A study about the way medical studies are reported in the media doesn’t engender confidence in the press’s ability to convey scientific information to the public. The analysis of 187 news stories from newspapers, television and radio about studies reported at scientific conferences found that many relevant details were not reported. Only 6 percent of stories about animal studies mentioned that the results were not necessarily relevant to humans, 21 percent of stories about studies involving fewer than 30 subjects mentioned the studies’ imprecision, 29 percent of the 142 stories about treatments mentioned any potential downside, and just two out of 175 stories about unpublished results mentioned that the studies were unpublished, had not undergone peer review or were preliminary.

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