Update: Dutch 'Big Donor' program a hoax

It turns out the Dutch reality television program 'Big Donor', in which a terminal cancer patient was to select an ailing contestant to receive on of her kidneys was nothing more than an exercise in 'guerilla awareness'. The program aired as planned on Friday, in spite of widespread criticism. At the moment of the big reveal, when the winning contestant would be named, the host of the program announced that the donor was just an actress, though the three contestants, who were in on the stunt, were actual patients in need of a kidney. The goal of the hoax was to raise awareness about wait times for organs.

How cancer quacks profit from science

Here at the bayblab, we routinely cure cancer, so when we hear of a miracle cure in the media we tend to be skeptical. More often than not, it tends to be an exaggeration of some in-vitro findings that are blown out of proportion by some over-eager journalist with a poor understanding of medical science. Unfortunately, often the scientist is misquoted, and the conspiracy theory of big pharmas not wanting to deliver a cure resurfaces. Of course this is bad for the scientist, it's bad for the general population who constantly ears about cancer being cured without any concrete drugs being offered, and it is bad for the patient, because cancer quacks will prey on their hopes. DCA, which was studied at the University of Alberta, is a simple chemical that can be used to combat the warburg effect (which we'll explain in the upcoming episode 9 of the podcast). It was even featured on "the current" on CBC last week. The findings published in Cancer Cell were promising, but need to be further investigated. However that doesn't stop cancer quacks to turn in a profit while pushing DCA to desperately ill cancer patients, a chemical that is highly toxic, a carcinogen, and teratogenic. This article explains how this remarkable discovery was perverted by unscrupulous people.

Alternative therapy = fraud

Just a warning, I'm going to rant about this, because I feel pretty strongly about this subject. Alternative therapy or complementary medicine are things like acupuncture, homeopathy or reflexology. Those who practice or promote these techniques are at best fooling themselves and at worst defrauding honest people. Science is a method to get answers, our only limitation is our ability to find testable hypotheses, which isn't a problem when it comes to alternative medicine. The truth about alternative therapies is this: They are unproven, untested, pseudo-medical procedures that are based on faulty logic and are scientifically unsubstantiated. Acupuncture is based on the idea that "vital energy" flows in the body via "channels", which when "clogged" cause diseases. Somehow you can stick needles into these channels to restore flow. All the clinical trials so far looking at pain prevention have shown no effect, and in fact sham needles which do not puncture the skin were just as effective. This is purely a placebo and relaxation effect. Homeopathy is based on the idea that diluting something 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times (actual figure), which causes similar symptoms to your disease (it can be anything really), leaves a memory imprint in water which will rebalance your body fluids. A drop of water is then placed on a sugar pill and then sold to you. Some people will forgo therapy to take that, paying good money too. Obviously readers of the bayblab know better, but many people don't. Health is a human right, and false claims and fraud on this scale should be punished. And it makes me really sad and angry when the therapies are offered as a program in universities, that I have to share a science degree with them.

Speaking of quackery, even cancer treatment is not immune to it, and it's too close for comfort. The alternative therapy offered by the Ottawa-based Canadian Cancer Research Group has more then questionable scientific validity. Even though you can find claims of efficacy on the web I cannot find any peer reviewed research that is happening there, and their methods remain unpublished, and for a good reason, it is not scientifically validated. Don't be fooled. If you want to learn more about the Canadian cancer research group, their amino-acid/vitamin "therapy", or Mr William O'neil you can check the very good quackwatch website and its canadian counterpart the canadian quackery watch, and the ratbag. I also strongly encourage you to see the CTV investigation on the show W5 about the claims made by this individual and his organistion. He's been known to bully his critics, including me, and authorities know about him... In fact there is a standing order at the OHRI to alert authorities and block his entry if he comes on campus.