Skip to content

These doctor types really are tossers aren\’t they?

A study of more than 1,000 pregnant women found those who consumed lower amounts of iodine, which is absorbed from food and found in milk, dairy products and fish, were more likely to have children with lower IQs and reading abilities.

Iodine is essential for producing hormones made by the thyroid gland, which has a direct effect on the development of the foetal brain.

The study by researchers at Bristol and Surrey universities found two thirds of the 1,040 pregnant women they tested were iodine deficient. These women were more likely to have children with lower IQs, and it was found the lower the iodine the lower the IQ and reading ability.

Professor Margaret Rayman of the University of Surrey, who led the study, said: \”Our results clearly show the importance of adequate iodine status during early pregnancy, and emphasise the risk that iodine deficiency can pose to the developing infant, even in a country classified as only mildly iodine deficient.\”

Researchers have said pregnant women should ensure they get enough iodine by eating dairy products and fish, as well as drinking milk. But they warned against kelp supplements, as they can have ‘excessive levels’ of iodine.

Yes, this is well known.

Iodine deficieny in the mother leads to goitre, in the child to cretinism. Been known for a long time this. The solution is to stick iodine into hte salt that the population eats (sea salt has it already, mined salt may not).

And what have the doctors been terlling everyone? Eat less salt, where the iodine the pregnant women need is.

Tossers.

20 thoughts on “These doctor types really are tossers aren\’t they?”

  1. there was a doctor on the Beeb this morning moaning about sugar as well. Apparently we all eat too much of it and it gives us diabetes &c &c.

    His preferred solution was not to add it to anything at all. There is ‘enough’ apparently, naturally occurring.

    To which the only retort is “Get back to your fig-bottling!”*

    Whenever someone wants something banned now my default assumption is that they’re a c***. I am prepared, on a limited basis, to admit that some things are better off controlled. But when someone comes on telly saying things should be banned, it’s usually the case.

    Oh, and any headline beginning “We must…”. Nearly always wrong and illiberal ullage.

    *extra points for knowing this one.

  2. It seems to me that different people need, or can cope with, different amounts of salt. We’re salt fiends in our family (I used to each salt sandwiches as a kid), and all have low to middling blood pressure, even at times like these. Maybe there’s a link there.

  3. Offshore Observer

    “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants”

    And go for a walk a few days a week.

    You can pretty much eat anything you like then, no need to anything to be banned.

    Oh and if you don’t want to follow that advice, that’s fine, drink booze, smoke all you like, eat pizza every day. no skin off my nose, and I won’t have to fund your pension and healthcare cost as you will probably be dead by the time you are 50. Everyone wins, I save money and you have a great (if slightly shorter) time on this planet

  4. If you listed solely to medical advice you may live a few years longer but will you be enjoying yourself?
    Or will you have a miserable existance followed by a drive by shooting in your 50s?
    Something to be said for living life.

  5. hmm, that article dearie links to does not dispute idea that high salt intake is bad for you, but it suggests too low can be bad for you too.

    so when a doctor advises somebody to eat less salt, the wisdom of that advice depends on the whether they are currently eating too much, or not.

    if they are currently eating too much salt, the gains from eating less may or may not outweigh the costs of lost iodine.

    but yeah doctors, tossers.

    I mean, I know somebody who smoked lots and didn’t get cancer, what a load of nonsense all these ninnies warning us not to do this or that.

  6. Too high a salt intake is bad for you – if you already have heart problems or something else affected by salt. For everyone else, the vast majority of you, excess salt just gets excreted.

  7. sam, I saw that doctor too on BBC breakfast. He kept saying that the advice hasn’t changed for ten years. I kept shouting back “have we evolved in ten years to require a change in levels” and “if the advice was wrong then and needs correcting now, how correct are you going to be this time”. And quotes from the sugar people was read out he just said “vested interests”. And I shouted back “what about your vested interests in publicity, more secure job with better salary, more published articles leading to more publicity then”.

  8. These doctor types really are tossers arent they

    It is much much worse than that in the case of UK GPs.

    As well as being tossers they are incredibly overpaid and generally incompetent.

    And, to top it all, one of them got married to R Murphy.

  9. “when a doctor advises somebody to eat less salt, the wisdom of that advice depends on the whether they are currently eating too much, or not”: I have often had advice from doctors to do/eat more of one thing or less of another. Never have I been asked how much I was doing/eating in the first place.

    With one exception: booze. I always tell the truth about my drinking but know perfectly well that I’ll be disbelieved and that the doctor will assume that he should multiply by at least two.

    P.S. Here’s another salty link:
    http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.co.uk/2009/01/who-decides-what-you-can-eat-sating-on.html

  10. I was somewhat amused by the fact that non-organic milk has far more iodine than organic because of the way that the cows are fed.

  11. @SMLD

    I didn’t shout the first – I didn’t think of that – but I sure as hell shouted the second, or something very much like it.

  12. I am old enough to remember when every factory had salt tablet dispensers, and everyone who sweated was urged to use them.

  13. So Much For Subtlety

    Luis Enrique – “so when a doctor advises somebody to eat less salt, the wisdom of that advice depends on the whether they are currently eating too much, or not.”

    This just looks like the cholesterol defence to me – instead of admitting ignorance and bad advice for a generation, doctors simply made up a new category of “good cholesterol”. Now they are going for epicycles within epicycles when it comes to salt. It would probably be easier if they just said the scientific basis of their claim was not that strong and they do not really know.

    “I mean, I know somebody who smoked lots and didn-t get cancer, what a load of nonsense all these ninnies warning us not to do this or that.”

    Doll recruited tens of thousands of doctors and followed them over decades. He showed a strong and robust relationship between smoking and lung cancer. I would be hard put to think of any life style disease where that same level of proof has been reached. You put people on low fat, low salt diets and they die more often than if you do nothing. Doctors are not entitled to respect and belief because they are doctors. That only works if their science is good.

    9SadButMadLad – “Too high a salt intake is bad for you [] if you already have heart problems or something else affected by salt. For everyone else, the vast majority of you, excess salt just gets excreted.”

    It is almost as if we have, you know, evolved in an environment where there was a lot of salt. Which means, you know, our bodies can cope.

    SadButMadLad – “Where I come from, a hot country, the most refreshing drink is one made of milky yogurt and salt. Its called doogh.”

    You are an Afghan translator?

    I am not sure anyone is going to be holding up Iran as a country which people ought to copy health-wise.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *