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COVID-19 continues to dominate the nightly news and play upon the global stage. While the probability of personal infection remains low at about 10%, the consequences are dire and there is a need to place these continually recurring statistics into context.

The alternative health advocates at Natural News recommend you spend an additional $83,000 on organic food to avoid cancer and the cost of expensive treatments for the disease. You should save your money because eating conventional food, even if it's genetically modified, won't up your cancer risk. 

As we try to reopen our domestic and global markets, as well as entertainment venues, increasingly there are voices calling for a method to ensure safe passage. That method is a so-called immunity or vaccine passport. But each comes with its own price – and ethical problems.

Much of our behavioral changes during the COVID-19 pandemic are driven by fear, a primal survival instinct, subsequently re-enforced by state mandates. It is proving difficult for some to unwind their fear even having been vaccinated. Is fear the best means of influencing our behavior? 

It remains a mystery to me why workers in “the business” of healthcare would be hesitant to be vaccinated. After all, they have high-risk exposure daily. 

ABC News really pulled a stinker when it published an online article entitled "Over 100 fully vaccinated people contract COVID-19 in Washington state, officials say." Sounds scary, right? No. The results paint a very different picture. Cheap scare tactics are the last thing we need right now.

It took only a few days for the American Federation of Teachers, their second-largest union, to say “not so fast” to the CDC’s recommendation for opening schools by reducing pupils' distance from six to three feet. What is the science behind their concerns?

Much of the literature in the softer sciences, and here we need to include studies of public health issues, like nutrition, exercise, or even COVID-19, seem irreproducible. One group's work does not seem to be easily reproduced by another, giving rise to concerns about bias and veracity. As always, there is far more to the story.

The pandemic is not a monolithic event; it is a dance of the virus and our behavior. What we have learned about pandemics from the mistakes in our models. What about “long” COVID? Why does “if it bleeds, it leads” make sense?

Let’s not forget that the goal in tamping down the COVID-19 pandemic is to vaccinate the world. But it’s an ambitious project impaired by the concepts of “vaccine nationalism,” fostered by “vaccine diplomacy.” We should consider more than how those words make us feel.

Chocolate is a staple in any Easter basket, but don’t fall for the rhetoric that the fancy-pants high cocoa (cacao!) stuff is a lot healthier.

Antibe Therapeutics is developing a badly-needed new class of anti-inflammatory and analgesic NSAIDs that seem to be much easier on the stomach. The FDA just approved the company's IND for otenaproxesul while the drug has already undergone Phase 2 trials in Canada and is gearing up for Phase 3. Not your typical path for drug development, but whatever works is just fine.

The push to reopen schools continues, as does the back and forth between the CDC’s school-opening guidelines and the teachers' unions saying “not so fast.” Could we all agree that remote learning has not adequately replaced in-class learning? Here is some data to consider.

Processed food has changed our world, providing nutritious, tasty food to growing populations. Questions are being raised regarding the “healthfulness” of processed foods, with more and more studies searching for an answer. But first, can anyone tell you what "processed" means?

Just as restaurants, fast-food or otherwise, are beginning to open up, a new study demonstrates an association between eating out and your mortality. I’ve had a few bad meals in my time, but can they be killing me?

With our first baby on the way, my wife and I were tempted to buy into common activist tropes about pesticides and food safety. Here's how we checked our fears as parents-to-be.

So which is it? And what gives this versatile adhesive its name? Odds are you, and most of those you know, have no idea. But luckily we have Dr. Joe Schwarcz to explain its origins. So if you have a few minutes, the Director of McGill University's Office for Science and Society, and ACSH friend, will reward you with some interesting insights.

Back in 2019 I did an April Fool's Day 'interview' with Andrew Kolodny. Many of you enjoyed it. He did not. Here's a new one. Have fun!

Once again, it seems you are what you eat, but only if you consider what your digestive tract’s microbiome is willing to snack on.

Obesity remains a significant public health problem. Now that we have the basic physiology in hand, it’s time to talk about the biggest problem in reducing this disease: human behavior.

A new article in the journal Clinical Toxicology reports on prohibited stimulants, found in significant amounts, in several sports and weight-loss supplements. Don’t let the long (and maybe scary) title of the research fool you. It presents sound science and deserves a broader audience than just toxicologists.

COVID-19 has brought racial and gender disparities in healthcare to the forefront, although they have been present for many years. A new article captures the gap in research participation.

Indisputable evidence shows the absence of a correlation between the number of opioid prescriptions and opioid abuse or addiction. This has not, however, dissuaded practicing physicians from buying into the false narrative that prescribing opioids for pain is fueling the overdose crisis.

When it comes to medications and advertising, the FDA has a host of regulations designed “to better inform us,” helping to separate fact from hype. The evidence for food labels helping nudge better choices is plus-minus. How about preventative care, like sunscreen? A new study shows that labeling regulation is failing.

There has been no shortage of COVID-19 vaccine doubters. One (of the infinite number) of criticisms of the mRNA vaccines is that clinical trial data is somehow unreliable, or that the vaccine won't work in the “real world." But a study at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center has slammed the brakes on that theory. The Pfizer/Moderna vaccines almost entirely prevented infection in first-line medical workers.