Medical Misinformation and Social Harm in Non-Science Based Health Practices

<p>Fraudulent harmful or at best useless pharmaceutical and therapeutic approaches</p><p>developed outside science-based medicine have boomed in recent years especially due to</p><p>the commercialisation of cyberspace. The latter has played a fundamental role in the rise</p><p>of false ‘health experts’ and in the creation of filter bubbles and echo chambers that have</p><p>contributed to the formation of highly polarised debates on non-science-based health</p><p>practices—online as well as offline.</p><p>By adopting a multidisciplinary approach this edited book brings together</p><p>contributions of international academics and practitioners from criminology digital</p><p>sociology health psychology medicine law physics and journalism where they critically</p><p>analyse different types of non-science-based health approaches. With this volume we aim</p><p>to reconcile different scientific understandings of these practices synthesising a variety</p><p>of empirical theoretical and interpretative approaches and exploring the challenges</p><p>implications and potential remedies to the spread of dangerous and misleading health</p><p>information.</p><p>This edited book will offer some food for thought not only to students and academics</p><p>in the social sciences health psychology and medicine among other disciplines but also</p><p>to medical practitioners science journalists debunkers policy makers and the general</p><p>public as they might all benefit from a greater awareness and critical knowledge of the</p><p>harms caused by non-scientific health practices.</p>