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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 […]

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Biology Cancer Medicine Politics Science

Are we playing it too safe in cancer research?

A couple of weeks ago, NEWSWEEK science columnist Sharon Begley wrote an article entitled From Bench To Bedside: Academia slows the search for cures. It was a rather poorly argued bit of polemic, backed up only with anecdotes that came across as sour grapes by scientists whose grant proposals the NIH had decided not to […]

Categories
Cancer Computers and social media Medicine

What’s wrong with Steve Jobs: Yes, Jobs did have a liver transplant, but was it for metastatic insulinoma?

Over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that the reason for Apple CEO Steve Job’s five month medical leave of absence from Apple is that he needed a liver transplant, which, according to the story, he underwent a couple of months ago in Memphis. In my discussion, I assumed, for the most part, the […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Why scientific medicine just can’t win in testimonials

Over the last month or so, I’ve written numerous posts about Daniel Hauser. Danny, as you recall, is the 13-year-old Minnesota boy who was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma back in February, underwent one round of chemotherapy for it, and then decided that he wanted to pursue quackery instead of more chemotherapy. His mother supported his […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Friday Woo Medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Finishing up Homeopathy Awareness Week: It’s not just homeopathy, it’s quantum homeopathy!

Homeopathy Awareness Week is almost over, alas. I hope I’ve done a good job at making my readers even more “aware” of just how silly the principles of homeopathy are. To finish up, I thought I’d repost a bit of “classic insolence” from three years ago, because it’s dedicated to one of the most amazing […]