My mother-in-law, who lives in New Jersey, recently mailed me a newspaper clipping. It was about a famous person who came to her state to publicly oppose a bill that would make it harder for parents to exempt their children from school-mandated vaccinations. This same famous person had just visited two other states to lobby against similar legislation…Continue Reading…
A hypothetical: You are a journalist who has written a great deal about the anti-vaccine movement and you have been asked to participate in a panel on the safety of childhood vaccines. This panel was organized by professional medical and health journalists. Also on this hypothetical panel would be a prominent scientist, such as Paul…Continue Reading…
Best as I can tell, most of the internet has denounced ABC’s decision to hire Jenny McCarthy as a cohost of The View, a popular daytime talk show on American television. The uproar, in case you just returned from a week-long, off-the-grid monastic retreat, owes to McCarthy’s role as a prominent spokesperson for the anti-vaccine…Continue Reading…
Today is a good time to be alive when compared to any in human history, such as 100 years ago, when the average life span in industrial countries was about 50. As one recent science article noted, the key in driving up our collective age lies with the advent of medical technologies, improved nutrition, higher education, better housing…Continue Reading…
I’m looking forward to seeing the video and transcript of Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s keynote speech at this year’s AutismOne/Generation Rescue conference. This is the annual confab of the anti-vaccine movement, where all the diehards gather to share their latest pseudoscience, quack therapies and conspiracy theories. Last year’s keynote address was given by actress Jenny McCarthy….Continue Reading…
During a debate last week for Republican presidential candidates and in interviews after it, Representative Michele Bachmann called the vaccine to prevent cervical cancer “dangerous.” Medical experts fired back quickly. Her statements were false, they said, emphasizing that the vaccine is safe and can save lives. Mrs. Bachmann was soon on the defensive, acknowledging that she was not a doctor or a scientist But…Continue Reading…
Last month, when Jon Huntsman criticized his fellow Republican Presidential candidates for spreading malarky about evolution and climate change, conservatives, by and large, looked away. So it is a curious thing that many commentators on the Right are now jumping all over Michelle Bachmann for her “dangerous flirtation” with the anti-vaccine crowd. Orac has a…Continue Reading…
Nobody in the blogosphere takes on the anti-vaccine movement with more passion than Orac, who is a surgeon and biomedical researcher. Stylistically, Orac is a bit long-winded for my taste, but his thoroughness is admirable and appreciated. While some may disapprove of his acidic tone, his persistent deconstruction of the arguments and propaganda advanced by the…Continue Reading…
Yesterday, after the news broke of an extensive investigative report by Brian Deer, a British journalist, CNN’s Anderson Cooper took it from there and completed the evisceration of huckster Andrew Wakefield, whose infamous 1998 study supposedly linking autism to the MMR vaccine was retracted last year by the journal Lancet. Cooper doesn’t mince words, and…Continue Reading…
This is the second post of what will be a three part series on the terminology used in the climate debate to define individuals and groups of people that share a common position. The first post surveyed responses from science and environmental writers on two common terms used in the climate debate: “skeptic” and “denier.”…Continue Reading…