Thursday, April 24, 2014

#1010: Larry Palevsky


Lawrence Palevsky is a pediatrician – “wholistic pediatrician”, according to himself – who has made a name for himself in the antivaccine underground. Apparently, Palevsky has a real medical degree, but he cannot have learned much about vaccines, since he clearly doesn’t know much about how they work – and, even more clearly, has no idea about how scientific testing works. That lack of understanding, combined with pseudoscience and a bit of conspiracy mongering earned him the prestigious “Visionary Award” from Barbara Loe Fisher’s antivaccine group the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC).

It also landed him a major role in the antivaccine movement’s propaganda movie – really their answer to the Intelligent Design movement’s Expelled – The Greater Good, which made its rounds on various film festivals back in 2011. In the movie, Palevsky manages to put in an impressive array of anti-vaccine pseudoscientific gambits, including the “toxins” gambit, conspiracy mongering about pharmaceutical companies, and claims that vaccines aren’t adequately tested. He even claims that because mortality from various infectious diseases was falling before vaccines for those diseases were introduced it must mean that vaccines are useless, one of the most intellectually dishonest arguments the movement has yet to come up with. In fact, Palevsky is even shown speaking (to parents!) about how amazed he was to discover that there was mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, antibiotics, and preservatives in vaccines, a point that proves once and for all that Palevsky is utterly incompetent at what he claims to be doing as a profession.

We won’t link to his website, but if you happened upon it you will encounter a plethora of woo, anecdotes and appeals to nature to rival any pseudoscientist. Indeed, according to his website, “[i]n using his “whole child” wellness philosophy, Dr. Palevsky recommends and incorporates the teachings and therapies of nutritional science, acupuncture and Chinese Medicine, chiropractic, osteopathy, cranial-sacral therapy, environmental medicine, homeopathy, and essential oils, along with natural healing modalities such as aromatherapy, yoga, Reiki, meditation, reflexology, and mindfulness.” Indeed. He also writes articles for the NVIC.

At least Rob Schneider is a fan. That is not an endorsement indicative of quality. More insidiously, Greg Marvel, president of the school board in San Ramon Valley, California, seems to be a fan as well.

Diagnosis: Ignorant denialist, who unfortunately possesses the formal credentials to lend some authority to his bullshit. Those credentials are apparently formal only.

9 comments:

  1. How did he ever make it through med school?

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  2. Question: What do you call the person who finished dead last in med school?
    Answer: Doctor.

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  3. why don't you folks all look up the ingredients in your regularly scheduled vaccines.... look up the safe dose of those ingredients for intravenous injection.... then go get your "safe" vaccines.....

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    1. And why don't you learn a bit about the chemistry you're talking about? You have revealed your ignorance publicly. The chemicals in vaccines are safe because:

      - The compound they are in is safe and/or easily excreted within 24 hours.

      - The concentrations are so low that they couldn't harm a flea!

      Don't believe me? Sodium metal ignites and/or explodes spontaneously. It's a real bad boy! Chlorine is a yellowish, dense gas and is deadly poisonous. When combined together they form sodium chloride which is in every living thing.

      And so it goes .....

      P.S. NO vaccine EVER has been injected intravenously.

      Educate yourself.

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    2. Guess someone didn't know as much as they thought. 2021 has been an education.. I guess you back big pharma and My body my choice (only to kill a baby not from a flu)

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  4. also to whom ever is reviewing this..... i appreciate healthy skepticism.... but you clearly don't research anything beyond mainstream propaganda... you have failed to protect the public.

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    1. I would like to know is there is a study regarding the mixture of all these toxins at the doses that are put a vaciation th without the traces of viruses then the new born blood. Baby's have it just as hard as monm when they come out its very stressfull then goes home exposed to even high toxins form amount come out to hide from their their food and clothes beds paint newly painted on the wall excetera excetera when walls when dose become harmful. Toxin so sometimes more harmful and lower dose has been higher for example a body will know that is exposed to a certain toxins I will go into overdrive 2 get rid of it but when it is exposed and Tiny amount such as closing from work washed in a washing machine with kids in the house everyday the small toxins go into the body the body will not know how to react it will then store the toxic and store toxic one day the person will be sick

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  5. Has Ben looked up the "ingredients" (toxins) in infectious agents of shingles, pneumonia etc.?
    Unlike the pseudotoxins in vaccines, disease toxins actually make you sick, or dead.

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  6. I have a question. Big Pharma (Big Science?) is saying that it would be unethical to test vaccines because using a proper trial (double-blind placebo-controlled study) would mean that the controls could be infected by the very disease that the vaccine is supposed to prevent. Doesn't this seem like circular reasoning?

    What about a study to confirm that polysorbate 80, aluminum nanoparticles, and saline injected into the body does not allow aluminum to cross the blood-brain barrier? Any problems with that?

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