Policy Initiatives


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A century ago, a charitable institution was concerned about the state of medical care, and commissioned a study of American medical schools to find out what was good and what was missing. It turns out that what was missing was science. Medical schools, the study revealed, weren’t training physicians to practice a scientific discipline. The report called upon medical schools to fully embrace science, and they did. The result was a phenomenon that transformed human health, not just in America but globally.

For all its achievements, the practice of scientific medicine is not secure. A century on, pseudoscience, unvalidated practices, and even anti-scientific notions have not only endured, but are on the rise. These threaten the health of individuals and the public alike. A consistent application of scientific knowledge and principles is urgently needed more than ever.

Policy-makers, including members of the general populace, can turn to the Institute for Science in Medicine as a reliable source of information whenever the scientific credibility of any medical or health practice is in doubt.

Calling upon the expertise of our knowledgeable Fellows, the Institute for Science in Medicine presents analyses and warnings.


Policy Statements — Concise documents, adopted by our Board of Directors, on the need for changes in health care policy where unvalidated and unproven practices threaten the public.

White Papers — In-depth essays exposing the underlying fallacies of scientifically-implausible medical models – and of other popular pseudoscientific health care practices – by demonstrating, among other things, their inconsistencies with well-established scientific principles of biological functioning, their lack of effectiveness, and their dangers.