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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Politics

No, the rush for a COVID-19 vaccine is not turning provaccine advocates into antivaxxers

There is already widespread distrust of a COVID-19 vaccine, even before a vaccine is approved. Contrary to claims from antivaxxers, that doesn’t mean provaxxers are becoming antivax.

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Antivaccine nonsense Computers and social media Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Plandemic 2: Electric Boogaloo, or: How Mikki Willis doubled down on COVID-19 conspiracy theories

“Plandemic” is back with “Plandemic 2: Electric Boogaloo.” It’s even more COVID-19 conspiracies with even less credibility!

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Medicine Science Skepticism/critical thinking

On “doing your own research”

Ethan Siegel at Forbes argues that you “must not ‘do your own research.’” While the title grates, Siegel is correct that most of us are not really capable of “doing our own research” about most scientific and medical questions because we lack the necessary background. We must therefore be humble and be very, very careful about “doing our own research.”

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Clinical trials Medicine Politics Popular culture

Yale epidemiologist Harvey Risch defends hydroxychloroquine in Newsweek—badly

Yale epidemiology professor Harvey Risch published an embarrassingly bad op-ed in Newsweek defending hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19. It reminded me how much acupuncture and hydroxychloroquine believers have in common.

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Antivaccine nonsense Bad science Medicine Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking

AAPS: A crank medical “association” promotes COVID-19 disinformation

The AAPS is a far right-wing crank medical organization. Unsurprisingly, it’s all in with COVID-19 disinformation and pseudoscience.