3 ms·

I once saw a case on a conspiracy forum of a guy who claimed that taking worming tablets had cured his cancer. It wasn't a clear case to me, as he'd also been t

by wbhart 7y ago

I once saw a case on a conspiracy forum of a guy who claimed that taking worming tablets had cured his cancer. It wasn't a clear case to me, as he'd also been taking traditional chemo. His doctors apparently told him that the worm tablets he was taking were harmless and he could go on taking them, but the doctor didn't think it had any effect on his cancer. The real issue I have with this sort of reporting is that the plural of anecdote is not data. If 1% of people with a given kind of cancer will survive, and some percentage of them take alternative medicines, then a smaller, but nonzero, percentage of people will believe they were cured by taking just about anything. Controlled, double blind, randomized trials are the only way we can know whether these anecdotes have anything to them.

tomohawk 7y ago
Agree with the studies, but the singular of data is not "cure" or "safe". A substance that is shown to be beneficial in general may not be beneficial for you, and may even be harmful for you. I have a family member who cannot take various common medicines, not because of the active ingredient (which they need) but because of the inactive ones which are generally considered safe. Conversely, it is possible for a substance which is not shown to have a general effect in a study to have an effect specifically for a person or small group of people. Discounting this and hiding behind "evidence based medicine" is not helpful.
jcims 7y ago
Unfortunately there appear to be zero references to this drug at clinicaltrials.gov.
londons_explore 7y ago
> Controlled, double blind, randomized trials are the only way we can know whether these anecdotes have anything to them. The problem is they're too damn expensive. There is a huge number of people willing to put almost anything in their body in the hope it might help (animal remedies, herbs, homeopathic remedies, etc). If we could harness these people into cheap double-blind trials, we could advance science much quicker and cheaper. I'm thinking something along the lines of "you tell us what pseudoscience remedy you want, and we'll return either it or a placebo with 50/50 chance, and then you self-report the results to us".

by wbhart 7y ago

tomohawk 7y ago

Agree with the studies, but the singular of data is not "cure" or "safe". A substance that is shown to be beneficial in general may not be beneficial for you, and may even be harmful for you. I have a family member who cannot take various common medicines, not because of the active ingredient (which they need) but because of the inactive ones which are generally considered safe. Conversely, it is possible for a substance which is not shown to have a general effect in a study to have an effect specifically for a person or small group of people. Discounting this and hiding behind "evidence based medicine" is not helpful.

jcims 7y ago

Unfortunately there appear to be zero references to this drug at clinicaltrials.gov.

londons_explore 7y ago

> Controlled, double blind, randomized trials are the only way we can know whether these anecdotes have anything to them. The problem is they're too damn expensive. There is a huge number of people willing to put almost anything in their body in the hope it might help (animal remedies, herbs, homeopathic remedies, etc). If we could harness these people into cheap double-blind trials, we could advance science much quicker and cheaper. I'm thinking something along the lines of "you tell us what pseudoscience remedy you want, and we'll return either it or a placebo with 50/50 chance, and then you self-report the results to us".