/oss/taxonomy/term/2728/all en /oss/article/critical-thinking-pseudoscience/if-it-sounds-too-good-be-true-it <p>There is hardly a week that passes without someone asking my opinion about some video purporting to have found a remedy for some terrible ailment that “Big Pharma doesn’t want you to know about.” Why? Because as we are told, these companies are more interested in selling expensive, ineffective treatments to make sure that profits keep rolling in, profits that would be lost if a cure were made available.</p> Wed, 28 Aug 2024 19:37:16 +0000 Joe Schwarcz PhD 10049 at /oss /oss/article/covid-19-critical-thinking-pseudoscience/back-away-americas-frontline-doctors <p>Not a day goes by without a video being forwarded to me accompanied by the question, “Is this true?” Invariably the answer is “um..no..there is no evidence,” and that usually ends the discussion. Sometimes, though, I can discern that a video has legs because I get the “Is this true?” query several times a day. An example of this is a recent epic, dripping with pseudoscience, produced by Dr. Lee Merritt an American orthopedic surgeon. Dr. Merritt may be a fine orthopedic surgeon, but when it comes to the science of COVID-19, she is a bumbling neophyte.</p> Thu, 04 Feb 2021 22:06:49 +0000 Joe Schwarcz PhD 8607 at /oss /oss/article/health-videos/right-chemistry-celery-juice-and-miracle-cures <p></p><div class="media-youtube-video media-element file-default media-youtube-1"></div> Sat, 02 Mar 2019 18:26:55 +0000 Joe Schwarcz PhD 7622 at /oss /oss/article/health-technology-reviews/book-review-bad-blood-secrets-and-lies-silicon-valley-startup <hr /> <p class="note"><strong>Take-home message:</strong><br /> -Elizabeth Holmes’ company Theranos tried to create a machine that could do hundreds of medical tests on a single drop of blood<br /> -John Carreyrou’s book Bad Blood reports on the lies and secrecy that allowed so many people to believe the machine was real</p> Thu, 16 Aug 2018 16:09:38 +0000 Jonathan Jarry, MSc 7309 at /oss /oss/article/health-you-asked/airborne-effective-against-common-cold <p>You can’t keep a good quack down for long. They keep resurfacing with irritating frequency. Victoria Knight-McDowell certainly doesn’t look like a quack. She looks like a pretty elementary school teacher. Which is exactly what she was before she became a millionaire peddling her invention. And what was that invention? A remedy for the common cold. Yup, this young grade two school teacher managed to accomplish a feat that had defied numerous highly trained researchers at the world’s top pharmaceutical companies. Or so she claims.</p> Mon, 19 Nov 2012 01:33:40 +0000 Joe Schwarcz PhD 1822 at /oss