CSPI, Where Contradictions Always Find A Home

Yesterday the Center for Science in the Public Interest released its distorted list of what it calls the “riskiest” foods. More than a few observers questioned why, for instance, CSPI insisted on claiming tuna was the third most risky food to eat when by its own calculations eight other foods on the list caused more illnesses.

What’s more, alert blogs like NewsBusters pointed out some of the most absurd contradictions from CSPI to date. If you read CSPI’s Nutrition Action News Letter you’ll see it promoting it’s Top Ten Super Foods For Better Health — at least three of those Super Foods are also named on its list of Riskiest Foods. So, employing CSPI’s matrix, it’s encouraging people to eat some of the riskiest foods– got it.

Those same news watchers made a good point when they singled out CNN for praise. The medical team and CNN Money were clearly guided by an interest in the facts when they reported this story and not interested in CSPI’s cherry-picked statistical hyperbole that danced around the fact that it had excluded from its report beef, chicken and pork-the proteins Americans eat the most of.

While CSPI claims to want to protect America’s food, it feeds journalists garbage and some appear to be catching on.