Does the world need fortified soft drinks?
That was my question when a sample of the new Diet Coke Plus arrived on my desk, with the tag line "Great Taste Has Its Benefits."
To me, it tastes the same as a Diet Coke. A 12-ounce can gives you 25 percent of the daily value for niacin, B6 and B12, and 15 percent of the daily value for zinc and magnesium. According to the ingredient list, it's sweetened with aspartame and acesulfame potassium.
I called Coca-Cola spokesman Scott Williams and found that a 12-ounce can contains 34 milligrams of caffeine, roughly the same as most cola soft drinks. That's a lot less than trendy "energy drinks," where most of the "energy" comes from caffeine and sugar.
By comparison, 12 ounces of Red Bull gives you 120 milligrams of caffeine; a cup of coffee is 80-150 milligrams, depending on how it's brewed.
It's not the first fortified soft drink — 7Up Plus (with vitamin C and calcium) got a lot of hype when it debuted in 2004. Pepsi has a similar fortified drink called Tava in the works.
Today, it's hip to sip. The grocery aisles are awash in soda, energy drinks, flavored water, bottled water and so on. It seems to me that if you're already drinking soda pop, you might as well be getting some nutrients along with it.
But three local dietitians I consulted said it's no substitute for real food, where nutrients occur naturally.
"A vitamin pill or soda with vitamins can't cover up a poor diet," said Pauline Williams, a dietitian at Primary Children's Medical Center. "We should get our nutrition from a wide variety of foods. Adding vitamins to a soda is a marketing tactic, not a sincere effort to help people eat better and make wise food choices."
When you drink fortified sodas or energy drinks, you displace that room in your diet for nutrient-dense food, said Becky Low, a dietitian with the Utah Dairy Council. Whole foods contain other micronutrients, such as phytochemicals, and nature seems to package nutrients to work in tandem for the best absorption and use in the body.
"By substituting a supplemented beverage in place of the food where the nutrient naturally occurs, consumers may be losing out on the benefits," Low said.
For example, she said, research shows the benefits of calcium on both bone health and weight loss. But studies also show that people lose more weight when calcium comes from dairy products rather than calcium supplements.
Also, just as certain nutrients work together for a desired benefit, some nutrients hinder each other when consumed together. For example, calcium supplements can hinder iron absorption, Low said. "But it is difficult to consume too much of any single nutrient from eating foods."
The concern of overdoing it on certain vitamins and minerals was also echoed by Stacie Wing-Gaia, a University of Utah professor and sports dietitian. "Although it is extremely unlikely you would see any vitamin or mineral toxicities from drinking Diet Coke Plus, with so many products fortified with vitamins and minerals, Americans are becoming 'over-nutritioned.' The bottom line is, the product is still a soft drink, and adding some vitamins and minerals does not make it a good replacement for drinking water and eating healthy foods."
Apparently, Diet Coke Plus isn't a sip in the right direction.
E-mail: vphillips@desnews.com