Busting popular misinformation about Alzheimer’s disease
Do cholesterol-lowering drugs or stress cause Alzheimer’s? Can coconut oil and mushrooms prevent it? Approach these claims with caution.
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Can HPV infection be treated? Here are the facts
The Internet is awash with products claiming to treat HPV infection. But evidence for these claims is scarce.
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Leucovorin might help some kids with autism, but it’s no silver bullet
Some studies suggest leucovorin could help treat certain autism-related symptoms. But experts caution against viewing it as a cure for autism.
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Beware of “miracle cure” claims surrounding DMSO
Claims about DMSO’s alleged curative properties are big on anecdotes but small on evidence.
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Anti-vaccine claims about the Alexis Lorenze case mislead on vaccine risks
This report highlights the questionable rapidity with which Lorenze’s illness was attributed to vaccines by anti-vaccine activists. As a fuller examination of the available evidence shows, it is challenging to reliably establish vaccines as the sole cause of her condition.
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How fears of parasites drive viral claims for detoxes and cleanses
Removing parasites from the body is a recurring theme in health misinformation on social media. These posts misleadingly suggest that…
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Are claims linking recent U.S. trends in cancer diagnoses to COVID-19 vaccines plausible? A look at the available data
Since it takes several years to gather, verify, and consolidate cancer data at the national level, there’s no real-time way to monitor national cancer trends. Medical experts have also explained that there is no plausible mechanism or data that connect COVID-19 vaccines to cancer.
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How health problems after COVID-19 vaccination are sometimes used to feed misinformation narratives
While illness can occur shortly after vaccination, it doesn’t mean that the vaccine must be the cause. Illness can also occur simply by coincidence, since diseases have existed long before vaccines arrived. Part of evaluating whether a vaccine is the cause of an illness requires determining if vaccinated people are at a higher risk of the illness compared to unvaccinated people—something that anecdotes alone cannot provide.
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“Disease X”: How pandemic preparedness talks spawned conspiracy theories online
On 17 January 2024, public health experts including Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), held…
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Variations on a theme: The evidence refuting the false claim that vaccines cause autism
While there has indeed been a rise in the number of autism diagnoses in the last decade, the evidence points not to vaccines as the cause, but to a broader diagnostic criteria of autism and increased awareness of the condition now as compared to the past.