"DON'T BELIEVE IT!"

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 1, 2 January 1937, Page 2 (Supplement)

"DON'T BELIEVE IT!"

MEDICAL FALLACIES EXPLODED. Dr. August A. Thomcn. the author of "Dan't Believe it! Says the Doctor." (Aliens and Robertson. Sydney), has collected nearly 200 examples of popular fallacies relating to health and hygien-. Some of them are jfrole«(|Ue, but there are few laymen who will not find among the 200 some to which they have givn unthinking adlierence. As Professor Harlow Brooks says in a foreword, "superstitions are found in every class of society, ignorant or educated: they [come to the surface particularly in times of great distress or emotional unbalance. They may want the judgment and action of even the most "intelligent when correct reasoning and logical deduction are confttsed or submerged bv emotion, pain, grief, and especially by fear." Dr. Thomen's method is to state the fallacy, trace its origin (where that is possible), explain why it. is a fallacy, and then give positive information based on present-day medical knowledge. The scope, of his useful book may be indicated by saying that the first "false notion"' dealt with is "that a. clean tooth never decays," and the last, "that hydrophobia can be prevented by applvI ing to the wound some of the hair of tiie dog that did the biting." There is a large section on the subject of cancer, concerning which fallacies are particularly dangerous.