|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
ONE WORD 
|
TV is a powerful medium, and the Alar incident in the United States back in 1989 shows exactly what can happen if you are careless about using that power when it comes to things we eat.
Alar is a growth suppressant used to keep fruit from ripening too fast. On Feb. 26, 1989, CBS’s flagship current affairs program “60 Minutes” started with a picture of an apple covered by an image of a skull and crossbones. The anchor said a highly carcinogenic chemical was being sprayed on apples. Citing a report by an environmental group, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the program claimed that 5,300 children who ate apples were going to get cancer. One interviewee said eating Alar apples was like playing “supermarket roulette.” In other words, buying apples from the neighborhood supermarket was like playing Russian roulette.
After the program aired, the Environmental Protection Agency was inundated with phone calls from people asking if they were allowed to throw their apple juice down the drain or if they needed to send them to toxic materials experts for disposal. One mother who saw the Alar report called 911 and had police stop her child’s school bus so she could remove the apple she packed in the child’s lunchbox.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Drug Administration and Environmental Protection Agency held a joint press conference saying it was safe to eat apples, but fears among consumers showed no signs of subsiding. Eventually, food manufacturers said they would not use Alar apples, while the producer of the chemical pledged it would no longer sell that substance. The whole controversy finally came to an end in 1991 after a UN panel of researchers, which included the WHO and the Food and Agriculture Organization concluded that there was no reason for alarm. But that was after apple farmers and food makers suffered US$400 million in losses. And there are probably a countless number of stories of human suffering behind the $400 million figure.
It is true that experiments on lab mice showed Alar was carcinogenic. The problem was the dosage. The lab mice were being injected with a daily dose of Alar equivalent to drinking 19,000 l of apple juice a day for the rest of their lives. At that amount, even if a substance is not carcinogenic, the quantity alone could trigger stress and lead to cancer. The Alar report remains a textbook example of exaggerating the facts in media reports.
There are many similarities to the mad cow scare in Korea. It involved suspicions about something we eat, was triggered by a broadcast report, led by an activist group and resulted in a nationwide hysteria. There is also a similarity in the way the broadcaster responsible for the scare responded to claims of factual errors. When it faced intensifying criticism that it had exaggerated and distorted the facts, “60 Minutes” aired a follow-up program on May 14 with an interview with world-renowned cancer expert Bruce Ames of the University of California at Berkeley. Ames said fears of the dangers posed by Alar were ridiculous. The anchor asked whether Ames represented the interests of the agro-chemical industry and the professor responded by saying he was absolutely independent. But “60 Minutes” ran a subtitle saying there was no evidence supporting his claim of being independent other than his word.
In its broadcast on June 24, “PD Diary” said the anchor had made a mistake by saying a downer cow shown in the program months ago was “possibly” infected with mad cow disease. Regarding the controversy it faces over distorting the facts, the “PD Diary” producers said they regretted creating room for misunderstanding due to “liberal” translation. But at the same time they complained that they were being accused when a bigger issue is being ignored. On Wednesday, one of the translators of “PD Diary” on the program’s website said she had raised concerns several times that linking a downer cow with mad cow disease was distorting the facts. “PD Diary” responded by saying the woman was just one out of 13 translators who worked for the program.
It was later revealed that the Alar report on “60 Minutes” was the result of careful planning by a public relations firm that was working for an environmental group. The strategy of the PR firm was to give “60 Minutes” the exclusive story, while simultaneous press conferences were held and celebrities like Meryl Streep would be mobilized as advocates. This shows how a program can be distorted and swayed if TV broadcasters get fixated on provocative images.
The column was contributed by Chosun Ilbo in-house columnist Han Sam-hee.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
PACIFIC
KOREA, INC., 364-1 Sunwha, Jung-ku, Daejeon 301-050, Korea.
TEL.+82(42)2546502, 2566853, FAX.(42)2570528
|
|
