Barrett was a practicing physician until retiring from active practice in 1993. As of 2019[update], his medical license was listed as "Expired" in good standing: "No disciplinary actions were found for this license."[4] A longtime resident of Allentown, Pennsylvania, Barrett now resides in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.[5]
Quackwatch received the award of Best Physician-Authored Site by MD NetGuide, May 2003.[14] In 1984, he received an FDA Commissioner's Special Citation Award for Public Service in fighting nutrition quackery.[15] He was included in the list of outstanding skeptics of the 20th century by Skeptical Inquirer magazine.[16] In 1986, he was awarded honorary membership in the American Dietetic Association.[15] Barrett has been profiled in Biography Magazine (1998)[17] and in Time (2001).[18]
The magazine Spiked included Barrett in a survey of 134 persons[19] they termed "key thinkers in science, technology and medicine."[20][21] When he was asked: "What inspired you to take up science?" he replied that his appreciation of medical science:
probably began when I took a college course in medical statistics, and learned what makes the difference between scientific thought and poor reasoning. Medical school brought me in touch with the rapid and amazing strides being made in the understanding and treatment of disease. My anti-quackery activities have intensified my interest and concern in distinguishing science from pseudoscience, quackery and fraud.[21]
The Quackwatch website is Barrett's main platform for describing and exposing what he and other contributors consider to be quackery and health fraud.[22] The website was part of Quackwatch, Inc., a nonprofit corporation founded by Barrett that aims to "combat health-related frauds, myths, fads, fallacies, and misconduct." The non-profit was dissolved in 2008.[23] Barrett's writing is supplemented with contributions from many scientific, technical, and lay volunteers and includes numerous references to published research articles.[24] Barrett defines quackery as "anything involving overpromotion in the field of health,"[25] and reserves the word fraud "only for situations in which deliberate deception is involved."[26]
Barrett has become a "lightning rod" for controversy as a result of his criticisms of alternative medicine theories and practitioners. Barrett says he does not criticize conventional medicine because that would be "way outside [his] scope."[18][27] He states he does not give equal time to some subjects, and has written on his web site that "Quackery and fraud don't involve legitimate controversy and are not balanced subjects. I don't believe it is helpful to publish 'balanced' articles about unbalanced subjects."[28] Barrett is at the forefront of exposing questionable aspects of chiropractic.[29]
Barrett is a strong supporter of the HONcode and has made efforts to improve compliance with its rules and to expose those who abuse it.[30]
A number of practitioners and supporters of alternative medicine oppose Barrett and Quackwatch for its criticism of alternative medicine.[27][31]Donna Ladd, a journalist with The Village Voice, says Barrett relies mostly on negative research to criticize alternative medicine, rejecting most positive case studies as unreliable due to methodological flaws. According to Ladd, Barrett insists that most alternative therapies "simply should be disregarded without further research. 'A lot of things don't need to be tested [because] they simply don't make any sense', he says, pointing to homeopathy, chiropractic, and acupuncture as examples of alternative treatments with no plausible mechanism of action."[27]
Both website reviews[32][33][34][35][36] and various journal articles[37][38][39][40][41][42] mention or use as references Stephen Barrett's Quackwatch as a useful source for consumer information. However, other authors have criticised Quackwatch as being overly biased in its presentation.[43][44][45]
In February 2020, Quackwatch became part of the Center for Inquiry. CFI maintains its various websites.[46]
Publications
Barrett's articles include:
In 1985, Barrett was the author of the "Commercial hair analysis. Science or scam?" article in the Journal of the American Medical Association that exposed commercial laboratories performing multimineral hair analysis. He commented that in his opinion, "commercial use of hair analysis in this manner is unscientific, economically wasteful, and probably illegal."[47] His report has been cited in later articles, including one which concluded that such testing was "unreliable."[48]
Dubious Cancer Treatment, Barrett SJ & Cassileth BR, editors (2001). Florida Division of the American Cancer Society
Chemical Sensitivity: The Truth About Environmental Illness (Consumer Health Library), Barrett, SJ & Gots, Ronald E. (1998). Prometheus Books. ISBN9781573921954
The Health Robbers: A Close Look at Quackery in America, Barrett SJ, Jarvis WT, eds. (1993). Prometheus Books, ISBN0-87975-855-4
Health Schemes, Scams, and Frauds, Barrett SJ (1991). Consumer Reports Books, ISBN0-89043-330-5
The Vitamin Pushers: How the "Health Food" Industry Is Selling America a Bill of Goods, Barrett SJ, Herbert V (1991). Prometheus Books, ISBN0-87975-909-7
^Barrett, Stephen (December 21, 2016). "Stephen Barrett, M.D. Curriculum Vitae". Quackwatch. Retrieved February 25, 2017. Wife, Judith Nevyas Barrett, M.D., is a retired family practitioner.
^Singh S, Ernst E (2008). "The truth about chiropractic therapy". Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine. W.W. Norton. pp. 171–72. ISBN978-0-393-06661-6.
^Hufford, David J. (2003). "Symposium article: Evaluating Complementary and Alternative Medicine: The Limits of Science and Scientists". The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics. 31 (2): 198–212. doi:10.1111/j.1748-720x.2003.tb00081.x. PMID12964264. S2CID29859505.. Hufford's symposium presentation was the counterpoint for another doctor's presentation, which argued that "alternative medicine" is not medicine at all. See Schneiderman, Lawrence J. (2003). "Symposium article: The (Alternative) Medicalization of Life". The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics. 31 (2): 191–198. doi:10.1111/j.1748-720x.2003.tb00080.x. PMID12964263. S2CID43786245.
^Arabella Dymoke (2004). The Good Web Guide. The Good Web Guide Ltd. p. 35. ISBN978-1-903282-46-5. Quackwatch is without doubt an important and useful information resource and injects a healthy dose of scepticism into reviewing popular health information. Its aim is to investigate questionable claims made in some sectors of what is now a multi-million pound healthcare industry.
^"Diet Channel Award Review Of Quackwatch". Retrieved September 18, 2007. Quackwatch is a very informative site which informs you about health fraud and gives you advice on many decisions.
^Cunningham, Eleese; Marcason, Wendy (2001). "Internet hoaxes: How to spot them and how to debunk them". Journal of the American Dietetic Association. 101 (4): 460. doi:10.1016/S0002-8223(01)00117-1.
^Vankevitch, Ned (2002). "Limiting Pluralism". In Ernst, Waltraud (ed.). Plural medicine, tradition and modernity, 1800-2000. New York: Routledge. pp. 219–244. ISBN978-0-415-23122-0.
