Science Controversies
Viewpoint: Will AI democratize personalized cancer treatment or fuel medical misinformation?
Artificial intelligence (AI) has made major advances in biomedical research. It has powered tools such as AlphaFold and systems that ...
Viewpoint: ‘Safer for children?’ Stonyfield yogurt under fire for deceptive organic marketing
In the competitive food marketplace, fear-based marketing continues to be a go-to strategy for some food companies trying to differentiate ...
Facebook swamped by hundreds of thousands of scam ads for illegal or dangerous medical products
Two months ago, a sponsored post for a supplement popped up on Facebook with a miraculous claim: “The doctors have ...
How big health brands are funding online medical misinformationÂ
A study published in the medical journal JAMA Network Open, which is published by the American Medical Association, found that health care-related ...
Millions take omega-3 fish oil for brain health. New research suggests it may do the opposite.
While omega-3 fatty acid supplementation is widely used for cognitive protection, its efficacy remains controversial, and its impact on core ...
Viewpoint: ‘Measles is a canary in the healthcare coal mine’: Challenging RFK, Jr.’s scare campaign
The rise of measles may also be a harbinger of something even worse, public officials say. “Measles is basically a ...
Viewpoint: Are cancer rates ‘skyrocketing’ as RFK, Jr. and MAHA claim? The evidence says mostly the opposite
Clickbait headlines often obscure this reality and reinforce misunderstandings. For example, cancer is not a single disease; it’s a catchall ...
GLP podcast: Big Pharma, Big Ag, Big Food—health harming industries or life-saving innovators?
Fossil fuels, pesticides and food processing have dramatically improved living standards around the globe. This may be a controversial claim, ...
Hantavirus outbreak research: Trump administration shut down study last year on rodent-to-human transmission
In 2025 the Trump administration eliminated funding for a group that had been running a pilot project aimed at studying the type ...
“Evidence for puberty suppression and gender affirming hormones limited’: British doctors group questions early transitions but also opposes blocker ban
The BMA’s long awaited critique of the Cass review has largely vindicated the findings of the original landmark review into ...
Cooling the planet with balloons: Could a geoengineering gamble slow global warming?
The political momentum behind costly climate-change mitigation appears to be weakening, especially in the United States. President Donald Trump has ...
Overmedicalization? RFK Jr.’s antidepressant crackdown raises conflict questions over his fee stake in Wisner Baum, the tort firm built on suing drug makers
Environmental lawyer and volunteer riverkeeper RFK Jr continues to make waves in his current job as head of the US ...
Science Disinformation Gap: The transatlantic battle over social media and censorship
Every day, the same post appears in two places at once. A Facebook user in Munich sees it with a ...
Viewpoint: Misinformation infodemic? Why assessing evidence is so challengingÂ
When United States Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. unveiled new dietary guidelines earlier this year to “Make America Healthy ...
Vaccine shootout at the CDCÂ
When President Trump named a new leadership team at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention two weeks ago, public ...
‘Conflict entrepreneurs’ are driving disinformation and shaping public opinion
As brands battle for people’s attention, they no longer control their brand messages nor the ecosystem they exist in. Their ...
Farmers are a major source of misinformation—about farming
Misinformation has long been a feature of social media platforms. That’s why a University of Waterloo researcher has launched a ...
FDA’s expedited drug reviews are hailed in some quarters but other approval practices are problematic
In July 2025, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a pilot program intended to expedite reviews for drug ...
Singularity crisis ahead? Can super babies save us from rogue AI geniuses?
Mathematician Tsvi Benson-Tilsen once worked at the Peter Thiel–funded Machine Intelligence Research Institute, where he was one of many experts tasked with ...
Immortal dragons: The quest to ‘make death optional’
...[I]n recent years, finding the secret to longer life has transitioned from mythical fiction to actual science with the help ...
GLP podcast: ‘Safe injection sites’: enabling drug addiction or saving lives?
With illicit opioids still killing thousands of Americans each year, some public health advocates are pushing a radical solution to ...
How RFK, Jr.’s false vaccine claims are holding up $600 million to fight diseases in poor countries
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s push to remake the U.S. vaccination schedule is on hold following a federal judge’s decision last ...
Viewpoint — Food-fear world: The latest activist scientists campaign: Cancer-causing additives
Here we go again. The rather tiresome Activist Playbook is being applied again, this time not to pesticides, plastics, fossil ...
Nanoplastics in drinking water: MAHA activists forge science-based bipartisan coalitionÂ
The Environmental Protection Agency proposed a rule that would, for the first time, formally flag microplastics and pharmaceuticals in drinking water as ...
Trump’s America First health aid cuts: Retrenchment has already hit global malaria, HIV, TB, and polio programs
A reduction in U.S. foreign aid under the "America First" policy of President Donald Trump, who took office in 2025, ...
‘Science moves forward when people are willing to think differently’: Memories of DNA maverick Craig Venter
I was saddened to hear of Craig Venter’s passing at the age of 79 on April 30, 2026. Often portrayed ...
Paraben panic: How a flawed study, media hype, and chemophobia convinced the public of the danger of one of the safest classes of preservatives
Public opinion driven by fear has immense influence in our society, especially when it comes to science and health topics ...
