Exaggerations?

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The following comes from a slide presented by (?) at the Low Carb Down Under tour.  You can click to enlarge, but here's what the slide says under the title "What changed in the 1900s?"

• Sat fat down 83%
• Veggie oil/margarine up 535%
• Sugar up 1150%

Now, no doubt there are changes in eating habits, and perhaps "down under" people changed their eating habits even more dramatically than we Americans have, or are purported to have.  I've blogged many times that something's "off" with any stats indicating that Americans actually consume a low fat diet, but I'm not going to address the fat claims above.  It's the sugar claim that just screams -- that can't be so?!

Here's sugar consumption in the US from this article.  If we cheat downward to the two dips in the curve after that, and say we consumed 30 kg/individual in 1900 and 70 kg/individual in 2000, that comes to a 133% increase in sugar consumption in the 1900's.  Let's go back to ~1850 where sugar consumption appears to tick up starting around 8 kg/individual.  So from 1850 to 2000, this amounts to a 775% increase.  I guess this presenter is going back to 1750 where sugar consumption appears to be about 3-4 kg/individual so we've had a horrifyingly 1650% increase in sugar consumption!!  OK, if you're interested in hyperbolic statistics, there's your money game...

Now, look at the obesity curve there.  Yeah, it tracks somewhat in the latter half of the 20th century with sugar consumption, and unfortunately there appear to be points missing in the mid century and data only begins in late 1800's ...still I think we can safely extrapolate those low rates back to 1850.

• 1850 - 1900 
• Obesity flat around 3% 
• Sugar consumption 8kg to 30 kg/individual = 275% increase
• 1900 - 1950 
• Obesity 3% to 9% = 200% increase
• Sugar consumption flat, fluctuated up to 45 kg or 50% increase twice in the 50 year period.
• 1950 - 2000  
• Obesity 9% to 40% = 344% increase
• Sugar consumption 30 to 70kg = 133% increase

Well, if we're going to play games with numbers like this ...   I'd rather we didn't, how about you?  Exaggerating to promote an agenda may work on some, but it will not go over well in the end.    {EDIT:  This is an odd study/graph, they use UK data - circles, and US data - diamonds, for the sugar consumption. I think this is still a useful example.}

Percent increases/decreases are the least helpful way of presenting these statistics because they are dependent on the magnitude of the starting point.  Well, least helpful to the consumer of the information anyway.   Case in point:

• 1850-1900 sugar consumption increased by about 22 kg/individual which amounted to 275% because consumption started at around 8% in this time frame.
• 1950-2000 sugar consumption increased by about 40 kg/individual which amounted to 133% because consumption started at around 30% in this time frame.

So the absolute increase in sugar consumption from 1950-2000 was almost double the absolute increase from 1850-1900.  And yet reported as a % increase, 1950-2000 was less than half that calculated for 1850-1900.  The absolute increases in sugar consumption are alarming enough in their own right and tell the better story.  No smoke and mirrors of percent increases necessary.