Chapter 8: Smoking and Heart Disease
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Apparently, various cancers, emphysema, lung
disease and a war on second-hand smoke is not enough for anti-tobacco
crusaders. Their agenda is to ban
smoking, and to do this smoking must be linked to as many health problems as
possible. Predictably, smoking is now considered a cause of heart disease. There is, though, a serious lack of evidence.
There have been studies looking at risk factors of heart attacks and strokes
since the 1950s, when government scientists started to conduct studies in
Framingham, MA. Three risk factors were
identified early on: smoking, high blood pressure and cholesterol. However, these are by no means the only risk
factors and well known ones now include fatty food (and foods containing
hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated fats), excessive alcohol consumption,
and lack of exercise. Oestrogen pills
have been linked to heart attacks in women;[1] male pattern baldness has been linked to heart
attacks in men;[2] and even more recently
researchers have discovered a link between heart attacks and surplus iron in the
diet,[3]with claims that the iron oxidises cholesterol and deposits harmful plaque on
artery walls.
Of course, the problem with
risk factors is the researchers decide which ones to assess, and which to
include in the final report. Further, it
cannot be overstated that correlation does not mean causation – after all, 100%
of lung cancer victims inhale air, and 100% of heart disease victims eat food,
but everyone knows we cannot link breathing to lung cancer and all food to
heart disease. Furthermore, how can researchers be sure that a particular risk
factor was responsible for the heart attack? As I said in chapter five, the
only way to deduce a risk factor is by isolating it as the one variable to
which anomalous results can be attributed.
As such, risk factors are automatically and without fail biased by the
researchers’ opinions, as they choose which to include, exclude, study, and,
ultimately, whether to reveal their raw data or to alter it to match their
hypothesis or premise.
[1] Bishop, J. E. 24th
Oct 1985 Studies Conflict on Estrogen Tie to Heart Attack Wall Street Journal
[2] Ruffenach, G. 24th Feb 1993 Baldness
in Males and Heart Disease may be Connected Wall Street Journal
[3]Base Metal:
Heart-Attack Study Adds to the Cautions about Iron in the Diet Wall Street Journal 8th Sept 1992
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