This letter to the editor appeared in the Orlando Sentinel on June 16, 2004:
To the editor:
Roger Moore's review in Friday's Calendar section of the movie Super Size Me calls director/star Morgan Spurlock's downward spiral compelling. But what Spurlock demonstrated in his movie was just plain gluttony, compounded by an intentional lack of physical activity.

Another myth bites the dust. This one falls into the category of supposed facts that "everyone knows." What's the worst thing you can drink in terms of ruining your teeth? "Everyone knows" that's got to be colas, right? But recent preliminary research from the journal General Dentistry casts doubt on this truism.

Yesterday's report that the United States Federal Trade Commission is going after the maker of Pedia Loss and Pedia Lean is good news, no doubt.

The juxtaposition of two recent items in the New York Times was striking.
First, there was the Sunday, June 13th frontpage photo of Presidential candidate John Kerry, helmetless, riding a motorcycle (accompanying the article "Behind the Scenes, a Restless and Relentless Kerry").

Get your VCR set, and don't miss the other side in the debate over fast food and obesity. Soso Whaley and Chazz Weaver (thirty-day McDieters) were interviewed by John Stossel of ABC's 20/20. The show is scheduled to be broadcast this Friday, June 18 at 10pm (and Madonna's on the show as well, if that helps). In the not-too-distant future, ACSH's director of nutrition, Dr. Ruth Kava, will present a nutritional analysis of Soso's and Chazz's McDiets. So watch 20/20 this week, and watch this site for further insights.

New York's Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has accused the British-based drug giant Glaxo-SmithKline of consumer fraud because of the manner in which GSK promoted Paxil, an anti-depressant, for children and adolescents. He has accused GSK of misleading consumers by suppressing studies which did not support the drug's efficacy, especially for teenagers with depression.

From a June 14 Mercury News editorial:
''There are just four words for weight control: calories in, calories out,'' said Dr. Ruth Kava, director of nutrition for the American Council on Science and Health.
The full article can be found at:
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/8918380.htm?1c

The brain hungers to place things in simple categories: good for you, bad for you...safe, risky. But the stomach hungers for French fries, salmon, meat substitutes, and other things that have been hastily labeled "bad" by activists, so the brain has some work to do: putting the activists' warnings (about food and other things) in context, weighing those tiny or imagined risks against other risks from everyday life. Ten lessons for the discriminating risk-assessor:

Two stories came to my attention recently testimony to our distorted health priorities thanks to activist groups' alarmist emissions and the media's slavish devotion to them:

That's toxic toothpaste you're using, or so says a consumer health advisory recently issued by the Environmental Working Group (EWG). The study claims that one out of every hundred popular cosmetic products contains ingredients identified by the government as toxins and/or carcinogens. This information, while meant to "heighten consumer awareness," actually exploits a fallacy and accomplishes little more than unnecessarily frightening the public.