page_title: Snake oil
section_title: Modern implications
hierarchical_section_title: Snake oil / Modern implications
context_page_description: Snake oil is a euphemism for deceptive marketing and health care fraud. It refers to the petroleum-based mineral oil or "snake oil" that used to be sold as a cure-all elixir for many kinds of physiological problems. Many 19th-century United States and 18th-century European entrepreneurs advertised and sold mineral oil as "snake oil liniment", making frivolous claims about its efficacy as a panacea. William Rockefeller Sr. sold "rock oil" as a cancer cure without the reference to snakes. Patent medicines that claimed to be a panacea were extremely common from the 18th century until the 20th, particularly among vendors masking addictive drugs such as cocaine, amphetamine, alcohol and opium-based concoctions or elixirs, to be sold at medicine shows as medication or products promoting health.
context_section_description: Many modern health products continue to be marketed using techniques formerly associated with snake oil. The marketing comprises storefronts, retail stores, and traveling peddlers; example products are herbalism, dietary supplements, or a Tibetan singing bowl (used for healing.) Claims that these products are scientific, healthy, or natural have no basis in science. Contrary to claims perpetuated by the Xinhua News Agency during the COVID-19 pandemic, the product does not prevent or treat infections from coronaviruses. The false claims caused the product to be sold out in stores across the United States and China.
caption: Historical interpreter Ross Nelson as "Professor Thaddeus Schmidlap", resident snake-oil salesman at the Enchanted Springs Ranch and Old West theme park, Boerne, Texas.
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