Category Archives: Lying for fun and profit

How did this heart drug get approved in the first place?

Posted on by Carolyn Thomas
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In case you believe that the medicine you’re taking has been adequately tested on real live patients before being legally approved, you might want to consider new research published this month in The New England Journal of Medicine*. A heart drug called nesiritide that for the past 10 years has been given to acute heart failure patients in hospital has failed to show any improvement compared to placebo.

But the drug had somehow received FDA approval in 2001 for use on these patients – after initial non-approval. Continue reading →

Can quantum mechanics really explain the “law of attraction”?

Posted on by Carolyn Thomas
9

"Dogs are so cute when they try to comprehend quantum mechanics!"

I’ll be the first to admit I am no scientist, although I did spend 20 years with one, amid scintillating breakfast conversations on topics like zinc and copper sediment in the Fraser River estuary. Does that count at all? Far brighter minds than mine, however, tell us what real scientists have often pondered: people believe an awful lot of “science” that isn’t scientific at all. Take the recent Reuters report from Russia that showed:

  • 32% of Russians surveyed believed the Earth is the centre of the solar system
  • 55% believed that all radioactivity is man-made
  • 29% believed that the first humans lived when dinosaurs still roamed the Earth  Continue reading →

Why there’s no such thing as “clinically proven”

Posted on by Carolyn Thomas
10

I really like reading the common sense essays of Pennsylvania physician Dr. Lucy Hornstein. She’s also the author of the book, Declarations of a Dinosaur: 10 Laws I’ve Learned as a Family Doctor.  I like her writing mostly because I agree with almost everything she says. She’s brilliant, really. Last month, Dr. Lucy took aim at one of my own pet peeves: advertising for questionable health products that claim the benefits of such products are “clinically proven”.

For example, she picked on a radio ad for a colon cleanse product that helps remove the ‘five to ten pounds of waste some experts believe are spackled along the inside of the large intestine’:

“But ‘some experts‘ also believe the moon landing was a hoax, the Holocaust never happened, and homeopathy is effective medicine. Somehow this colon cleansing stuff helps you preferentially lose belly fat. Not really sure what belly fat has to do with five to ten pounds of stuff spackled inside your intestine. But they’re not selling logic. Call right now for your free sample. Or not.  Continue reading →