OK, so many news stories today are reporting the new statistics suggesting (with lots of head-scratching and remaining doubts by some observers) that the U.S. had the biggest single-year decline in deaths since 1938.

If true, who or what gets the credit?

The Star Tribune, in its first sentence,says it's "a powerful testament to medical advances." It quotes a state health department official attributing it to "technology" and drugs.

Whoa! Where is any discussion of prevention, of lifestyle changes, of a "powerful testament to public health"?

This journalism-juiced love affair with high tech and emphasis on medicine with minimal or no mention of public health is troubling, sensational, and short-sighted. We need to remember: the U.S. spends more on health care than any other country and has outcomes worse than many other countries. People in countries that spend less on technology and drugs live longer than Americans.

Not only do these statistics demand more scrutiny, as many have already stated, but so do the possible explanations for any possible decline in the death rate. Journalists, don't be cheerleaders for high-tech and drugs if you don't have the evidence to back that up.

First day traffic to the new HealthNewsReview.org website was strong yesterday, with thousands of journalists and consumers visiting the site.

Public comment has been overwhelmingly positive.

Merrill Goozner of the Center for Science in the Public Interest wrote on his blog: "...I'm hoping a new effort by journalism professor Gary Schwitzer of the University of Minnesota has some impact on the profession. ... He's deployed several graduate students to monitor stories in dozens of newspapers and broadcasts and grade them with one to five stars -- just like the movies! By hacking around his website for a few minutes, I quickly discovered that the grades were based on solid, objective evaluation criteria. Any reporter looking to see why their work earned a poor rating could learn a lot by delving into the details of the critique.

I wish him well in his efforts. Health care journalism has to get off the dead end track of reporting the latest study du jour, which is a one-way ticket to flacking for the drug industry. If there are any reporters reading this blog, I encourage you to check out his site. It's got a lot to offer."

I’m proud to unveil a project I’ve been working on for 8 months. Please visit HealthNewsReview.org to see a new attempt to help improve health journalism in the U.S.

A team of more than 20 reviewers from journalism, medicine, public health and health services research will evaluate and grade health news stories that include claims of efficacy or safety about treatments or procedures in health care.

An Associated Press story on the launch today quotes one observer saying she hopes the site doesn’t "end up being another media-bashing exercise." This website is not about media-bashing. It is quite the opposite: it is about supporting excellence in health/medical journalism.

We hope that journalists and consumers will use HealthNewsReview.org each day to help improve critical thinking and scrutiny of new ideas in health care. And we welcome your feedback.

HealthNewsReview.org is an attempt to help improve the accuracy, balance and completeness of news stories that make claims about new ideas in health care. It is not intended to belittle the hard work of well-intentioned journalists. I covered health and medical news on a daily basis for 15 years and I know about deadline pressures. I know you don't always have the time and space you need. I know that you don't call all the shots - that editors or producers or news directors play a significant role in what is finally reported.

Our ratings criteria are clear and fair. And, yes, they're tough. Journalists may ask, "How can you expect us to cover all of these in each story?" But good health care journalists find a way to fit this information into their stories (see a five-star example on this site). One thing is inarguable: consumers need this information in order to make good health care decisions. We set the bar high. Consumers deserve nothing less.

We also want to thank the Media Doctor websites in Australia and Canada - our inspiration for this site.

A top Canadian health care journalist, Andre Picard of The Globe and Mail of Toronto, has been reviewed by the Media Doctor Canada project. In a recent e-mail to me, Picard wrote: "I actually like having my stories reviewed because we get so little useful feedback." Once he received a weaker two-star grade for a vaccine story. "When I looked back at the two star effort I thought: ‘Yes, there's some basic info missing.’ When I wrote another vaccine story recently, I was more careful and thorough. Some of my colleagues complain that the criteria are unfair, that they don't have room to get everything in every story. I don't have a lot of sympathy for that - and most of my stories are in the 400-800 word range."

We hope that U.S. journalists find our reviews helpful and accept the constructive criticism. This project is intended to support excellence in health and medical journalism. But it's also intended to help news consumers and health care consumers get the information they need to make decisions.

Here's more followup to the Center for Media & Democracy's report on the use of Video News Releases last week.

The LA Daily News picked up the story and reported that one of the culprit TV stations found to use VNRs is in that second biggest TV market in the country - KABC.

They reported: "Last September, Channel 7, the ABC affiliate for Los Angeles, aired a story during the 5 p.m. Tuesday newscast about a blood test to find allergies in kids. It looked like a legit news story, with interviews, graphics, cute kids and a voice-over by a Channel 7 news reporter. It wasn't, though. The report was a canned video news release, or VNR, produced for and paid by Quest Diagnostics, a company that runs labs around the country that do this very sort of testing. There was no disclosure by the station that the piece was an advertorial."

KCBS and KTLA in Los Angeles were also found to run VNRs without disclosing it.

In all, the report found 36 VNRs airing on 77 stations all over the country, and every newspaper in those cities should be telling the story, as the LA Daily News did.