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Antivaccine nonsense Bad science Medicine Popular culture Pseudoscience Quackery

An attempt to “Null”-ify Wikipedia on science

Love it or hate it, Wikipedia is a main go-to rough and ready source of information for millions of people. Although I’ve had my problems with Wikipedia and used to ask whether it could provide reliable information on medicine and, in particular, alternative medicine and vaccines, given that anyone can edit it, I now conclude that Wikipedia must be doing OK, at least in these areas. After all, some of the highest profile promoters of alternative and “integrative” medicine hate Wikipedia, to the point of attacking it and concocting conspiracy theories about it.

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Antivaccine nonsense Bad science Bioethics Medicine Pseudoscience

False analogies and pseudoscience as “moral arguments” against the use of fetal cell lines to manufacture vaccines

Antivaxers frequently object to the use of fetal cell lines to manufacture vaccines on “moral” grounds. Über-quack Joe Mercola lays down some astonishingly bad moral arguments based on pseudoscience.

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Antivaccine nonsense Bad science Medicine Politics Quackery

It’s always about the grift

Hawkers of ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, and other “miracle cures” for COVID-19 are just like snake oil salesmen going back to time immemorial. Sure, many, if not most, of them believe in their quackery, but it’s also always about the grift.

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Politics Popular culture

Radical COVID-19 antivax sentiment is metastasizing to childhood vaccines

COVID-19 has radicalized the antivaccine movement. Unfortunately, that radicalization is metastasizing to encompass all vaccines.

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

Steve Kirsch uses doxxing and the threat of a libel suit to silence Dr. Canuck

Tech bro turned antivaxxer Steve Kirsch threatened to dox and sue pseudonymous influencer Dr. Jonathan E. Canuck, completing his journey to the antivax Dark Side as a litigious bully.