Snake-oil
sa smith | August 20, 2012Via Coffee Loving Skeptic-- The laziest example of peddling snake-oil I have ever seen.
Revealed: Gorton church sells olive oil and blackcurrant squash as miracle 'cure' for cancer and HIV
M.E.N. reporter: After just 15 minutes I was offered church's ‘miracle cure’
Pastor: We are trying to help ... we aren’t hurting anyone
See, normally when people are scamming desperate people for money, the scammers put in quite a bit of effort on the front end, concocting a story for why their 'alternative treatment' is so fabulous. A good back-story can up your profit by orders of magnitude.
Its not a…
sa smith | June 20, 2012Luc Montagnier was once one of Gods of Science.
Dude was head of one of the groups of scientists who ultimately discovered HIV-1 was the cause of the AIDS pandemic.
Wonderful science that amazes me-- The things they could do when we didnt know anything, when they didnt have the technology that I have-- Amazing.
Im not the only one-- Montagnier got part of the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2008 for his part of the work.
And then... something went wrong...
As cataloged by Orac, Montagnier started pushing any number of absurd, if not blatantly anti-science agendas-- from homeopathy and autism woo,…
sa smith | April 17, 2012As many of you know, I am a graduate student. Luckily, I am a graduate student in the biological sciences, which means that while I am going to school, I get a monthly stipend. Also luckily, I go to school in a place like Oklahoma, a state with a relatively low cost of living.
Its also lucky that I grew up relatively poor, with a mom who was REALLY GOOD at being poor. Thus I am REALLY GOOD at being poor too. I clip coupons, I shop sale flyers for groceries, I send in rebates, I get pretty much all of my toiletries and make-up at CVS for free/nearly free using their monopoly money store…
sa smith | January 24, 2012We in the skeptic community like to make fun of naturopaths and homeopaths and all the snake oil salesmen out there. While its a good ol laugh here in the West, if not nostalgic, the damage these charlatans can do in other parts of the world is not funny at all.
Long-time readers of SciBlogs might remember someone named Matthias Rath
In the battle of science versus woo...
The Dr. Will Sue You Now - A stolen chapter from Ben Goldacre's book Bad Science
Homeboy got rich taking advantage of desperate HIV/AIDS patients in Africa. Gave them some 'magic potion' of Vitamin C to cure HIV/AIDS HE…
sa smith | September 25, 2011Wow.
WOOOOW.
You know, people should be legally forbidden from saying "Dr. Oz cant drop any lower than this!"
Pimping snake-oil salesmen? CHECK!
Taking 'creative liberties' editing the comments of scientists on his show? CHECK!
Playing 'scientist' with rock-stars just to get his face in the media? CHECK!
Constant, apparently pathological fear mongering? CHECK!
Just read anything about 'Dr. Oz' at Oracs place.
Do you all want to know what hes done now?
Do you *really* want to know?
The sexiest woman alive, Dr. Mehmet Oz has teamed up with the second most sexiest woman alive, Dr. Michael…
sa smith | May 10, 2011I want you all to see an article I just found via Relative Risk Blog. Its about 'Chronic Lyme Disease'. About a young woman who was aggressively treated by a 'questionable' practitioner who had 'cured herself' of 'Chronic Lyme'. No one believes in 'Chronic Lyme'. 'Everyone' was 'against' this practitioner, while she insisted she 'KNEW' what she was talking about. Questionable tests. Off-label prescriptions. And this practitioner almost killed this young woman.
Janet Love and Dana Rosdahl come across as sincere in their belief that doctors routinely misdiagnose the disease, leading to…
sa smith | May 6, 2011Remember that shit supplement I wrote about just over a year ago, 'Gene-Eden'?
The FDA notified them that they have to stop saying their plant smoothie treats chronic viral infections and other STDs:
Dara Corrigan, JD, the FDA's associate commissioner for regulatory affairs, says the warning letters give the companies time to voluntarily comply with federal law. He says the agency will "continue to take aggressive enforcement action against firms that market false treatments or cures that may lead to significant public health consequences."
The companies have 15 days to notify the FDA of…
sa smith | March 2, 2011VIPDx took this down from their website, but this is the internet. The internet remembers everything.
VIP Dx Laboratory is highly regarded in the field of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and neuro immune disease testing. VIP Dx also tests for intestinal gut dysbiosis by means of the Immunobilan test, the same test used in BioRay's CytoFlora study. The CytoFlora study showed remarkable results with autistic children. Specifically:
Improvement in speech and social interaction
Reduction in abdominal pain and gastro-intestinal symptoms
Until now, antibiotics have been the only recognized treatment for…
sa smith | February 22, 2011Spend your lunch break with a founder of Science Based Medicine and Neurologica Blog!
Journalist/Ninja Trine Tsouderos is going to be hosting a live chat with Dr. Steve Novella TODAY, NOON CENTRAL time!
sa smith | May 14, 2010A while back I wrote about how the lead researcher at the Whittemore Peterson Institute, Judy Mikovits, is speaking at Autismone, a huge anti-vax rally in Chicago later this month.
I thought Judy was just a crank. Dime a dozen, whatevs.
Turns out things are worse than that.
Much much worse than that.
Its cranks all the way down.
Vincent Lombardi, first author on the original 'XMRV causes Chronic Fatigue' Science paper, founded some weird testing company several years back. This weird testing company was then bought by Harvey Whittemore (father of The Princess That Cant Be Named), and turned…
sa smith | April 14, 2010One of the reasons I started writing ERV was to help demystify viruses for the general public. To Average Joes/Janes, viruses are scary-ass little buggars-- alien creatures that make you sick, kill you overnight in horrible scary ways, and you never see them coming.
I hope long-time readers of ERV are now aware that while some viruses are 'scary', the fact of the matter is, humans wouldnt exist without them. Hell, probably all life on Earth wouldnt exist without them. We can use them to study principles of evolution that would be impossible with other organisms. Theyve helped us learn…