[SomeCallMeTim]

I know, I read the article about sugar as well. And I think there's a good chance it's probably right, and as a result I'm eating less sugar. It was actually when I went from drinking a six-pack of soda a day to none at all that I immediately stopped gaining weight and started losing weight.

My point about trans fats is that it's been known for YEARS that they're bad, and as you point out it's only recent that people have been believing it. I've been avoiding trans fats for over ten years, since well before most people had heard of them, but the original studies showing they were bad news date back to the 50s.

I think you may have misunderstood my point. What I'm saying is that the "it's another health scare meme" is a dangerous concept because it causes people to ignore ALL health advice they hear. Your point about false health claims reinforces my point: Because a lot of "health claims" made in the press are based on a single study (which could be poorly designed or just randomly showing a result), people now ignore all health advice. They've lost faith that any health advice can possibly be useful to them.

That's why I'm saying that it's a dangerous habit to label every new health report as a "health scare meme." On the other hand, it's also important to take pretty much anything you see in the press with a grain of salt. My hope is that, now that we have Google and other online research options, it will be easier to debunk the garbage ("my all protein diet is good for you!") and determine what the studies really show.