PHILADELPHIA – It is difficult to communicate medical risk to a large audience, especially when official recommendations conflict with emotional narratives. That is why, when the United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) in 2009 presented its guidelines for breast cancer screening, which recommended against routine screenings for asymptomatic women in their 40’s and biennial, rather than annual, mammograms for women over 50, the public responded with confused fury.
发自费城——与一个庞大的听众群体交流医学风险是一件相当艰难的事情，尤其是在官方建议与人们的情绪化描述相抵触的时候。而这也是美国预防医学工作组（USPSTF）在2009年所遇到的问题，当时该机构发布了其乳腺癌医学筛查指引，建议将原有的40岁以上无症状妇女每两年做一次筛查改为所有50岁以上的女性每年拍一张乳房X光片，结果却引发了公众的极大愤怒。