Caffeine Intake Linked to Miscarriage?
The media can have a tremendous impact on other people’s opinions, so much so, that people even develop a sense of fear from the media. Many consumers of the media are quick to form uneducated opinions just based on what they read in one article. Because of the media’s lack of information present to pose any real threats, people have the tendency to become susceptible to fear tactics used in the media.
The Chicago Tribune recently published an article that claimed that a couple’s caffeine intake leads to miscarriage. Right from the beginning, this article instills fear among people, especially couples planning to become pregnant or already expecting. This article hits on two things that most people love- caffeine and babies. Twist the article so that it seems like one is causing harm to the other, and people are instantly afraid. However, readers need to realize that this article doesn’t any identify any real threats. Caffeine has never been good for people’s health, so why not blame miscarriage on drinking too much caffeine?
The first sentence in this article states, “A couple’s risk of miscarriage may rise when the woman or man consumes more than two caffeinated drinks a day in the weeks leading up to conception, a new study suggests”. This opening sentence should suggest anything but fear to the readers. First of all, “the risk of miscarriage MAY rise” shows that there isn’t enough proof to link the two problems together. Secondly, drinking more than two caffeinated drinks a day isn’t good for anyone’s health, even if there isn’t a baby involved. Lastly, “a new study suggests” isn’t a very reliable source. How is anyone supposed to know who is conducting the study and what the study is focused on? Yet, there are probably people out there who are now afraid to drink one cup of coffee because of the fear tactic used in this article.
This article gives no new information to determine how likely the threats are to affect people. Throughout the article, there are multiple statements that don’t pose any threat whatsoever, such as, “The study doesn’t prove that caffeine causes miscarriage” and “The reason caffeine is linked to miscarriage is unknown”. There are also statements that can already be proven without caffeine being involved as part of the problem, such as, “The new research also found that women who took a daily multivitamin before conception and through early pregnancy were less likely to miscarry” and “The risk for miscarriage nearly doubled for women 35 and older, the researchers found”. Obviously taking a multivitamin can only benefit women during pregnancy and there have already been studies that have found that women over 35 are more at risk for complications during pregnancy, so these new “researchers” really don’t have anymore useful information that pose as likely threats to people.
Even the two sources used in the article couldn’t validate any proof that caffeine was linked to miscarriage. One of the sources, Katherine Sapra (postdoctoral fellow at the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development), offered two solutions for this caffeine threat- drinking no more than three cups of coffee or other sources of caffeine per day and taking a multivitamin everyday. So, basically Sapra offered no new advice.
This article is a perfect example of how news sources use fear tactics to scare their readers. There is no solid evidence that can link caffeine to miscarriages based on the information present in this article. Readers need to be aware that the news can be wrong at times or provide faulty information. It is important for all consumers to do more research outside of reading one article in order to gather as much information about the topic as they can so that they don’t fall prey to the media’s fear tactics.