Wednesday 7 November 2012

More 'miracle cures' revealed by the Express

Another Express front page, another 'wonder pill' to 'beat' a disease:

Jo Willey's article explains:

People at risk from cholesterol could soon take a simple pill which controls levels and protects sufferers.

Scientists are hailing the treatment as a new fat-buster because of the way it helps to prevent the clogging up of patients’ arteries.

'Scientists are hailing the treatment'. But the Express forgets to mention something rather important about the 'scientists' in question. The research covered by the Express was led by Dr Mitchell Jones. The 'pill' comes from a company called Micropharma.

And:

Dr. Mitchell Jones has been with the company since its inception and is the driving force behind Micropharma’s innovation and R&D.

The paper has included a dissenting view, although it comes deep into the article, as usual:

Victoria Taylor of the British Heart Foundation said: "This is a relatively small piece of research and it’s still some way off before we could recommend probiotic supplements to help people with high cholesterol."

Similarly, last week the Express revealed '7 easy ways to beat arthritis':


Jo Willey (again) explained that the 'easy ways' were:

The seven key methods are herbal therapies, exercise, massage, acupuncture, yoga, meditation and dietary supplements.

Organisations working with sufferers must be delighted that beating arthritis is so 'easy'. But the quotes in the article suggest - shock - it may not be that simple:

A spokeswoman for Arthritis Research UK...said: “...there isn’t very much hard scientific evidence that many of these therapies actually work.”

Ailsa Bosworth, chief executive of the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, said...“There is no evidence that any of these therapies have any impact on slowing or halting the disease."

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment.

Comments are moderated - generally to filter out spam and comments wishing death on people - but other messages will be approved as quickly as possible.