That's just not true man. Medical journals are the hands-down best source of medical information. Peer reviewed studies, conducted by scholars with expertise in relevant sub-disciplines. The open, independent scientific literature does not have the same conflicts of interest and such that we see so rife in privately funded research and the two must not be conflated!
There are problems in medical science, but to dismiss all medical science as being in bed with big pharma/fda is unwise in the extreme! After all, this very process of knowledge creation and verification may well save your life one day, if it hasn't already (and it certainly has saved the lives of people around you whether you know it or not)!
Todd McCormick is a good example of one who is very critical of big pharma and some practices in medicine without throwing the baby out with the bathwater - he'll tell you himself that medical science saved his life and was indispensable in his battle with potentially terminal illness.
I am not talking about government organizations or privately funded research here (where there can be problems with conflicts of interest and other issues of administrative interference), but about academic research carried out by independent scholars (usually college academics) and published in peer reviewed journals.
In independent academia, the level of scrutiny before you even start a research project is incredibly painstaking and the process very long. You have an entire ethics committee to get your ideas past and every single member of said committee is duty-bound to slap you with a billion questions about the implications and methodology of the research you propose and any issues with conflicts of interest or flawed methods.
It is less likely for these sorts of problems to make it into published medical journals than most any other kind of publication and honestly the standards for evidence elsewhere just cannot be compared.
There is no more reliable source of information out there IME than peer reviewed scientific journal publications, and I've got to say that this claim includes cannabis more and more these days. Most of my recent advances in knowledge re: cannabis and extraction have come from my time considering relevant academic research literature (not just in medicine either!) - not from the stoner community lol.
Not meaning to call you out man, but I had to save that screaming baby as you went to empty the tub!
EDIT: BTW, I can't remember a time that I ever looked at a medical journal and read 'what I wanted to hear' lol.
I don't think you called me out, it sounds like we are saying the same thing. I don't think I dismissed all medical science at all, just saying most of the big names have the most disinfo. Big names being the "government organizations or privately funded research" you even mention here.
I have reversed multiple "incurable" diseases from health info I learned online that is very contrary to mainstream nutrition. I can show studies that say fat and cholesterol is healthy, and show studies that say it causes cancer, stroke, atherosclerosis, etc. Both with scientific research and peer reviewed studies. As @grokit points out, it's very much about who is funding said studies and what they have to gain/ conflict of interest.
I do read medical journals, personally I find someone like Dr. Michael Gregor much more accurate and trustworthy than a celebrated figurehead like Dr. Mercola. But I'm an herbivore
