To clarify a point I made last week, folic acid should be taken from the moment a woman starts trying for a baby, to ensure she has adequate amounts during those crucial first four weeks of pregnancy. While the Department of Health recommends taking a folic acid supplement until the 12th week, I would suggest it is taken in a multivitamin formulated for pregnant women for the entire duration of their term.

No amendment to the original article. I suppose people who supplement iron, calcium etc. have the sort of backbone to maintain that this is a clarification rather than the rectification of an error.

>So who’s going to do a clinical trial on chemicals in red wine – or stuff like turmeric and broccoli for that matter ?

Funny you should mention that Mike – Cancer Research UK are funding a few studies – including clinical trials – of some of these “superfood” molecules, including resveratrol (red wine), di-indolylmethane (broccoli) and curcumin (turmeric). I’ve written a bit more about our work in this area on our blog here:

http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2008/07/21/broccoli-%e2%80%93-the-latest-cancer-fighting-%e2%80%9csuperfood%e2%80%9d/

Enjoy!

Kat

Enjoyed the comments, though.

It occurs to me (though not knowledgeable in body fluid transport systems) that a follow-up to an in vitro study could be to implant some absorbent particles or probes into the tissue in question.

These could then be retrieved after a requisite period following the red wine diet and tested for the compounds with the in vitro effect.

Obviously the particles would have to be formulated or coated to behave in some respects like tissue, but could contain a diffusion layer (to determine dose time profile) and chemical traps for the compounds in question.

Then at least one could say that the compounds with the in vitro effects were present (or not) in the intercellular spaces in the target organ(s). Hence lending support for a possible “proper” clinical trial.

A home remedy (what we would call CAM today) was to stuff the opening with herbs to facilitate healing. He told me it didn’t work well.

Another treatment based on pull-it-out-of-your-ass witch doctor/home remedy-ville that caused problems was women douching with a dilute solution of water and Lestoil.

“If I see a headline such as “red wine COULD help prevent cancer,” then I just ignore it as it essentially meaningless.”

I consider myself fairly good at filtering out nonsense health advice but after years of being pelted with the same misinformation from magazines, adverts, colleagues, wild-eyed soothsayers on buses etc. it starts to break down the barriers.
Now, if I’m deciding between red or white wine, there’s an almost subconscious leaning towards the ‘healthier’ option, even though I know that’s bollocks. I’m sure I can’t be the only one whose decisions are being influenced like this.

Ahh the wonders of ‘Quantum ambiguity’.
actually, i wonder if you could sell that?

Woo and genocide, an interesting combination.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7517799.stm

Journalism is not about truth and accuracy, maybe it should be, but the fact that is isn’t isn’t the just the fault of the journalists.

If I’ve understood this correctly it looks remarkably like the “just following orders” line of defence. And I disagree with it. Journalists are responsible for what they write, even if what was written has been sub-edited out of all recognition.
Newspapers set themselves up as arbiters of truth and morals, therefore no special knowledge should be necessary for the public to decode any news journalist’s output. The fact that special knowledge is necessary is not the fault of the public but entirely the fault of journalists who choose to lie and choose to work for organisations whose policy is dishonesty.

Apart from anything else, I think you’re right about agreeing to disagree. I’d be happy to continue the discussion, but I’m not sure how thrilling it would be for other readers (a commenter on my blog has today used the phrases “particularly ramble-some” and “unnecessarily wordy” in describing my most recent post and I don’t disagree).

Cheers,
jdc.

“If the casual reader knows no better and assumes that an article in their favourite daily newspaper will accurately reflect the science then how are they to blame if the article is, in fact, completely inaccurate?”

Isn’t it partly the responsibility of the casual reader to make sure that they know better? Should they expect the newspaper to accurately reflect the science? I think that if the reader makes a potentially harmful decision based on reading a news story then there is some reponsibility in both camps(and in many other camps aswell).

“Do you not think in this case the journalist should take responsibility for what they have written?” – Yes, but obviously what they have written is interpreted in different ways by different people. If it is interpreted wrongly, then is there not a wider responsibility to make sure more people make better judgements about what they are reading?

“This is not a case of readers assuming that ‘red wine could prevent cancer’ means ‘red wine will prevent cancer’ – it is a case of a journalist misleading their readership by writing a story they should damn well know is wrong, because they wrote about a study that showed their story to be wrong.”
Its both – poor journalism and misinterpretation of what is actually being claimed.

Journalism is not about truth and accuracy, maybe it should be, but the fact that is isn’t isn’t the just the fault of the journalists. This BS article is close to implying that bad journalism can cause cancer – this would be spectacularly unfair – what causes bad journalism? why do they get it wrong? Surely there are many, many reasons. We can all find much horror and amusement from journalist errors every week, but does it really get to the heart of the problem?

I guess this could go on, maybe we’ll have to agree to disagree on some points.