[cal5k]

It would be damn near impossible to conclude anything from such research without a control. “Randomized double-blind, placebo-controlled trial” is the critical sentence - at best you’d get a correlation which probably has been influenced by the availability of research. Finding truth is freaking hard.

[buckthundaz]

Do you think that qualitative data is useless?

'It would be damn near impossible to conclude anything from such research without a control. “Randomized double-blind, placebo-controlled trial” is the critical sentence'

Since the advent of randomized double-blind, placebo-controlled trial has our public health improved or declined?

[cal5k]

I'm resisting the urge to respond flippantly, since I think that's a question that could be answered rigorously and is certainly worth asking.

With that said, since the advent of the RCT, life expectancy has gone up dramatically in the Western world. It would be hard to imagine testing the efficacy of, say, antibiotics or vaccines without testing them against a control in a placebo-controlled, double-blinded way.

Same goes for simple things like washing your hands and administering prophylactic antibiotics during a C-Section, which dramatically improves the odds that a mother will live through complications during child birth. There would be no way to actually know that these were important without studying them vs. the status quo at the time.