Day 030 - 03 Oct 94 - Page 33
1
2 Q. There is no need to read it out unless Mr. Morris or
3 Ms. Steel want you to, because I can read it in your
4 statement.
5 A. Then I would say, because I would wish to make a
6 statement on this, the statement complained of, the
7 statement made by London Greenpeace, seems to me actually
8 rather carefully phrased. What that statement says is
9 that a diet high in fat, sugar, animal product and salt
10 (sodium) and low in fibre, then you interpolate of course
11 in this context, "which describes a typical McDonald's
12 meal, is linked with cancers of the breast and bowel and
13 heart disease. This is accepted medical fact".
14
15 I would only wish to comment on the last sentence. I
16 would not have phrased it like that, but if instead it had
17 said: "This is generally accepted as true among the
18 medical and scientific profession", which I think comes to
19 the same thing, then I would accept that.
20
21 MR. MORRIS: When you say -----
22 A. The other point I would make, which may be relevant to
23 this case, is what the currency of this statement is,
24 because when consensus develops on any matter of public
25 interest -- here we are talking, of course, about
26 nutrition and public health -- it develops over a period
27 of time. If London Greenpeace had issued that statement
28 in 1750 or even in 1950, I could not have agreed with it.
29
30 Q. Just on that last point about accepted medical fact; you
31 said earlier that as from 1982 the consensus had clearly
32 emerged?
33 A. No. I am saying that the view of the National Academy
34 of Sciences, which then very rapidly was taken up by the
35 relevant cancer charities in the States that set the
36 agenda on these issues (the National Cancer Institute, the
37 American Cancer Society), that was a consensual view in
38 the States by the mid-80s and accepted by government in
39 the States in 1988; different countries move at different
40 speeds.
41
42 Q. When you said that the quote was "carefully phrased", the
43 word "linked" is actually not as strong as "causes"?
44 A. That is what I mean; London Greenpeace could have been
45 more lurid.
46
47 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You have really gone into the area which
48 I have to decide. Put simply what it means.
49
50 MR. MORRIS: Specifically with that statement, would you concur
51 with that statement as a whole?
52 A. Yes, and I think it would have been clearer if the
53 term "causally linked" had been used as well because, of
54 course, "linked" by itself can just suggest association
55 without any causal link. The clear implication of that
56 passage to me, if I may, is that the link is causal. I am
57 assuming that is what was meant.
58
59 Again, perhaps I should elaborate that a little. Using
60 the term "causal", I again, my own interpretation of the
