The Great Wellness Hoax: How Bad Science and Predatory Tactics Created a Multi-Billion-Dollar Industry

For a particular subset of the American population, the solution (and remedy) to America’s 2020 societal ills is obvious: Essential Oils.

Derived from the distillation of specific plants, an essential oil is a concentrated extract of a plant’s “essence” that some people believe provide health benefits if inhaled (through aromatherapy) or applied topically.

The essential oil market generated $7 billion in 2018, and some projections have the industry burgeoning to $14.6 billion by 2026 — if the bubble doesn’t burst before then. The largest essential oil supplier, Young Living, reported $1.5 billion in revenue for 2017.

The essential oil craze is just one small part of the Natural Wellness, or “Naturopathy,” Movement, a multi-billion-dollar industry bent on convincing healthy people they’re sick, and that the only way to be “cured” is to purchase alternative medicine and natural remedies to supplement a “holistic” lifestyle.

For the record, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with being more mindful about one’s health and seeking a more naturalistic lifestyle. At the same time, however, the fact that personal wealth is the largest contributing factor to one’s personal health goes largely ignored in…