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"You say tomato. I say tomato." It's not only a saying that fails to work when used in print instead of uttered aloud, it's also the wacky, devil-may-care opening line of a booklet promoting alternative medicine that Oxford Health Plans sent out a few days ago to all of their participants, including, ironically, us skeptics at the American Council on Science and Health.

There are a growing number of reasons to drink alcohol.
No, no, I don't mean because my girlfriend left me or because it's so terribly cold in the big city (the Kyoto Accord against global warming must be working perfectly). I mean that drinking appears to be associated with health benefits:

Anti-chemical activists are banding together this week to say numerous illnesses are caused by the combined influence of numerous chemicals, and they say the Centers for Disease Control affirms their view. It doesn't. Read my TechCentralStation.com column about it:
http://www.techcentralstation.com/1051/envirowrapper.jsp?PID=1051-450&C…

As I write this, we're told to expect a possible attack from Al Qaeda and a possible war against Iraq in the next few days (naturally, I'll be in New York City and Washington, D.C.). The past few weeks saw scares involving ricin, bubonic plague, and anthrax, though such things happen so regularly these days, it's easy to forget about them.

This week saw the arrest of sixteen teenagers in Westchester County for underage drinking at a party which is not big news, but the report made passing mention of the presence of several tablets of Ritalin, the drug prescribed with growing frequency as a treatment for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and said that the drug is sometimes used recreationally. It's ironic that at the same time some people are concerned that some kids are overmedicated with Ritalin to keep them under control, other kids are rebelling by using more Ritalin than they're supposed to.

One brief programming note:

Australian researchers note the immense cost to society of smoking compared to illegal drugs...

You know, I've been feeling awfully tired lately. I haven't been sleeping well, and when I do sleep, I grind my teeth. Also, I'm feeling slightly nervous, forgetting minor details, and eating more than usual but not gaining weight. Should I be worried? According to the November 2002 issue of Secrets of Robust Health promoted as a "health newsletter for the thinking person," I should. Divulging information "you will probably never hear from your family doctor"(with good reason, as we'll see), the newsletter claims that all of my symptoms point to the same culprit: a parasite.

For some reason, Marion Burros of the New York Times seems to have it in for food irradiation. In an article published in the Times on January 29 ("The Question of Irradiated Beef in Lunchrooms"), Ms. Burros and some authorities she quotes mislead readers about the proposed irradiation of beef used in school lunch programs.

The Associated Press reported last week that "health officials said Wednesday that concerns over compensation for people injured by the smallpox vaccine are hampering the inoculation program, which has vaccinated just a few hundred people so far. Federal authorities acknowledge the problem but still have no solution." Workmen's compensation is one possible channel for funds to the small fraction of vaccine recipients who suffer side effects. Here in fiscally troubled New York City, officials will delay the vaccination program for months, pending a solution to the compensation problem.

Europeans, out of some romantic rebellion against America and high technology, were shunning U.S.-grown food containing G.M.O.'s [genetically-modified organisms] even though there is no scientific evidence that these are harmful. But practically everywhere we went in Davos, Europeans were smoking cigarettes with their meals, coffee or conversation even though there is indisputable scientific evidence that smoking can kill you.
Thomas Friedman, in his February 2 New York Times column.

"It is absolutely essential for the protection of our consumers that a national frying limit be set at 175C."

We're pleased to see the esteemed British journal The Lancet noting the American Council on Science and Health in the conclusion of its February 1 article on the tumultuous debate over acrylamide in food. The Lancet emphasizes the unknown but at least recognizes that there's no evidence of harm:

Two biotech companies agreed last week to pay $110 million to corn farmers who lost money because of consumer fears three years ago when some genetically-modified StarLink corn, intended as animal feed, found its way into the human food supply.

French scientists, writing in the February 8, 2003 issue of The Lancet, claim success in treating a heart attack victim with muscle stem-cells transplanted from his thigh to his heart. Though the seventy-two-year-old patient died eighteen months later, examination of his heart showed that the grafted stem cells had taken root and were differentiating into myotubes and contractile tissue.

Recent research from the Harvard School of Public Health and Sweden's Karolinska Institute found no link between consumption of acrylamide from foods and the occurrence of colon, bladder, or kidney cancers just as ACSH predicted.

Two recent articles in my hometown newspaper show how hard a time the media have understanding and explaining science.
The "Organic Foods" Story

Recent research from the Harvard School of Public Health and Sweden's Karolinska Institute found no link between consumption of acrylamide from foods and the occurrence of colon, bladder or kidney cancers. These results are in line with expectations of physicians and scientists associated with the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) (see Acrylamide in Food: Is It a Real Threat to Public Health?).

To the Editor:
As a physician and public health educator, I say it's self-evident that parents' rights to evade vaccinations for their school-age children stop at classmates' respiratory tracts ("Worship Optional")
Parents seeking "religious" exemptions from vaccinations for their kids should be made aware of recent epidemics of whooping cough and other rare communicable diseases. When vaccination rates drop below 80 percent or so, community ("herd") immunity falters and even vaccinated youngsters become vulnerable.

When I wrote a skeptical article about the alleged benefits of the fruit juice POM earlier in the year, some people thought I was being pretty radical. After all, it was one of the most popular beverages of 2005 -- and it's full of antioxidants.

Friday the Thirteenth is a fitting time to remind ourselves that there's no evidence risks and probabilities in the external universe the brute, physical facts of reality change in response to human attitudes. Your optimism or pessimism may alter your own behavior, but it doesn't change the odds of you winning the lottery, getting hit by a meteor, or having your picnic rained upon (any more than the number thirteen does). It will rain or it will not rain, and the odds are in no way tied to whether you remembered your umbrella, despite the common belief in "fate."

The website TomPaine.com seems to exist mainly to place large ads on the op-ed page of the New York Times, usually denouncing corporate greed in such cartoonish and oversimplified terms that one almost expects to see the pieces decorated with top hat-wearing Snidely Whiplash figures, chomping on cigars and carrying big bags of money.
That is standard left-wing politics, but TomPaine.com recently took up a new cause: attacking vaccine manufacturers.

One of the nice side effects of last month's elections was the defeat of a proposal in Berkeley that would have sentenced people to jail for selling non-organic coffee beans.

You can have all sorts of irresponsible fun with statistics, but James Bond video games may be more educational, as I learned over the holidays.