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Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
"Meat consumption is just as dangerous to public health as tobacco use … It’s time we looked into holding the meat producers and fast-food outlets legally accountable."
— PCRM’s Neal Barnard in a September 1999 U.S. Newswire press release, urging a federal lawsuit against “Big Meat”
"To give a child animal products is a form of child abuse."
— from Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) president Neal Barnard's 1994 book, Food For Life
"The general approach used by PCRM takes selective data and quotations, often out of context … In response to a Resolution passed unanimously at the recent AMA House of Delegates meeting, the American Medical Association calls upon the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine to immediately terminate the inappropriate and unethical tactics your organization uses to manipulate public opinion."
— Letter to PCRM’s Neal Barnard, from James Todd, executive vice president of the American Medical Association, July 26, 1990
"The AMA continues to marvel at how effectively a fringe organization of questionable repute continues to hoodwink the media with a series of questionable research that fails to enhance public health. Instead, it serves only to advance the agenda of activist groups interested in perverting medical science. The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine is an animal ‘rights’ organization, and, despite its title, represents less than .5 percent of the total U.S. physician population. Its founder, Dr. Neal Barnard, is also the scientific advisor to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), an organization that supports and speaks for the terrorist organization knows as the Animal Liberation Front (ALF)."
— from a September, 1992 censure of PCRM issued by the American Medical Association
"The major purpose of [Foundation to Support Animal Protection (FSAP)] appears to be to enable PETA and PCRM to evade public recognition of their relationship, the real extent of their direct mail expenditures, and the real extent and nature of their assets. If FSAP, PETA, and PCRM were seen as a single fundraising unit, as the existence and activities of FSAP indicate they should be …"
— Animal People News, December 2002
Background
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. PCRM is a fanatical animal rights group that seeks to remove eggs, milk, and meat from the American diet, and to eliminate the use of animals in scientific research. Despite its close ties to violent animal-rights zealots and “above ground” animal activist groups like People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), PCRM has successfully duped the media and much of the general public into believing that it represents the medical community.
While PCRM presents itself as a doctor-supported, unbiased source of health guidance, the group’s own literature shows that 95 percent of its members never graduated from medical school. And the American Medical Association (AMA), which actually represents the medical profession, calls PCRM a “fringe organization” that uses “unethical tactics” and is “interested in perverting medical science.”
PCRM is a font of medical disinformation. The group has argued, with a straight face, that animal experiments “interfere with new drug development.” They reject the consensus of the respectable medical community by writing articles with titles like “Animal Experimentation Leads AIDS Research Astray.”
PCRM discourages Americans from making donations to health charities like the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, the American Foundation for AIDS Research, the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, the American Red Cross, and even Boys Town. All because they support research that makes use of animals to cure human diseases. PCRM’s multi-year crusade against the March of Dimes has made headlines nationwide.
Attacking Meat and Dairy
Often appearing in a lab coat, PCRM president Neal Barnard looks the part of a dedicated health expert. He also churns out a steady stream of reliably anti-meat and anti-dairy nutrition research. Because his “results” emphatically conclude that a vegan diet will solve dozens of health problems, the mass media eats them up. But Barnard was trained as a psychiatrist. His “studies” generally aren’t submitted for peer review, and they typically involve only a handful of subjects.
PCRM’s “nutritional” advice boils down to one basic message: don’t eat meat, or anything that comes from animals. The group calls school lunches “weapons of mass destruction” for including meat. It has complained to the Federal Trade Commission about advertisements that depict meat as part of a healthy diet. It even petitioned the government to slap meat and eggs with a “biohazard label.”
“There’s no room for chicken in a healthy diet,” an article in one of its publications insists. PCRM’s argument? A big non sequitur: “Chicken, no matter how smartly advertised, will never contain fiber, complex carbohydrates, or vitamin C.”
In 1994, PCRM created an ad that suggested eating meat is "tantamount to suicide." The ad began: "Last year, over a million people left the same suicide note." Under that headline a handwritten note read: "Shopping list: Butter, eggs, mayo, potato chips, ham, bacon."
A 2003 PCRM ad campaign had the same theme. The group bought a full page in the “Hospital Guide” issue of U.S. News & World Report and used the space to imply that eating meat will put you on a hospital gurney. The ad places readers in the position of a patient, looking up at surgeons, and reads: “High-Protein Diets Can Have Surprising Results.”
And so it goes with milk. PCRM claims that dairy causes “a host of medical problems like cancer, anemia, diabetes, and heart disease.” The group has compared Christopher Columbus’s introduction of cheese in the New World to the 15th century contagions that ravaged Native American populations. It also makes the ridiculous argument that policy makers “should think of drinking milk the same way we think of smoking cigars.”
A January 23, 2002 article by the Cybercast News Service further reveals PCRM’s duplicity:
A Harvard professor is denouncing efforts by an animal rights group to show a link between milk and cancer, accusing it of misrepresenting his research. The group Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) is using the research of Dr. Daniel Cramer, M.D. to support a recent ad campaign that claims milk and dairy products contribute to "obesity, ear infections, constipation, respiratory problems, heart disease, and some cancers."
But Cramer said those conclusions are false and that his research never supported such claims … “I think that particular group has their own sort of agenda, of not wanting milk production around, and cows to be utilized," said Cramer. "Their agenda is that [they] don't want ... cows exploited or they want everybody to be vegetarians," Cramer said.
Participating in Fast-Food Lawsuits
One of the most farcical aspects of American culture in the last few years has been the advent of lawsuits blaming restaurants and food companies for individuals’ obesity. Even before such cases became the stuff of late-night television comedy, PCRM was demanding tobacco-style federal lawsuits against meat producers and fast-food restaurants. Claiming that "meat consumption is just as dangerous to public health as tobacco use," PCRM recommended that the Justice Department "begin preparing a case against major meat producers and retailers." That was in 1999.
In the summer of 2002, New York City attorney Samuel Hirsch filed suit against McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Burger King, and KFC, alleging that the restaurant chains should be held financially responsible for some of their customers’ obesity and health problems. The suit’s lead plaintiff was an obese maintenance worker named Caesar Barber. At the time, PCRM stated that it “applauds the lawsuit filed Wednesday in a New York State court that holds four fast-food chains responsible for an obese man’s health problems.”
Less than a month after the Barber lawsuit was filed, PCRM threatened doctors with possible legal action. “An ad targeting primary care physicians -- with the headline ‘Could Prescribing a High-Protein Diet Put You at Legal Risk?’ -- will debut the following week on The Journal of Family Practice's Web site,” PCRM wrote in a press release. In the release, Neal Barnard alleged that doctors who prescribe high-protein diets “may be assuming serious legal liability."
When Samuel Hirsch filed a second lawsuit early in 2003 (this time blaming McDonald’s alone for the weight problems of children), Barnard’s name appeared four times in the legal complaint. One section read:
The Defendants' [sic] allegedly distributed attractive plastic toys and booklets on what they consider to be good nutrition. One of these toys is a plastic beefsteak named "Slugger," which flexes its toy muscles as if to suggest that meat gives strength. Dr. Neil [sic] Barnard, a physician who is the president of the Physician's [sic] Committee for Responsible Medicine (with over 5000 members) testified that the accompanying booklet stated that eating two servings a day of foods in the meat group "can make it easier to do things like climb higher and ride your bike farther." However, as Dr. Neal Barnard noted, the aforementioned "Slugger" representation was deceptive as foods in the meat group do not increase endurance or athletic prowess, and do not improve a child's capacity to climb or ride, and the concept that high-protein foods are essential for endurance was proved false many years ago. See Exhibit J, Witness Statement, Dr. Neil [sic] Barnard.
In June 2003, Barnard’s book Breaking the Food Seduction went on sale. Part 1, less than 60 pages of the book, uses "recently conducted but previously unpublicized studies" (translation: research conducted by animal-rights radicals, which has not been peer-reviewed) to argue that meat, cheese, and chocolate -- all anathema to the PETA crowd -- are addictive. Part 2, more than 200 pages long, makes the case for a vegan diet. The book is littered with absurd claims (page 51 insinuates that there's morphine in milk) and is exactly what you'd expect from an animal-rights zealot posing as a nutritionist.
Except that the press release announcing Barnard’s book was headlined: "Nutrition Expert Provides New Ammunition for Fast-Food Lawsuits." The release insisted that "it's high time we stopped blaming ourselves" for overeating. Instead, PCRM argues, we should blame restaurants and the food industry. After all, Neal Barnard has declared that meat is addictive, and cheese is “morphine on a cracker.”
PCRM is also engaged in its own lawsuit against Tyson Foods. It seems that an ad campaign describing chicken as “heart healthy” ruffled PCRM’s feathers, even though the American Heart Association says that Tyson’s products are exactly that. The bogus lawsuit also complains about the company describing their products as “all natural,” even though the USDA approves of Tyson’s use of the term.
What Real Doctors Think of PCRM
The American Medical Association (AMA) has issued two public censures of PCRM. One reads:
The AMA continues to marvel at how effectively a fringe organization of questionable repute continues to hoodwink the media with a series of questionable research that fails to enhance public health. Instead, it serves only to advance the agenda of activist groups interested in perverting medical science. The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine is an animal “rights” organization, and, despite its title, represents less than 0.5 percent of the total U.S. physician population. Its founder, Dr. Neal Barnard, is also the scientific advisor to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), an organization that supports and speaks for the terrorist organization known as the Animal Liberation Front (ALF).
The AMA also declares that PCRM is “blatantly misleading Americans on a health matter and concealing its true purpose as an animal ‘rights’ organization.” It points out that PCRM’s animal rights agenda “definitely taints whatever unsubstantiated findings it may claim.” And it "finds the recommendations of PCRM irresponsible and potentially dangerous to the health and welfare of Americans." When he was the AMA’s senior vice president for science and medical education, Dr. M. Roy Schwarz wrote of PCRM: “They are neither responsible nor are they physicians.”
AMA Resolution 524, I-92, currently in force, reads in part:
The AMA will … continue to aggressively counter fallacious claims about biomedical research being made by animal rights groups and especially those of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine and the Medical Research Modernization Committee, two animal rights organizations that purport to speak for medicine.
In response to PCRM's campaign of deception against the use of animals in AIDS research, the president of the California Medical Association (CMA) sent a letter to Neal Barnard saying that the CMA’s House of Delegates had:
… voted unanimously to register the strongest objection to the lies and misrepresentations promulgated by your organization … The inability of the so-called “Physician’s Committee” to make the obvious distinction between misuse, and proper use of animal research subjects has resulted in a total loss of credibility for that organization.
Finally, a July 26, 1990 letter informing Barnard of the AMA’s censure asserts:
The general approach used by PCRM takes selective data and quotations, often out of context … In response to a Resolution passed unanimously at the recent AMA House of Delegates meeting, the American Medical Association calls upon the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine to immediately terminate the inappropriate and unethical tactics your organization uses to manipulate public opinion.
Big Lies
One particularly irksome element of PCRM’s behavior is that its pronouncements often explicitly disavow an animal-rights agenda. For example, Barnard’s response to a 1997 Washington Times article titled “Animal lovers boycott drug for menopause” implies that he has no concern whatever for animals. His disingenuous letter began: “Animal advocates are not the only people worried about Premarin.” Likewise, regarding PETA’s ad campaign linking milk to the prostate cancer of then New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Barnard wrote: "The Giuliani ads sparked outrage and debate, but what's been missing from the controversy is a focus on science." In both cases, Barnard misrepresented himself as an unbiased doctor in order to bolster the animal-rights position.
In a campaign against the United States Surgical Corporation (USSC) in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, PCRM brandished a petition supposedly including thousands of signatures from doctors who opposed USSC’s animal experimentation. PCRM even claimed the list had been “audited.” But according to the (now-defunct) Animal Rights Reporter, PCRM’s list contained “names of physicians who deny having signed or even seen the document. It also contains many names of persons who are not physicians.”
It’s worth noting that PCRM has never released a list of the 5,000 doctors it currently claims are members.
By the time PCRM trumpeted its petition in 1989, the campaign against USSC had become so intense that animal-rights militant Fran Stephanie Trutt attempted to assassinate the company’s president. PETA paid her legal expenses.
Big Money
Some of PCRM’s high-profile officers use their affiliation with the group to take financial advantage of an unwary public. Consider Cornell University’s Dr. T. Colin Campbell. This vocal PCRM Advisory Board member has appeared in print, warning of the supposed dangers related to dioxin in food (especially in meat). He also serves as chairman of a company called Paracelsian, Inc., which markets its own proprietary method of dioxin testing.
PCRM's name is also used to sell "Dr. McDougall’s 12-Day Diet Meal Plan,” a product marketed by PCRM Advisory Board member John McDougall. You can find this slick $120 bundle of cup-a-soup meals in grocery and health-food stores, as well as in the Sharper Image catalog.
Atkins-Blasting 'Physicians' Committee is a Front Group for PETA
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