Peruvian Fishtale Shiploads

I stopped in a South Carolina breakfast joint yesterday while driving cross-country. Best biscuits I've had in a while, and somehow I managed to stop at two. While waiting for the main course I decided to check some email, and guess what I saw? An ad for fish oil - but it wasn't MY fish oil

This one was from a doctor who has been in the vitamin business for quite some time. If I didn't know what I know about this business, this letter would have scared me to death. But since I didn't just fall off a turnip truck, (I learned that phrase here in South Carolina from a waitress), I started laughing about a third of the way into the letter.

Look, I don't mind bragging if it can be backed up. But this ad was doing the bragging part right, and missing out completely on the second half of the equation.

In his letter the good doctor says he sources his fish oil in southern Peru and Chile. He calls this "non-industrial waters." That's creative, but ocean water is ocean water.

He makes the claim that fish sourced in European waters contains 8 times more dioxins than fish sourced off Peru and Chile. The information comes from something called the Scientific Committee on Food. I tried looking up this committee, but couldn't find it.

He claims his Peruvian fish oil is high quality - but I don't think you can get high quality from where you can't even get clean water. Maybe that's a little too much common sense for him.

All I saw were lots of supposedly scientific comparisons that were anything but. He even uses the straw man technique, which a chart and everything. And shockingly his oil comes out on top.

I didn't see anything about pharmaceutical grade fish oil, which has worldwide standards. Just a comparison among commercial grades.

In summation: Stick with pharmaceutical grade fish oil. You won't get it from Peru.