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]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]] SCARE OF THE WEEK [[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[
(4/22/1989)
By Daniel E. Koshland, Jr., editor of SCIENCE
From Science 244, p. 9 (7 April 1989)
[Kindly uploaded by Freeman 10602PANC]
The fable of the boy who cried wolf is as pertinent today as
it was in Aesop's time. We are being subjected to the scare of
the week. Some of these scares may reflect real dangers, but
they are becoming obscured by a cacophony of false or exag-
gerated ones. Two that hit the headlines recently illustrate
quite different problems.
The first was a highly publicized announcement by the Natural
Resources Defense Council that Alar-treated apples would cause
thousands of cancer deaths to children. The reaction was
predictable: school districts quickly canceled apple distribution
and the fruit piled up on grocery shelves. The facts came more
slowly. Only 5% of apples are treated with Alar, and in that 5%
the levels of Alar are well below conservative Environmental
Protection Agency tolerances. Even in a worst case scenario the
probability of cancer among the affected group would change from
25% to 25.025%. When health commissioners announced the facts,
the country returned to normal and apples were returned to school
districts and grocery shelves. However, serious psychological
and financial damage was sustained.
It is time to recognize that public interest groups have
conflicts of interest, just as do business groups, even though
their public positions are orthogonal. Businesses prefer to be
out of the limelight; public interest groups like to be in it.
Because they are selling products in the marketplace, businesses
downplay discussions of hazards. Because public interest groups
acquire members by publicity, they emphasize hazards. Each group
convinces itself that its worthy goals justify oversimplification
to an ``ignorant'' public. Businesses today have product
liability and can incur legal damages if they place a dangerous
product on the market. Public interest groups have no such
constraints at the moment; it may be time to develop appropriate
ones so that victims of irresponsible information have redress.
Public interest groups, as well as apple growers, contribute
importantly to our society, but both groups should be accountable
for their acts.
The second scare was the banning of Chilean grapes after a
terrorist threat and the finding of traces of a little cyanide in
two grapes. On the surface it resembles the Alar scare: the
amounts of cyanide were found to be negligible, so the job losses
and the ensuing ill will created among Chilean farmers seemed
disproportionate in retrospect. The difference is that eating
too much cyanide can cause instant death, whereas Alar presents a
possible danger only over a lifetime of consumption and that
scare required no instantaneous action. Although the Chilean
grape scare may have been more justifiable, a reevaluation
suggests that a less extreme reaction would have been more
appropriate.
The overreaction in these cases has as its background the
present climate in our society in which complete safety without
cost is seen as a feasible goal. The possibility of danger,
therefore, is perceived to result from chicanery, negligence, or
incompetence. In such a climate, officials respond with extreme
measures. Because increased costs in either the affected
products or in taxes are not obviously linked to these official
actions, the system becomes tilted to overreaction. A certain
balance is necessary to prevent the costs of legitimate safety
measures from becoming prohibitive. A graphic illustration of
this problem surfaced recently with the arrest in Los Angeles of
a person who admitted having made about a hundred bomb threats to
airlines, all false, each of which had to be investigated by
authorities. If every threat causes flights to be canceled or
fruit to be removed from grocery shelves, terrorists and
psychotics will soon be able to grind society to a halt. On the
other hand, the alternative of broadcasting each threat, caveat
emptor with a vengeance, would soon cause all warnings to be
ignored.
To thread our way between real dangers and false alarms, we
must often let officials decide which terrorist threats deserve
wide publicity, and the public must be understanding of risks as
well. Because these officials cannot always be right they
deserve to be judged on an overall record, not from any certainty
of hindsight. The public must recognize that a risk-free society
is not only impossible, but intolerably expensive. At some point
the real danger of too much pesticide must be balanced against
the value to poor people of cheaper fruit. There are numerous
deaths from falls down stairs in the home every year, but we do
not advocate that all staircases be replaced by elevators.
Scares of the week are in the same category. We cannot afford to
be complacent about real threats, but we must remember that to be
alive is to be at risk. -- Daniel E. Koshland, Jr.
* * *
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