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In
his latest book, "Myths, Lies and Downright Stupidity,"
John Stossel expands on his popular "Myth" segments
on ABC Television's "20/20" and unearths truths often
distorted -- or disregarded -- by the media. Below is an excerpt:
Thomas Jefferson
said he'd rather live in a country with a free press and no government,
than in one with a government but no press. "The only security
of all is in a free press," he wrote. "It is necessary,
to keep the waters pure."
I couldn't agree
more. Without media to tell us about the excesses of government,
the risks of life, and the wonderful new ideas that emerge constantly
from every cranny in America, our lives would be narrow, and
our freedom diminished. The Fourth Estate both informs and protects
us. "Where the press is free, and every man able to read,"
said Jefferson, "all is safe."
However, thirty-six
years working in the media has left me much more skeptical of
its product. Reporters are good at telling us what happened today:
what buildings burned down, what army invaded, the size of the
hurricane that's coming. Many reporters take astonishing risks
to bring us this news. We owe them thanks.
But when it comes
to science and economics, and putting life's risks in perspective,
the media do a dismal job.
MYTH: Radioactivity
is deadly; keep it away from food!
TRUTH: Food irradiation
saves lives.
A classic example of journalists falling for
a stunningly stupid scientific scare-falling en masse
and really hard-was the outcry over treating food with radiation.
The irradiation process would give consumers
wonderful new options: strawberries that stay fresh three weeks,
and chicken without the harmful levels of salmonella that the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says kill six hundred
Americans every year, and cause countless cases of food poisoning.
(The last time you thought you had the flu, you may have really
been sick from bacteria on chicken-this is no myth! Wash the
counter, your hands, and everything that touches raw meat, because
they are all crawling with potentially dangerous germs.)
But reporters and environmental activists don't
worry much about the horrible toll from bacteria. For some reason,
even when bacteria pose a far greater risk, the media obsess
about chemicals and radiation. Radiation! Horrors! Three Mile
Island! Jane Fonda! Nuclear bombs!
They don't worry much about bacteria because
bacteria is natural. But radiation is natural too. We are exposed
to natural radiation every minute of our lives: cosmic radiation
from space, radiation from the ground, and radiation from radon
in the air we breathe. Every year, the average U.S. citizen is
exposed to natural radiation equal to about 360 dental X-rays.
The reporters and protesters probably didn't
know that, but even if they did, they'd still be upset because
irradiation plants propose passing radiation through food. News
stories featured Dr. Walter Burnstein, founder of a "consumer
group" named Food & Water, saying, "This will be
a public health disaster of the magnitude we have never seen
before!" I have to admire the activists' skill in naming
groups: Food & Water. What reporter could argue with a group
with a name like that? They must be the good guys, right? I interviewed
Dr. Burnstein and his "political organizer," Michael
Colby.
MR. COLBY: If you look at the existing
studies on humans and animals fed irradiated food, you will find
testicular tumors, chromosomal abnormalities, kidney damage,
and cancer and birth defects.
STOSSEL: Caused because somebody ate
irradiated food?
MR. COLBY: Absolutely. Absolutely.
STOSSEL: [Food & Water claimed
an Indian study had said that, but we called the author and she
told us she didn't conclude that at all.] We just talked to her
and she says she didn't say that! She never said those kids were
developing cancer.
DR. BURNSTEIN: These are pure scientists
and she doesn't want to make that break. We are taking it the
extra inch. We're saying to people, "Don't-don't be put
to sleep by people who work in test tubes-don't." I don't
need proof that it goes to cancer. We already know it leads to
cancer.
Reporters gave Burnstein and Colby's dubious
claims so much credulous press coverage that politicians in Maine
quickly banned food irradiation. New York and New Jersey followed
suit. That spread fear to other states. I went to Mulberry, Florida,
to report on a protest against Vindicator, a plant that proposed
using radiation to kill germs on strawberries. When I got there,
demonstrators were marching with picket signs, chanting, "Don't
nuke our food! Don't nuke our food!" Their campaign persuaded
the state of Florida to put a moratorium on Vindicator's opening.
DR. BURNSTEIN: Vindicator will go out
of business, and not only Vindicator. That'll be the end of the
entire irradiation industry ... When we go to talk to people,
we don't have to break their arms to convince them not to eat
irradiated food. We just say, "Irradiated food," and
people go, "What? Who wants the food irradiated?"
The fact that Dr. Burnstein was not a research
scientist, but rather an osteopath with a family practice in
New Jersey, didn't diminish the respect he got from the media.
His protests drew headlines and TV coverage. Reporters knew radiation
was bad for humans, and therefore bad for food.
One woman stood outside the Vindicator plant
shouting angrily, "How much pollution are we going to put
into our mouths?!"
"None," is the answer. People think
food irradiation makes food radioactive, but it doesn't; the
radiation just kills the bacteria, and passes right out of the
food. That's why the FDA and USDA approved the process a long
time ago. Spices have been irradiated for more than twenty years.
Irradiation is good for us. If it were more common, all of us
would suffer fewer instances of food poisoning and we could have
fruits and vegetables that stay fresh weeks longer. But scaremongering
has kept it from catching on.
Food & Water told people that the AMA and
the World Health Organization did not approve of irradiation,
but that was a lie. Both organizations did approve. WHO told
us irradiation is as important as pasteurization.
Pasteurization also met public skepticism when
it was introduced. Louis Pasteur discovered that heating milk
would kill bacteria, but critics charged that pasteurization
was "meddling with nature," and that it might change
the properties of the food-or contaminate it. The U.S. dairy
industry actually promoted raw milk as more acceptable than pasteurized
milk. Only the persistence of scientists and medical experts
allowed pasteurization to become standard practice. Irradiation
might save as many lives, if the scaremongers would just get
out of the way. After three years of delays, the Vindicator plant
finally was allowed to open. But fear of radiation has kept this
good idea from spreading across America. Only a tiny fraction
of American meat is irradiated today.
If 50 percent were irradiated, the CDC says
nearly a million cases of bacterial infections could be avoided
and 350 lives could be saved every year. 350 lives! Why isn't
the press screaming about that? Because reporters and legislators
look for danger in the wrong places.
Many reporters believe the activists because
"something must be causing the cancer epidemic." Mysterious
and unnatural additions to our environment are an easy suspect.
After all, during the past fifty years, Americans have been exposed
to chemicals and forms of pollution and radiation that humans
have never experienced before. "No wonder there's so much
more cancer!" say reporters. Get the shovel.
Myths, Lies and Downright Stupidity." (www. Amazon.com)
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