Categories
Bioethics Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics

They don’t call it “cheat-lation” for nothing (updated)

Last year, a seeming victory for the protection of human subjects from being subjected to pseudoscience. It began when Kimball C. Atwood IV, MD; Elizabeth Woeckner, AB, MA; Robert S. Baratz, MD, DDS, PhD; and Wallace I. Sampson, MD published a lengthy criticism of the NIH Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT) in Medscape, pointing […]

Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Senator Tom Harkin pulls a fast one: Alternative medical practitioners will be part of the “healthcare workforce” under health care reform

Earlier this year, I wrote about Senator Tom Harkin’s attempt to hijack President Obama’s health care reform plans in order to inject quackery in the form of “alternative” or “integrative” medicine into the effort. Specifically, he wants to legitimize quackery by including it in any federal plan under the guise of “preventative care.” He even […]

Categories
Cancer Entertainment/culture Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Television

CBS News’ resident anti-vaccine propagandist Sharyl Attkisson dives into breast cancer crankery

Remember Sharyl Attkisson? She’s the CBS reporter who can really bring home the crazy when it comes to vaccines and autism, laying down some serious crankery (complete with many logical fallacies) and hit pieces on Dr. Paul Offit. Indeed, at times she gives Mike Adams a run for his money when it comes to laying […]

Categories
Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

The ghoul returns again to feast on the flesh of celebrities

I waited. I knew it was coming. It had to. History was on my side. My quarry was nutty, but in a way exceedingly predictable. it wasn’t so much that I knew exactly what he would do. He wasn’t predictable in that way. It was that I knew he would do something crazy. Actually, on […]

Categories
Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

Another call to help vaccinate Las Vegas!

On Friday, I posted a plea for donations to the JREF effort to help poor families vaccinate their children against childhood diseases. Over the weekend DuWayne Brayton did me one better with his plea: I have been where a lot of those families are. While $25 may not seem like a hell of a lot […]