Thursday, October 8, 2015

More Phony Science

Got Incompetence? The Federal Gov't Has Misled Public About Milk For Decades

"If you look up "whole milk" in the government's official Dietary Guidelines, it states pretty definitively that people should only drink skim or 1% milk. "If you currently drink whole milk," it says, "gradually switch to lower fat versions."

This is the same advice the government has been issuing for many years. And it's wrong.

Research published in recent years shows that people "might have been better off had they stuck with whole milk," according to a front-page story in the Washington Post on Wednesday. "People who consumed more milk fat had lower incidence of heart disease."

The story goes on to note that the government's push for Americans to eat a high-carb diet "provokes a number of heart disease risk factors."

As the Harvard School of Public Health's Walter Willett put it, the "campaign to reduce fat in the diet has had some pretty disastrous consequences."

The Post goes on to note that this "has raised questions about the scientific foundations of the government's diet advice."

It should.

Based on flimsy evidence, the USDA first started urging people to eat low-fat diets in 1977. As evidence grew that this advice was misguided — at best — it steadfastly refused to change course.

So what we have here is the U.S. government using its power and might to push Americans — quite successfully — to change their eating habits in ways that likely killed many of them.

If a private enterprise had done this, it would face massive class action lawsuits, its executives would be in jail, and its reputation permanently ruined.

But the government simply brushes off its own disasters, and goes right on telling people what they should and shouldn't eat. The public would do well to tell government officials to stay out of the kitchen."
The US government couldn't develop more distrust of science if it actually tried.

2 comments:

Phoenix said...

For those like myself who don't have a background in mathematics, science or engineering but would love to be able to analyze scientific data. I'm taking a free online course at coursera.org on Data Analysis and Statistical Inference. It's a 10 week long course which requires at least learning 30 min a day. After week 10 you'll be able to design a study, test a hypothesis, analyzed data,learn the difference between an observational study and an experimental study, probability theory etc.
The best part is that the only prerequisite is basic high school math.

Stan said...

Great! Good for you.