October 13, 2025 — We have trust issues. It is true in every dimension of life today, so it should be no surprise that we face increasing skepticism about healthy eating advice. In a review of the IFIC Food and Health Survey research, one fact stands out to us. Among U.S. adults, 79% say it’s hard to know what […]
September 14, 2025 — The attention economy has been getting a lot of, well, attention lately. In fact, the phenomenon is nothing new. People have been competing for the attention of Americans since the rise of cheap daily newspapers in the 19th century. But lately it seems that the quest to command attention is taking over more and more […]
July 10, 2025 — Whatever one’s politics, it should be plain to all that this is a humbling moment for the righteous cause of public health. An essay by John Tierney in The Atlantic says public health has discredited itself. Tierney describes the state of things in stark terms: “Although many skeptics have overreacted, rejecting sound science in favor […]
March 2, 2025 — Stuff happens. That was the response of a cynical U.S. health secretary last week to the needless death of a child from measles in the midst of an outbreak growing worse in Texas and New Mexico. The situation tells us the cost of cynicism can be death – in this case, the death of an […]
December 29, 2024 — In recent years, a troubling trend has emerged – a growing distrust in health science, particularly in fields like nutrition and obesity. This skepticism isn’t just about healthy debate or constructive criticism. It’s about an erosion of confidence in scientific expertise. In the age of social media and viral misinformation, unreasonable doubts have real consequences […]
April 28, 2024 — Daniella Lamas is a critical care physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. She recalls telling the wife of a patient who was dying something she did not want to hear about her husband’s care. The woman told Lamas: “Why should I believe you? I don’t think that I do.” The Imperative for Trust […]
March 11, 2024 — We can point to any number of symptoms. The rise of measles because of skepticism about vaccination comes to mind. Certainly, we hear from people who reject scientific concepts about obesity. So it’s no surprise to us that a new report in PNAS documents high but declining public confidence in science. Arthur Lupia, David Allison, […]
February 25, 2024 — Are we cynical? We can surely find excuses to be. Examples of cynicism pop up at every glance. Certainly we see it in politics and public policy. Closer to home at ConscienHealth, people routinely find reasons for cynicism about all kinds of medical research and advice – especially nutrition and obesity. This is a real […]
January 22, 2024 — Breastfeeding is such a good idea. But unfortunately, it doesn’t do much to prevent obesity. No matter. On the subject of breastfeeding and preventing obesity in children, we have policy-based evidence – the answer is preset. A new paper in Pediatrics lines up with this. Based on yet another finding of an association between breastfeeding […]
January 7, 2024 — We are living is a time of concern about mistrust, misinformation, and polarization. Edelman has been warning us for years now about deepening distrust that promotes misinformation because people do not know what to believe. It promotes polarization because they come to trust only people with beliefs similar to their own. As we confront misinformation, healthy […]
