Tag: antivaccine

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Pseudoscience

Thacker the hack keeps Thacking and hacking

Paul Thacker

hack: adj.: 1. Working for hire especially with mediocre professional standards (a hack journalist); 2. performed by or suited to a person who works or writes purely for the purpose of earning money; 3. characteristic of a hack 4. MEDIOCRE (e.g.) hack writing, hackneyed, trite.

Thack: adj: All of the above, but in the style of Paul Thacker. Verb (transitive): To write hack hit pieces in the style of Paul Thacker.

I know I’ve written about Paul Thacker’s attacks on young physician Dr. Allison Neitzel three times now, but he just keeps going lower and demanding more not-so-Respectful Insolence. Orac is happy to oblige.

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

Quoth Dr. Prasad: “It would not be difficult” to do an impossible VAERS study

Prasad as Dr. Strangelove? "It would not be difficult...."

Dr. Vinay Prasad recently attacked an epidemiological study published in JAMA Open Network reporting that people in red states are more likely to report vaccine injuries, claiming that it “would not be difficult” to do a much more rigorous study.

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Medicine Politics Popular culture Quackery

The DSHEA and supplements made Alex Jones

Alex Jones
Alex Jones doing what he does best, yelling.

As the HBO documentary The Truth vs. Alex Jones shows, Alex Jones promoted the conspiracy theory that the Sandy Hook massacre was a hoax to sell his supplement line. It’s a model that many Internet conspiracy theorists use, like Mike Adams. Did the DSHEA help create Alex Jones and the modern conspiracy industry?

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Quackery

Big antivax sites amplify Paul Thacker’s hit piece on Dr. Allison Neitzel

Children's Health Defense

A week ago, Dr. Allison Neitzel posted an “apology” to some particularly odious antivax quacks. Predictably, the big antivax sites went into high gear to use the forced apology to amplify attacks on her.

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Antivaccine nonsense Cancer Medicine Quackery

Mark Sircus tries to rebrand quackery as “natural allopathic medicine”

Mark Sircus
Mark Sircus sure loves him some magnesium.

The term “allopathic medicine” was invented by homeopaths in the 19th century as a disparaging term for medicine. So to see a quack like Mark Sircus try to coopt it as “natural allopathic medicine” is quite something.