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Antivaccine nonsense Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

HuffPost Health: A soon-to-be one-stop shop for quackery?

Oh, goody. Just what we need. Some of my readers sent this to me yesterday, and I, like them, was appalled. Apparently that wretched hive of scum and quackery, The Huffington Post, has decided that it’s starting a “real” health section (to be, apparently, distinguished from its old “Lifestyle” section, where previously most of its […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Religion

For shame! Oprah Winfrey shills for faith healer John of God

In terms of promoting woo and quackery, there is one person who stands head and shoulders above all the rest. True, she doesn’t just promote woo and quackery, but she does have a long list of dubious achievements in that realm, including but not limited to unleashing Jenny McCarthy and her anti-vaccine crusade plus Suzanne […]

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Cancer Medicine Quackery

A horrifying breast cancer “testimonial” for “holistic” treatment, finale

(NOTE: The videos of Robert O. Young’s interview with Kim Tinkham have been removed, as I predicted in this post that they would be. Fortunately, I downloaded copies before he managed to do that. Part 6 appears to be still there–for now.) (NOTE ADDED 12/7/2010: Kim Tinkham has died of what was almost certainly metastatic […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Elizabeth Edwards and Kim Tinkham: A tale of two victims of breast cancer

Two women died of breast cancer yesterday. One was named Kim Tinkham. One was named Elizabeth Edwards. In some ways, these women were similar. True, one was older than the other, but both of them died far sooner than they should have, one at age 53, the other at age 61. Both engaged in activism […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

When testimonials are used in medical advertising

(NOTE ADDED 12/7/2010: Kim Tinkham has died of what was almost certainly metastatic breast cancer.) If there’s been one theme running through this blog every since the very beginning, it’s the unreliability of testimonials as “evidence” for the success of a cancer treatment. Indeed, if you go back to one of the very first “Orac-length” […]