Get a Second Opinion

Editor member, John Morgan, discusses a recent Press Council guideline on the reporting of health and medical matters.

8.00 Good Medicine [9]

A guide to healthcare, patient rights international break-throughs and cutting-edge technology.

Just what the doctor ordered, well we can hope so. Nothing like a DIY guide to good health for an after-dinner TV couch potato. All that and perhaps a few tips on how to sue the doc (MD if American) ... to hell with his insurance costs. And there's nothing like a quick look at a cure for in-grown toenails even if it won't be ready for use until 2050; that's the sort of cutting edge I need.

8.30 Quantum [ABC]

Looks at a simple low-calorie diet that could double your lifespan.

Wow! That's for me ... another 70-odd years of telling my son-in-law how to grow grapes and administer justice at the same time, of instructing my grandsons on the grandeur of aerodynamics and the duplicity of opinion 'sciences' such as economics, of the joys of yet more medical check-ups and the worries of whether my teeth will last for a double lifespan. That 'could' bugs me though; perhaps the starvation diet (I'm guessing, but I bet the damn diet doesn't include steak-and-kidney pud or a plateful of chips) ... perhaps the aforesaid diet 'could' also halve a lifespan. Given three score and ten, that's 35 years somebody might owe somebody.

Passing thoughts as I contemplate the evening's TV guide, hoping for something to cheer me up against the diving dollar, the dipping interest rates (no cheering from self-funded ancients who've paid their full share of taxes years ago), and the thought of endless political argy-bargy from here to the election.

There is, however, serious intent in all this. Two TV programs on one night delving, perhaps deeply and no doubt with good intentions and to be hoped with accuracy, into the area of health and medicine. In all probability the news and current affairs programs of the day also covered one or two health-style stories. A swift click or two of the remote produced a news-feature on Down's syndrome and yet another coming cure for leukaemia.

My one and only spy in the world of TV tells me that the rating formula is to cover a health story, and throw in a sob or two if possible ' the following day the switch boards are jammed with folk who want to double their lifespan or sue their doctors.

And it certainly is not just TV that caters to the public appetite for news and views on medicine and health matters. The press knows the public interest just as well as the electronic media. Everyone's a mild hypochondriac at heart, and what better than to feed that pleasant condition and perhaps allay fears and offer a little hope.

The Internet is positively flooded with health and medical sites, 'wellness' magazines for women, healthy recipes, daily health magazines, and weird machines for reading your health by gazing into your eyes, twiddling your toes, searching for hot spots, or testing your sweat outputs.

Right or wrong? There's the rub! The media needs to be damn sure that whatever it is saying is as right as it is possible to be. Not that there's any hope of always being perfect, not that there's any chance of all experts agreeing, not that some outlandish claim may not turn out in the end to be justified, but what the media says should take into account all limitations, qualifications and provisos, and put them squarely before the public.

Statements and claims made by any source should be treated at arm's length. Even writers qualified in some way cannot be the final authority on all the many and varied claims and 'facts' presented each year by anything from serious researchers to the labels on patent medicines.

Thus the press release put out by the Australian Press Council in April. The Council's aim is to help protect the public from the sometimes outrageous claims made for medicines, treatments and even devices. As the release says, the dangers of exciting unnecessary fears or hopes are far too great for anything but the utmost care; sick people are vulnerable.

Attribution in medical and healthcare reports is essential; it alone is the defence the media can offer where its own direct knowledge is lacking. However, a slowly growing number of professionally qualified people are taking up their word-processors, microphones, and TV cameras (Dr Norman Swan is a prime example). They are more justified in accepting or rejecting claims, but even they cannot be accepted as the final authorities, nor would they claim to be so.

After all, the clash between orthodox medicine and the various alternatives, from Chinese acupuncture and herbal cures to spine manipulation and foot reading, has been going on since Hippocrates was a medical student. That clash has shown up many times in complaints to the Press Council, promoting this comment nearly 20 years ago and still resonant today:

'The Press has no duty to support medical orthodoxy or to refrain from publishing accounts of treatments by alternative medicine. Alternative medicine is part of the world the press reports. However, it takes great responsibility when it publishes a story which may tempt readers to forsake orthodox for life-threatening conditions, and should exercise care commensurate with that responsibility.

'What is reasonable will vary with the circumstances, and the Press Council cannot lay down any set procedure. At the very least it requires a careful checking of the facts it publishes ... It may also warrant the seeking of comment from someone able to speak as an expert in the field, to suggest other explanations or point out the risks involved.'

The 1986 adjudication goes on to warn that the responsibility was not lessened 'because the material appeared in a human-interest story about a public figure ' some people may be more heavily influenced by such personal accounts than by more technical articles.'

Then again, the press has a duty to try to be fair to all sides. To quote from an adjudication some 10 years later:

'The Press Council is not a medical tribunal. Its central concern is whether the publication observed its principles and gave those who disputed the article's conclusions a reasonable opportunity to state their views in the article and subsequently.'

Another adjudication stressed the need for editors to provide a balanced picture in medical and health matters, and to offer a right of reply to people or organisations whose interests might be in danger.

However, it seems clear to me that a fair amount of scepticism is needed to deal with many of the claims trundled out in media releases and carefully orchestrated briefings. Any reading of court proceedings suggests that experts can be found to say almost anything; impossibly contradictory expert positions are nothing new for baffled judges and juries. But then, part of the art of journalism is to juggle the outlandish claims and conflicting positions and 'smell' the phony.

Scepticism would have helped, for example, with the story beginning thus:

'Arthritis, heart disease, kidney disease - even cancer. Debilitating ailments such as lupus and chronic fatigue syndrome. Simple but nevertheless annoying conditions such as colds and flu. The grim mystery of AIDS and the heartbreak of infertility

'What do all these have in common? They can all be treated by the sufferer taking vitamin C.

'Now it's been established virtually beyond doubt that there is a better form of vitamin C: Brand X. It is a modern, more sophisticated form of the vitamin.

'Many Australians who have already taken Brand X would not be surprised to hear that the federal Department of Health has recognised its effectiveness by granting registration numbers for Brand X powder and tablets ... this is the first time a vitamin or mineral has been awarded such status in Australia.'

This report led to a complaint from the Commonwealth Therapeutical Goods Administration, which pointed out to the Press Council that Brand X had been approved only for 'the treatment and prevention of ascorbic acid deficiency'. Upheld! Ouch!

In an adjudication resulting from another complaint from the Administration, the Press Council commented on a two-page display that included the headline 'Wonder cure from lab'. After calling again for extreme care in dealing with medical matters, the Council said: 'Even in carefully and properly attributed reports there is the danger that the paper or magazine will appear to give credence to claims through the very fact of reporting and, perhaps, more strongly by the display and manner of reporting.'

In this case my own opinion is that alarm bells should have gone off when the European research team in question claimed not only that it had developed a pill that triggered the skin's repair system and so slowed ageing, but also that it was leading in research on HIV/AIDS and the Ebola virus. A little too much, perchance?

Finally, there's the tear-out report featured on this page (click on the image to read the full-size version). Claims are not identified as such; nor is it clear who is making the claims, even though a pharmaceutical company and a researcher are mentioned at the end of the story. The source of the information on how the vaccine works is not given, even though it is highly technical. No outside medical authority is quote in support of the claims. Indeed, a university professor and expert on cancer was moved to complain to the Press Council over the report.

For the sake of the sick, and the going-to-be sick, have a care in health and medical reporting. Unless sure of your ground, get a second opinion - and even more if needed.

JOHN MORGAN

see also
Index of reporting guidelines on this website.

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