Learning is beautiful

I actually run across this information a while ago, but even if it is old I believe it’s worth spreading it anyway. Do you know airborne? The dietary supplement created by a school teacher? Well, it has never been seriously tested as a product to cure or even prevent a cold, and especially it hasn’t been tested by the Food and Drug Administration.

I have always wondered why does it say that it was created by a school teacher? That’s not a doctor, or a scientist, or a researcher, why would that be a good thing or a fact to put forward? Plus, if you carefully read what’s written on the box you get clues that the product cures cold, but it actually never says so. A clever way to mislead the buyer. Here is what’s on the package:

On the top of the box the phrase is:

Sick of getting sick wile traveling? Take Airborne

Then below:

Sick of catching colds?
For Use In:
- Airplanes
- Restaurants
- Offices
- Hospitals
- Schools
- Health Clubs
- Carpools
- Theaters
- Sports Arenas

Take at the first sign of a cold symptom or before entering crowded environments.* 100%Guaranteed Satisfaction.

In the instructions there are other three sentences with an asterisk indicating a footnote, such as

at the first sign of a cold symptom, simply drop (1) airborne tablet in a small amount of plain water, let dissolve about (1) minute and drink*. Repeat every three hours as necessary.*

And here is the footnote:

*These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

The product creator is “Knight-McDowell Labs”, composed by Victoria Knight-McDowell and Rider McDowell, a schoolteacher and a scriptwriter respectively.

Not only they don’t have any competence in the field, they advertise it on their website: “Airborne dietary supplement was created by a school teacher”. A very effective marketing scheme, as it turned out.

David Cowan is the one who originally debunked Airborne on his blog. His post was featured in an article of scientific american called Airborne Baloney written by the Michael Shermer, director of the Skeptic Society. Shermer contacted Harriet Hall, a retired U.S. Air Force flight surgeon and physician who studies alternative medicine. He writes: “Hall looked up Airborne’s ingredients in the Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database and found no evidence that any of the ingredients prevents colds. Worse, vitamin A is unsafe in doses greater than 10,000 units a day, and Airborne contains 5,000 units per tablet and recommends five pills a day or more. The only positive finding was for vitamin C, for which some evidence indicates that taking high doses may shorten the duration of cold symptoms by one to one and a half days in some patients. But the large amounts needed may cause side effects.”