Inside Person of interest, we talk to people who call our attention now about what they are doing, eating, reading and loving. The next one is registered nutritionist Vanessa Rissetto, the acting director of the NYU Dietetic Internship Program and co-founder of the Culina Health.
The world of nutrition is divided. But the word “divide” does not even present this accurately, which makes it look divided in half. It is not. About 12.9 percent of registered nutritionists are people of color, and this is preventing a whole field of progress. It is preventing a whole field of medicine from helping people who need it most.
Vanessa Rissetto, a registered nutritionist in New Jersey, sees what it is: ingrained and structural racism. When I spoke to Vanessa a few times about her entry into the industry, and where she is now, she started talking fast, dropping all the F bombs and naming them. She is excited and eventually exasperated. She is hilarious, warm and will only tell the truth. As one of only a handful of black dieticians in the country, she carries an undue burden to make changes in the sector. She is doing this. But she has a few things to say, so I’m going to let Vanessa handle this from here. –Alex Beggs, senior team writer
My favorite breakfast as a child it was an English muffin roasted with Cheez Whiz. In college, he consumed six packs of Pepsi every three days. So much Sbarro. I am now the acting director of the New York University internship program in dietetics.
When I was a student in the NYU nutrition program, my class was made up of thin, wealthy white women. Years later, little has changed: 81% of registered nutritionists are white. This creates an unbalanced system that lacks cultural competence. Black people are made to feel that our food is bad and unhealthy and that working with a nutritionist means eliminating it completely. Every day, while these nutritionists cry over the culture of the diet and post expensive powdered collagens on Instagram, black people are dying because of structural racism in healthcare.
While I watch protests around the world against the devaluation of black lives, it seems to me that this is not true only for the justice system; it’s true for all of our systems. Black families are 2.5 times more likely to suffer from food insecurity than white families. If you are food insecure and I am promoting organic fruits and vegetables as the only way to go, you can resign yourself to believing that health is simply not achievable for you. Blacks have higher rates of obesity, heart disease and cancer – not because of their skin color, but because they are systematically undertreated and 1.5 times less likely to have health insurance. That is the real reason why they are considered “prone to chronic diseases”. But health care works as if race itself is a biological factor.
I’m advising a couple, Harold and Jess, who are black. Harold has diabetes and has worked with a white doctor for four years to no avail. They told me that they came to me to be seen and heard. I worked on a nutrition plan with them, and after a few weeks, Harold regained control of his blood sugar and lost 10 pounds. Jess lost 10 by association. It should make us sad that they needed a black practitioner to get that basic level of support.
To diversify the field, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics needs to limit barriers to entry. The new Academy rules will require that, to take the registered nutritionist exam, you must have completed your master’s degree – two more years of school (while nurses only need an associate’s degree). So you have to do an unpaid internship for one year while paying $ 103,000 in tuition. So far, the academy has not committed itself to discussing how to break these barriers.
I became a nutritionist because I was inspired by someone who saw me as an individual. She heard my story and made no assumptions based on my race. I do the same with my patients, but we need more. We need to make nutritional education accessible to everyone. We need to produce more than two black nutritionists out of every 100 qualified. We need health care that listens to blacks when they need our help.