Search results

Alternative health guru Joe Mercola claims there's been a massive increase in autism cases since the 1960s and that the weedkiller glyphosate is a "key culprit." He's wrong on both points.

Multiple studies have shown that vaping can help smokers give up cigarettes if they want to quit. But research is beginning to show that vaping may actually incentivize smokers to quit, even when they have no plans to stop.

Let’s face it, Dr. Google remains the Dr. Benjamin Spock of our current generation; 53% of Americans search there for health information. A close runner-up is Mehmet Oz, a cardiovascular surgeon and now influencer – and when he speaks, he moves markets, at least for diets and supplements that often, although not always, have scant if no scientific basis. A new study looks at how we combat or, more appropriately, do not combat the Oz Effect.

It is that time of year when we present listicles of our top 5 or 10. Here are our most popular articles based on your page views. On behalf of myself and all of our wonderful writers, thank you for all 400,000 reads.

Fear porn, humane “washing” food labels, catching up with Sisyphus, junk food diets - for plants

A recent Newsweek report on the toxicity of ultra-processed foods was based on a carefully performed study comparing the responses of 20 individuals to both unprocessed and ultra-processed foods. It is worthwhile, as citizen-scientists, to look at the study for ourselves. We cannot argue the dots but may disagree with how they connect.

We are fortunate enough that there is now an FDA-approved drug called Paxlovid, which does an incredible job of keeping COVID patients out of the hospital (or morgue). Yet NBCNews.com chose a sensationalist, scary headline about the drug as its lead health story of the day. Really lousy journalism.

It was pretty much a forgone conclusion, but the FDA's decision to grant an Emergency Use Authorization to Pfizer's COVID drug, Paxlovid, could mark the turning point in our battle against the virus. Here's the story that you won't find anywhere in the press.

Is it tax avoidance or tax cheating, robot dogs from Electro to Spot, synthetic meatspace, and synthetic meat and the coming bio-economy

Some social justice activists have alleged that Western companies use biotechnology to "colonize" the developing world. There isn't a bit of evidence in support of this popular but very dangerous accusation.

Name’s Kluge. KLOO-GEE. Sam Kluge. I work for OSHA: S.Kruge, license 24680. One other thing you should know: I hate Christmas. No surprise they call me Skrugj.
So why do I hate Christmas?

Most COVID-19 concerns have focused on daily infections and their accumulated impacts. Relatively little attention has been given to the lingering symptoms known as “long-haul COVID,” even though it comprises some 30% of cases. The available data are spotty but amenable to the same kinds of population analysis that has been applied to daily cases.

Yet another high-quality study has shown that vaping can help smokers permanently give up cigarettes. The media seems not to have noticed. Why?

"For everything, there is a season,
A time for every activity under heaven."
Just as there are patterns to our lives, there are patterns to our afflictions. More specifically, in the time of COVID, a pattern to how it spreads, our symptoms, and outcomes. A new pattern discerns a subtle but intriguing pattern that may help to explain why delta is more transmissible than alpha. Perhaps it can help provide a clue to omicron’s heightened powers.

As the Supreme Court gears up to determine “the fate of the fetus,” the state of their “pre-genitors” also remains murky.

'Tis the season. As we turn to the holidays, their spiritual meanings, and the liminal moment as we end another extraordinary pandemic year, we should take stock of our position. We should consider that a bit of DNA, far smaller than we can see, that we could not imagine until 1892 has brought the world to its collective knees. Where exactly do we stand in the grand scheme of life?

I’ve written several times about taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages. While the public health goal has always been to reduce obesity, nearly every publication has looked at the effect of taxes and the subsequent higher prices on purchasing those drinks. Today, we finally have some research on how well those taxes reduce our weight; we already know they reduce the weight in our wallets.

It's at times like this that the *real* value of ACSH makes itself known. Where else could you 1) Learn about the vileness of fruitcakes and 2) Simultaneously get a lesson on carbon-14 radiolabeling, a technique used to determine the age of really old stuff? Like fruitcakes. Enjoy this annual tradition.

It is impossible to estimate how much time, money, and effort has been wasted trying to find a real health issue with bisphenol A (BPA). Yet, JAMA published a study that is so obviously amateurish that it makes you wonder if the reviewers were comatose. Of course, "BPA increases deaths" made for great headlines, even though it does nothing of the sort.

Starting next month, many grocery store products will have to carry the USDA's bioengineered ("GMO" in the vernacular) food labels. Here's what you should know about this pointless, costly regulation.

A recent study suggests that vaping may be linked to erectile dysfunction. The results are alarming if they're valid, though there are several critical reasons to doubt their validity.

One of our loyal readers brought a recent Newsweek cover story to our attention. It is titled, Americans Are Addicted to 'Ultra-Processed' Foods, and It's Killing Us. In addition to cherry-picking words to favor “natural” over “ultra-processed,” whatever that means, the article raises but does not resolve or necessarily clarify some crucial issues. Are our foods addictive, like fentanyl? What does processed and ultra-processed really mean to our health? What does “the science” reveal or not fully comprehend? It is time to take a deeper dive.

Annapurna – goddess of food, Christmas trees, phrases I may or may not miss next year, and do our inner cycles embody our “self?”

While COVID-19 vaccinations are increasing (however slowly), infections are increasing more rapidly. Both provide a degree of immunity from further infection. We have previously investigated daily rates of change in detail. Here we consider the cumulative rates of infection and the implications for the future of the pandemic.

We need the industry to respond to AMR the way it responded to Covid. For that, we need a government intervention to fix the broken antibiotics market - the Pasteur Act.