“Noise destroys information by introducing uncertainty” - Principles of Neural Design @whatishealth21 We have a problematic amount of noise online around health, with zero accountability by those who create it. It’s harmful to a healthy system, society. More to come.

Oasis fear for profit scheme continues. Lead in everyday vegetables: Potatoes: 4.82 µg /serving - About 9x CA Prop 65 - 220% above FDA threshold for children Lettuce: 2.15 µg /serving - About 4x CA Prop 65 - 98% of FDA threshold for children. Tomato: 1.14 µg /serving - About 4x CA Prop 65 - 48% of FDA threshold for children. Food from the earth has trace heavy metals. This does not mean it’s harmful. The Prop 65 level is set with a 1,000x margin of safety to “no observable harm.” That means this threshold says you could have 1,000 times the level - or 162 Aloha bars - every day, for years, and would still see no harm. Not to mention these levels were set based on the context of lead contamination in drinking water (ie, pipes), not naturally occurring lead forms - which are far less bioavailable. Next, the FDA threshold for children must be compared against children portions, not adults. So once again Oasis missed basic arithmetic and are falsely representing the data. Calling out food for having trace heavy metals and saying it’s a health crisis is like calling out breathing for being toxic because too much oxygen in your blood is harmful. If you want to eat food, you will consume heavy metals. And you’ll be just fine. Consuming this type of content, however, will result in fear and misunderstanding.

Seeing this “study” going around? It’s a flawed basic understanding of biology and tests. Plus click-bait headlines tying this to dietary xylitol, when the very testing methodology has nothing to do with that. The data in the report says higher BLOOD xylitol linked to 57% elevated incidence of heart attack and stroke. The headline says “xylitol found in gum linked to higher heart attack risk” This is so bad. The blood test for xylitol is done FASTED. Dietary xylitol has been shown to have a 15-20 MINUTE half-life in your body. This means that dietary xylitol is literally long-gone by the time the test is collected. The xylitol measured in these results is what the BODY MAKES. That simple fact is baked right into the method of data-collection. But why bother checking into those kinds of things these days? Fear-maxxing is a better strategy for reach. And accountability is all but zero. The actual story here? The body makes about 10g of xylitol a day in the normal course of business. Kidney disease or reduced kidney function increases blood xylitol. So does liver failure, insulin resistance, and oxidative stress. You know… the things we’ve well established as connections to heart disease and stroke.

You’ve seen the backlash against many beloved brands from a report citing no avocado oil in avocado products? Something seems off. 95% of olive oils passed, yet 90% of avocado oil failed? Testing methodology was good - but what if the fat matrix it was judged against is flawed? There’s something called a Codex that the tests results are compared against. The Codex for olive oil has be refined for 40 years. The codex for avocados is 2 years old. Oils vary by region, season, strain. This could be a simple error of an insufficient Codex standard for the range of produced avocado oil. Could very well be a false representation by suppliers too. But with the recent reveal that, for example, the “big microplastic exposé” was actually bad testing from glove residue in lab work, we should take a beat to really look at methodologies.

Blue zones based on fraudulent data. (Old news but many not aware). Unfortunately, lots of “the science” writ large is littered with bad data-sets like this. Blue zones oriented around longevity. Turns out, in many of the top scoring countries, ~80% of the Centurian’s were dead but not reported as such because their families were still collecting pension checks. Audits later down the line revealed this. Also, turned out, you could buy blue zone status with some pull for tourism cred.

I keep hearing from more companies that have been harmed by Oasis or other fear-maxxing accounts that misrepresent testing. Founders are either afraid to speak up and risk making things worse or are earlier in their startup and not able to afford litigation. 1) Reach out if you want to connect with our counsel - they have a other brands in the works. 2) Read our cease and desist and complaint. Build on and reference the legal work and research that has gone into this. For the last 18 months we've made good faith efforts in direct communications with them on how to accurately read test results. More broadly, there's years of research that's gone into this by myself and our team.

I’m afraid this seems to be more likely across many disciplines of health research.

Bringing legal action is difficult. But sometimes necessary. Today we sent a letter to Oasis. I’ve attached it below. Read on if you want the background. … I first heard of Oasis in December 2024 when they published false reports about LMNT. I publicly and privately explained to the founder why he was reading lab results wrong. 300x wrong, to be specific. He failed to make corrections. I let it go. But I kept hearing from founders being unfairly treated. Kept seeing these guys put out made up content that would go viral. Striking fear into thoughtful people concerned for their health. 4 other brands (so far) have sent cease and desist letters with him for falsifying test reporting. He’s been mocking them online about it. No rigor. Not recognizing there is a group of people (scientists and brands) who actually operate and know how this stuff works. Like basic math. Like basic testing protocols. Just last week, an Oasis post misrepresenting heavy metal levels in protein went viral. It reached 3.5MM people on twitter that day. They got called on it and retracted it with a public apology – the retraction reached 27k people on twitter. That’s a 100x higher reach on false information than the truth. Blatant errors in reading test results, paired with language like “heavy metals in protein causes neurological impairment and birth defects in kids” strikes terror in people - especially new parents. Many feel that reform is unlikely. I prefer to be optimistic of people. If Oasis wants to stay in this business, I suggest they: - Immediately remove themselves from the App Store. Defamatory damages build every day for each misrepresented brand. - Rebuild the entire framework of their app with a reputable toxicologist and scientist input with a fair framework equitably applied to all brands (no personal bias penalties). - Correct the misinformation, with equitable reach, on each of the brands damaged. - Develop communications guidelines for social media. Context over clickbait. Empowerment over fear. Consumer choice over chaos. Oasis has defamed dozens if not hundreds of brands now and misled millions of people. And I have heard from many other brands and consumers wondering how to help make this stop. This is not just Oasis. There are other offenders too. I’ve never been a fan of litigation. I’m really not thrilled about it. But I am committed to it. If you won’t stand up for your product, who will? And don’t people want to be customers of brands that stand behind what they make? I do. If damages are ultimately awarded, they will go to charity. It’s hard to stand up for what’s true online these days. At some point, when it gets bad enough, some people do.

"Wikipedia is the best thing ever. Anyone in the world can write anything they want about any subject. So you know you are getting the best possible information." - Michael Scott, The Office, 2007