“Drink enough soda and your bones could pop” the headline from the Charleston Gazette rang out on Saturday. “Drinking pop in school when I was a student was unheard of,” Richwood High English teacher Susan Johnson said. “Back then, everyone drank milk, and it seems there were a lot fewer broken bones.” That estimation is about as scientific as the Harvard School of Medicine study by Grace Wyshak that the Gazette’s story is centered on. Wyshak found cola drinkers were five times more likely to have broken bones. Of course, Wysak acknowledges that the study didn’t measure bone density, didn’t ask how much soda the girls drank and can’t necessarily prove a true cause-and-effect relationship. (“Health,” Chicago Tribune, 11/8/00
