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More Anti-Vaccination Insanity


A recent article in the Daily Record posts some alarming figures:

In August, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported measles cases had spiked; 131 cases were reported nationwide for the first seven months of the year, compared with an average of 63 cases per year since 2000.

Of the infected, 91 percent were unvaccinated, most because of “philosophical or religious beliefs,” the CDC report said.

Homeschooled children accounted for 25 out of 30 cases in an outbreak of measles in suburban Chicago in May, according to the CDC. In Grant County, Washington, public health officials tied 11 of 19 measles cases to unvaccinated home-schooled children.

It will be interesting to see how anti-vaccinationists twist this story to prove their point. My bet is they’ll focus on the 9% of vaccinated children that also contracted measles as proof that vaccines are ineffective. 

Lance Rodewald, director of the CDC’s Immunization Division, states: 

“Somebody who has taken an exemption from school laws, like a philosophical or religious exemption, is 35 times more likely to get measles … and 22 times more likely to get whooping cough.”

But, of course, he is part of the vast conspiracy to austism-ize our nations children. And surely he is in the (seemingly infinite) pocket of “big pharma”. 

If it wasn’t for the fact that the innocent will have to suffer along with the guilty, I wouldn’t mind. Let the parents who choose to neglect their children, and fail to get them immunized, contract the disease. Not the children, who’s only crime is being born to gullible, intellectually lazy parents. 

The only bit of solace coming out of the news in recent weeks has been a push by the AAP (American Association of Pediatrics) to have pediatritions ask parents to sign a release when they refuse to vaccinate their children. Autism quackery websites have, as one would expect, been resoundingly critical of the form, amidst fears of it causing them to lose their children for neglect. While I can find no mention anywhere of this having ever happened, I see no issue with it. 

If you, as a parent, are unable to have even the most basic knowledge of safety regarding your children, or if having that knowledge, you choose not to act for them, you are unfit to be a parent.

Posted 23 October 2008 § Health § Skepticism ‡ Comments ° Tagged: ,

Does HeadOn Work?


The short answer is, no. HeadOn is a product marketed by Miralus Healthcare, and pushed by an aggressive TV ad campaign. Its claims are, for all intents and purposes, homeopathic bits of mumbo jumbo. Any efficacy, based on ingredients, can only be thanks to the placebo effect.  

Brainless

Apply Directly to Forehead!

First, to believe the product works as advertised, you must lack even the most rudimentary knowledge of how absorbtion through our skin works. Their advertisements contain numerous well-shot depictions of commercial models rubbing what appears to be a deodorant stick on their forehead. This is shockingly, shockingly stupid. I assume what they’re infering is that since your head is hurting, you apply their product to the skin…of your head? And the product will then, of course, penetrate through your skin, through your skull, and drip directly in to the gaping void you must have where your brain should be.

There is absolutely no viable mechanism by which this chain of events can occur. Your skin does most definitely absorb things applied topically to it. However the location of the topical application, in so far as rate absorbtion goes, much less final location of chemicals, is mostly insignificant. There are areas of your skin that have thicker layers, and thus take longer to absorb anything topically applied. However, once a chemical is absorbed, it is entered in to your blood stream and circulated through your body. Regardless of what portion of your skin it was introduced from. 

As if all of that wasn’t enough, the active ingredients in HeadOn are, as I stated before, homeopathic. The product is almost entirely comprised of wax. It has a few herbal ingredients at absolute trace amounts; nothing that could in any way “cure” a headache. It does, however, contain trace amounts of potassium dichromate, which (in larger doses) may cause cancer. 

A fact that is telling is that there are no dosage restrictions listed on the packaging. This betrays intellectual dishonesty on the part of the company. If they were true-believers, and they actually believed their product work, they would have to assume that whatever chemical properties it has to stop a headache may — in larger doses — also cause harm. Then, if for no other reason, they would include a dosage restriction and controindications.

The packaging contains nothing of the sort.

It is also telling that their research page contains much information on their packaging methods, and not a shred about the ingredients, or how they stumbled upon this “cure”. They mention being an FDA Registered Drug Establishment, but since HeadOn (and all their other *on products) are considered dietary supplements, there is no oversight by the government with regards to chemical composition and/or efficacy.

The disturbing truth is this product is selling quite well. In fact, they have an entire line of *on products for everything from scars to itch relief. Each more homeopathic and quackish than the next.

Posted 20 October 2008 § Skepticism ‡ Comments °

What is Homeopathy?


Quite simply, homeopathy is bunk. Nonsense. Magical thinking. 

Cure for cancer.

Cure for cancer.

Its a complex series of mystical beliefs and practices that amount to believing water will hold the “energy” of whatever substance it comes in contact with — even after that substance is gone. This, coupled with a like-cures-like mentality leads to some seriously flawed thinking.

Boiling it down, its essentially claiming that if you’re, say, suffering from insomnia, you might dilute a molecularly insignificant bit of caffeine in a cup of water. You would then pour this cup of water in a swimming pool, and stir the whole thing with a canoe paddle. After waiting a few moments (to insure that the caffeine has properly mixed), you would scoop a cup full of the pool water out and guzzle it down in one quick gulp. 

You would then, presumably, immediately fall in to a blissful slumber. 

The problems with this seem incredibly apparent, but lets go through them anyway. First, the entire like-cures-like modality has no basis in real science -whatsoever-. You aren’t going to cure your insomnia by taking stimulants, you aren’t going to cure HIV by infecting yourself with more of it, you aren’t going to get rid of a headache by dashing your head against an anvil. It doesn’t work. 

That being said, even if this modality was effective, the dosage is so diluted that it can have no significant effect on your body chemically.

Homeopaths get around this troubling little issue by claiming that water will retain the “vibrations” of whatever substance is dissolved in it, even after that substance is removed. This, as you might guess, is also entirely unsubstantiated.

If you think about it though, if you want to get in to woo, this is the kind of woo to get in to. If you’re a chiropractor, you might make a mistake and paralyze someone. Homeopaths are essentially giving their patients pure water. So unless you’re unlucky enough to somehow manage to drown a patient, you’re probably in pretty good shape as far as lawsuits go.

So why do I bring this up? Well, proponent of all things woo NaturalNews.com has a wonderful list of 50 facts you may not know about homeopathy. Some of my favorites:

Fact 2 - Homeopathic theories are based on fixed principles of the Laws of Nature which do not change — unlike medical theories which are constantly changing! 

I must say I absolutely love when claims such as this are made. To think that somehow, the fact that science based medicine adapts to new information it gleans is a bad thing, is just….flabbergasting. I’m not sure what “fixed principles of the Laws of Nature” homeopathy is supposed to be based on, but I would be skeptical of any statement so vague. 

Fact 5 - The Homeopathic provings of medicines are a more scientific method of testing than the orthodox model.

Again, this is of course an unsubstantiated claim. I fail to see how their “provings” of medicines are more scientific. When I get a headache I take ibuprofen, after a short amount of time, my headache is gone. The JREF has had a million dollar prize waiting for anyone who can prove homeopathy can do just that much. It is still unclaimed.

Fact 7 - Homeopathic medicines work by communicating a current/pattern/frequency of energy via the whole human body to jump start the body’s own inherent healing mechanisms

I always find these types of claims interesting as well. I like how it exhibits a complete lack of knowledge of how the body works. The idea that there is some hidden healing mechanism within the human body that is just evolutionarily “switched off”, and only in need of a little prodding from your glass of water is completely insane. And, obviously, untrue. 

There would be no evolutionary pressure to not have such a mechanism switched on, if it existed. Our bodies have selectively evolved traits to insure survival. Why would it voluntarily handicap itself on the defense front?

* Fact 15 - Homeopathic medicines have no toxic side-effects.

* Fact 16 - Homeopathic medicines are non-addictive.

Byproducts of:

* Fact 17 - Every true homeopathic medicine is made using one substance 

Yes, that one substance is water. 

Fact 31 - Big Pharma does not want the Public to find out how well homeopathy works!

This is another one of those oft-repeated claims. I’m not sure why, if homeopathy worked, “big pharma” wouldn’t just synthesize the treatments and sell those with exorbitant markups. 

Fact 39 - Scientists agree that if and when homeopathy is accepted by the scientific community it will turn established science on its head.

The same thing is true of magic dentistry. When its finally accepted by the dental community, it will turn established dentistry on its head. I’m not sure who these “scientists” are (they’re never named). Probably because if they were, they’d be immediately exterminated by big pharma.

Fact 50 - The media as a whole has been unwilling to air a defence of the efficacy of homeopathy and the validity of this 250 year old profession.

This is a really great twisting of the facts here. The fact that the media has not aired a claim that your modality works is PROOF that it does, and theres a coverup. Well then. Theres really nothing anyone can say. Any study that disproves your theory is a flawed one, paid for by big pharma. News outlets that don’t air stories that are favorable to your claims are in the pocket of big pharma. Its amazing how deep this conspiracy goes. 

The bottom line is, to believe that homeopathy works you have to swallow a mountain of incredibly far-fetched claims, along with an awful lot of water. From the cover-ups to the modality itself, its all very difficult to fathom. Occam’s razor certainly seems to point to its pseudoscience.

Posted 17 October 2008 § Skepticism ‡ Comments °