Epidemiology, as a useful science, falls somewhere between creation science and astrology. Their research methodology seems to have been borrowed from actuarial science which appears to be another non-scientific science.
Actuaries work for insurance companies and develop mathematical models that determine the risk of insuring certain people or things. So, life, health, home, casualty, medical malpractice insurance, or any other insurance you can possibly imagine are all grist for their unscientific mill. The premiums you pay for your insurances are developed by actuaries, and it is their job to guarantee that insurance companies make a profit, a large profit. The actuaries are not hired to do research and report how nature works.
Epidemiologists took the concept of risk and actuarial mathematical models and they developed something called a risk factor. No other legitimate science uses this term because it has no real scientific meaning.
Real science uses the terms cause or correlation to describe the results of their scientific research. And they use statistical analysis to determine if there is a relationship between variables and how certain they are that the relationship they are reporting was not obtained by chance or error. Epidemiologists don’t.
An example. A recent epidemiological study reported that married people live 7 to 15 years longer than “never married” people. So their conclusion was that “never being married” was a risk factor for premature death. If you are an insurance company, you simply raise the premium for never married policy holders and make a bigger profit.
That is annoying enough, but if you are an epidemiologist working for the Federal government, you take your flawed study to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. You suggest that the Federal government start a propaganda campaign to encourage “never married” citizens to hurry up and get married. And you might take your flawed study to a scientifically illiterate Congressman or Senator and suggest that legislation is needed to force “never married” citizens to marry immediately. After all, lives are at stake. Immediate action must be taken. The “never married” are increasing the cost of health care. Perhaps “never married” income tax rates should be increased. Perhaps “never married” behavior should be criminalized so that they can be forced into rehabilitation programs to alter their “never married” attitudes.
Sounds crazy doesn’t it. But it happens all the time.
What’s wrong with the epidemiological study and its conclusions? Everything. Morbidity is caused by many factors, and usually many factors in combination. Like; race, income, medical service availability, weight, occupation, genetic susceptibility to certain diseases, State of residency, and about two hundred other factors. They took just one possible factor and compared morbidity to the categories of “never married” and “married”. Other factors will most assuredly have a higher correlation with morbidity than whether or not someone is married. They didn’t even bother to include divorced and windowed people. Sloppy science? Absurd non-science.
But they sent out their press releases to the media outlets and suddenly we are inundated with misleading information. Will a propaganda campaign be forthcoming? Will legislation be introduced when Congress resumes working?
That is the most frustrating part of this situation. Real scientists should be complaining loudly about anybody, citizen or legislator, thinking that epidemiology is a science. And media should simply toss those press releases into the waste can where they belong. I am beginning to think that all epidemiologists are conservatives who are promoting the family values agenda.
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