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Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Popular culture Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Combatting antiscience denialism and quackery

I spent a nice long weekend in New York at NECSS, which has grown to quite the big skeptical conference since the last time I was there five years ago. The Friday Science-Based Medicine session went quite well and, as far as I could tell, appeared to be well-received; so hopefully we will be doing […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics Quackery Science Skepticism/critical thinking

Blowing the antivaccine dog whistle again

You remember Dr. Bob, don’t you? I’m referring, of course, to Robert “Dr. Bob” Sears, the Capistrano Beach, CA pediatrician who’s arguably the most famous of the antivaccine pediatricians who have been spreading fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) about vaccines. (Sorry, Dr. Jay, but, regardless of your being Jenny McCarthy’s son’s pediatrician, I’d bet that […]

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Medicine

“Integrative medicine”: The lure of the shaman healer

Quite to my surprise, apparently I’ve become fairly well known as a critic of so-called “integrative medicine,” that which used to be called “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM) but whose name was changed because its practitioners didn’t want to be “complementary” to anything. Rather they wanted their woo to be co-equal with science-based medicine (SBM). […]

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Anti-Semitism Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Science Skepticism/critical thinking

As states try to crack down on non-medical exemptions to school vaccine mandates, antivaccinationists lose it (yellow Star of David edition)

With the Disneyland measles outbreak still going strong and striking far more unvaccinated than vaccinated, it’s not surprising that a discussion has begun in some states about lax policies that permit religious and/or philosophical exemptions. In Oregon, for example, the legislature is considering SB442, a bill apparently originally intended to provide a technical fix to […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Popular culture Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

CNBC publishes an antivaccine press release from the Weston A. Price Foundation and Leslie Manookian

One of the things I’ve noticed over the last decade of covering pseudoscience and quackery from a skeptical point of view is that no pseudoscientific trope ever really dies. This is particularly true of antivaccine tropes. No matter how many times this piece or that of antivaccine misinformation is slapped down, sooner or later it […]