The way Oz portrayed it, he was using flowery language to express his enthusiasm for promising new supplements, and then he himself was victimized by unscrupulous manufacturers: Companies that used his name, likeness and statements to sell name-brand versions of the generic supplements that he endorsed.
The members showed only limited sympathy for his complaints, pointing out that he was the one pumping those substances up in the first place. We all have the experience as elected officials of [having] any word that can be taken out of context, said Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) with a wry smile. But at the same time, in addition to being a celebrity, you're a doctor, and I believe that doctors have this duty to give [your audience] the best evidence.
Midway through the hearing, after lengthy lines of questioning from McCaskill and Klobuchar, Oz came under cross-examination by Sen. Dean Heller, a Republican from Nevada. (Heller, who lost his Senate seat in 2018, is now running for governor of Nevada.) Heller cut straight to the point, asking Oz whether or not he believed in the existence of a miracle pill that causes consumers to lose weight.
Theres not a pill that's going to help you, long-term, lose weight, live the best life without diet and exercise, Oz responded.
Do you believe theres a magic weight-loss cure out there? said Heller.
Oz stammered. If youre selling something because its magical, no, he said. If youre arguing that its going to be magic because if you stop eating carbohydrates youre going to use a lot of weight, thats a truthful statement.
I asked Matthew Eisenberg, an expert on health economics and policy, at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, to review Ozs testimony. He said that Oz's rhetorical sleights-of-hand disclaiming "magical" while defending "it's going to be magic" are a common feature of deceptive advertising in the weight-loss industry. And despite Oz's careful parsing of claims like that, several of his hearing statements ran afoul of both scientific and regulatory consensus, said Eisenberg. In his written testimony, says Eisenberg, Oz clearly violated the Federal Trade Commissions guidance to dietary supplement companies when he referred to a pills ability to melt fat.
The scientific consensus is that pills cannot do that, and the regulatory consensus is [the same], said Eisenberg. The FTC has said no product can say in their advertisement that a product burns or melts fat.
Neither the FTCs recommendations nor Congress scorn has done much to deter Oz, whose lucrative empire has thrived despite being repeatedly condemned in mainstream medical circles for making unsupported claims about diet and weight-loss products. In 2013, a team of researchers at Georgetown University analyzed the various health recommendations made on Ozs show, finding that about 78 percent of those recommendations did not align with evidence-based medical guidelines, society recommendations, or authority statements. In 2018, without admitting liability, Oz agreed to pay a $5.25 million settlement in a class-action lawsuit alleging that he misrepresented the efficacy of two weight-loss pills, which he had referred to on his show as a revolutionary fat buster and magic weight-loss cure.
Ozs critics characterize him as a charlatan and early in the hearing, McCaskill came just short of doing exactly that. When Oz defended his decision to peddle unproven weight-loss drugs by noting that he had also promoted the healing power of prayer, McCaskill shot back, But you dont have to buy prayer prayer is free.
Yes, prayer is free, said Oz. Thats a very good point.
Chalking Ozs endorsements of weight-loss pills up to simple greed, though, misses something critical about his enterprise. During the question-and-answer portion of the hearing, Oz repeatedly noted that he had never sold any specific dietary supplements through his show, nor has he profited directly from the sale of the supplements that he endorsed. Although there is little doubt that Oz has profited handsomely over the years from his audiences credulity his show has been on-air for 13 seasons and he has written eight New York Times bestsellers he didnt make money from selling diet pills. Asked by Klobuchar why he chose not to sell products himself, Oz said, A doctor shouldnt sell products. You wouldnt trust me if you came to me for advice and I said Oh, youd got a stubbed toe here, take my version of a solving cream.
But the efficacy of the pills that he endorsed may not really matter to the core of his enterprise. When pressed by McCaskill about his support for miracle weight-loss pills, Oz conceded, I recognize that oftentimes, [my claims] dont have the scientific muster to present as fact. My job, I feel, on the show is to be a cheerleader for the audience, and when they dont think they have hope, or when they dont think they can make it happen, I look everywhere for any evidence that might be supportive to them.
Despite the subcommittees focus on diet supplements, the hearing got at something deeper about what Ozs real product is: not weight-loss pills at all, but rather the promise of an alternative reality.
Seven years after the Senate put Ozs brand of misinformation on trial, the court of public opinion has returned a not guilty verdict. Far from posing a challenge to Ozs political credibility, the deluge of pseudoscience and misinformation that emerged from the pandemic has proved that Americans are more eager than ever to buy what he is selling. Huge swaths of the country are turning away from a medically effective vaccine and embracing random treatments touted by the politicians they like. Oz himself offers a diagnosis of the countrys political ills that is primarily metaphysical rather than material. Im running for the Senate to empower you to control your destiny, to reinvigorate our great nation, and to reignite the divine spark that we should always be seeing in each other, wrote Oz in the Washington Examiner.
Oz hasnt yet offered a policy prescription for relighting the nations divine spark.
See the original post here:
The Scientific Community Is Almost Monolithic Against You: When Dr. Oz Went to the Senate - POLITICO Magazine
