Berman's PR campaign against Mercury Warnings

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...Berman's latest campaign is to convince the public that fears about toxic levels of mercury in tuna are wildly overblown. According to a spokesman at the Center for Consumer Freedom, of which Berman is the executive director (he also heads the PR firm Berman & Co.), overly cautious federal agencies are to blame for understating the amount of mercury-tainted fish a pregnant woman would have to eat before putting her fetus at risk for brain damage. For years, the FDA and the EPA have cautioned children, pregnant women, and those who might become pregnant to avoid eating more than about one serving of white albacore tuna a week and to abstain altogether from four types of large, predatory fish that test high in mercury...

But if you go to fishscam.com, a well-designed, content-heavy website, you'll find a mercury calculator that allows you to type in your body weight and click on the kind of fish you want to eat. The calculator does the math based upon the BDLL "to demonstrate the actual dose of mercury in tuna and other fish that's completely safe to eat." According to Berman, a 160-pound pregnant woman could safely eat up to 3.2 pounds of albacore tuna a week. That's a lot more than the FDA recommends....

Berman is also fighting health advocates who want sodas and sugary snacks removed from schools, and just about anyone else who seeks to curtail what Berman calls personal freedom and responsibility in the name of the public good. His campaigns can seem so over-the-top that many activists laugh when his name comes up.

Still, it would be a mistake to underestimate the lobbyist, whose message may be hitting home with Congress. On December 15 the House Committee on Energy and Commerce approved HR 4167, a measure that would prevent states from placing food warnings stricter than federal warnings. If the National Food Uniformity Act is passed, supermarket shoppers in states like California that have for years required mercury warnings on fish will be affected.

http://villagevoice.com/people/0603,hunter,71775,24.html