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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Naturopathy Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Thanks, Dr. Oppel, we need to see a lot more of this

If there’s been a theme running through this blog, it’s been the importance of science and critical thinking. The main focus of this emphasis on skepticism, of course, has been medicine, which makes sense, given that I’m a doctor and a cancer researcher, but I don’t limit myself to just medicine. However, as part of […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Appeals to other ways of knowing for “integrative” medicine

So-called “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM) or, as it’s now as frequently called, “integrative medicine” (IM) represents a hodge-podge of remedies that are mostly based on prescientific concepts about how the human body works and how disease attacks it. Homeopathy, through its concept of “like cures like” and law of contagion. The former in essence […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Quackery Television

“A Dose of Controversy”: More like a dose of equivocation

Last Thursday, I expressed dismay about an upcoming NBC news special, A Dose of Controversy, which is about a man who arguably caused more damage to public health than just about anyone in the last decade, namely Andrew Wakefield. Anyone who’s a regular reader of this blog knows just what I think of Andrew Wakefield. […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics Quackery

The SickKids Foundation supports woo

It really and truly saddens me to have to do this. The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto is one of the finest children’s hospitals there is. Unfortunately, as I documented yesterday, the hospital has, either knowingly or unknowingly, lent its good name to the metastasis of the quackfest known as Autism One from its […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Popular culture Quackery Television

Matt Lauer to look at the vaccine-autism “debate”? Oh, goody.

I realize that I’ve gotten into one of those runs where it seems that all I blog about is anti-vaccinationist loons, but, before trying once again to take a break from the madness, I had to go to the well one more time because this looks a bit frightening: NBC News’ Matt Lauer will take […]