Banner
When Salt Is An Endocrine Disruptor, The Term Is Officially Meaningless

A new environmental claim about endocrine disruptors would seem to be an early Christmas gift for...

Rant: Enough Damn Awareness Days Already!

Dear Awareness People:Shut the F......... (1) I'm begging you.I already have more than enough to...

Old Man Balls: Fact Or Fiction?

Disclaimer: If you read this, don't blame me for whatever psychological damage that will inevitably...

European Endocrine Disruptor Study Is Lightweight Of Evidence

So, if you take literally what Patricia Hunt, Ph.D. and colleagues reported in the new...

User picture.
picture for Hank Campbellpicture for Steve Savagepicture for Helen Barrattpicture for Steve Schulerpicture for Gil Rosspicture for Richard Taite
Josh BloomRSS Feed of this column.

Josh Bloom, Ph.D. Director of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Ph.D. at the American Council on Science and Health, New York. He earned a Ph.D. in organic chemistry at the University of Virginia, and... Read More »

Blogroll
Here at the American Council on Science and Health, we meticulously avoid politics because science, in its purest form, is a quest for the truth while the essence of politics is lying well, preferably without getting caught. And, even if you do get caught, it probably doesn’t matter, since lying is part of the job description.

Hence, our mission is, by definition, incompatible with political discussion or debate.

This, however, does not mean that if a public figure, elected or not, is using his or her soapbox to spread bad science or medicine, that we won’t go after them. And we do so emphatically, since the bigger the audience that an individual commands, the more harm they can do.

Despite all the hype we hear about revolutionary new approaches to combating cancer, such as genetic analysis of tumors, targeting cell growth pathways, and immunotherapy, the reality is that most cancer patients are still treated with cytotoxic drugs (cell poisons), many of which have been used for more than 50 years.

The following table gives examples of commonly used cytotoxic drugs, when they were first used, and how likely they are to cause vomiting:

Every now and then you get a 3-1, 86 mph fastball down the middle of the plate. You just have to swing.

This exact pitch was thrown in Washington this week. Not the Nationals. By the PostThey ran a superbly silly story this week entitled  "The dirtiest places on an airplane, ranked." I swung.

It was inevitable.

The “Look at me! I can smoke pot legally!” generation has traded in the toast for the toke.

Instead of “tying the knot,” they are now “trying the pot.” Want the new couple to kiss? Forget about clinking your glass. Just inhale some gas. Tossing the bouquet? What a waste! If the bride is going to toss something that a bunch of single women will pounce on like a tiger on a baby antelope, it might as well be a brick of cheeba.

"Carbonated drinks linked with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest of cardiac origin"

Right away, this looks suspicious. 

"Linked with" is a standard junk science term that translates roughly into: "Let's see if I can get some headlines by manipulating people into thinking that there is a nebulous relationship between something stupid, and their health, even though I know damn well that it isn't real."
In 1985 Michael Hovey, an organic chemist at duPont in Wilmington, Delaware cooked up in his lab a batch of 3-methylfentanyl—a narcotic that is more than 6,000-times stronger than morphinethus ushering in the era of designer drugs. 
Hovey's drug, which belongs to a class of drugs called "synthetic heroins," had a street value of $112 million.