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A new nutrition study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) shows that increased consumption of organic foods will likely reduce the risk of cancer.
The general idea is quite simple. Non-organic products are often sprayed with pesticides that have been associated with an increased risk of certain cancers. If a person eats a biological apple instead of an ordinary apple, he will be less exposed to pesticide residues.
But despite a host of titles touting the results of the research, the details of the study are not terribly convincing. Among the 68,946 participants, there was an inverse association between a diet rich in organic foods and the overall risk of cancer. This is an interesting point, but nevertheless, of all these people, only 1340 contracted cancer for the first time during research – just under 2% of the initial pool. Absolute risk reduction – the number of percentage points of a person who risked losing their own risk if they ate mostly organic foods – was set at 0.6%.
As for the more concrete details on the individual plans of the participants, these were not available. The researchers wrote in the study that participants self-reported their dietary habits through questionnaires, a method of data collection that leaves plenty of room for error. Perhaps a respondent categorized non-organic foods as organic? Maybe he misunderstood what he ate There are many variables unknown.
Along with the new study, Frank Hu, chairman of the T.H. Department of Nutrition at Harvard University, also published a commentary commented. Chan School of Public Health. He is very involved in the world of nutrition and has served on the most recent US Government Advisory Committee on Dietary Guidelines. Hu did not show effusion on his faith in the work.
"The consumption of organic foods is notoriously difficult to evaluate, and its self-assessment is very likely to be confused by healthy behaviors for health and socio-economic factors," Hu wrote.
In other words, all the study participants were treated equally, but that's not happening in the real world. People who can afford to eat organic foods generally enjoy better health throughout their lives. However, the 68,946 original participants were not necessarily all part of a high socio-economic income bracket. In fact, the study does not provide any socio-economic data on the participants.
Finally, as Hu points out, the study is written in such a way as to "imply" that people who reported consuming more organic food were less likely to be exposed, in general, to pesticide residues present in the food. other foods. It's a totally unfounded implication. Someone might have recommended eating organic tomatoes every day of the week, but also eating non-organic apples every day of the week.
The new research is therefore interesting, but it should be taken with a grain of salt and not chosen – at least not yet – as an announced call to eat only organic foods. There are still many unresolved issues and many barriers to adopting this type of plan. As Hu said, perhaps we should start by tackling the herculean task of convincing people to simply eat more fruits and vegetables. Then we can start talking about organic versus non-organic products.
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