quackery
oracknows | April 27, 2010I never would have thought it possible, but it's happened.
I'm sure most of you have heard of Dr. Andrew Weil, that champion of quackademic medicine who has made it his life's mission to bring the woo into academia in the form of training programs to "integrate" quackery with science-based medicine. From his home base at the University of Arizona, he spreads the woo hither and yon throughout academia, racking up big speaking fees wherever he goes and building a multimedia empire of books, DVDs, TV appearances, and Internet presence. Not satistfied, last year in the early stages of the debate…
oracknows | April 13, 2010Believe it or not, there was once a time when Dr. Mehmet Oz didn't bother me that much. At least, for all his flirting with woo, I never quite thought that he had completely gone over to the Dark Side. Although I probably knew deep down that I was fooling myself. Maybe it was because Dr. Oz is a surgeon--and not just a surgeon but a cardiac surgeon. After the enthusiastic embrace of pseudoscience by so many surgeons, and in particular Dr. Michael Egnor's embrace of "intelligent design" creationism and mind-brain dualism, maybe I didn't want to believe that yet another surgeon had fallen for a…
oracknows | April 11, 2010It has now been nearly two months since Andrew Wakefield was forced to resign from Thoughtful House in the wake of his being found guilty of research misconduct by the British General Medical Council (GMC), the withdrawal of Wakefield's infamous 1998 Lancet paper, and the withdrawal of Wakefield's last grab at scientific credibility, his infamous hepatitis B "monkey study." After a period of silence, over the last week, Wakefield has started to pop up in the public eye again, most recently last week in an interview for an independent filmmaker that is getting wide play in the anti-vaccine…
oracknows | March 25, 2010I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I'm not really a political blogger. True, I do from time to time succumb to the blogger's temptation of being a pundit on current events or pontificating on politics, but in general I don't do that very often because political bloggers are a dime a dozen and politics isn't my area of strength. Writing about science and science-based medicine is. That's part of the reason why I really haven't said much about the massive health care reform bill that was passed on Sunday or the political process, except when on occasion the utter insanity of it all (…
oracknows | March 4, 2010Now that's what I'm talking about! This is what we need to see more of! A father whose child underwent the quackery that is the Defeat Autism Now! (DAN!) protocol is suing the doctors who administered it for malpractice:
The father of a 7-year-old Chicago boy who was diagnosed as a toddler with autism has sued the Naperville and Florida doctors who treated his son, alleging they harmed the child with "dangerous and unnecessary experimental treatments."
James Coman and his son were featured last year in "Dubious Medicine," a Tribune series that examined risky, unproven treatments for autism…
oracknows | March 1, 2010I've had it with Dr. Oz.
Although I haven't seen his show today (for one thing, I work for a living; for another thing, even if I had today off I wouldn't waste it watching Dr. Oz's show), readers have informed me that yesterday, on March 1, 2010, Dr. Oz threw away whatever shred of respectability that he had left. On March 1, 2010, Dr. Oz had Deepak Chopra on his show.
But that wasn't enough.
After all, Chopra is a never-ending font of woo in categories too numerous to recount here, a small subset of which includes evolution, neuroscience, and medicine, but most of his woo is is fairly "…
oracknows | February 23, 2010How does homeopathy work? Heh.
Yes, this is in honor of my post earlier today.
I'm also appreciative that homeopaths have apparently diagnosed what's wrong with Parliament. Apparently it's emitting an angry purple aura.
oracknows | February 21, 2010I must admit that I never saw it coming. At least, I never saw it coming this fast and this dramatically. After all, this is a saga that has been going on for twelve solid years now, and it's an investigation that has been going on at least since 2004. I'm referring, of course, to that (possibly former) hero of the anti-vaccine movement, the man who is arguably the most responsible for suffering and death due to the resurgence of measles in the U.K. because of his role in frightening parents about the MMR vaccine.
I'm referring to the fall of Andrew Wakefield
Wakefield has shown an incredible…
oracknows | February 18, 2010What is it with cranks and trying to shut down criticism?
I know, I know. I've written about this before, but this week has been a banner week for a phenomenon that I consider a sine qua non of a crank or a quack, namely an intolerance of criticism. Seemingly, whenever a quack or a crank encounters serious criticism, the first reaction is almost never to try to argue based on facts, reason, and science, but rather to try to silence the person doing the criticizing. The tactics are many and varied, but the end goal is always the same: Suppress the criticism by any means necessary. The very…
oracknows | February 18, 2010Last night, it came to light from a posting on the Thoughtful House Yahoo! discussion group that Andrew Wakefield has apparently resigned from Thoughtful House. I have yet to see confirmation anywhere, although Brian Deer has chimed in that this comes as no surprise to him and that he suspects that Dr. Arthur Krigsman, Anyssa Ryland, and Jane Johnson are behind Wakefield's ouster. However, more interesting is this comment from Liz Ditz. In it, she points out a couple of interesting bits of background.
Tidbit #1 from 2008:
In 2007 alone, Thoughtful House saw 1,500 new patient requests -- or…
oracknows | February 13, 2010The utter discrediting and disgrace of Andrew Wakefield, first by the judgment of the General Medical Council against him and then by the retraction of the crown jewel of his respectability his 1998 Lancet paper that sparked the modern anti-vaccine movement and launched a thousand autism quacks. The reaction of the anti-vaccine loons was very predictable, with Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey producing a hilariously paranoid conspiracy theory and J.B. Handley following suit with more monkey business. Truly, the downfall of their hero, which has been a long time in coming but has finally arrived…
oracknows | February 10, 2010Well, well, well, well.
I should have know that sooner or later a certain group would weigh in on the trial of Anne Mitchell, RN, whose malicious prosecution is a result of a doctor who peddles woo using his connection with Boss Hogg Winkler County Sheriff Robert L. Roberts to find out who had complained against him and prosecute her criminally, trying to throw her in jail for up to ten years for doing her duty and reporting this doctor's questionable activities. Before I reveal what crank group has weighed in, given that its identity will not come as much, if any, of a surprise, let's just…
oracknows | February 10, 2010While I'm at it blogging about the trial of Anne Mitchell, the nurse who is being maliciously prosecuted for having reported a doctor who hawks serious woo in the form of colloidal silver for H1N1 and who also happens to be buddies with the County Sheriff, I thought it would be worthwhile to post this update from ABC News:
I also want to report report on the latest update I've received from the Texas Nurses Association, which is covering the trial every day:
THANK YOU to everyone who has contributed to the TNA Legal Defense Fund in support of Anne Mitchell. A number of donations have come…
oracknows | February 9, 2010Remember how I've been following the story of two Texas nurses who were fired and prosecuted on trumped up charges, first in September and then a couple of days ago as the case went to trial? Of course you do. I made it very, very plain that I view this malicious prosecution to be a horrific miscarriage of justice that will have a potentially grave chilling effect on nurses who witness physician misconduct and want to report it. After all, Anne Mitchell, RN and Vickilyn Galle, RN found themselves facing jail for doing nothing more than living up to their professional code of ethics when they…
terrasig | February 3, 2010A few weeks ago, we discussed (1, 2) some of the drugs confiscated by authorities who searched the Sedona resort room occupied by self-help guru, James Ray, following the October 2009 deaths of three followers who paid nearly $10,000 each for his Spiritual Warrior retreat program.
Late this afternoon, Ray was arrested - the best news and supporting information continues to come from The Prescott (AZ) News, with a sidebar to the lower right of the story that links to their extensive timeline of coverage:
The Yavapai County Grand Jury returned a "true bill" on 3 counts of Manslaughter against…
oracknows | January 28, 2010Faster than a blink of an eye (well, not really, but it sure seems that way sometimes) another fortnight has flown by, meaning that it's time yet again for another meeting of that venerable blog carnival of critical thinking, the Skeptics' Circle. This time around, we have our first ever veterinarian hosting. I could make jokes about the Skeptics' Circle going to the dogs, but I'll exercise some rare self-restraint and refrain from doing so. (Oh, wait...)
In any case, this time around, the 129th Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle is being held over at SkeptVet.
Head on over and check it out.…
oracknows | January 26, 2010Almost two years ago, I discovered something that disturbed me greatly. Basically, I learned the story of an Air Force officer named Col. Richard Niemtzow, MD, PhD. Col. Niemtzow is a radiation oncologist who has over the last decade fallen deeply into woo. Specifically, he has become known for a technique that he has dubbed "battlefield acupuncture," a technique that he has promoted energetically (word choice intentional) and ceaselessly, to the point where, sadly, the military is starting to take it seriously even though the evidence Col Niemtzow has presented in favor of the technique is…
oracknows | January 24, 2010Mike Adams is confused.
I know, I know. Such a statement is akin to saying that water is wet (and that it doesn't have memory, at least not the mystical magical memories ascribed to it by homeopaths), that the sun rises in the East, or that writing an NIH R01 grant is hard, but there you go. Speaking of writing an NIH R01, that's exactly what I'm doing now, hence the decreased blogorrhea over the last few days, but sometimes trying to cram a five year project into the 13 pages (one page for specific aims and twelve to describe the project) makes my head hurt so much that reading and…
oracknows | January 23, 2010Oh, yes, my brothers and sisters, we have done it!
My pharma paymasters are very, very pleased indeed with me and all of their other blogging and Twittering minions. Very, very pleased indeed. In fact, they are cackling with glee over the discomfiture of one of their greatest enemies, Mike Adams, a.k.a. The Health Ranger! This brave rebel's plan to attack the conspiracy by winning a Shorty Award in Health has been thwarted, thanks to the efforts of you and me, oh my brothers and sisters, and The Health Ranger has gone completely mental about it:
I was set to take the top prize, and Dr.…
oracknows | January 22, 2010One week ago, The Chicago Tribune added yet another excellent addition to its recent series of articles exposing the dark underbelly of the anti-vaccine movement and, more importantly, the quackery that permeates the "autism biomedical" movement promoted by anti-vaccine groups such as Age of Autism. The first installment in the series, written by Tribune reporters Trine Tsouderos and Pat Callahan, examined Mark and David Geier's Lupron protocol for autism (which I had written about three years ago under the title Why not just castrate them?), and the second shone a light under the rock…