28 October 2010 by Erik Davis
This is the fourth installment of my five-part series on Magical Thinking, running Monday – Friday this week, which picks up on the themes I introduced at Skepticamp Toronto last weekend. Parts 1, 2, and 3 are here, here, and here. On Holism, Contagion, and Sympathy In the last article in this series, we discussed [...]
Posted in Alternative Medicine, Cognition, Critical Thinking, Skepticism, Vaccines1 Comment
20 October 2010 by Scott Gavura
Anti-vaccine advocates have declared November 1-6 to be Vaccine Awareness Week, and intend to use the week to spread unfounded fear about vaccines. Here in Canada, we already had our own Immunization Awareness Week, but Skeptic North will take up the antivax challenge. We will be joining other science advocates to counter-detail the fearmongering and [...]
Posted in Vaccines19 Comments
13 September 2010 by Scott Gavura
A comprehensive study published today has failed to find any relationship between autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and the administration of vaccines that contain thimerosal. This lack of association even extends to prenatal exposure to thimerosal-containing vaccines. Will this study finally put an end to the manufactroversy about vaccines, thimerosal, and autism? Background There’s been repeated [...]
Posted in Skepticism, Vaccines21 Comments
03 September 2010 by Scott Gavura
I guess it was inevitable. The Public Health Agency of Canada issued a travel advisory today. Advisories themselves aren’t surprising, they’re issued all the time for travellers to countries like China, Angola and Tajikistan. But today’s warning is for travellers to California: An increased number of pertussis cases (also called whooping cough) has been reported [...]
Posted in Canada, Skepticism, Vaccines4 Comments
18 February 2010 by Kim Hebert
Some science blogs are reporting today that Andrew Wakefield is leaving Thoughtful House, following this posting on Thoughtful House’s Yahoo! group (login required):
Posted in Pseudoscience, Vaccines0 Comments
10 February 2010 by Kim Hebert
One question that crops up during discussions of autism prevalence is “If autism isn’t on the rise, then why aren’t there more adults with autism? Where are all of the autistic adults?” There are plenty of adults with autism, but I think these are some of a few reasons for this question.
Posted in Logic and Fallacies, Vaccines0 Comments
04 November 2009 by Kim Hebert
The skeptical blogosphere is abuzz. Unfortunately it’s because the founder of the anti-vaccination group Generation Rescue (GR), JB Handley, has managed to distract everyone from the issue of vaccines with an ad hominem attack against Amy Wallace, of Wired. Before I continue, I want to defend my label of this group as anti-vaccination. For example, [...]
Posted in Health, Skepticism, Vaccines0 Comments
17 October 2009 by Kim Hebert
An article over at Science-Based Medicine (an American medical blog) by Mark Crislip alerted me to a Mexican study relevant to H1N1 vaccinations in Canada. This latest study (and it’s published, too — imagine that) demonstrates no link between seasonal flu vaccines and the H1N1 vaccine. In fact the study showed a small protection effect [...]
Posted in Health, Vaccines0 Comments
