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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Bad science Medicine Politics Pseudoscience

Brooklyn measles outbreak of 2013: A case study of the cost of antivaccine pseudoscience

Infectious disease outbreaks are costly in human and financial terms. An analysis of the 2013 Brooklyn measles outbreak shows just how costly one outbreak can be and how much it can strain already strained public health resources. This is the cost of antivaccine madness.

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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Movies Politics Quackery

The violent rhetoric of the antivaccine movement, VAXXED edition

Back in December, I wrote about a phenomenon that I had observed from the very beginning of my sparring with those who promote antivaccine pseudoscience and thoroughly debunked idea that vaccines cause autism. It was a phenomenon that seemed to get a lot worse last year, almost certainly due to the impending passage and then […]

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Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

The new Secretary of Health and Human Services is a member of a fringe medical organization. Here’s what that means.

I’m always hesitant to write about matters that are more political than scientific or medical, although sometimes the sorts of topics that I blog about inevitably require it (e.g., the 21st Century Cures Act, an act that buys into the myth that to bring “cures” to patients faster we have to neuter the FDA and […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery

Did Gardasil kill Colton Berrett? The answer is almost certainly no.

Colton Barrett was a 17 year old boy who developed acute transverse myelitis at age 13, which left him partially paralyzed and dependent on a portable ventilator. Tragically, he died less than two weeks ago. His mother blames Gardasil, which he received two weeks before his first symptoms appeared, for his neurologic illness and death. However, Gardasil almost certainly had nothing to do with Colton’s illness.

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Bioethics Medicine Politics Skepticism/critical thinking

Hillary Clinton is “medically unfit to serve” as President and Donald Trump has narcissistic personality disorder: Stop this uninformed medical speculation about the candidates!

I’ve been debating whether to write about this for a while now, given that the first article that I noticed about it was first published a week and a half ago. Part of the reason for my reluctance is that it would be too easy for politics to be dragged into this more than I […]