Healthy Skepticism Library item: 11806

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

O'Dowd A.
Scientists challenge companies' dubious marketing claims
BMJ 2007 Oct 20; 335:(7624):795
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/short/335/7624/795-b?etoc

Abstract:

Young scientists have challenged 11 big companies over their marketing claims about the health benefits of their products, ranging from yogurts to spa treatments, which have been described as “extraordinary.”

These 11 named companies are making “unproven and pseudoscientific” claims about their products, according to a report funded by Sense About Science, a charity that promotes good science and evidence for the public.

In the report There Goes the Science Bit: A Guide to Standing up for Science for Early Career Researchers, the authors say that they decided it was time to question some of the claims and see what evidence existed to back them up.

A team calling themselves “early career researchers”-a group of doctoral and postdoctoral scientists-contacted the companies’ customer service helplines to ask questions and received responses, some of which they describe as shocking and some ridiculous.

In one example, the team questioned a claim from . . .