Bad Advice: Or Why Celebrities, Politicians, and Activists Aren't Your Best Source of Health Information

Written by Paul A. Offit, MD

Narrated by Patrick Lawlor

Science doesn't speak for itself. Neck-deep in work that can be messy and confounding and naïve in the ways of public communication, scientists are often unable to package their insights into the neat narratives that the public requires. Enter celebrities, advocates, lobbyists, and the funders behind them, who take advantage of scientists' reluctance to provide easy answers, flooding the media with misleading or incorrect claims about health risks. Amid this onslaught of spurious information, Americans are more confused than ever about what's good for them and what isn't.

In Bad Advice, Paul A. Offit shares hard-earned wisdom on the dos and don'ts of battling misinformation. For the past twenty years, Offit has been on the front lines in the fight for sound science and public heath. Stepping into the media spotlight as few scientists have done-such as being one of the first to speak out against conspiracy theories linking vaccines to autism-he found himself in the crosshairs of powerful groups intent on promoting pseudoscience. Bad Advice discusses science and its adversaries: not just the manias stoked by slick charlatans and their miracle cures but also corrosive, dangerous ideologies such as Holocaust and climate-change denial.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Jan 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781977339249

Reviews for Bad Advice

[d-fbuser-458172062 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

i expected some more meat- very anecdotal. those on offit's side of the isle need to begin answering tough questions; the information vacuum is immense.

[akbouterse · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I have written about people’s beliefs that vaccines cause autism in classes so I knew a lot of the background with the Wakefield study and why parents believe vaccines cause autism but it was interesting to get a doctors perspective on that matter and learn from someone who has been involved with vaccine creation. Some parts of this book did get a bit repetitive, especially at the end but it was still very interesting and I liked hearing about some of his stories fighting against vaccine denial and I liked hearing some more background on this conspiracy theory.

[widdersyns · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed the anecdotes but I didn’t feel like it was as informative or interesting as his other books.