Posted 15 August 2016
If you’ve been watching the Olympics, along with looking on in awe at the athletes’ almost superhuman feats, you might also be looking on in confusion at a lot of large, circular bruises adorning some of the athletes’ bodies. Those marks are from an alt-med practice known as “cupping,” in which the flow of ones’ vital life force is somehow corrected by means of the suction of heated glass bowls applied to the skin. Not only does this practice have no medical or scientific basis, but it can be quite dangerous, causing burns and infections.
In some of the coverage during the run-up to the games, some athletes have been extolling what they see as the benefits of other pseudoscientific treatments such as homeopathy, acupuncture, and the proud display of kinesiology tape.
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