr 15;18(1):41.   doi: 10.1186/s12986-021-00571-2.

Conclusion: “Mulberry leaf extract can be used as part of lifestyle changes that may lead to healthy blood glucose levels.”

Acknowledgements:  The authors would like to thank Dr Chen Xie (CX) and Mrs Hongwen Yu (HY) for technical input during the conceptualization of the study and editorial commentary on the draft publication. CX and HY are both employees of Phynova Group Limited.

Funding: The work in this study was funded by Phynova Group Ltd, a privately held company that is the developer of Reducose® mulberry leaf extract. Phynova was involved in the study design and manuscript preparation but had no role in data collection and analysis.

Competing of interest: AG is an employee of Phynova Group Limited, the funder of the study. He was involved in the development of the product, design of the study and drafting of the manuscript, but was not involved in the collection, analysis or interpretation of data. PST, HL, and LA have declared they have no conflicts of interest.

Comment:  This degree of industry involvement turns this study into industry-funded marketing research, no matter how beautifully the science is conducted.  Please refer to my book, Unsavory Truth, for references to the studies backing up that statement.

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