A couple of years ago I made a bunch of school resources for teachers with the organisation NESTA and a group of teachers. Since I mentioned them in the book a couple of people have asked for them, so here they are: Read the rest of this entry »
Generous review of my book in the Daily Telegraph
There’s a very nice review of my book “Bad Science” in the Telegraph this week. I have to say I’m delighted to see that the two newspapers I’ve probably been meanest about over recent years are the two that have reviewed it so far. This betrays a genuinely wholesome grown up approach to life which properly warms the cockles of my heart.
Matthias Rath drops his million pound legal case against me and the Guardian.
It’s just been publicly announced that the vitamin pill magnate Matthias Rath has pulled out of his gruelling legal case against me and the Guardian. He bought full page adverts denouncing Aids drugs while promoting his vitamin pills in South Africa, a country where hundreds of thousands die every year from Aids under an HIV denialist president and the population is ripe for miracle cures. I said his actions were highly worrying, in no uncertain terms. I believe I was right to do so.
This libel case has drawn on for over a year, with the writ hanging both in my toilet, and over my head. Although fighting it has been fascinating, and in many respects a great pleasure, it has also taken a phenomenal amount of my time, entirely unpaid, to deal with it. For the duration of the case I have also been silenced on the serious issues that Rath’s activities raise, the chapter on his work was pulled from my book, and I have been unable to comment on his further movements around the world.
This will now change, Read the rest of this entry »
The Charities Commission think blogs have no educational value
Rant. Podnosh has unearthed a true gem: Read the rest of this entry »
Radio 4 The Rise of the Lifestyle Nutritionists
Well, very excitingly – to me – the first half of my two-parter on Radio 4 went out over the airwaves last night. You can listen to it here:
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Part 2 is here.
It’s Radio 4’s “Choice of the Day” for Monday Read the rest of this entry »
Aids Quackery International Tour
Ben Goldacre
The Guardian
Saturday December 1 2007
If you were going to be actuarial about media coverage – an eighth of a column inch for each premature death perhaps – then this paper would be filled with diarrhoea and Aids. Today is World Aids Day: so come with me on a world tour of Aids quackery.
South Africa is traditionally where we would start such a voyage, headed as it is by President Thabo Mbeki, a man who remains an HIV denialist and recently told a biographer that he regrets withdrawing from publicly discussing his beliefs. He has compared Aids scientists to Nazi concentration camp doctors and portrayed black people who accepted orthodox Aids science as “self-repressed” victims of a slave mentality. Read the rest of this entry »
A startling lack of critical self-appraisal
One for the small print maybe, but I think this is culturally quite interesting, because to me it tells a small part of the story on how you can maintain a belief system by avoiding appraisal of your ideas.
As you will remember, Craig Sams, a confectionery millionaire, recently wrote an article which I suppose you’d have to describe as an “attack” on me. This was close to what I’m hoping for – which is an attack on my ideas – and I genuinely wish he’d engaged with any single one of my criticisms of McKeith and the wider nutritionism industry. As I have said many times: there’s nothing I like better than people engaging in a discussion about ideas, and criticising mine. If you haven’t read Sams’ article already I’d highly recommend it for sheer enjoyment. Read the rest of this entry »
The Amazing Qlink Science Pedant
Ben Goldacre
Saturday May 19, 2007
The Guardian
Normally I’d ignore quack medical devices, but when the catalogue from Health Products For Life – run by vitamin pill salesman Patrick Holford – arrived, I found an unexpected treat waiting for me. Among his usual “special formulation” pill-peddling banter, there was the QLink pendant, at just £69.99.
The QLink is a device sold to protect you from those terrifying invisible electromagnetic rays, and cure many ills. “It needs no batteries as it is ‘powered’ by the wearer – the microchip is activated by a copper induction coil which picks up sufficient micro currents from your heart to power the pendant.” Says Holford’s catalogue. According to the manufacturer’s sales banter, it corrects your energy frequencies. Or something.
Read the rest of this entry »
