Originally broadcast August 15, 2024
Dr. Aaron Carroll raises eyebrows with statements that highlight contradictory health advice: “‘Eggs are going to kill you because of cholesterol’ — ‘oh, it actually doesn’t matter. Eat as many eggs as you like.’ ‘Red meat will kill you.’ ‘Oh no, read meat can be part of a diet.’ ‘Drink no alcohol’ … ‘Oh, no no. Drinking red wine is perfectly healthy.’”
Dr. Carroll has devoted his career to advocating for scientific and research communities need to improve how they discuss nuance, especially in health. Dr. Carroll, serving as CEO of the AcademyHealth, says “science is portrayed as binary — positive or negative — and that can breed mistrust from the public.”
“The way that we discuss nutrition and food [can] burn people’s belief in science, in that it feels like people are told one or the other,” Dr. Carroll tells “Conversations on Health Care” hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter.
For most people, ramping up or cutting out consumption of one particular food “can add a tiny bit of risk here or there. But the extremes that we are often sold, one way or the other, about what you should and should not eat are often not really well-supported by science,” he says.
It’s not that new data disproves old research, he says. But both add up to a more complex picture. “When you describe things in absolute terms … it creates a climate where people don’t trust exactly what you’re saying.”
Despite the constantly changing nature of science, nurses and doctors are still consistently held in high trust, Dr. Carroll says. One way to add nuance to public discourse is to use trusted voices to help people understand what questions to ask when they hear new information: Pre-buttal, as opposed to rebuttal, as he puts it. “[That] is much more powerful than trying to change their minds after they’ve heard things that are just not true.”
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | Podchaser | TuneIn | RSS | More
Originally broadcast April 22, 2025 Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced…
Originally broadcast April 17, 2025 The U.S. healthcare system could save up to 500,000 lives…
Originally broadcast April 10, 2025 Eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes founded his eponymous Medical Institute over…
Originally broadcast April 3, 2025 Roughly 85% of respondents to a survey cited by Michael…
Originally broadcast March 27, 2025 Two young innovators are leading a movement that proves food…
Originally broadcast March 20, 2025 Mary Bono has left the halls of Congress, but she’s…