'Study: Ginkgo useless!' read the front-page headline last week at the top of the much read msn.com web site.

Ginkgo "did not enhance performance on standard neuropsychological tests of learning, memory, naming and verbal fluency, or attention and concentration," according to the study referred to in the headline. The study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The National Institute on Aging of the National Institutes of Health funded the study.

Some of the biggest, most well-known and impressive names in popular news, private education and public governmental groups decry the use of ginkgo.

Impressive.

It must be true then, that the extract of the leaves from the ancient ginkgo biloba "Offers No Mental Benefit" and "Doesn't Aid Memory" as the headlines at the popular internet portal yahoo.com declare from the media giants Reuters and Associated Press news services.

Right?

What was that old adage?

This ginkgo study was conducted with 203 individuals in good mental health over a six week period. At the end of the study there was no difference detected between those who took ginkgo and those who did not.

First of all let me just state for the record that I don't have a dog in this fight. I have no experience with ginkgo biloba.

However, I do know a little bit about the claims for ginkgo.

Ginkgo biloba is put forth as beneficial for those with mild to moderate mental impairment. This new study that is being offered as proof that ginkgo has no value was tested on individuals without mental impairment.

OK, think this one through.

Gather 203 individuals in good mental health. Give half of them an anti-depressant (take your pick -- Paxil, Zoloft, whatever). After six weeks check 'em out.

Voila!

At the end of the study you won't find those who took the anti-depressant to be less depressed than the other group because neither group was depressed in the first place!

By the same token, the promoters of ginkgo say it is helpful to those suffering from memory problems. Testing the herb on those without memory problems and then noting it is worthless because there was no improved memory is just not honest.

NOW I remember!

It didn't take any ginkgo biloba to bring this old adage to mind: Figures don't lie but liars can figure. It only took a shabby study on ginkgo and lemming-like news coverage to follow.

Games people play

The lead author of the study who also secured its funding ended a recent interview with the npr program "Morning Edition" as follows:

"… when someone goes to their physician, and he or she prescribes for them a medication, they can be confident that that medication has gone through a very rigorous series of tests and studies that have all been scrutinized carefully by the FDA. When someone goes to a supermarket and buys a so-called nutriceutical or supplement, they can have no confidence that that nutriceutical has undergone the same level of scrutiny, and again the judgement needs to be made whether these things really work."

Well, after careful scrutiny the judgement needs to be made that the only confidence in this recently published study of the supplement ginkgo is what used to be called a confidence game. These days that is usually just referred to by its shortened name -- A CON.