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Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Popular culture Quackery

Even more quackery at–where else?–The Huffington Post

Khhaaaaaannnn! I mean, Arriiiaaaaannaaa! Ever since its very inception, I’ve been–shall we say?–less than enthusiastic about the Huffington Post’s medical blogging. Indeed, the level of anti-vaccine rhetoric there from the very beginning, back in 2005, astounded me. If anything, HuffPo’s record has gotten even worse over the last four years, be it Deepak Chopra, or, […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine

A tale of two news stories: The HPV and flu vaccines and why it’s so easy to confuse correlation with causation

And so it begins. Well, it hasn’t really just begun. In fact, it’s been going on a long time. I’m talking about confusing correlation with causation when it comes to vaccines. For example, the “vaccines cause autism” variety of the anti-vaccine movement blatantly confuses the correlation with the beginning of the increase in autism diagnoses […]

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Biology Evolution Medicine Religion Science Skepticism/critical thinking

The trouble with Deepak Chopra, part II

As I mentioned on Friday, I’m in Chicago right now attending the American College of Surgeons annual meeting, where I’ll be until Wednesday afternoon. If there are any of my readers who happen to be surgeons attending the meeting, drop me a line and maybe we can get together. In the meantime, here’s a blast […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Popular culture Quackery Surgery Television

Blogging Suzanne Somers Knockout, part 2: Is Somers a female Mike Adams?

This project is behind schedule. The reasons, I hope, are forgivable. First off, there was just too much other stuff going on last week, to the point where, even though I’ve read several chapters of Suzanne Somers’ new book (if you can call it that) Knockout: Interviews with Doctors Who Are Curing Cancer–And How to […]

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Cancer Medicine

“Obama’s fixin’ death panels for your mama,” the misogyny gambit, and other idiotic responses to the updated USPSTF mammography recommendations

I knew when I first heard about them that the new United States Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommendations on breast cancer screening would be controversial. I tried to discuss these guidelines and the issues involved in a calm and rational way, relatively devoid of Insolence, Respectful or not-so-Respectful, yesterday, pointing out that screening guidelines […]