Beware the opportunist in the age of COVID-19

I wrote this paper 20 years ago!

Evolution Vs. Creationism

John Oliver on Media Hyping Science

Nye and Blackburn on Climate Policy

12/12/12 - nine days until alignment!

Neuromythology - don't kid yourself.

A Big Problem in Science Publishing

In the following video a prominent medical doctor, author, and anti-anti vaccine activist named Ben Goldacre rails against a big problem in the way scientific data is published. His point is that only exciting and dramatic results get published. Because of this reality all those boring negative results that show no difference between experimental and control groups do not get published.

Take a simple experiment... a bunch of different scientists ask - does drug X work at curing a particular disease? So they get people to volunteer. They give half the people drug X and the other half a sugar pill (placebo). Now say there are 10 different studies set up just like this but only 5 show any difference in the group that took drug X. The studies that show that drug X "works" will get published while those that do not show the drug to have any effect will not get published. Why is this a problem? because the deciders at your bedside (aka doctors) will only see the papers with positive results, while never knowing that there were a bunch of unpublished studies that show drug X to be ineffective. This is a disservice to patients and doctors alike and does not help anyone.

The onus is on publishers to publish everything no matter how un-sexy the result. There is no reason in the internet-age that all results can not be archived in a universally searchable data-base. Doctors and patients need the whole picture when they make decisions, not just the bright shiny bits editors choose for them!

GMO Cancer Study in Rats - Sketchy Science

Listen to the following interview with science-writer and Yale University professor Carl Zimmer to see how the release of the recent study from France that claims genetically-modified corn causes increased rates of tumors in a special breed of rats is misleading.

Witches, tree-rings, and LSD

In the moonlight mothers and fathers watched the shriveled toes of a poor beggar swing from the gallows. They placed their faith in God that the death of this "witch" might take away the torment, fits, and visions that plagued their children. That somehow through supernatural forces the sensations of ants crawling underneath their skin, delusions of bursting into flames, and frenzied shrieks of terror in the night would cease. As the the seasons brought new harvests the number of swinging bodies dwindled. But bouts of bewitchment would visit the same valleys for centuries.

This was a typical scene in the medieval villages that lined the Rhône and Rhine rivers. Here, and in other curiously coincidental micro-climates all over Europe something dark and treacherous lurked in the farm fields.

During the cold, wet harvest seasons a deep purple fungus Claviceps purpurea reared its ugly sclerotium amongst the ears of rye. Looking much like the rooster's spur the killer was given the french name - erogot. When rye was milled the flour could contain up to 30% ergot by dry weight. And so it goes that the biochemistry of bewitchment had its origins under the millstones of fifteenth century Europe. 

During this age the peasantry ate an enormous proportion of the darker cheaper rye; upwards of three pounds a day. As the chemicals made by the ergot made their way into the blood and brains of those apparently seized by demons, the unaffected were left to assume they had been bewitched. The linguistic fossil preserved in the very word - seizure - describes the uncontrolled fits the affected displayed. A condition known at the time as "St Anthony's fire"  (aka Ignis Sacer) did not become known as ergotism until 1853 when the clinical connection to the fungus was finally made.

Mycotoxins are poisons produced by fungi and mold. The variety of mycotoxins contained in ergot-infested rye cause two distinct varieties of ergotism - gangrenous or convulsive ergotism. Ergotamine, a powerful vaso-constrictor, prevents blood flow to the extremities and is the main culprit in gangrenous ergotism.  Whereas ergine and lysergic acid hydroxyethylamide cause convulsive ergotism. These lysergic acid compounds found in the ergot fungus have similar effects on the human brain as the psychoactive drug - LSD.  Both LSD and the ergot alkaloids induce hallucinations by a similar and yet poorly understood mechanism.  Structurally similar to serotonin these compounds bind serotonin receptors in the brain. It is not known how this induces hallucinations but it is thought that agonist activity to serotonin releases higher concentrations of the neurotransmitter glutamate in the brain's cortex exciting neurons in random ways.  This would explain the varied psychological effects reported by individuals under the influence of this class of drugs.

By their activity these compounds were known long before their chemical makeup was uncovered. Ergotamine had been used for nearly two centuries in midwifery to stop hemorrhaging after birth and also to induce abortion. In the first half of the 20th century the other ergot alkaloids were probed for alternative medical uses such as blood pressure and migraine treatments.  A young chemist named Albert Hofmann working for Sandoz pharmacueitcal company in Basel, Switzerland literally stumbled across LSD while performing organic synthesis of ergot alkaloids.  His wild bicycle ride is a story of scientific lore worthy of its own post.

But here we are focused on the science behind medieval bewitching. The connection between ergotism and witch trials was first proposed by Linda Caporael in 1976 where she hypothesized in the Journal Science that Ergot could have been the real world cause of the supposedly supernatural events that transpired in the village of Salem, Massachusetts in 1692.  
 

In her paper Caporael outlines the evidence for ergotism being the scourge that set off the string of hangings accompanying the infamous witch trials in Salem.  She points out that the symptoms of ergotism; spasms, the sensation of ants crawling under skin, and the feeling of being disemboweled - were all recorded by the court clerk when taking the testimony of the affected teenage accusers.  Indeed the very fact that the accusers were female and in their teens also implicates ergotism as these are the most susceptible individuals in any community where there is an outbreak.  Lastly, she turns to the geographic distribution of the bewitchment. Here she reconstructs a map of Salem village where she hypothesizes that a contamination of grain grown on the eastern bank of the Wolleston river could have been the only source of ergot and still affected all the families involved.
  

Caporael's work inspired historian Mary Matossian to conduct further investigations into the possible connection between witch trials and ergotism outbreaks throughout the middle ages up until the 19th century.  In her book Poisons of the Past Matossian lays out an incredibly convincing argument that outbreaks of ergotism indeed correlate to increased incidence of witch trials throughout the medieval period.  She explains how tree ring thickness measurements compiled for every year from 1269 - 1977 C.E. can be compared to an annual index of number of witch trials with statistical correlation in southwestern Germany and the Swiss alps. 

 

Years in which the growing season was cool and wet correspond to thicker tree rings and therefore seasons in which the amount of fungus growing amongst the rye was high.  These long wet seasons directly preceded autumns with more witch trials. Like the medieval trials the Salem affair was also preceded by two years of unusually cold spring weather.

I was and still am utterly fascinated by the potential connection between a nefarious fungus and the waves of witch trials throughout the middle ages. So fascinated that I have continued seeking further evidence for this biochemical culprit in primary sources.  As I have said, the mid-wives of medieval Europe knew how to use ergot to treat hemorrhaging after birth, but did they know they could use this fungus to induce abortion? Surely they must have, and this would only have placed them higher on the list of public enemies by church rulers. Interesting observation, but how can I use this bit of information to test the claim that the presence of ergot in the diet of medieval peoples lead to witch trials?

There was a guide-book to hunting witches written in Germany in 1486 and approved by the papcay - the Malleus Maleficarum. Translated to English from Latin this means "the hammer of the witches."

The main purpose of the Malleus was to attempt to systematically refute arguments claiming that witchcraft does not exist, discredit those who expressed skepticism about its reality, to claim that witches were more often women than men, and to educate magistrates on the procedures that could find them out and convict them.

Might I use this primary text to hunt for clues connecting ergot to geographic regions affected by witchcraft?   Ergot can induce abortion in humans, right? Well, ergot in rye can also induce abortion in cattle. With this fact in mind I went to the text of the Malleus which is available through Google Books and project Gutenberg. When I searched in the book for the word "cattle" I found several references and even a whole chapter on how witches injure cattle in various ways. To my astonishment, there was even mention of bewitched cattle spontaneously aborting their calves! To the witch-hunters and inquisitors of the middle ages this phenomenon was a sign of witchcraft but the reality was most likely a rotten rye crop!

Thanks for reading! I hope you liked this story. If you did please share it! I would like to make this part of a storytelling series I am planning on you tube. Stay tuned here in the coming weeks for more biochemistry of Halloween content! You can subscribe to Tom Paine's Ghost at the link in the upper-right sidebar. If you like what you read here please make a donation of any size so I can continue to do what I love :)  Donate button also in the sidebar.

I would like to thank Nick Clark for our many discussions and collaboration on this topic and George Hudler for his kind advice and additional references.


Caporael, L. (1976). Ergotism: the satan loosed in Salem? Science, 192 (4234), 21-26 DOI: 10.1126/science.769159  

Schweingruber, Fritz H., BrÄker, Otto U. & SchÄr, Ernst (1979). Dendroclimatic studies on conifers from central Europe and Great Britain Boreas, 8, 427-452  

Congressman - evolution and bing bang "lies from the pit of Hell!"

Rep. Paul Broun (R-Georgia) is seen in the video below saying that evolution, embryology, and the big bang are “lies straight from the pit of Hell”. The scariest part of this is that he is a current member of the Science Committee of the House of Representatives! No wonder we are lagging international in science education. We have young earth creationists operating at the upper echelons of our federal government!

A Cure for Homeopathy: Critical Thinking

Morality without religion? Kenneth Miller fields my question

A little bird told me that Dr. Kenneth Miller would appear on the Huffington Post live this afternoon. I proceeded to create an account, log on, and record a video question for him. Lo and behold, Josh Zepp the HuffpostLive moderator aired my question. Skip to 21:25 in to see my question and subsequent answers. 

Miscreant Mimicry Among Creationists

For four long days my colleague Carl Zimmer has been wielding the battle axe for sound science education, fighting the good fight for evidence and evolution. In the aftermath of this battle I have noticed a disturbing trend among the current generation of evolution denialists - they are shape-shifting!

First, a brief history of the debate.

Since the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859 a sub-group of stubborn Christians have been in a perpetual war with reality. Over the years the deniers of evolution have changed their name in order to re-frame their rhetorical attack on the mounting evidence supporting evolution. For the better part of the twentieth century they went by the title "creationists." They sincerely believe an imaginary sky-father "created" all living things six thousand years ago and just plopped them all down on earth in their present form before taking the next day off for a nap.

All was good from their perspective and they were allowed to tacitly poison science education in the United States for more than a century.

But alas, that pesky establishment clause in the US constitution caught up with them. In a 1987 Supreme Court decision six of the nine justices came down squarely on the side of science. Edwards v. Aguillard established that teaching creationism along with evolution in science classrooms is unconstitutional.

The stubborn creationists were undaunted. They knew what any good snake-oil salesmen knows. When your name gets smeared, just change your name. So began the rise of the "intelligent design" proponents. The idea being that the overtly Christian feel of the word "creation" would be remedied with a switch to the more scientific sounding "intelligent-design."  With this new name came new propaganda. Well, not really, as writing is tough work! So they just took an old creationist text-book and changed some words around a little bit so they could slip it into science classrooms without calling it creationism. The book was called "Of Pandas and People." 

The problem with this book was that the editors were lazy and left bits of the old "creationist" language behind in textual fossils. Where the text once read "creationist" it then read "cdesign proponentists."

In 2005 a group of nosy lawyers and science educators took issue with the use of this book in a science classroom in Dover, Pennsylvania. As a result the book and the faith-based science education it promoted was banned from science classrooms. It was deemed by a federal appeals court to violate the precedent set by the 1987 Supreme Court decision mentioned earlier.  

What's a creationists to do?

Here we are seven years later in a scary place where the intelligent design movement has dispensed with identifying themselves altogether and are now just publishing propoganda with scientific-sounding names.  

Enter the copy-cats.

In evolutionary biology some species copy the shape, color, smell, or sound of unrelated species. They do this to protect themselves in order to survive. This is called mimicry. Remember the scene in the Wizard of Oz when the scarecrow, tin man, and lion dress as the wicked witch's guards to enter her fortress unharmed? That is what I'm talking about.

Guess what? Evolution deniers are doing this like crazy! They are cloaking themselves in scientific sounding names so they can slip through the cracks and deliver their propaganda to students of biology caught unaware.

 Listen to these names.  Biologic Institute, Evolution News & Views, and Science and Human Origins.

These are a facebook page, a website, and a printed book respectively.

Coming to these titles cold one would assume they are legitimate organizations for teaching biology and evolution.  Not so. All three are propaganda outlets for the notorious "Discovery Institute."  (*)

You may know about this Seattle based outfit by their incessant call to "teach the controversy." Their goal being to have intelligent design taught along side Darwinian natural selection in biology classrooms around the country. This is total bullocks as there is no controversy. The physical evidence of evolution is overwhelming and grows with each new discovery in biology. This idea of being fair and balanced regarding every single topic discussed often confuses speculation and facts. Lawrence Krauss describes this dilemma well.

Too often in the media, speculative ideas are treated on the same footing as well-tested ones. As a result, it is sometimes hard to tell the difference between them. This is particularly unfortunate when firmly grounded ideas that are known to accurately describe the physical world (such as evolution and the big bang) are passed off as mere theoretical whims of a group of partisan scientists.

As a scientist, writer, and educator it is highly disturbing to see this kind of re-branding by the intelligent design community. By conflating scientific ideas with assumptions of faith and slapping a sciency-sounding name on their front page these groups further damage an already crippled science education program in the United States. Shame on them!

Back to Carl Zimmer.

Intelligent design proponents have been goading Carl with snarky ad hominem attacks on a combination of online forums including Facebook, his Discover Magazine blog - the Loom, and their own comment-free web space - "Evolution News & Views." He has been gracious with the amount of attention he has paid this group of pseudo-academics. Carl has responded at length to a series of games they have been playing with him over the past four days. Read all about it here. 

My advice to Carl is the same advice being given all over the web lately - Don't Feed the Trolls! That being said, I think he has done a great job of staving them off so far and keeping his talents where they belong, on HIS blog. As I walk away from these ceaseless trolls I keep in mind the perennial duty to play the role of a catcher in the rye. For as long as my words last I will attempt to catch those who have fallen into fuzzy-logic and irrational faith-based thought and bring them back to reason. I want to thank Carl for reaffirming my dedication to this goal and for exposing the harmful mimicry going on in the intelligent design community.  

(*) ~ in a previous version of this post I had incorrectly stated that the Discovery Institute and the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY were of the same ilk. I was informed via a facebook friend that those organizations had cuts ties when the Dover descision came down in 2005. So as not to offend I have deleted mention of the creation museum. That batch of crazy is brought to you by Ken Ham. Apologies for the error and I hope this paragraph is sufficiently transparent.

Abound Solar - Colorado Company Goes Belly-Up

Abound Solar, a Colorado manufacturer of thin-film solar cells went under this week. Pressure from inexpensive Chinese products combined with poor management drove a promising company out of business in just two years.

The company spun-off research done at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO. Before re-branding itself as "Abound Solar" the company was called AVA Solar. AVA or air-vacuum-air, representing the unique assembly method used. 

The thin-film cadmium-tellurium photovoltaic cells produced by the company were the brainchild of Dr. W.S. Sampath. I wrote optimistically about Dr. Sampath and the company when they first announced their business plan. See this post for a more extensive background of the company.

I had hoped Abound...

Fantastic Global Discussion with Richard Dawkins

I was extremely impressed with this wonderfully well organized discussion with Richard Dawkins. Watching this makes me feel like a true citizen of the world. The video implements the new technology of Google+ Hangout On Air seamlessly. A tip of the hat to Al Jazeera English for putting this together.  I wrote about this exciting new tool earlier this week. After watching the video read more about Google+ Hangouts here.

New Atheism's most polarizing figure?

Rebecca Watson on Homeopathy and the FDA

Rebecca Watson has been at the center of a lot of heated debates lately over at Pharyngula as well as the recent subject of a famous you-tuber named Thunderf00t. This dust-up stems from her suggestion that something ought be done about sexual harassment at various free-thinking conferences like The Amazing Meeting (TAM) and so on.  All this controversy coupled to me finally listening to the skeptics guide to the universe podcast on a regular basis, brought me to Rebecca Watson's Blog - Skepchick. On the sidebar I found this wonderful video (above). Though it is old by web standards (posted 8 months ago) I want to share it today to give anyone with even a passive interest in the whole current controversy a view of Rebecca Watson unfettered by the kerfuffle. I stand in solidarity with her as I think she is a force to be reckoned with in the world skeptical thinkers. I have dealt with a constant barrage of alternative medicine hocus pocus thrown at me my entire life. Read about my experience with this here. From my perspective I appreciate her concise description of of the shortcomings of homeopathy and also the suggestions of how to participate in raising awareness about this perennial scam.

Eugenie Scott on Climate Change

Whenever I am asked what I think about global climate change I immediately try to understand the perspective of my questioner. I do not respond to the question until I find out how old they think the earth is. If their response in anything less than 4 billion years I can not begin a conversation about climate change.

Why not?

Well because if a person does not comprehend geologic time then I can safely assume they do not trust the scientific method in general and they are not going to pay attention or care about any climate change data I might present to them.  So this brings me to the following video. In order to begin a global conversation about climate change we need a more wide-spread acceptance of the scientific method.  The history of the evolution vs intelligent design debate is a great model for this campaign of public awareness.  It is my opinion that it ought to be used as a template for beginning the climate change conversation.

Good for Goodness' Sake?

I have decided to focus my "homework" leading up to the World Science Festival on E.O. Wilson and his recent change of mind regarding a long-held tenet of evolutionary biology - inclusive fitness. The theory of inclusive fitness provides a logical and mathematical framework to rationalize kin-selection. Kin-selection explains why behavioral traits such as self-sacrifice come to be in certain species. Although it appears an organism is sacrificing their life for the "greater-good" they are really just behaving that way so that their genes can be passed on through their relatives who they are trying to help survive. Wilson has abandoned the idea that altruistic behavior emerges out of the struggle for existence as previously explained by a simple equation championed by none other that HIMSELF at an earlier stage in his life. The equation is rB>C. In which r is a relatedness factor B is the fitness Benefit to the altruistic organism and C is the Cost of genetic fitness to the organism for carrying out the act of altruism. This equation was put forth and formalized by the British evolutionary biologist W.D. Hamilton in the 1960's.

So why has Wilson changed his mind about inclusive fitness? In a 2010 paper in the prestigious scientific journal Nature Wilson, along with colleagues Martin Nowak and Corina Tarnita claim there is not enough evidence in the real world of organisms who display altruistic behavior that follow the rule rB>C. They go further to say that the factors in the equation, B and C are too difficult to quantify.  Wilson admits the equation is simple, elegant, and alluring however he maintains that it is too simple and needs revision.

Wilson's flip-flop (btw, I am not using flip-flop in a negative way here as I think in science changing one's mind is a virtue not a vice) has caused an uproar in the scientific community drawing heavy criticism from some of the most vocal evolutionary biologists including Jerry Coyne and Richard Dawkins.  Wilson's critics have said he is using his authority to make assumptions without backing up his claims with real-world data (though Wilson does cite termite and ambrosia beetle societies). Wilson fires back at them with the same criticism, saying they have a lack of data on their side (though they do cite sawfly, wasp and bee societies). This makes for the juiciest kind of intellectual debate, one that sends scientists out in the field in search for more evidence.

Meanwhile, Wilson's apparent embrace of "group-selection" has opened the flood-gates for scholars from the humanities to jump on board the cooperation-train and use "group-selection" to explain social phenomenon like the persistence of religion in human society and the rapid growth of social networks. Among these are psychologist Jonathan Haidt and social commentator David Brooks. The worry here is that the scientific debate over evidence will be overlooked by the hungry mobs of humanitarians so eager to extract rationale for morals out of biology. 

I am excited to go into this debate and try as I might to filter out the wheat from the chaff when it comes to sound-science.  It gets particularly noisy when morals get involved. I have seen this before at the World Science Festival as I covered the last "Faith and Science" discussion panel in 2010. My big worry is that the conversation will devolve into a silly argument about the participants underlying motives as the festival is in large part funded by a controversial organization called the John Templeton Foundation.  Compounding this fear of mine is that Matin Nowak (the Austrian born, Harvard mathematician, and co-author of E.O.Wilson's) has received many millions of dollars form the Templeton foundation for his research.  Indeed, many of the intellectuals in the Wilson camp are notorious in the scientific community for receiving money from Templeton (Jonathan Haidt winning the Templeton prize in 2001.)  My hope is that the conversation can stick to the science and not get railroaded by money and politics. 

This post has been entered into the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center's travel award contest. Winner's will receive money to help pay for the travel expenses for attending the Science Online conference to be held at the end of January 2013 in Raleigh, North Carolina. Apply for the travel award here!

Drano for your heart?

There is a growing number of people around the world who believe they have found an alternative treatment for clogged arteries. The idea is to use a kind of molecular Drano and slowly remove the plaques that line the artery walls. It is called chelation therapy.

Is there any evidence that shows this treatment is good or bad?

Almost...

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has completed data collection on a large-scale double-blind clinical trial to assess the efficacy of chelation therapy to treat coronary artery disease (CAD). This study is called the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy or TACT. Though the trial itself has had its own trials and tribulations the study is now complete and the results are being mulled-over by the primary researchers at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine with the intention of publishing results within this calendar year - 2012.

UPDATE: Publication of results now postponed until February 2013!

Why am I interested in this? Doesn't this study pang of "alternative medicine" aka - quackery? 

I await the results with extreme anticipation because of my father. 

My decision to go into science and complete a PhD in biochemistry was made in direct response to my father and his seemingly unreasonable evangelism of chelation therapy as treatment for clogged coronary arteries. My father is a firm believer that chelation therapy saved his life. I think he perhaps got lucky somewhere amid the myriad "alternative" treatments he underwent with no scientific way to assess whether the chelation therapy helped or harmed him. The reality is that until this point there has not been a sufficient study to make a scientifically sound assessment of this treatment.   

While I was in high school in the late 1990s my father (now 80 years old) had heart problems - namely congestive heart failure and arrhythmia. He was a lawyer-turned-vitamin salesman and had it in his head that he did not want to end up dead like many of his contemporaries. I watched as many of his life-long buddies had open-heart surgery only to die weeks or months later from pneumonia, MRSA or other illnesses brought on by their chest cavities having been cracked open. 

After having a spiral CAT-scan of his heart at age 65 my father was told he had up to 80% blockage in some of his coronary arteries. His cardiologist suggested bypass surgery but my father did not want his chest opened up. He had heard through friends in Erie, PA that he could try an alternative treatment with no surgery. He signed up and against the advice of his cardiologist began to receive weekly doses of intravenous EDTA and tetracycline in order to remove the plaque from his arteries. He repeated this every week for many months. After the initial intravenous treatment he switched to a maintenance program of monthly EDTA suppository that he has been on ever since. 

The idea that EDTA or ethylene diamine tetraacidic acid injected in a person's blood could wrestle away calcium deposits (aka apatite) from the walls of hardened arteries seemed to-good-to-be true to me. This was until I went to the dentist's office in graduate school.  I had and still have a orthodontic retainer behind my lower front teeth (I am now 29 years old).  Every 6 months I have to have the accumulated plaque removed from the back of my lower front teeth which builds up due to higher concentration of dead and dying bacteria there due to the retainer.  While I was in graduate school visiting the school dentist the dental hygienist told me that keeping plaque cleared from a person's gums helps fight heart disease by keeping plaque in their coronary arteries low. I was flabbergasted. Here I had a direct link between  bacterial plaque and coronary artery disease.  I could understand that calcium deposits on the tooth enamel were similar to calcium deposits in hardened arteries.  I saw that injecting high concentrations of EDTA would impose Le Chatelier's principle on the calcium ions present in a clogged coronary arteries and thus reduce the size of the atherosclerotic deposits. Despite this theoretical comprehension I was and still am highly skeptical of EDTA chelation therapy. I see my father's success with the treatment as anecdotal. Perhaps he was not as likely to have a heart attack as his vital statistics would have him believe.  My skepticism remains.

Beyond the chelation therapy, my father has for as long as I can remember advocated "preventive medicine" like vitamins and various concoctions sold by his former company - Rexall Showcase International (Now called Unicity).  My father  had unfortunately fell into a pyramid scheme run by a bunch of crooks in the early 90s. I could see right through this bullshit when I was 12 years old! A company named "Sundown" acquired the brand-name "Rexall" in 1985 and used it to lure in "sales associates." Think AMWAY for vitamins. Rexall Drugstores had a shining reputation with old-timers like my father who remembered the good-old-days when Rexall Drugstores were synonymous with root-beer floats and grandpa's heart-burn remedies. Sundown bought the company and used the brand-name (with no connection to the remaining chain of Rexall drugstores) to sell vitamins and weight loss products in big package deals to "sales associates" who could then sell the product to whomever they could convince. I recall the most touted of the panacea powders my father peddled was called BiosLife 2. A disgusting chalky version of what we know as "Emergen-C." But, as Rexall Showcase International's stock tanked, my father's enthusiasm for the brand waned.

In addition to Rexall my father has also evangelized the writing of Julian Whitaker MD. Dr Whitaker as Dad so fondly calls him, writes a weekly newsletter lauding the new advances in "alternative medicine" and telling all subscribers exactly where they can purchase all the new supplements - FROM HIM. 

As much as all this bothered me as an adolescent what really bothered me was that I could not have a rational conversation with my father - a very reasonable man. I love my father and I could not understand how he was so sucked in to to all this crap. I have a hypothesis that he so desperately wanted to be healthy and live a long time so he could be with us into old-age, that he would believe anything. I can't say that he was wrong as he has survived several bouts of congestive heart failure and a mini-stroke. But the fact that he was so manipulated by executives at Sundown/Rexall Showcase International fills me with an uncontrollable animosity towards these snake-oil salesmen. 

I am admittedly skeptical of most of my father's self-prescribed therapies. But as for TACT I have my mind open as "THERE WILL BE DATA!" The pricipal investegator in this study is Gervasio A Lamas, M.D. of Mount Sinai School of Medicine. I have heard that the results will be published and made publicly available around June 2012. Please join me in the assessment of said data! Finally I can have a rational discussion with my father grounded in data on a subject quite literally near and dear to his heart. 

Lamas, G., Goertz, C., Boineau, R., Mark, D., Rozema, T., Nahin, R., Drisko, J., & Lee, K. (2012). Design of the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT) American Heart Journal, 163 (1), 7-12 DOI: 10.1016/j.ahj.2011.10.002

Ernst, E. (2000). Chelation therapy for coronary heart disease: An overview of all clinical investigations American Heart Journal, 140 (1), 139-141 DOI: 10.1067/mhj.2000.107548