Skip to main content

How to Write a Newspaper Nutrition Article

This article from the Miami Herald, "Popular Paleo Diet Still Has its Skeptics" by Deborah S. Hartz-Seeley, is a textbook example of how to write a nutrition article.

  • Choose a hot topic. In this case, paleo diets.
  • Describe the topic and how it got started. This article cites popular media and books written no less than 12 years ago; one book is from 1975. 
  • Find some examples of people who've tried the regimen. One man interviewed lost 200 pounds (yes, two hundred) and got rid of his acid reflux; a bariatric surgeon lost 40 pounds.
  • Somewhere in the article, mention that they are not alone. 
  • Create conflict. A couple of registered dieticians interviewed trot out the gospel of food groups, healthy whole grains, and warnings that more research is needed.
  • Recommend people talk to their doctor.

What NOT to do when writing a newspaper article on nutrition:
  • Proofread. "Just about everybody, including daytime talk show hosts and fitness bloggers, are touting..."
  • Look up recent sources of information. Dr. Cordain, whose book from 2001 is mentioned, wrote The Paleo Answer two years ago. In particular, he's changed his position on dietary fat. The book is one of over a dozen on the paleo diet that have come out in the past three years.
  • Fact check. Where to begin? Lean meat is not part of the Atkins Diet. The paleo diet is based on a great deal of scientific research in both medicine and anthropology, not just anecdotes. Grains are nutrient poor compared to paleo food.
  • Turn on your BS detector. Mark Bluh, according to the article, lost 200 pounds. He started out at 330, and he's six feet four. So he's now 130 pounds and six feet four inches? (A normal weight for a man that height would be 200 pounds. That was the height and weight of my ex-jerk, who was lean and toned.) The same diet that humans have lived on for 2.5 million years, a diet that corrects weight, allergies, acid reflux and avoids foods some people don't tolerate well, will make you ill? Consult a medical professional about diet, even though most of them look like they're 50 pounds overweight?
 Finally, send the article to the local newspaper and wait for a check.



Labels:

Comments

Galina L. said…
Such annoying article on several levels! You provide us with a good recipe how to cook one, I saw even worse examples, and diet advice on local news just full of infuriating BS. I wonder, how people manage to get payed for it, because anyone can write such cookie-cuter material.
November 16, 2013
Lori Miller said…
The dying industry of newspapers probably doesn't attract many bright young people. The article is such cookie-cutter material that I wonder if they recycled an old one with a couple of new interviews.
November 16, 2013
Lowcarb team member said…
Lori recently said "Haven't seen that yet, but I'm sure it's a gem. I like Kendrick's blog--I should have it on my blog roll."

Maybe slightly off topic but I see you have Dr Kendrick in your list now ... nice one

All the best Jan
November 17, 2013
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

My Long-Term Experience Eating Safe (and Other) Starches

Years ago, before the Perfect Health Diet came out, I followed a program that involved eating quite a bit "safe starch." It was called Body for Life. It involved eating six small servings of carbohydrate along with six small servings of protein, plus two servings of fibrous vegetables per day. (A serving was the size of your fist or the palm of your hand.) There were six workouts a week (three weightlifting, three cardio) and one free day every week where you ate whatever you wanted and didn't exercise. In all fairness, these two programs are different: BFL allows certain grains, legumes and low-fat dairy and discourages fat. It doesn't call for a wheelbarrow full of vegetation. Nevertheless, my experience eating lots of fruit and lots of starch is relevant to the PHD because the amount and type of digestible carbohydrates are similar, and for the first few years, I didn't eat wheat except on free days. At first on BFL, I felt great. Before, I was continually...
17 comments
Read more

Blog Lineup Change

Bye-bye, Fathead. I've enjoyed the blog, but can't endorse the high-fat, high-carb Perfect Health Diet that somehow makes so much sense to some otherwise bright people. An astrophysicist makes some rookie mistakes on a LC diet, misdiagnoses them, makes up "glucose deficiency," and creates a diet that's been shown in intervention studies to increase small LDL, which can lead to heart disease. A computer programmer believes in the diet and doesn't seem eager to refute it because, perhaps, scientists are freakin' liars and while he's good at spotting logical inconsistencies, lacks some intermediate knowledge of human biology. To Tom's credit, he says it's not the right diet for everyone, but given the truckload of food that has to be prepared and eaten, impracticality of following it while traveling (or even not traveling), and unsuitability for FODMAPs sufferers, diabetics and anyone prone to heart disease (i.e., much of the population), I'm...
24 comments
Read more

Carrageenan: A Sickening Thickener. Is it a Migraine Menace?

Let me tell you about my ride in an ambulance last night. I woke up at six o'clock from a nap with a mild headache. I ate dinner and took my vitamins, along with a couple of extra magnesium pills. Since magnesium helps my TMJ flare-ups, I thought it might help my headache. Then I went to see my mother. A few hours later, I had a severe headache, sinus pain and nausea. During a brief respite from the pain, I left for home, but less than a mile later, I got out of my car and threw up. A cop, Officer Fisher, pulled up behind me and asked if I was okay. He believed me when he said I hadn't been drinking, but he said I seemed lethargic and he wanted the paramedics to see me. (Later he mentioned that a man he'd recently stopped was having a stroke.) Thinking I had a migraine headache, the paramedics wanted to take me to the hospital. But since I knew that doctors don't know what causes migraine headaches, and I didn't know what effect their medicine would have on m...
15 comments
Read more