Vaccines are a plot by big pharma!

[KichigaiNeko]

This 'Holistic' method of treatment has gotten out of hand. 

'Holistic' for me means "treating the whole", as such that includes vaccinations, general hygiene, clean water AND whole foods. 

Huge bugbear of mine. I'm all for Holistic... In the right place. If but it's taken on a weird meaning. Now it often means

"I'm not trained in the particular type of boo boo you've come to me with but I AM trained in a particular type of woo which I'm convinced affects everything, so I'll do some stuff on that while I wait for your symptoms to get better via regression to the mean. That'll be £40 please"

Sometimes reductionism is a GOOD thing. But you talk about treating the symptoms these days people look at you funny! What if I WANT my symptoms treated?

The other thing about "Holistic medicine" is that it's bloody hard / impossible to test. Science works by reducing variables and generating a falsifiable hypotheses. Holism specifically seeks to include all variables! Convenient no?

Holistic medicine. My aching arse!

Fully sympathise with your sentiments there JacobS.

How to have science hiJacked, and woo woo take over in the minds of the populace for the benefit of the fraudsters.

[FreeTony]

I can highly recommend Ben Goldacre's - Bad Science.

Deals with the woo that comes from the alternative medicine brigade through to poorly constructed big pharma tests.

[thesummerqueen]

Very true. In fact, the person who started off telling me all this vaccine paranoia garbage, I think he was an atheist. Just because you don't believe in God doesn't mean you can't believe in a whole other host of batshit conspiracy theories. He sounded like a liberal Alex Jones.

I actually got into an argument (also on FB) with a former schoolmate who was studying to become a nurse and who was passing along anti-vax stuff. I - and another of her friends - spent a lot of time posting studies refuting her shit (which consisted of one of those nice meme-style photos talking about the evils of Big Pharma/vax) with studies and sourced articles, and she eventually unfriended me.

Now, I know I can be a real asshole on this board, but I spent a good deal of time being VERY friendly to her trying to explain where she'd got it wrong, because if she was studying to be a nurse, I wanted her to actually take it into account.

It didn't much matter. It doesn't matter what approach you take with these people - when they want to keep their beliefs, they will cover their ears so they don't have to hear sense.

Just got some news that my sister is going vegan...why?...because of a youtube video!

Youtube has some well-sourced videos as well as shite. I'd have asked who had made the video and what the reasoning was for going on the diet.

[FreeTony]

It didn't much matter. It doesn't matter what approach you take with these people - when they want to keep their beliefs, they will cover their ears so they don't have to hear sense.

Exactly. These people care more that other people think they are right, not whether the belief is actually true.

[psychoslice]

I've had multiple vaccinations my entire life and no mental health issues.

go figure

Yes of course everyone won't get mental illness, the same if you smoke, not everyone is going to get lung cancer, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

[NoraBrimstone]

I drank juice when I was a kid and I got meningitis. Not all kids who drink juice are going to get meningitis, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

[My imaginary friend is GOD]

I drank juice when I was a kid and I got meningitis. Not all kids who drink juice are going to get meningitis, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

Correlation =/= causation

[Bad Writer]

I drank juice when I was a kid and I got meningitis. Not all kids who drink juice are going to get meningitis, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

Correlation =/= causation

Bingo.

I've had multiple FB encounters regarding the anti-vaccination movement. I have two friends that won't vaccinate their kids, so they're usually the ones with whom I cross swords. I've made it a practice to parry with a scientific/medical journal entry every time they hit me with a website article from some nutjob, agenda-driven hack.

[NoraBrimstone]

I drank juice when I was a kid and I got meningitis. Not all kids who drink juice are going to get meningitis, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

Correlation =/= causation

You're wrong. It was the juice. Definitely the juice.

[Jacob(smooth)]

I've had multiple vaccinations my entire life and no mental health issues.

go figure

Yes of course everyone won't get mental illness, the same if you smoke, not everyone is going to get lung cancer, but the danger is still there, where we are told there isn't any danger.

Not the same.

There are large, in fact huge scale trials which show that vaccines are not a risk factor for mental illness.

And there is even more data that smoking is a strong predictor of lung cancer.

In simple terms, the danger is NOT there. The only danger, in fact, is from not vaccinating. Then there is a definite danger of Contracting a serious disease!