 | | | | |  | An antidote to panics based on dodgy statistics and dubious arguments.
Edited by Rob Lyons. |  | | |  |  |
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| | | 10 December 2004 | A load of balls?
Panic: 'Laptops may reduce male fertility' says BBC News, reporting a study from New York which shows that working with a computer on your lap for hours on end can increase scrotal temperature by up to 2.8 degrees celsius. Testicles produce sperm more effectively when at a slightly lower temperature than the rest of the body, and the theory goes that increasing scrotal temperature reduces sperm production. Yefim Sheynkin, who led the research, told the UK Guardian that heavy laptop use 'may cause irreversible or partially reversible changes in male reproductive function'.
Don't panic: This is a pilot study that doesn't actually measure sperm production. Instead, it simply measures scrotal temperature after a period of using a laptop. So whether there is any real effect is speculation.
What is clear is that the laptops played only a minor role in the temperature increase. According to the study, simply sitting with legs together, a sometimes-necessary position to balance a laptop, accounted for the majority of the temperature rise. Thus, the effect only applies where you actually have the computer on your lap - using a laptop in any other situation would be fine.
Nor does a mere rise in temperature proclude sperm production. If it did, how on Earth would residents of hot countries have managed to produce families? It is all a matter of degree, as it were.
As Paul Turek, a fertility specialist at University of California, told New Scientist, any effect is likely to be subtle. 'I live near Silicon Valley. If this was having a pervasive effect, I'm sure we would have noticed it here.'
The wide reporting of this study shows how big an issue fertility has become, as if modern society is insidiously emasculating Western men. The same discussion takes place over everything from plastics to air fresheners. However, since previous reports suggest that regular ejaculation improves sperm production, we can take comfort from the fact that one of the major uses of laptop computers is to surf internet porn.
Read: |  | Laptops may damage male fertility | | BBC News, 9 December 2004 | | Attention all men: using a laptop may, ahem, heat your testicles and cause infertility | | Guardian, 9 December 2004 |
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| | | 3 December 2004 | Youthful excess
Panic: As the Christmas party season gets into swing, a new advertising campaign in cinemas warns women of the dangers of binge drinking. 'Younger women in particular are increasingly adopting the more risky drinking styles of their male peers in that they are more likely to engage in heavy episodic drinking', says the Portman Group, the UK alcohol industry body that encourages 'responsible' drinking which has produced the adverts.
According to Portman, the proportion of young women aged 16 to 24 drinking more than 35 units of alcohol per week more than tripled between 1988 and 1998, rising from three per cent to 10 per cent. Their briefing to accompany the ads warns that, 'Heavy drinking, particularly over a period of years, can increase the risk of suffering from all of the following: liver damage, pancreatitis, cancers of the mouth and throat, gastritis, stomach ulcers, brain damage, breast cancer, infertility, haemorrhagic stroke and coronary heart disease.'
Don't panic: Nobody who has spent any time drinking regularly will be under any illusions about drinking being good for you. But this campaign, like recent UK government health campaigns, blurs ordinary social drinking with dangerously excessive consumption.
For example, the recommended daily intake for a woman is three units of alcohol per day - three small glasses of wine, or just over a pint of any of the most popular lagers. 'Binge' drinking is defined as twice this amount. It will come as a surprise to many people to find that, officially at least, binge drinking includes not just a weekend bender but an ordinary after-work drink or two with your workmates and friends.
All these figures show is that young women with greater incomes and independence in recent years have drunk a bit more. In fact, the Portman Group briefing shows that this is largely a feature of younger women. For women as a whole, they note that, 'the number of women exceeding 35 units per week remained virtually unchanged, at two per cent for the period 1988 to 1998 rising to three per cent in 2002'. In other words, women, like men, enjoy partying when they're young, then grow out of it as they get older.
There is a strongly moralistic tone to discussions of drinking, particularly when directed at young women. Unable to touch people through Puritanism these days, anti-alcohol sentiment is represented as a health concern - or even beauty tips (apparently, the demon drink plays havoc with your skin). What is strikingly absent from this discussion is the fact that drinking is, usually, no more than a great way to have fun, even when you drink too much. As they say, 'A hangover can last a day; a good drinking story can last a lifetime'.
Read: | | Women and alcohol, | | Portman Group [Word format] | | Measure for measure, | | by Jamie Douglass | | spiked-issue: Drink and drugs |
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| | | 24 November 2004 | Exhausted claims
Panic: 'Premature deaths tied to moderate smog', said MSNBC on 16 November 2004, reporting on a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Between 1987 and 2000, ozone levels in 95 cities across the USA were measured and compared with death rates in the days that followed. Ozone increases of 10 parts per billion were associated with an increase in deaths of 0.52 per cent. Over the course of a year, this amounts to an additional 4000 deaths caused by raised ozone levels, which are associated with exhaust pollution from 'cars, power plants and industry'.
John Kirkwood of the American Lung Association said: 'Early death would join the long litany of harmful effects of ozone exposure: shortness of breath, chest pain, wheezing and coughing and greatly increased risk of respiratory infections, asthma episodes, pulmonary inflammation, and the need for medical treatment and hospitalisation for asthma. More may come as new studies are raising the possibility that ozone may cause asthma to develop in children.'
Don't panic: This is a large study, but it is also a very crude one. Such studies are suitable as an initial test of whether an effect may be found - but they cannot be relied upon as an accurate measure of risk.
The increased risk of death found in this study - 0.52 per cent - is far smaller than the margin of error inherent in such a study. Worse, the headline figure obscures the fact that out of 95 cities tested, only five had increased death rates that were statistically significant. As Steve Milloy, editor of the website Junkscience notes, 'It's simply not credible that smog would be a killer in five particular cities, but nowhere else'.
This study is a classic example of epidemiology that finds a tiny effect, but creates headlines by multiplying that effect by the millions of people in the population. But 4,000 deaths annually in a US populaton of 293million is still a tiny effect.
Nobody thinks that pollution is beneficial. But being able to travel quickly and easily is certainly a good thing, and we should not allow it to be restricted on the basis of spurious research into alleged ill-effects of exhaust fumes. We should also remember that, while many are keen to point the finger at cars (and factories), in fact air in the developed world is far cleaner than in the past. In the UK, for example, PM10 levels (particulate matter of 10 micrometres (mm) or less) are around 30 micrograms per cubic metre - compared to 300 micrograms 50 years ago, and a staggering 3000 micrograms during the 1952 London Smog.
Read: | | Premature deaths tied to moderate smog | | MSNBC, 16 November 2004 | | Smoggy statistics | | Fox News, 18 November 2004 | | spiked-debate: Air pollution and health |
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| | | 11 November 2004 | Death by supplement
Panic: 'High dose vitamin E death warning', reports BBC News. A new study from Johns Hopkins University suggests that taking high doses of vitamin E may actually increase death rates by four per cent, while taking lower doses could reduce mortality. Lead author Dr Edgar Miller said: 'If people are taking a multivitamin, they should make sure it contains no more than a low dose of vitamin E. Our study shows that use of high-dose vitamin E supplements certainly did not prolong life, but was associated with a higher risk of death.'
Don't panic: The level of 'excess' deaths in this study is too small to be regarded as practically significant. The risk of death in the groups not taking vitamin E was 10.22 per cent - the risk in the high vitamin E groups was 10.61 per cent. Hardly a startling difference. For those taking low-level vitamin E supplements, there appeared to be a protective effect - but it was very small indeed.
Besides the very small effect measured, the authors of the study admit that there may be other limitations in their work: vitamin E was taken with other vitamins in some studies but not others; many of the study groups were people with pre-existing chronic diseases; the actual intake of vitamin E may have varied, with some people taking high doses for a period then not taking the vitamin at all.
It would be better to see this study as confirmation of earlier work that showed no protective effect from high doses of vitamins. Speaking on the BBC science programme Horizon, Catherine Collins, chief dietician at London's St George Hospital, said: 'For most people there's absolutely no benefit in taking high dose vitamin supplements. At best they are a waste of money and at worst they could seriously affect your health.' Vitamins are essential for good health, but we need only very small amounts to survive, which the vast majority of us get quite easily even if we eat nothing but so-called 'junk' food.
What the reporting of this study illustrates, however, is that if we fret about what we eat, we will frequently find ourselves caught between one health panic and another.
Read: | | High dose vitamin E death warning | | BBC News, 11 November 2004 | | The truth about vitamins | | BBC News, 16 September 2004 | | Meta-Analysis: High-Dosage Vitamin E Supplementation May Increase All-Cause Mortality | | Annals of Internal Medicine, Vol 142 Issue 1 |
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| | | 3 November 2004 | The pylon panic
Panic: 'Pylons "double child cancer risk",' says BBC News, reporting on research from the Childhood Cancer Research Group at Oxford University. 70,000 children under 15 were studied for the report, half of whom had cancer of various types. For most types of cancer, whether children had lived near power lines had no effect. However, the rate of leukaemia for those relatively few children born or living near power lines was 1.7 times higher than for other children. The report author, Dr Gerald Draper, believes that power lines may be responsible for 20-30 cases per year that would not otherwise have occurred.
Don't panic: Even the report author believes caution is required in interpreting these figures. 'The findings have been surprising, it has made us want to figure out the reasons for these results, and whether power lines might be to blame. But I feel strongly that we have not yet found out conclusively that this is the case,' said Dr Draper.
There are around 500 cases of leukaemia per year in children in the UK, so the risk for any particular household is low. Doubling a tiny risk is still a tiny risk. Even if this new report were accurate, it would suggest an increase in the risk of leukaemia from about 1 in 1400 to around 1 in 700 for the relatively small number of families who actually live near power lines. According to John Brignell, discussing a similar finding in 2001 elsewhere on spiked, that amounts to an extra case of leukaemia every other year.
In any event, the overall risk is so small that it is very possible that this figure is just a statistical artefact and there is no real effect at all. Moreover, no-one has yet managed to put forward a convincing mechanism for how the fields created by power lines might cause cancer.
Other research has shown no link. For example, in 1999, UK Childhood Cancer Survey found no link between the strength of electromagnetic fields in the home and cancer. This would seem to be a superior study in that the strength of such fields was actually measured, rather than simply assuming that fields were higher in homes near pylons.
Families may very well not want to live near pylons because they tend to spoil the view, but there is little evidence they will cause cancer.
Read: | | Pylons 'double child cancer risk', | | BBC News, 30 October 2004 | | Pylons safe, says 'definitive' research, | | BBC News, 3 December 1999 | | Power cables - what risk?, | | by John Brignell |
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