Day 052 - 21 Nov 94 - Page 27
1 causal relationship? You see, as I have heard -- you may
2 well be right but when I read "linked with" I thought that
3 meant "causally linked with", but it has occurred to me
4 since last November that there may be another reason for
5 the use of the words "linked with", "associated with", that
6 those are words used by scientists very often in papers
7 which are to do with population studies.
8
9 MR. RAMPTON: Yes, positive association.
10
11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes. Population studies, it might be argued,
12 cannot actually show that a certain kind of diet causes a
13 person a certain kind of degenerative disease because
14 population studies are not apt to do that, it might be
15 said. The very most they can do is show that if a
16 population's diet is such and such there is a higher
17 incidence of a certain kind of degenerative disease. So,
18 words like "linked with" or "associated with", one might
19 think of rather bland words, are used because the
20 scientists are actually stopping short of saying: "It does
21 actually cause it". Is that a tenable argument or not?
22
23 MR. RAMPTON: It depends in what context the argument is
24 placed. As a proposition, it is plainly right that
25 scientists use those words when they do not mean "caused"
26 or "causal association". That is perfectly right. But if
27 it is placed in the context of the question: What does
28 this leaflet mean or is capable of meaning? Second, if it
29 means "causation", what is the evidence required to prove
30 that to be true? Well, then, really the fact that some
31 scientists may believe or may see in epidemiological
32 evidence of the population studies an association which
33 suggests the need for further research, perhaps in the
34 laboratory and perhaps in the hospital, is quite
35 irrelevant. It takes your Lordship nowhere.
36
37 All I am concerned about at the moment, having made my
38 submissions about the meaning of the leaflet, is this, that
39 having now asked your Lordship to allow us to state with
40 complete clarity what we say is the meaning of the leaflet,
41 that the Defendants should not seek to persuade your
42 Lordship, or should not succeed in persuading your
43 Lordship, that they are in any sense prejudiced by that.
44 The reason I mentioned the passage about heart disease just
45 now is this: I noticed -- I have only read it briefly --
46 in the Defendants' skeleton argument there is something to
47 the effect: "Oh, well, we, the Plaintiffs, never made it
48 clear that we had conceded that the relationship between
49 diet and heart disease was a causal one".
50
51 I pose two questions about that; first, is it credible?
52 But, second, even if it were, would it matter? Even if
53 I conceded now -- in fact, I have conceded it earlier in
54 the case, I think, possibly when Professor Wheelock was
55 giving evidence, possibly when Dr. Arnott was, I cannot
56 remember -- even if I were to concede it in those terms
57 now, which I am quite willing to do, it leads nowhere; it
58 has no consequence.
59
60 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, that may be another matter. What I am
