Day 030 - 03 Oct 94 - Page 72


     
     1
     2   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  You have probably come across them before?
     3        A.  Yes.
     4
     5   MR. RAMPTON:  What it tells the reader -- I take it you would
     6        know better than I -- a public information document?
     7        A.  Yes.  These are characteristical documents put out
     8        from time to time by the Health Education Authority.
     9
    10   Q.   The Europe against Cancer Initiative, whatever it may be,
    11        presumably was a co-operative venture or still is amongst
    12        the member states of the EEC?
    13        A.  Yes.
    14
    15   Q.   This is the UK's contribution?
    16        A.  Yes, I would expect so.
    17
    18   Q.   So we can regard it, at any rate, at that date as
    19        authoritative, can we?
    20        A.  I am not sure I would use the word "authoritative".
    21        In my own work I tended not to summarise work which was
    22        produced by the Health Education Authority or bodies like
    23        that in other countries.  But, leaving other countries out
    24        of it, the Health Education Authority in this country
    25        I think, quite reasonably and understandably, is bidden to
    26        stay behind what is the formal official view, so that in
    27        the absence of any reports, any COMA Report, sanctioned by
    28        the government, either on diet and disease as a whole, the
    29        DRV report in this case, or on diet and cancer in
    30        particular, which is forthcoming, anything produced by the
    31        Health Education Authority would always, I think
    32        understandably, veer on the cautious side; hence, for
    33        example, a phrase under "fats", "many researchers suspect
    34        a link between these cancers and the food people eat".
    35        The reason for a phrase like that is, if you wish, turning
    36        to your profession, a prejudicial statement; that is a
    37        statement before the evidence goes into the equivalent of
    38        court.
    39
    40   Q.   But, you see, Mr. Cannon, it is really no different in
    41        effect that passage, is it, in its advice to the consumer,
    42        to the general public than what COMA was saying in 1991?
    43        A.  It is broadly the same.
    44
    45   Q.   Can we look at what this -----
    46
    47   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Mr. Rampton, can I just say, I have also,
    48        because my eye had not fallen on it before, looked at page
    49        20 and the last paragraph in the left-hand column there.
    50 
    51   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes, exactly.  That is very helpful.  Page 20, do 
    52        you see that?  "Eat plenty of fibre, fruit, beans, peas", 
    53        and there you find, do you not -- have you got it?
    54        A.  Yes, indeed.
    55
    56   Q.   Please read it.  I do not want to ask you a question
    57        unless you have read it.
    58        A.  If I might, could I start on page 19 on "fats"?
    59
    60   Q.   Yes.

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