NZ Skeptics Articles

David Cole

Prof. David Cole is a former Dean of the Medical School and while on the Medical Council investigated a number of aberrant doctors.

Snake Oil: a brief history of alternative medicine

1 May 2006

Early in 2005 Professor Kaye Ibbertson, the relentless grand vizier of the Marion Davis Library and Museum, asked David Cole to offer the Medical Historical Society some comments about the history of unorthodox medicine. He was in the process of assembling several convincing excuses, when Ibbertson turned off his hearing aid and any excuses were set aside. This article is based on the talk which resulted.