Do You Believe in Magic? The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine

Offit (chief, infectious diseases, Children's Hosp. of Philadelphia; Deadly Choices: How the Anti-Vaccine Movement Threatens Us All) examines alternative medical therapies that are popular today: acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic, herbs and supplements, and cancer cures. He discusses the history of these treatments and states that there is no evidence for their effectiveness. He also looks at celebrities such as Dr. Oz, Andrew Weil, Oprah Winfrey, Suzanne Somers, and Jenny McCarthy who endorse and sell alternative treatments. Using case histories to show the sometimes tragic outcomes of abandoning modern medicine, the author separates the therapies that work from those that are useless. Some alternative therapies do work in select cases, although the placebo effect may be involved. Offit notes that the placebo effect is a valid one, saying, "There's no such thing as alternative medicine. There's only medicine that works and medicine that doesn't."