India, Nov. 12 -- Three recent developments in the health and wellness sphere stirred controversies that made public discourse look increasingly like reality television.

A documentary on Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos; Deepinder Goyal's Temple, an experimental wearable exploring signals potentially related to brain blood flow; and former cricketer Yuvraj Singh's Protocol32, a multi-ingredient wellness supplement, ignited fierce online exchanges. Supporters of the two much-publicised Indian innovations clashed with doctors and other critics demanding evidence. Instead of receiving serious attention, complex scientific issues have become victims of social media users mixing up commercial interest and science, resulting in instan...