After VIGOR results circulated, Merck's chief scientist emailed: "It is a shame but it is a low incidence and it is mechanism based as we worried it was." The authors say the published VIGOR report counted gastrointestin…
Sold as safe · 2009-02-01 · Art Van Zee, MD, American Journal of Public Health, 2009
"A consistent feature in the promotion and marketing of OxyContin was a systematic effort to minimize the risk of addiction." "On May 10, 2007, Purdue Frederick Company Inc ... along with 3 company executives, pled guilt…
Repurposed anti-parasitics: the case for a closer look
Don't stop, replace, or delay any cancer treatment without talking to your oncologist. Fenbendazole is a veterinary drug. It is not approved for use in humans.
The authors describe three patients "who demonstrated complete response after receiving FBZ therapy as a single or supplementary chemotherapeutic agent"; two had progressed "despite multiple lines of therapy." "No side e…
Repurposed drugs & anti-parasitics · 2020-01-01 · Abughanimeh, Evans, Kallam (Univ. of Nebraska Medical Center), Austin Hematology, 2020
Mebendazole "has anti-cancer properties that have been elucidated in a broad range of pre-clinical studies," and "there are also two case reports of anti-cancer activity in humans." The authors call it a "low-cost agent"…
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Peptides & SARMs · 2025-12-11 · Guardian Australia (independent journalism), December 11, 2025
"All allowed us to immediately browse and 'add to cart' injectable peptides that have not been approved by the TGA ... before speaking with a medical practitioner." It describes BPC-157 as having "been investigated for w…
Peptides & SARMs · 2025-09-01 · Edwin Lee, MD & Kailynd Burgess, Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, 2025
"The infusions of BPC-157 resulted in no measurable effects on the tested biomarkers of the heart, liver, kidneys, thyroid, or blood glucose levels ... with no side effects reported."…
Supplements · 2025-06-18 · WIRED (independent journalism), June 18, 2025
"Four of six popular creatine gummy products sold on Amazon contained almost no creatine or none at all when samples were tested by an independent lab." For one top-selling brand, two gummies "actually contained 0.005 gr…
Peptides & SARMs · 2024-03-29 · Evexias Medical Centers et al. v. FDA, No. 4:24-cv-00293 (N.D. Tex., filed Mar. 29, 2024); Alliance for Pharmacy Compounding news, Sept 2024
Plaintiffs argued the peptides were moved without advisory-committee review or notice-and-comment. A settlement led to advisory committee meetings in October and December 2024 to review four peptides.…
Supplements · 2023-09-27 · Philips et al., Hepatology Communications, 2023
"Out of 23 patients with liver injury from ashwagandha (January 2019 to December 2022), we report 8 patients with single-ingredient formulation-related HILI." "Five patients had underlying chronic liver disease; 3 presen…
Supplements · 2022-08-19 · Chen et al., Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine, 2022
The authors report NK at 10,800 FU/day "effectively managed the progression of atherosclerosis and hyperlipidemia," with reduced carotid intima-media thickness and plaque size; "NK was found to be ineffective ... at a do…
Peptides & SARMs · 2021-07-01 · Edwin Lee, MD & Bradley Padgett, Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, 2021
"Of the 16 patients, 12 had received only BPC 157 ... 11 of the 12 patients (91.6%) had significant improvement in knee pain." "Overall, 14 of 16 patients (87.5%) had relief of their knee pain."…
Supplements · 2021-01-01 · Hodis et al. (University of Southern California), Clinical Hemorheology and Microcirculation, 2021
"Annualized rate of change in CIMT and CAS did not significantly differ between nattokinase supplementation and placebo," and there was "no significant effect ... on blood pressure or any laboratory determination."…
Supplements · 2019-09-13 · Lopresti et al., Medicine (Baltimore), 2019
The authors report that, compared with placebo, ashwagandha "was associated with a statistically significant reduction in the HAM-A (P = .040) and a near-significant reduction in the DASS-21 (P = .096)," plus greater red…
Guideline thresholds & controversial drugs · 2019-03-07 · Charles Piller, Science (AAAS), March 7, 2019
ADA "ratcheted down its prediabetes A1c threshold from 6.1% to 5.7%," creating "about 72 million potential new prediabetes patients in the United States alone." "Seven of the 14 ADA experts got between $41,000 and $6.8 m…
Guideline thresholds & controversial drugs · 2018-05-31 · Kei Miyazaki, MD, PhD, Journal of General and Family Medicine, 2018
"It is a serious intellectual COI that the Chair of the SPRINT trial steering committee was commissioned as chair of the guideline panel." "The new threshold would lead to 46 percent of the U.S. adult population being ca…
Food & diet · 2015-09-23 · Nina Teicholz, The BMJ 2015;351:h4962 (investigation), with BMJ correction 2016
The report "fails to reflect much relevant scientific literature in its reviews of crucial topics and therefore risks giving a misleading picture," and the committee did not use its own systematic-review library "for mor…
Food & diet · 2015-08-09 · Anahad O'Connor, The New York Times, Aug 9 and Dec 1, 2015
The network argued Americans were "overly fixated on how much they eat and drink while not paying enough attention to exercise." A Coke proposal said: "Akin to a political campaign, we will develop, deploy and evolve a p…
Guideline thresholds & controversial drugs · 2013-11-21 · Jeanne Lenzer, The BMJ, November 21, 2013
"The chairman and one of two additional co-chairs ... had ties to the drug industry at the time they were asked to lead the panel. And, in all, eight of the 15 panelists had industry ties." The chair "acknowledged ... th…
Peptides & SARMs · 2013-08-19 · GTx, Inc. press release (Business Wire), Aug 19, 2013, via Fierce Biotech
The trials "failed to meet the overall criteria for the co-primary responder endpoints of lean body mass and physical function." An exploratory analysis showed a "consistent effect on LBM" in both trials; stair-climb res…
Food & diet · 2013-08-09 · Kummerow v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration et al., No. 2:13-cv-02180 (C.D. Ill., filed Aug. 9, 2013), as reported by FoodNavigator and the Food & Beverage Litigation Update
The complaint claims "use of partially hydrogenated vegetable oils in the American food supply has contributed to a national epidemic of coronary heart disease," and that the petition, filed August 7, 2009, "never" got a…
Food & diet · 2012-09-04 · Dennis v. Kellogg Co., U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, No. 11-55674 (2012)
The opinion quotes ads saying the cereal "helps improve children's attentiveness by nearly 20%" and describes plaintiffs' claim that the marketing claims were false and that the underlying study did not support them.…
Peptides & SARMs · 2011-08-02 · Dalton et al. (GTx, Inc.), Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia and Muscle, 2011
At 3 mg, participants gained "a statistically significant (P < 0.001) average of 1.3 kg" of lean mass versus placebo, with improved stair-climb power (P = 0.013). "No SAEs were reported."…
Peptides & SARMs · 2010-11-09 · Adunsky et al., Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics 53(2):183-9, 2011 (Merck-sponsored)
Documents describe "Merck marketing employees developing plans for manuscripts, contracting with medical publishing companies to ghostwrite manuscripts, and recruiting external, academically affiliated investigators to b…
Food & diet · 2006-01-01 · Luise Light, former USDA director of dietary guidance, account in 'What to Eat' (2006), reported by The Irish Times
Per The Irish Times, Light says the advice "to limit grain consumption to two to three helpings per day became a recommendation to eat six to 11 helpings," and limits on sugar were removed.…
Sold as safe · 1946-01-01 · Stanford Research into the Impact of Tobacco Advertising (SRITA) ad archive
R.J. Reynolds "paid for surveys to be conducted during medical conventions": doctors "were gifted free packs of Camel cigarettes at tobacco company booths" and then asked their favorite brand or what they carried. "All o…
Food & diet · 1913-01-01 · Procter & Gamble, 'The Story of Crisco' (1913 promotional cookbook), Project Gutenberg edition
The book says "the chief point emphasized was, that Crisco was a richer, more wholesome food fat for cooking," and describes cookbooks where "the words 'lard' and 'butter' have been crossed out and the word 'Crisco' writ…
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