“... a big federally funded study found.”
A big red flag went up when I read that.
The majority of medical studies are federally funded, including all studies I have been involved with in one capacity or another. There is actually very little private funding of medical research, and when there is, questions arise about whether the research is really objective, given that the funding corporation might have a financial interest in a certain outcome.
As long as the science is sound and reproducible, and experts review the studies to ensure scientific validity, the source of funding should not be an issue. That said, an observational study such as the one described here has a lot of flaws due to the type of study. These flaws may be unavoidable, since we are limited with what we can do with human subjects. I would wait to see if others can replicate this finding before getting all excited about the prospect of discontinuing what is currently the standard of care.
My first thought also