Celebrities vs. Science

By ACSH Staff — Jan 04, 2009
Another British news outlet, the Times Online, has a much saner article about debunking health myths that are propagated by celebrities. For example: "Heather Mills, former model: '[Meat] sits in your colon for forty years and eventually gives you the illness you die of. And that is a fact.' Melita Gordon, gastroenterologist at the University of Liverpool: 'Meat proteins, like all other proteins, are digested by enzymes, and absorbed in the small bowel before they ever reach the colon. Any indigestible matter is...expelled.'"

Another British news outlet, the Times Online, has a much saner article about debunking health myths that are propagated by celebrities. For example: "Heather Mills, former model: '[Meat] sits in your colon for forty years and eventually gives you the illness you die of. And that is a fact.' Melita Gordon, gastroenterologist at the University of Liverpool: 'Meat proteins, like all other proteins, are digested by enzymes, and absorbed in the small bowel before they ever reach the colon. Any indigestible matter is...expelled.'"

"This is just like our Celebrities vs. Science publication," says ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan. "This article is replete with examples of celebrity idiocy when it comes to scientific matters."

ACSH's Jeff Stier adds, "We have reason to believe that the British group Sense About Science provided this information, though they were not quoted in the article."