A Shift By the Traditional Media on Nutritional Supplements?
The traditional media have over the years tended to take a cynical approach to "alternative" health approaches and the nutritional supplements and emphasis on prevention that are often part of alternative treatments. Many seemed to take delight in scientific studies that questioned the benefits of vitamin E or echinachea (and failing to point out possible weaknesses in the study methodologies).
But in just the last few weeks, we've seen signs of a 180-degree shift. Newsweek in its Jan. 16 issue devoted 41 pages to a special section entitled, "Health for Life: Vitamins and Your Diet". (Never mind that the special section's major advertisers were Big Pharma, touting various drugs to reduce cholesterol and relieve asthma.) The New York Times, on its front page Jan. 11, had an article, "In the Treatment of Diabetes, Success Often Does Not Pay", in which it chronicled how a hospital center offering preventive treatment was forced to shut down because it couldn't make money; the profits come to the hospitals that perform amputations and other serious procedures to deal with the complications of diabetes. The most surprising evidence came in the Jan. 21-27 issue of The Economist, the staid chronicler of international business and economic developments. Its cover pointed readers to, not one, but two, pieces under the heading, "Eat More Fish Oil". The articles both related to a new study suggesting that mothers of children who consumed more of the omega-3 contained in fish oil had higher IQs and better sociability than under-consumers. One of the articles was an editorial that concluded, "...environmental damage wrought in the womb is as irreversible as the effects of bad genes. It is surely cheaper to make interventions that have an impact early on than to react later." Ah, the compelling force of economic logic.
Surely more such media shifting is to come as evidence mounts that nutritional voids in our diets likely create huge long-term health risks.
The Complete Patient
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