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Cancer Medicine Politics

John McCain: A “crazy cancer-ridden dishonest madman”?

I was disappointed to find an approving link from a fellow ScienceBlogger to this sort of rant by Matt Stoller: We all know that winning this election is not enough. It’s just not. It’s not even close. This is the most unpopular President we’ve ever had and our opponent is a crazy cancer-ridden dishonest madman. […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Surgery

Why the whole “mitochondrial disease plus vaccines = autism” argument is nonsense

Since vaccines seem to be back in the news again, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention a fantastic post that I saw the other day over at A Photon in the Darkness. Read it. Read it now. I’ve done fairly long posts about how pseudoscientists and antivaccine advocates are capitalizing on the case […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Antivaccinationists on the measles outbreak: The stupid, it burns thermonuclear

Regarding the recent antivaccinationist-fueled outbreak of measles reported yesterday, quoth J. B. Handley, founder of Generation Rescue, now arguably the most prominent antivaccine activist group in the U.S., given that its coffers are filled with money from celebrity and pro wrestling fundraisers: Autism and antivaccines advocates are unapologetic about the return of measles. “Most parents […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Thanks again, Jenny McCarthy and Andrew Wakefield! Thanks again for the measles!

I realize that I’ve thanked Jenny McCarthy and Andrew Wakefield before for giving the U.S. the gift of a measles resurgence. Originally, when I started this sarcastic little exercise, I assumed that it would be 5-10 years before we in the States caught up with the level of endemic measles that has been resurgent in […]

Categories
Bioethics Clinical trials Medicine

When clinical trials are designed by the marketing department

I must be slipping. Well, not really. It doesn’t bother me that blog bud and fellow skeptical physician PalMD beat me to an important publication that came out a couple of days ago in the Annals of Internal Medicine. I’m a surgeon and a translational/basic scientist; so Annals is not usually one of the journals […]