AZ Astrea
October 28th 04, 12:31 AM
The Halloween Candy Scare - Parents, Police, and Physicians Once Again
Mobilized
10/25/2004 6:05:00 PM
Every Halloween, police and medical centers across the country X-ray candy
collected by trick-or-treaters to check for razors, needles, or pins that
might have been placed there by strangers intending to hurt or kill
innocent children
But no sinister foreign objects are found.
"Parents across America are scaring themselves, and their children,
needlessly," says Benjamin Radford, managing editor of Skeptical Inquirer
magazine and the author of Media Mythmakers: How Journalists, Activists,
and Advertisers Mislead Us (Prometheus Books, 2003). "X-raying candy helps
parents feel like they are protecting their children, but in fact they are
simply wasting time and resources and scaring their children needlessly."
Year after year, Radford has searched for news reports about dangerous
candy and contacted facilities across the country that X-ray candy. He has
never found (or even heard of) such a case. "This scary tale is essentially
an urban legend; there has never been a case of this happening," says
Radford. "Despite e-mail warnings, scary stories, and Ann Landers columns
to the contrary, there have been only two confirmed cases of children being
killed by poisoned Halloween candy. In both of those cases, the children
were killed not in a random act by strangers, but intentionally murdered by
one of their parents. The 'original' and best known case was that of Ronald
Clark O'Bryan, who killed his son in 1974 by lacing his Pixie Stix with
cyanide."
He adds, "While parents and children should of course examine the candy
they collect, they should realize that the threat is virtually non-
existent."
Radford believes that there are better uses for the X-ray equipment and
technicians than combating a baseless myth. "We have people who need health
care in this country, and instead we're X-raying Snickers bars."
~AZ~
Mobilized
10/25/2004 6:05:00 PM
Every Halloween, police and medical centers across the country X-ray candy
collected by trick-or-treaters to check for razors, needles, or pins that
might have been placed there by strangers intending to hurt or kill
innocent children
But no sinister foreign objects are found.
"Parents across America are scaring themselves, and their children,
needlessly," says Benjamin Radford, managing editor of Skeptical Inquirer
magazine and the author of Media Mythmakers: How Journalists, Activists,
and Advertisers Mislead Us (Prometheus Books, 2003). "X-raying candy helps
parents feel like they are protecting their children, but in fact they are
simply wasting time and resources and scaring their children needlessly."
Year after year, Radford has searched for news reports about dangerous
candy and contacted facilities across the country that X-ray candy. He has
never found (or even heard of) such a case. "This scary tale is essentially
an urban legend; there has never been a case of this happening," says
Radford. "Despite e-mail warnings, scary stories, and Ann Landers columns
to the contrary, there have been only two confirmed cases of children being
killed by poisoned Halloween candy. In both of those cases, the children
were killed not in a random act by strangers, but intentionally murdered by
one of their parents. The 'original' and best known case was that of Ronald
Clark O'Bryan, who killed his son in 1974 by lacing his Pixie Stix with
cyanide."
He adds, "While parents and children should of course examine the candy
they collect, they should realize that the threat is virtually non-
existent."
Radford believes that there are better uses for the X-ray equipment and
technicians than combating a baseless myth. "We have people who need health
care in this country, and instead we're X-raying Snickers bars."
~AZ~