If we knew that Coca-Cola was one of the deadliest products in the American diet, would we keep drinking it? In this episode, journalist Murray Carpenter joins Peter and Orlando to uncover the story behind his book Sweet and Deadly. You learn how soda corporations spent decades funding research, building shadow networks, and spreading disinformation to obscure the links between sugary drinks and chronic disease. 

Sweet and Deadly: How Coca-Cola Spreads Disinformation and Makes Us Sick by Murray Carpenter

Credit: The MIT Press

 

This episode brings you inside the world of soda, marketing, and misinformation. Journalist Murray Carpenter explains how Coca Cola orchestrated a campaign to downplay the health risks of its most profitable product. Drawing parallels with tobacco and opioids, Carpenter shows how corporations cultivate doubt, fund friendly science, and redirect attention toward exercise. You hear how the company maintained an aura of happiness while sugar sweetened beverages became the leading dietary driver of chronic disease.

You learn that these risks are not abstract. Liquid calories evade satiety, meaning people rarely cut back on food when they drink soda. The result is sustained overconsumption, rising insulin resistance, and a growing burden of obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. Carpenter emphasizes that the harms are not evenly shared. Communities of color and low income neighborhoods bear the greatest health costs while facing the heaviest marketing.

Throughout the conversation, Peter, Orlando, and author Murray Carpenter unpack how Coca Cola’s messaging shaped what you hear about diet and health. From the Global Energy Balance Network to debates over soda taxes, you see how the industry’s playbook has kept consumers in the dark. This is a clear, candid look at how one company reshaped public understanding of nutrition and why informed choices matter now more than ever.