Rickets?

Browsing around the BBC website, I ran across a story about the unexpected benefits of the Harry Potter books. Some British Pediatric physicians noted that on the weekends that the Harry Potter books were released, emergency room (casualty) visits dropped by more than 50%. They were rather pleased with this finding, but worried that if children read too much, they may become obese, suffer from rickets, or develop cardiovascular problems.

They went on to publish in the British Medical Journal:

"It may.. be hypothesised that there is a place for a committee of safety conscious, talented writers who could produce high quality books for the purpose of injury prevention."

Hello doctors! How about reading for the sake of reading and simply accept that children who read a lot may be prone to fewer accidents and call it a double bonus. And what about published children’s authors who already have their books lining the shelves of libraries and bookstores? Do these doctors have children? Or talk to any children?

As for rickets...swapping computer games and television for books is probably going to be a fairly even trade-off. If the kids haven’t developed rickets from all the TV and computer games yet, they probably won’t by picking up the occasional book. Heck, I read several books a week when I was a pre-teen with nary a sign of rickets or obesity or heart problems. And besides—in the summer time, I took my books outside to read them. You can’t do that with a television.

When doctors get all serious and scholarly, they can be pretty funny. A committee of safety conscious, talented writers...oh my.