Joseph Mercola

From RationalWiki
Jump to: navigation, search
Against allopathy

Alternative medicine

Icon alternative medicine.svg
Alternative articles

Joseph Mercola, "doctor" of osteopathy, is a popular guru of alternative medicine and a member of the right-wing quack outfit Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. He advocates and provides a forum for many classic crank medical ideas, such as vaccine hysteria and the belief that modern (sorry, "allopathic") medicine kills more people than it helps. His website is a veritable spring of pseudoscience, quackery, and logical fallacies. He is a promoter of the idea of an AMA/Big Pharma/FDA conspiracy.[1]

Despite his claim that unlike real other doctors, he is not interested in profit,[2] he advertises all manner of unproven products, and has a health center that dispenses alternative medicine for a steep price.[3]

Contents

[edit] Issues

In addition to the issues mentioned above, Mercola promotes various disproved crank health ideas such as:

  • Toxic metals in vaccines and dental fillings. The idea of heavy metal poisoning as being responsible for many common health problems is a popular one, and completely wrong. The studies of mercury in dental amalgams and vaccines are conclusive – there is no danger (which is more than can be said for the unnecessary chelation therapy quacks prescribe to fix the "problem").[4]
  • Statin drugs are dangerous. This one is particularly horrible, as few medications or interventions has been found to be as safe and effective as statins. Failing to prescribe a statin to someone with coronary artery disease is very much against the standard of care (meaning that it could be construed as malpractice).
  • Microwaves "kill nutrients in food." Just plain wrong.[5]
  • Modern medicine kills you dead, but homeopathy works! (Fractal wrongness).
  • Seriously, just pick a quack bête noire out of a hat, anything from aspartame to water fluoridation.

[edit] FDA warnings

Mercola has received two warnings from the FDA for hyping coconut oil, chlorella, and the Living Fuel RxTM diet.[6][7] He received a third warning for selling infrared cameras that he claimed could be used to diagnose a number of illnesses.[8]

[edit] Birds of a feather...

In what can only be termed a quack alternative medicine practitioner group hug, Mercola has recently come to the defense of the Burzynski Clinic despite the obvious pitfalls of doing so.[9]

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

  1. When Should You Use Conventional Medicine?
  2. http://www.mercola.com/forms/background.htm
  3. http://www.mercola.com/forms/nptour/index.htm
  4. Somewhat ironic that he got on the anti-mercury bandwagon, considering that his last name kind of sounds like mercury.
  5. The Claim: Microwave Ovens Kill Nutrients in Food, New York Times
  6. FDA warning, Feb. 16, 2005
  7. FDA warning, Sep. 21, 2006
  8. FDA warning, Mar. 22, 2011
  9. Quoth Joe Mercola: I love me some Burzynski antineoplastons, Respectful Insolence
Personal tools
Namespaces

Variants
Actions
Navigation
Community
Toolbox
support