Greetings for 2010 and Our RE-Commitment to Good Journalism

We're starting our sixth year at Natural Health News.  For new readers, this blog is a continuation of work we started many years before through on-line broadcasts with These Orwellian Times, and our Health Matters© publications we began in 1991.

Other than the fact that our work didn' t just pop up because of a trend, or constant digital piracy like some other sites, you can be sure that our health (35+ years) and natural health (50+ years) background offers our readers a sound basis for our comments and selection of articles we believe to be important for your health.

Natural Health News invites you to follow us here and through our other venues, as well as to participate in the discussion.

A REVIEW OF 900 MAINSTREAM MEDIA NEWS ARTICLES FROM 2009  -
• 71% fail to adequately discuss costs.

• 71% fail to explain how big (or small) is the potential benefit.

• 66% fail to explain how big (or small) is the potential harm.

• 66% fail to evaluate the quality of the evidence.

• 60% fail to compare new idea with existing options.
Source: Health News Review

We hope to do much better because your health depends on it.

Conflict between what may be simplistically termed " the old and the new"  is far from ended.  The recent and on-going battle for public health care shows us this as 2010 begins.

We' re still faced with health insurance reform bills that do not address the core of health care but only the ruling dictocrats who aren't wiling to give up anything.  It may be that all that gets delivered is something that shows onlt that the system (as corrupt as it is) worked, because a bill was produced.  After the bill may come the reality that the system isn't working too well for the common man; it only has its focus on more moneyed corporate interests that are at stake: profits for Big Insurance and Big PhRMA.

Obama's stock falls as Medicare-for-all is abandoned 
The Guardian, Friday 1 January 2010 An increasing number of Americans are voicing their disillusionment over the current healthcare legislation (Democrats in final push for healthcare bill, 21 December). It's a pity President Obama has largely taken a hands-off approach and meekly allowed the Republicans to shred the bill. Behind the scenes, the administration met secretly with the health insurance and drug companies and negotiated terms favourable to their continued high profitability. Predictably, the stock for insurance companies has soared to a 52-week high in anticipation of a measure that will force over 25 million Americans to buy health insurance.  Millions of dollars have been doled out to lawmakers to cajole them into compliance. In the rush to pass a poorly crafted bill and declare "a healthcare victory", the Democrats have created an albatross around the neck of their party. It is tragic that support for a public option, or Medicare-for-all, which has overwhelming public support, has been abandoned. This is another shameful example of deeply entrenched business special interests triumphing over the aspirations of the American people. Jagjit Singh

For this reason, with our commitment to your best health, during 2010 the focus at Natural Health News, and for all of our web and print work will be health and healing, because your " Health Matters©".

Natural Heakth News wishes you the best of health in the coming year and we hope you'll continue to be one of our many loyal followers.  Tell your friends about us too...

And please consider supporting Natural Health News with your purchases and tax-deductible donations.  It takes a great amount of work to keep our projects going.

Science, Money and Politics in Journalism

a quote from journalist Daniel Greenberg in his 2001 book, Science, Money and Politics:

"The press, on its own, if it chooses, can make the transition from cheerleaders of science to independent observers. The journalistic trumpeting of medical cures, even though accompanied by sober cautions against optimism, deserves to be severely throttled back in recognition of an unfortunate reality: though news is sold around the clock, major advances in medicine come along infrequently."

http://www.healthnewsreview.org/blog/mt-tb.cgi/7141

TV Health News Harmful to Health

UPDATE: September 22 -

Mainstream Media Miss the Point on Swine Flu Vaccine
The Associated Press is reporting on a study that indicates about half of all health workers, including doctors, would reject the swine flu vaccine due to concerns about its effectiveness, side effects and safety. The AP emphasizes the risk of doctors and nurses spreading swine flu if they don’t get vaccinated. We’d like to suggest a different thrust for this particular story, that doctors and nurses don’t think the swine flu vaccine is either safe or effective!

Health workers are not like everyone else. They have knowledge about health and illness that the general public lacks. They are trained to diagnose and treat disease. So when they reject a course of action, everyone should pay attention. Doctors and nurses do more good by acting according to their consciences and their training than by blindly parroting the will of government or BigPharma. Why should health workers — or anyone, really — be obliged to do something they believe is both harmful and useless?

Health workers aren’t just rejecting the swine flu vaccine. Almost two thirds of health care workers in the United States also reject the seasonal flu vaccine. The percentage is even higher in the United Kingdom. What do most of these professionals do to prepare for flu? Nothing. That’s right, nothing. Why? Could it be because the best way to deal with a virus is to let your immune system fight it off? Could it be because flu vaccines and pharmaceuticals do nothing to strengthen the immune system so it can do its job? Perhaps the rest of us could learn something from health professionals’ approach. From AAHF

I regularly read a health journalism report that grades news articles and reports by a list of standards. The report is operated by a journalism professional who is also an educator in the field.

Recently he notified list members that his organization would no longer evaluate TV health news because of the consistent poor level of reporting.

You might want to weigh the value of what you see and hear from broadcast media.

Network TV morning health news segments may be harmful to your health 08/03/09

By reviewing health news coverage every day, we are able to see big pictures of clear patterns unfolding that the casual day-to-day news consumer may miss.

One picture is quite clear. The morning health news segments on ABC, CBS and NBC do the following regularly:

Unquestioningly promote new drugs and new technologies
Feed the “worried well” by raising unrealistic expectations of unproven technologies that may produce more harm than good
Fail to ask tough questions
Make any discussion of health care reform that much more difficult

Mainstream Media and Health Reporting

Related Article: Mainstream Health Coverage Unsatisfactory, May 2008
Network TV morning health news segments may be harmful to your health
Created 08/03/09

By reviewing health news coverage every day, we are able to see big pictures of clear patterns unfolding that the casual day-to-day news consumer may miss.

One picture is quite clear. The morning health news segments on ABC, CBS and NBC do the following regularly:

Unquestioningly promote new drugs and new technologies
Feed the “worried well” by raising unrealistic expectations of unproven technologies that may produce more harm than good
Fail to ask tough questions
Make any discussion of health care reform that much more difficult


Here is just some of what we’ve observed, broken down by topics. You can look up any of these on the HealthNewsReview.org website. Probably the easiest way is to go to “Find Reviews” > “By News Organization”, then use the pulldown menu to select the news source. http://www.healthnewsreview.org/review/by_org.php?type=Media+Source

We apologize for the length of this note, but we thought it was important for you to see the full pattern of what we see unfolding. We give you the “headline” of the story, the date it aired, the star score it received after our review, and a brief excerpt of our review comments.



Obesity & weight loss & thinning

ABC’s Good Morning America

Breakthrough obesity drug
July 21, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

Miscasts an experimental obesity Rx as potential "silver bullet" for people wanting to drop a few pounds. Oddly refers to interviewee's potential conflicts of interest as evidence of expertise. Huh?...

Super shot? Can it cut weight by 25%?
July 14, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

Woefully inadequate reporting on animal research on a weight loss drug. Makes the unfounded leap that this is a "promising new drug that could ultimately impact how to control obesity and diabetes."

Cutting the fat--without incisions: New weight-loss surgery
June 3, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

Breathless enthusiasm - not backed by facts about new incision-free approach to weight loss surgery. Story calls it "remarkable" and "exciting" but that results aren't as good as gastric bypass....

Blasting Inches Off Without Surgery: New Technique to Lose The Fat
January 5, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

This story medicalizes a normal state of health - a few additional pounds or inches. The story lacked evidence and data from the alleged 50,000 who've had it - an astoundingly poor use of air time....

CBS Early Show

The Real Skinny: Liposlim During Lunch?
February 16, 2009
Rating: (0 stars out of possible 5)

What the anchorman calls a "healthy, gorgeous" young woman gets lunchtime lipo with no discussion of evidence or whether insurance covers it. If your premiums went up because she was in your insurance pool, would you be happy?...

NBC Today show

Lose weight while you sleep?
February 9, 2009
Rating: (0 stars out of possible 5)

NBC gave 5.5 minutes of free publicity to Glamour magazine's pseudo-scientific experiment, then made bold, baseless projections that women would "probably add about 7 years to their life". Amazing....



Paralysis & spinal cord injury

ABC’s Good Morning America

In Christopher Reeve's footsteps: Young man beats the odds
July 16, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

Story focused on one person's experience but failed to reference any research or provide quantitative data on benefits. No independent expert, no discussion of cost, harms, alternatives or outcomes.

CBS Early Show

Blue Breakthrough? Blue Food Dye Could Help Prevent Spinal Cord Injury
July 28, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of possible 5)

A story about spinal cord injury with no certain human application that implied just the opposite. The fact that the study was done on rats does not appear until 2 minutes into a 3-minute segment. ...

Walk on: New device helps paraplegics walk again
July 22, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of possible 5)

This segment puts a check next to nearly every item on a list of Health Journalism Worst Practices. It calls the device new, revolutionary, miracle. The device is none of these. Terribly misleading.



New medical technologies

ABC’s Good Morning America

The Cutting Edge: Robotic Surgery, Today!
May 5, 2009
Rating: (1 star out of a possible 5)

A few minutes of techno-tainment with inexcusable, almost inconceivable lapses in journalistic hygiene. No discussion of cost, of evidence for benefits or harms, and no independent insight....

The Cutting Edge: Amazing Journey Inside the Brain
May 4, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

Another gee-whiz Good Morning America segment that fits their apparent formula: no discussion of costs, no quantification of benefits or harms, and no independent source....

Cutting edge nail cure
April 9, 2009
Rating: (0 stars out of a possible 5)

The advantages were unsubstantiated, the harms unstated and the effectiveness exaggerated. Network TV promoting an off-label use. Disease mongering at its worst. A new low. Stay tuned for lower....

Life-Saving Test: How One Minute Can Save Your Life
March 25, 2009
Rating: (0 stars out of a possible 5)

The story overstated the risk of esophageal cancer and the value of a new approach for direct visualization and biopsy of the esophagus and was a free ad for a local hospital and a manufacturer. Wow....



America’s leading killer - cardiovascular diseases

ABC’s Good Morning America

Medical Breakthrough: Amazing New Heart Valve Procedure
January 7, 2009
Rating: (2 stars out of a possible 5)

One week into 2009, calls this "one of the big medical stories of 2009, "groundbreaking," and "the biggest thing since the heart transplant." Unfortunately no data are given to support that....

Heart Health: New Treatments For America's #1 Killer
March 30, 2009
Rating: (1 star out of a possible 5)

Story on coronary calcium test fails to discuss evidence, cost, or problems with false positive tests. But it hypes the test and disease mongers - telling us it's a wakeup call we all need. Not so....

CBS Early Show

Three Heart Tests Every Woman Should Know About
June 18, 2009
Rating: (0 stars out of possible 5)

Classic morning show health news garbage - confusing screening and diagnostic tests and confusing viewers. And a glaring error on the CBS website claims that heart CT scans had no radiation! On which planet?...

Heart Score: New Treatment for Heart Failure
February 16, 2009
Rating: (1 star out of possible 5)

The plural of anecdote is not data. Viewers were told one very positive patient story, but nothing about whether that's a representative outcome. No independent sources. Nothing on harms or costs.

NBC Today show

Today's Matters of the Heart: Dr. Nancy's Personal Wake-Up Call
February 4, 2009
Rating: (1 star out of possible 5)

A 6-minute segment almost completely devoid of evidence and data, riding the single personal anecdote of the network's medical editor. Disease-mongering. Incomplete story on heart CT scans....



This is a dangerous pattern. Such stories do more harm than good to public understanding of health care. This must change.

We continue to offer our help to any news organization that wants it. We have loads of good story ideas to take the place of this pablum – stories that affect individuals’ health, finances and decision-making – all the makings of good news stories.

Gary Schwitzer
Publisher
__________________________________________________________________

Website: www.HealthNewsReview.org

Test Panel Checks for 12 Viruses

In January 2008 the FDA approved a new lab test for a panel of viruses.

In early November, the Wall Street Journal reported on the test as

" A new cold and flu test can precisely diagnose a dozen winter ailments and reduce unneeded use of antibiotics, says the company that sells it. Physicians say the test is accurate and the most comprehensive available, but some say its long processing time limits usefulness in emergency rooms. "

Health News Review today ranks this article with 5 Stars and says

"This story does a good job of presenting accurate, comprehensive information - a balanced approach in presenting the evidence supporting the pros and cons of the test."

More on the evaluation of the story can be found on their web site.

FDA Clears Test to Identify 12 Respiratory VirusesFDA Clears First Test Designed to Detect and Identify 12 Respiratory Viruses from Single Sample The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today cleared for marketing a test that simultaneously detects and identifies 12 specific respiratory viruses.

The test, called the xTAG Respiratory Viral Panel, is the first test for the detection and differentiation of influenza A subtypes H1 and H3. Influenza A is the most severe form of influenza for humans, and has been the cause of major epidemics. The new panel is also the first test for human metapneumovirus (hMPV), newly identified in 2001.

The xTAG Respiratory Viral Panel amplifies viral genetic material found in secretions taken from the back of the throat in patients with possible respiratory tract infections. In the test, specific beads, or microspheres, bind to the amplified viral genetic material. The beads are then sorted so that the specific virus can be identified.

The xTAG panel is the first FDA-cleared test for infectious respiratory disease viruses that uses a multiplex platform, allowing several tests to be processed using the same sample.

"Nucleic acid tests such as the xTAG Respiratory Viral Panel utilize small amounts of genetic material, and then replicate it many times," said Daniel G. Schultz, M.D., director of FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

"This speeds up the usual process of detecting and identifying respiratory viruses, which can take up to a week," said Schultz. "And, because this multiplex viral panel tests for 12 viruses at once, it uses less of a patient's test specimen."

Other viruses identified by the xTAG Respiratory Viral Panel:

influenza B - one of three types of human influenza, less severe than influenza A respiratory syncytial virus subtype A and B - both are leading causes of infant pneumonia and bronchiolitis (an infection of the airways leading to the lungs) and often contribute to the development of long-term pulmonary disease

parainfluenza 1, 2 and 3 - all are leading factors in the croup and the common cold

rhinovirus - the most common viral infective agent in humans and a cause of the common cold

adenovirus - a cause of respiratory tract infections often similar to strep throat or tonsillitis

While the test is faster than conventional tests, it is specific to the dozen viruses listed and should be used with other diagnostics such as patient data, bacterial or viral cultures and X-rays. Positive results do not rule out other infection or co-infection and the virus detected may not be the specific cause of the disease or patient symptoms.

The xTAG Respiratory Viral Panel is manufactured by Toronto-based Luminex Molecular Diagnostics.

SOURCE: FDA Press Release, January 3, 2008

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