More than 100 health organizations and municipal public health departments, along with more than two dozen scientists, have asked the U.S. surgeon general to issue a report on sugar-sweetened soft drinks – akin to the landmark 1964 report on tobacco.
It never ends, does it?
A surgeon general’s report, the letter says, could evaluate the science and appraise the health effects of sugar-sweetened beverages. And it “would pave the way for policy measures at all levels of government.”
Well, duh. Why else would the swivel-eyed, biscuit-hating, vegan, coffee-fearing cranks of the Center for Science in the Public Interest be involved?
“I think people are coming around to the notion that sugary drinks aren’t healthy, and one of the astonishing things is that per capita consumption of [nondiet] carbonated drinks has gone down by 24% between 1998 and 2011, which is a big under-the-radar change in people’s drinking habits,” said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, an organizer of the letter.
What was that?
"...per capita consumption of [nondiet] carbonated drinks has gone down by 24% between 1998 and 2011..."
Does that not tell you something? How much empirical evidence would you like before you give up on a crusade that blames drinks—which provide just 7 percent of calories to Americans—on your bogus epidemic?
Jacobson said Friday that the “goal isn’t to wipe out sugary drinks completely,” but to return “soft drinks back in the place they were 50 years ago, an occasional small serving.”
Sorry dude. Heard it too many times before. "All we want is non-smoking seats in restaurants, we're not trying to stop people smoking completely." It doesn't work like that with you guys, does it? Not really the compromising kind, are ya?
Besides, who are you to decide that Americans are going to go back to one occasional small serving? Get a job, sir, preferably one that involves minding your own business.
And among the questions that remains in the debate over caloric soft drinks is whether there’s any addictive aspect – a question that remains unsettled. “That’s the blockbuster question – is sugar addictive? It’s certainly controversial.”
It's not controversial. It's not addictive. It doesn't meet any psychiatrist's criteria for addiction, the Center for Science in the Public Interest isn't a serious organisation and this is a non-issue. Next.
Jacobson said. “It may be that it tastes good so people like it.”
Bullseye. That's all it is. Now go away. If you want to know what makes people obese then don't write letters to the Surgeon General. Go see her personally and follow her to the canteen.
 |
| Surgeon General Regina M. Benjamin |
4 comments:
Why any adult would need the nanny state to put him off drinking the foul muck is rather puzzling.
Besides eliminating the draft and giving 18 year olds the right to vote, Richard Nixon almost succeeded in eliminating the office of the Surgeon General.
Check this out:
"Surgeon General Jesse Steinfeld (1969–1973) infuriated President Richard Nixon so much that the president fired him. “You can’t fire me,” Steinfeld told Nixon. “I’ve got a four-year term.” So Nixon took away Steinfeld’s office, his secretary and his parking place. At the beginning of Nixon’s second term, the surgeon general quit. Steinfeld once told The New York Times that although his departure was part of an overall Nixon housecleaning, he believes he lost his job because he raised concerns about second-hand smoke and television violence. Steinfeld and Elders are the only two surgeons general forced to resign.
The Office of the Surgeon General was essentially mothballed from 1973 to 1977, a time when Congress and the Nixon and Ford administrations tried to eliminate the position but failed."
In light of the fact that the office has become the suffocating Nanny General more concerned with lifestyle manipulation than infectious disease, it's too bad Nixon didn't prevail.
It's not controversial. It's not addictive. It doesn't meet any psychiatrist's criteria for addiction
Back in Feb 2012 this article appeared in the DM http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2098428/I-went-cold-turkey-sugar-Its-toxic-addiction-say-scientists-easy-up.html
This person believed they were 'addicted'. It was in the DM so must be true.
A study, 'Evidence for sugar addiction', in 2008 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2235907/?tool=pmcentrez had some interesting things in it. Of note is the references to acetylcholine.
Finaly DSM IV (The US guide for Psychiatrists) uses the terms Abuse and Dependence rather than 'addiction'. Sugar could fulfill some of the criteria as can many things.
Reginas a former RWJF fellow!
And former coordinator of Mississippis tobacco control program!
After her 2010 sg report she disapeared for about 8 weeks after being totally whipped by the media about the outrageous claims!
Post a Comment