 Veronique Gingras, MSc, PhD In August and September 2017, three nutrition studies derived from the PURE study were published in the Lancet and an old, endless – and somewhat tiresome – debate resurfaced: is a low-carbohydrate or a low-fat diet better for your health? These publications received tremendous attention with headlines such as: Study challenges conventional wisdom on fats, fruits and vegetables or PURE shakes up nutritional field: finds high fat intake beneficial. However, many of the headlines either exaggerated or misrepresented the findings. The media coverage that followed highlights how important it is to be cautious when we interpret and present results.
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 Full disclosure: all of my colleagues refused to write a blog post on this topic. “Ewww,” one said. “I don’t feel comfortable writing about that,” said another. Even when I pointed out that our department has written papers on very similar topics, they all declined. So I decided to tackle it myself, because a) it’s a topic that applies to everyone who was ever born, b) is biologically very important and interesting, and c), I think it’s an excellent example of how the implications of a small but interesting scientific study can be misinterpreted, exaggerated, or distorted.
 Oprah -- yes, THE Oprah -- recently made headline news with her $43 million dollar investment in the diet company Weight Watchers. She also announced that she is now actively participating in their famous “points” program. While I admire her for being so public with her weight struggles over the years, I started thinking about why some individuals spend half their lives trying to lose weight and keep it off, and others never count a calorie (or point or carb) in their entire life.
 Lately I’ve felt defensive when ordering food at restaurants. “Can you let me know if this has any gluten in it? I have celiac disease,” I’ll say while silently whispering to myself: please believe me. Over the past few years, those of us with celiac disease – a genetic disorder in which the gluten protein found in wheat, rye, and barley triggers a damaging autoimmune response – have found ourselves in an awkward spot. There’s now greater awareness than ever before of what gluten is, which foods contain it, and why people diagnosed with celiac disease need to scrupulously avoid it. Yet eating gluten-free has also become a fad, with many people avoiding wheat without receiving a formal diagnosis. Some people self-diagnose themselves with “gluten sensitivity”, or a wheat allergy, or simply insist that they feel better when they avoid gluten. Unfortunately, this has led to skepticism over gluten-free diets in general.
 It’s hard to go too long in today’s 24-hour news cycle without seeing headlines announcing the “latest scientific report” on weight loss, fad diets, or why the health trend of the moment is the best thing you never knew about. And as exciting as many of these news reports seem at first, these research headlines are often a sugar-coated version of the real story. And the outcomes of these studies may not even be the most important part.
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