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Antivaccine nonsense Bad science Homeopathy Medicine Sports

Homeopathy vs. COVID-19: Aaron Rodgers edition

Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers has COVID-19. He claimed to be “immunized,” but it turns out that he had used a “homeopathic immunization” instead of a real COVID-19 vaccine. Surprise! It didn’t work.

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Antivaccine nonsense Computers and social media Medicine Politics Quackery

Hacker X: How Mike Adams expanded his quack empire to politics

Ars Technica recently published a story about Hacker X, who helped Mike Adams expand his online empire of health fraud into an empire of fake news and political disinformation, thus intertwining health and political misinformation into the deadly combination we see now.

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Antivaccine nonsense Religion

“Fetal cells” in COVID-19 vaccines…again

In the age of COVID, everything old is new again in antivax conspiracy world. This time around, antivaxxers are trying to claim (yet again) that COVID vaccines contain “fetal cells.” Once more into the breach.

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Computers and social media Medicine Politics Popular culture

Attacks on scientists in the age of COVID-19: How “they” view “us”

Nature recently published a survey showing how common online and other attacks on scientists trying to communicate science-based information are. The hatred is nothing new. What’s new are COVID-19 and social media.

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Bad science Clinical trials Medicine Politics Popular culture Quackery

Ivermectin is the new hydroxychloroquine, take 7: Are there positive studies that aren’t fraudulent?

Ivermectin is the new hydroxychloroquine, a drug repurposed for COVID-19 that almost certainly doesn’t work but is still being touted as a “miracle cure” by quacks, grifters, and political ideologues. Are the data supporting it all fraudulent and/or biased? The answer, increasingly, appears to be yes.