Richard Smith, the previous editor of the British Medical Journal, recently published an article in that journal entitled Are some diets ‘mass murder’? (British Medical Journal, 15 December 2014.) While the article was related to diet (he was explaining that, after reading Nina Teicholz’s book The Big Fat Surprise, he now feels that the dietary advice given by western medicine about saturated fat for the last fifty years or so is complete nonsense), the sentiments expressed relate to many areas of general medical wisdom handed out to the public by the FDA and various health authorities.
He states that, ”…the forensic demolition of the hypothesis that saturated fat is the cause of cardiovascular disease is impressive. Indeed, the book is deeply disturbing in showing how overenthusiastic scientists, massive conflicts of interest, and politically driven policy makers can make deeply damaging mistakes. Over 40 years I’ve come to recognise which I might have known from the beginning – that science is a human activity with the error, self-deception, grandiosity, bias, self-interest, cruelty, fraud, and theft that is inherent in all human activities (together with some saintliness), but this book shook me.”
(Bolding by HCS)
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