The article in the New England Journal of Medicine caught my eye immediately, even before I'd read any of the coverage. "Myths, Presumptions, and Facts about Obesity," was what it said, and I quickly clipped it and...
Category: diet
The article in the New England Journal of Medicine caught my eye immediately, even before I'd read any of the coverage. "Myths, Presumptions, and Facts about Obesity," was what it said, and I quickly clipped it and saved it. With all the recent controversy among science journalists over what does or what doesn't work regarding weight loss, this seemed like the answer to a prayer--a summary of the evidence on key points, and published in the reputable New England Journal.
Marilynn Marchione at The AP wrote it up this way:
Fact or fiction? Sex burns a...
In the pages of the Columbia Journalism Review, the medical and health-policy writer Trudy Lieberman is tossing a laurel to the legacy media--remember the legacy media?--for some nice reporting on childhood obesity.
The medium in question is a kids' magazine called...
In the pages of the Columbia Journalism Review, the medical and health-policy writer Trudy Lieberman is tossing a laurel to the legacy media--remember the legacy media?--for some nice reporting on childhood obesity.
The medium in question is a kids' magazine called ChopChop, which aims to "get kids in the kitchen." Here is Lieberman:
ChopChop is beautiful, engaging, empowers kids to cook and eat healthy foods, offers recipes even adult foodies will love, and aims to help reduce childhood obesity—the coming scourge of the health care system. For doing all this, ChopChop deserves a CJR laurel.
Whether or not one would call this journalism is an arguable point, but Lieberman is correct to observe that the magazine is sending a message to children and families, which does make it journalism of a sort. The magazine's...
New evidence that sugary soft drinks could contribute to obesity was presented at a conference and published in the New England Journal of Medicine last week.
The AP's Marilynn Marchione wrote that new research "powerfully strengthens the case...
New evidence that sugary soft drinks could contribute to obesity was presented at a conference and published in the New England Journal of Medicine last week.
The AP's Marilynn Marchione wrote that new research "powerfully strengthens the case against soda and other sugary drinks as culprits in the obesity epidemic." Marchione's story nicely recaps the evidence in the new studies and adds thoughtful quotes from appropriate authorities. She took time to make the extra calls, and her lede was strong, but also cautious and appropriate. She followed that immediately by noting that sweet soft drinks interact with genes predisposing some people to obesity, according to the studies.
Kathleen Doheny at WebMD...
15Apr 2011
This Sunday's New York...
This Sunday's New York Times Magazine features an unusual story by Gary Taubes, whom some of you might remember as the author of the controversial story in the Times in 2002 touting the virtues of a high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet.
That story appeared under the headling, "What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie?" The headline on the web version of this Sunday's story is equally direct: "Is Sugar Toxic?" (The...
A few tidbits from the past week or two, thanks mostly to suggestions from Tracker...
A few tidbits from the past week or two, thanks mostly to suggestions from Tracker readers and Twitter friends:
• The Boston Globe put out a fine feature piece Mar. 20th on Ryan Westmoreland (left), once a top Red Sox prospect, who is now recovering from a sudden illness that could have killed him. The story is by Charles P. Pierce, a Globe magazine staff writer. You could call it a sports story, or a medical story. However you want to characterize it, it's one heck of a piece of writing. From the lede:
The afternoon is fading, and he is...
The closest I came to practicing medicine in my career as a medical reporter was during countless lunches with colleagues in the...
The closest I came to practicing medicine in my career as a medical reporter was during countless lunches with colleagues in the AP cafeteria, an activity we used to refer to delicately as "tying on the feed bag." Newspaper people are classy; I'm pretty sure that's well known.
I covered a lot of stories on diet and nutrition, and my lunch pals were all over me about what they should or shouldn't be eating. I gave them the best unlicensed medical advice I could muster. It was a good reality check--I got a preview of the reactions that readers might have when the stories went out on the wire.
The point is that these stories can be tricky. A study this week in the Archives of Internal Medicine is...
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