Angelina Jolie, surgical strategies for cancer prevention, and genetics denialism (revisited)
Sometimes, weird things happen when I’m at meetings. For example, I just got home from the Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO) meeting in Houston over the weekend. Now, one thing I like about this meeting is that, unlike so many other meetings these days—cough, cough, ASCO, I’m looking at you—at the SSO there wasn’t a single talk I could find about “complementary...
On the “right” to challenge a medical or scientific consensus
While everyone has the "right" to challenge a scientific consensus, overthrowing a scientific consensus takes data. Lots and lots of data. Few people realize how difficult it is.
A brief bit of shameless self-promotion…The Prince of Wales edition
In an effort to expand the Gorski empire almost to the level of the Crislip empire and to try to make it to somewhere within two or three orders of magnitude of the Novella empire, I’ve published an article on Slate.com about Prince Charles’ visit to our fine country entitled “Prince of Pseudoscience“. Consider this the mandatory shameless self-promotion that all SBM...
Medical marijuana as the new herbalism, part 3: A “cannabis cures cancer” testimonial
Medical marijuana is often touted, primarily in the form of cannabis oil extract, as a cure for cancer that “they” don’t want you to know about. While some cannabinoids do have modest antitumor activity in vitro, there is no compelling evidence that cannabis can cure cancer. Yet that doesn't stop a proliferation of testimonials claiming that cannabis cured cancer. They are no...
Clinical trials of homeopathy versus “respect for science”
A few months ago, Steve Novella and I published an article in Trends in Molecular Medicine entitled “Clinical trials of integrative medicine: testing whether magic works?” It was our first foray together into publishing commentary about science-based medicine versus evidence-based medicine, using a topic that we’ve both written extensively about over the years on this blog and our respective personal blogs. Specifically,...
The Gerson protocol, cancer, and the death of Jess Ainscough, a.k.a. “The Wellness Warrior”
Less than four days ago, a young Australian woman died of a very rare type of cancer. Most of my American and probably many of my European readers have never heard of her, but in Australia she had become quite famous over the last seven years as a major proponent of “natural health.” Her name was Jess Ainscough, but, like a certain...
The Hippocrates Health Institute: Cancer quackery finally under the spotlight, but will it matter?
I first came across Brian Clement, the proprietor of the Hippocrates Health Institute in West Palm Beach, Florida, a little more than a year ago based on the story of Stephanie O’Halloran. Ms. O’Halloran was—word choice unfortunately intentional—a 23-year-old mother of an 18 month old child from Ireland who was diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer in 2013, with metastases to her...
The Food Babe’s war on “chemicals” heats up again
[Note: This is an extra bonus post. Because The Food Babe has been in the news and I couldn’t wait until today, I discussed it at a certain not-so-super-secret blog. If you’ve read it before, it’s only somewhat modified and updated. If you haven’t, it’s new to you. Either way, feel free to comment. Completely new material by me will appear here...
What do we do about politicians and physicians who promote antivaccine misinformation?
There are politicians and physicians out there promoting antivaccine misinformation. None of us expect politicians to be scientists or physicians, but we do expect them to listen to them. Worse are physicians who betray their profession to promote antivaccine pseudoscience. What can be done about these very public figures who endanger public health?