How can it be bad when it feels so good?

Something’s fishy here. 5

From The New York Times:

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration commissions report by Institute of Medicine on risks and benefits of eating fish. Institute of Medicine obliges, states that marine-life consumption "may" reduce risk of heart disease, but further study is needed per risk of exposure to PCBs, dioxin, and other nasty stuff. Meanwhile, Harvard School of Public Health conducts different study and declares fish to reduce risk of coronary death by 36 percent. Coauthor of Harvard study declares fish-eating risks to be "greatly exaggerated." NOAA sponsors press conference for release of Harvard study, much to surprise of Institute of Medicine. Why? Why would NOAA support the study they didn't commission?

"We're just trying to make consumers feel good," said William T. Hogarth, assistant administrator for fisheries of the National Marine Fisheries Service, part of NOAA.

Feeling good trumps awareness of risks to my health any day!

Sarah K. Burkhalter is Grist’s assistant managing editor.

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  1. KathyF Posted 6:56 am
    18 Oct 2006

    What I found interestingwas their comment that fish contains similar amounts of dioxins, pesticides, etc. as beef, pork, and dairy.
    Exactly. That's the problem with it!

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  2. lorri Posted 10:43 am
    18 Oct 2006

    How can it be bad... (fish)A little OT but related...
    For quite a while now I've avoided buying fish-containing cat food (except for rare treats), not so much because of the health risks but because we are killing too many fish -- and I think other shoppers may be doing the same thing.  Sometimes when I look for non-fish canned cat food on supermarket shelves, it's down to small amounts, while a lot of the fish-containing cat food sits there unsold.
    Ideally my cats and I would not eat animal products at all (or shop at supermarkets?!), but I think owners of carnivorous pets as well as seafood lovers would like to know which products (if any) containing fish are safe both to fish populations and to our health.
    For now I'll just continue to forego the fish, for me and for the cats.

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  3. Delay And Deny's avatar

    Delay And Deny Posted 5:39 am
    19 Oct 2006

    Eating Anything is Dangerous

    In nature, the game is survival.   Anything that makes itself a target is not going to survive (unless there is some type of symbiosis where it effective gets a "kickback").
    Running around saying that eating something is "good for you" really overstates the issue.   Poignant would be "I ate this, and I'm still alive".   That's the best we can always hope form.

    The Texeme Construct offers international text memetics construction and textcasting services.

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  4. Roz Cummins Posted 8:15 am
    19 Oct 2006

    Cat Food...It would be great if someone who is knowledgable about these things could write an article about cat food (and dog food too) as I worry a lot about what's in it. Maybe someone from a vetinary school could do it? My vet said not to give my cats a "home cooked" diet as it would surely be too low in taurine. Right now I feed my kitties canned food made from chicken and turkey, and, for the one who needs "novel proteins" (due to allergies) he gets -- I kid you not! -- canned cat food made from duck, venison, and rabbit. It's expensive and he hates it and he just ends up eating the other one's Fancy Feast anyway.

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  5. KathyF Posted 4:23 pm
    19 Oct 2006

    There is a lot out there on thisA year or so I was looking, and found all sorts of dog food info. Whole Dog Journal (subscription only) has a list of decent over-the-counter dog foods (those "premium" diets like Science Diet and Iams aren't on their list). I don't know about cat food; I wasn't looking. In general, I think home made is better, but vets are reluctant to give people permission to cook their own pet food. I feed a combination of homemade and organic, whole-food commercial.
    Two people who write about this that I follow: Gina from Dogma blog, a syndicated pet columnist and author, and Christie from Dogged Blog. Christie also has a listserve mainly about feeding pets.
    Dogma: http://spadafori.typepad.com/

    Dogged Blog: http://dogged.typepad.com/doggedblog/ (You'll have to dig for info on her site; she's a multi-niche blogger.)

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