Day 298 - 11 Nov 96 - Page 41
1 Her view was that that statement could mislead people. She
2 went on to say that she thought that in promoting healthy
3 eating there were lots of factors which prevent the
4 information getting through to people clearly. One of
5 those factors was that it was difficult to get people to
6 change habits and, also, that there were a number of people
7 saying the opposite thing, and people saying the opposite
8 thing tended to be the food industry and companies which
9 wanted to promote particular foods -- which obviously would
10 apply to McDonald's. That was on page 24.
11
12 She went on it say that when a diet that is obviously high
13 in fat, high in salt and low in fibre, and low in vitamins
14 and minerals, then it misleads people to say it is a
15 nutritious part of the diet, because it gives people the
16 impression that it is OK to have a McDonald's meal every
17 day, and that that would be misleading the public. That
18 was on page 24, as well.
19
20 On page 36, she said that the consensus on salt and blood
21 pressure had existed for about 20 to 25 years, and her view
22 was not going to be changed by one paper which was put by
23 Mr. Rampton. That was line 22.
24
25 When she was questioned about whether or not there was a
26 consensus about diet and cancer, she said that there was no
27 disagreement that reducing fat will prevent certain
28 cancers; nobody is saying all cancers. Then she referred
29 to the Government report -- well, nobody is saying all
30 cancers, as the government report said, that Mr. Rampton
31 had alluded to. The paragraph in that report was talking
32 about cancers in general. She said that, yes, it was true
33 that there is not a consensus about cancers in general, but
34 in relation to specific cancers, the diet-related cancers,
35 i.e., colon cancer, breast cancer and others, were
36 considered to be diet-related; and that is, without a
37 doubt, the case or the view of anybody working in the
38 field. That was on page 42, line 32.
39
40 This was kind of explained a bit better later on, on page
41 56. With reference to the World Health Organisation
42 report, she agreed with the conclusions -- which I think
43 are particularly important, bearing in mind that the
44 Plaintiffs are trying to deny the causal relationship
45 between diet and cancer on the basis that you cannot show
46 which individual components have which effect; that the
47 World Health Organisation report says that high fat intake
48 is associated with cancer at several sites; certainty about
49 the optimum intake of fat in relation to cancer must await
50 future research such as control trials, but, in the
51 meantime, international correlation analysis and other
52 epidemiological data indicates that fat intakes of less
53 than 30 percent of total energy will be needed to attain a
54 low risk of fat-related cancers, and that a reduction in
55 risk is also likely when fat intake is reduced towards
56 30 percent, especially if its dietary changes is combined
57 with the change of other dietary components. That was page
58 56, line 30.
59
60 The final point -- and this is all I have to say today --
