American Council on Science and Health

Debunking misinformation is a big business. For every health "influencer" selling a supplement on Instagram, there's probably a doppelganger with a Ph.D. making a lot of money arguing against supplementation. That's not inherently wrong—unscientific nonsense should be confronted. But when skepticism becomes our identity, we may reflexively dismiss a conclusion before we've considered all the data.

By Joe Schwarcz — Oct 14, 2026 From celery juice and carnivore diets to gluten avoidance and "proteinmaxxing," nutritional advice has become a bewildering mix of science, pseudoscience, and outright nonsense. But dietary fads are nothing new. From Hippocrates to today's social media influencers, people have been promoting questionable nutritional advice for thousands of years. Here's a look at how we got here. “Wellness influencers” are crawling all over social media platforms.

We tend to regard chronic disease as the cumulative consequence of choices made over decades. However, a study of an experiment in natural history, Britain’s sugar rationing in the aftermath of WW II, suggests that some of those risks may begin accumulating before we are old enough to make a single choice of our own. Britain's Sugar Rationing Became a Natural Experiment In September 1953, Britain ended its decade-long rationing of sugar and sweets.

According to one recent cancer-risk methodology, living near Costco can be “associated” with thousands of cancer deaths — often far more than living near a nuclear power plant. When a statistical model repeatedly generates positive associations without measuring actual exposure or identifying a plausible causal pathway, it may be detecting its own design rather than a real health hazard.

A new study helps clarify the weight-loss impact of diet drinks and dispel a popular myth about artificial sweeteners. As it turns out, zero-sugar beverages are neither nutritional villains nor magical cures for obesity—but they still might help you slim down. Good news for the Coke Zero enjoyers among us: in a two-year weight-management program, artificially sweetened drinks were just as effective as water in helping people lose weight and maintain it.

She was told she was chasing the impossible. She persisted through poverty, skepticism, and 25,000 failed attempts. In the end, Ada Yonath unlocked one of biology’s most elusive structures: the ribosome, transforming our understanding of how antibiotics work and paving the way for drugs that can overcome antibiotic resistance. Her story is not only one of scientific brilliance, but of extraordinary perseverance.

Pesticides are designed to kill insects, fungi, and weeds. So, it is reasonable to wonder whether they can harm us as well. Recent reports of pesticide residues in berries exceeding Canadian limits sound alarming, but exceeding a regulatory limit doesn't necessarily mean exceeding a safety threshold. How much risk is really involved?

Paracelsus taught us that “the dose makes the poison.” A new analysis of respiratory-virus infection suggests that biology requires an important qualifier: where an exposure enters the body and which tissues encounter it first can matter even more than how much arrives. Dose describes quantity; route helps determine what that quantity actually does.

Here's a viral wellness trend that promises big health benefits while taking a bite out of your wallet: vitamin patches. Dr. Katie Suleta joins Ana-Marija Dolaskie to separate science from marketing hype and explore whether these trendy little stickers actually deliver on their claims. The Q&A is based on Dr. Suleta's original article. You can read it here. Stay curious. Stay informed. Free, independent writing delivered weekly — no ads, no sponsored fluff. Join Now Donate

From the hidden institutional pressures ruining scientific integrity to the alarming public health signals behind rising rabies inquiries, our experts continue to drive the national science and health conversation. Here's a look at recent media pickups and features highlighting ACSH analyses across the digital landscape. Watts Up With That amplified Arielle Selya's recent ACSH report, Fraud, compromise, and groupthink: How warped research incentives undermine science.