"First, do no harm."

[unixronin]

Or, not.

The General Medical Council ruled that Dr Andrew Wakefield, who claimed a link between the MMR jab and autism, also “failed in his duties as a responsible consultant”.

[...]

His 1998 research, based on 12 children, was published in the Lancet and is said to have done more damage than anything published in a scientific journal in living memory.

[...]

The charges against the trio run to 93 pages and include the allegation that Dr Wakefield failed to disclose to the Lancet that he had accepted £55,000 from the Legal Aid Board.  The money was allegedly for research to support legal action by parents who believed their children were harmed by MMR.

Step 1:  Create a false medical panic.

Step 2:  Rent yourself out to people looking for someone to blame for their kid's autism.

Step 3:  Profit!

(Pointer via brownkitty)

Comments

[ithildae]

I have begun to doubt that the science journals are any more accurate than Wikipedia. I have heard that science changes one funeral at a time. I know that there has always been politics in science. But the stuff we are getting fed as factual is getting further and further from the raw data. I remember my father telling me that he ended up doing some of his physics labs with a slide rule in college. Apparently, that is the norm for researchers also. That and very small samples to form statistically insignificant conclusions.

It seems that laws and sausages are not the only things it is best not to observe being made.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

I think it should be noted that Dr. Wakefield did not create the panic, nor is the panic necessarily false. All they have done is prove conclusively that he went against medical orthodoxy, and accepted payment for his research from someone with an agenda.

Neither is bad. Medical Orthodoxy has for years paid MD's to publish "research" that suited their agenda, even when it was done with inadequate controls or obvious bias. And, in this case, I tend to be very suspicious of the medical establishment, as most of the studies they publish (re: safety of treatments that have been accused of causing autism) were paid for by the pharmaceutical companies who make the meds.

[smandal.livejournal.com]

The problem with conspiracy theory is that it cuts both ways. Why be suspicious of the "medical establishment," but not of the Dr. Wakefield's of the world?

This is precisely why duplication of results is the gold standard for establishing/disproving scientific theories. Wakefield's results have not been duplicated in wider studies.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

I never said I wasn't suspicious of Dr. Wakefield - I just felt that since unixronin's post was already antago to Dr. Wakefield it wasn't necessary to push that point. My only point was to show that the skepticism unixronin was heaping on Dr. Wakefield could be leveled equally on the medical establishment, and for the same reasons. That does not imply defense of Dr. Wakefield.

[smandal.livejournal.com]

You did write "in this case, I tend to be very suspicious of the medical establishment, ..."

So I was wondering why you weren't as suspicious of Wakefield, but perhaps I misinterpreted your comments.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

That's ok, perhaps I could have been more clear. But then we wouldn't have gotten to have this conversation!

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

nor is the panic necessarily false

That is, fortunately, not the standard we use for credible scientific research. It is not necessarily false that the entire cosmos sprang into existence five minutes ago, with everything in such perfect order as to create an illusion of history. However, the total lack of evidence to support such a view means that this view, while not necessarily false, is hardly within the heartland of scientific thinking. A physicist who promulgated this view as anything more than a thought experiment would rightly be decried for operating outside of the heartland of physics.

The same applies to Dr. Wakefield.

[laurarey.livejournal.com]

Ok, is it just me or does Dr. Wakefield look like Q from Star Trek?

[cymrullewes.livejournal.com]

He does indeed look like John DeLancie.