DC’s Improbable Science

55 responses so far ↓

• 1 coracle // Jul 29, 2007 at 20:00

  Hi David, great to see a nice blog format for improbable science, looking forward to more of the same.

  Oldfart, I think it’s a need to be logged in to comment. I see a comment box on the ‘BBC makes good on MMR’ page, though that might be a recent fix?

• 2 peter horne // Aug 2, 2007 at 11:13

  Much better. This wordpress seems ok.

• 3 Minnies_Dad // Aug 6, 2007 at 10:00

  Hello David…and congratulations on your new look.

  At least something positive has come out of the recent unpleasantness – Improbable though that may have once seemed!

• 4 kazelnio // Aug 9, 2007 at 05:35

  Hello, I found the link to your website in the Lawrence paper. Its a great essay and I have blogged about it on my site at The Other 95%, plus added my perspective on metrics and taxonomy.

  I had a look around and really like what you are doing, will check back often for updates!

• 5 reginald // Aug 15, 2007 at 23:23

  Hello David,
  Having read your amusing Guardian article about homeopathy its good to see that skepticism is alive and well in the British media - what ashame that you didn’t bother to research your article and find out anything about homeopathy, the principles it is based upon or even the fact that it has been used with great success for over 250 years as opposed to 30 as you suggest. Seems that bigotry is also thriving in the media if your writing is anything to go by. Active debate is always useful but it becomes a great stumbling block to evolution when one makes one’s mind up before actually knowing anything about the topic up for discussion. Arguing from blatant ignorance renders any valid points you make a bit laughable you know…

• 6 admin // Aug 16, 2007 at 04:23

  Just one thing. The Guardian piece was not (primarily) about homeopathy, but about something much more important. I think you missed the point Reginald.

  Of course real medicine had hardly begun when homeopathy was invented, and the homeopaths’ solution, to do nothing, could well have been preferable to bloodletting. But homeopaths stayed stuck in 1800 and the rest of us moved on. I wonder if Reginald will opt for a homeopathic general anaesthetic if he needs a hip replacement. Or homeopathic treatment if he is unfortunate enough to get malaria. That would qualify him for a Darwin award. Francis Wheen referred to the Bush-Blair-Khomeini era as a period when mumbo-jumbo came to be mistaken for truth. Homeopathy is just one minor example of that. Being an optimist, it seems to me that the endarkenment is a temporary hiccough which is gradually coming to an end.

• 7 Minnies_Dad // Aug 18, 2007 at 10:52

  David: I see that ‘Reginald’ states that it’s “a shame that you didn’t bother to research your article and find out anything about homeopathy, the principles it is based upon or even the fact that it has been used with great success for over 250 years as opposed to 30 as you suggest.”

  Apart from the fact (since Reginald is rightly concerned about them) that your excellent article doesn’t suggest that homeopathy has only been used for 30 years, his own understanding of homeopathy may well have shed new light on the science behind Samuel Hahnemann’s theory, as it would make the good doctor -who was born in 1755 - no more than two years old at the time.

  In fact, it wasn’t until 1810 that he compiled the results of his cogitations into a treatise called “Organon of rational therapeutics”.

• 8 zathrus // Aug 19, 2007 at 17:23

  Splendid - a much more readable blog - but just as good, contentwise, as before….

  I’ve only just seen here that the Department of Pharmacology is to be “disestablished”. Sad it’s to go - I have many happy memories of the place, from when I did my PhD there. The building had a ramshackle air, totally belying the furious research effort that went on inside. DC’s pipe, the tiniest and smokiest tea room I’ve ever experienced (presided over by the formidable Joyce,), and practical demonstrations that N2O makes medical students behave weirdly are the three abiding memories….oh, and some pharmacology, too….

• 9 Prem_Joshi // Aug 23, 2007 at 15:40

  Hi David, As a college student in India, I was in an area that had a serious “Cobra Problem” And, of course we had a Homeopath who prescribed his pills for cobra bites. Among my friends were some believers in Homeopathy. So one day in jest I asked if they were bitten by a cobra , would they go to this doctor? Without batting an eylid they said yes !! and then as an after thought, added, they will also see a regular doctor. They were all Science , Engineering and Technology students.

• 10 Dr Aust // Sep 5, 2007 at 23:38

  Yes Prem, India is often cited by homeopaths as “a huge population using homeopathy happily”.

  Of course, it is not quite the same as in the European situation as my understanding is that in India you have to pay for medical care, Homeopaths presumably charge far less than conventional doctors, so less well off people consult the homeopath because the fees are affordable.

  In European countries where medical care does not usually have to be paid for it tends to be more a sense of dissatisfaction with “mainstream” medicine, or with a scientific way of looking at the world generally.

  PS Someone bitten by a Cobra taking a homeopathic remedy makes me think “Darwin Award”

  http://www.darwinawards.com/

• 11 Charles Copeland // Sep 6, 2007 at 16:38

  David,

  Great site – you are a past master at putting the boot into pseudoscience!

  But are you sure you are right about the adverse effects of liberal gun control policy in the US? (I’m referring to your posting on the Virginia Tech murder spree). I think the jury is still out on that issue – indeed there have been quite a few studies whose findings suggest that the widespread availability of guns may reduce rather than increase the crime rate (chiefly because felons fear being shot by their putative victims).

  The book to read is John Lott’s ‘More Guns, Less Crime’. You’ll find an interview with Lott here:

  http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/493636.html

  Apart from that, you’re perfect.

  Keep up the good work!

• 12 tg2 // Sep 7, 2007 at 18:39

  It is gratifying to see a young Indian, Prem, who realizes homeopaths as quacks. A colleague of mine from India, whose expertise is in statistics, and I had the following conversation recently:

  I: Good to see you. How was your trip?

  (He tells me about his trip to China, about which he had told me earlier. His original plan was to leave his toddler in India with grandparents, and go to China only with his wife. He told me that his child went with them as well.)

  I: I thought you were going to leave the child in India while you went to China. What happened?

  He: Oh, there are all kinds of fevers in the state. So I didn’t want to leave her there.

  I: Yes, I heard chikkungunya is really bad there.

  He: Yes, but we took some homeopathic medicine, so we were fine.

  I: Come on! You are a statistician. You ought to know better! (I am never diplomatic. I am polite, but very direct, which is one reason I am still an honest academic.)

  He: But it worked. We didn’t get sick, whereas my mother-in-law did.

  There was nothing further I could say. I was flabbergasted! Oh, ours is the top-rated and largest program in the US in our branch of engineering. I won’t say which, but you can probably guess if I tell you that a large component of my branch of engineering is statistics. We are supposed to have the strongest statistics program of its kind. I am from India too. As the only other Indian on the faculty, it is rather depressing to see supposedly expert statisticians believe in such quackery.

  Prem, keep it up! India needs more people like you!

• 13 David Colquhoun // Sep 8, 2007 at 21:18

  Charles Copeland. I’m never sure I’m right about anything, and the experiments on gun control have not been done, nor are they likely to be done.

  But you must be as well aware as I am that most guns in the USA are not used on felons, but on family and friends.

  It is, I agree, a bit naive to point out that the USA has a vastly higher homicide rate that any other rich country, as well as vastly more guns. For me it is quite sufficient to say that it is uncivilised to have private citizens carrying lethal weapons, just as state executions are uncivilised. One lives in hopes that now the days of the “Texecutioner” are numbered, the USA may perhaps eventually catch up with Europe in such matters.

• 14 Jack Murphy // Sep 8, 2007 at 22:05

  Sorry…
  Can I ask question?
  Does the problem of gun availability tie anyway to quackery and homeopathy?

  However, if you are discussing this question…
  ‘More Guns, Less Crime’ is wrong opinion, certainly. There are many countries where the law prohibits men from carrying arms. Nevertheless, the crime rate in these countries is not more than in USA. Actually, the crime rate and the availability of guns is not tied. A high crime rate is a reflection of an unstable society.

• 15 David Colquhoun // Sep 8, 2007 at 23:26

  Jack -the reference is to the posting about Virginia Tech on my politics page, at http://www.ucl.ac.uk/Pharmacology/dc-bits/corrie.html#vtech

  I think that there is a connection between questions like that and about quackery. They are all about believing things that aren’t true, and about the betrayal of enlightenment values. Originally I had pages on politics and religion as well as about dubious science. Now I agree with Francis Wheen. They are all aspects of the endarkenment.

• 16 Jack Murphy // Sep 9, 2007 at 02:17

  Yes, David, I’ve understood that the talk is about Virginia Tech case.

  You have answered excellently about connection between all these questions. I agree with you that it is different “symptoms” of one and the same “disease” of present civilization - the endarkenment.

  Thereby some idea suggested itself to me. Perhaps I have not enough the right to criticize the form of your blogs. And I don’t try to do it, of course. However, maybe would it be interesting solution to tack two your blogs together? In fact the uppermost subject of conversation in both blogs is one and the same. This subject was designated and defined in your profound article “Science in an Age of Endarkenment”.
  Certainly, the creation of one great combined blog supposes the additional hard work. But I think that future result of it could be very important - new uncommon website (blog) would arise with clear powerful progressive idea. This blog could be divided into different themes according to all aspects of main problem - the crisis in present world and science.
  I could help you in this work, if you would decide to do it. With my pleasure and gladness!

  Well… Perhaps, my enthusiasm ran away with me Don’t take to heart…

• 17 DMcILROY // Oct 15, 2007 at 13:36

  I have linked the Lawrence paper as reading for my scientific english students. They have to prepare two role plays connected to this issue; one with a group leader telling a PhD student and post-doc that they have to add two honorary co-authors to their manuscript, and the other a recruitment committee evaluating candidates’ CVs.
  On the theme of CVs and recruitment, I have also linked to the material you obtained on Patrick Holford’s appointment at Teesside. Tomorrow they will be re-enacting the discussion that led to his professorship.

• 18 susanekg // Oct 25, 2007 at 13:37

  Readers of Improbable Science might be interested in reading Snake Oil Salesmen Hit Jackpot in Nevada, an academic blog about the ongoing campaign in that state to promote medical tourism by legalizing medical devices and treatments that are outlawed in other states: http://faculty.uml.edu/sgallagher/NIRB.htm. Thanks for calling attention to the rising power of irrationality in medicine and other sectors of the knowledge industry.

• 19 jdc325 // Oct 25, 2007 at 17:02

  Re Susan’s link - “…placing the supervision of medical research and treatment in the hands of a unique coalition of homeopaths…”, some of whom have “lost their medical licenses in other states”. Remind me not to get sick in Nevada Susan!

  PS - clicking the link brings up a 404 error message. If you copy and paste the link into your browser, the final full stop (or period) needs to be deleted.

• 20 madmedea // Jan 11, 2008 at 14:57

  The names of the “experts” involved should certainly be published alongside the documents which they have made a contribution to. To make a comparison (in case you need to state a precedent) the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education produces subject benchmark statements which set our standards expected for undergraduate degrees. All of the published statements include details of who was on the group which created them - experts drawn from the subject area.

  I’ll be interested to see if Skills for Health are covered by the FOI Act - as I can’t see a mention of it on their website. As a similar type of body, QAA are not currently covered.

  P.S. If they come back and say they can’t release the names because of data protection…. that really isn’t true….

• 21 CTurner // Feb 8, 2008 at 14:06

  Hi David, have just stumbled across your site. Very nice indeed… Was impressed to read your robust defence of Martin Walker’s (and Clifford G Miller’s) slanderous accusations about you in the Grauniad’s CiF section (Ben Goldacre - Clinical trials and playing by the rules - http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jan/05/1). Keep up the good work.

• 22 Old boy // Apr 10, 2008 at 11:50

  Comment on In-human resources, science and pizza:

  Thanks for that - I LOVED IT. It’s fantastic that the truth of HR (I truly hate that phrase) has been so ruthlessly exposed. Should be part of the School Handbook. Any VC who stripped out all the BS would immediately retain and attract good people and see their productivity soar.

• 23 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 10, 2008 at 13:51

  GERD: You don’t have it because it doesn’t exist
  10 April 2008
  If your doctor tells you that you suffer from GERD (gastro-esophageal reflux disease), he’s lying – because the condition doesn’t exist, and was invented by the drugs industry.

  GERD is a serious-sounding name for common-or-garden heartburn, which many of us have from time to time.
  http://www.wddty.com/03363800371954492866/gerd-you-don-t-have-it-because-it-doesn-t-exist.html
  But you don’t need to take a powerful drug indefinitely in order to deal with heartburn – so that’s why drug giant GlaxoSmithKline invented the condition, GERD, in order to market its drug Zantac.

  The same goes for conditions such as ‘overactive bladder’, which was invented by the drug manufacturer Pharmacia in order to market Detrol, and ‘compulsive shopping disorder’, a mental illness devised by Forrest Laboratories and used to promote its antidepressant Celexa.

  This practice is known in the industry as condition branding, a new book, Our Daily Meds, reveals. Doctors usually fall for it because most of their ongoing education after leaving medical school is from the drug company salesmen or company-sponsored conferences.

  (Source: Our Daily Meds, by Melody Petersen, published by Farrar Straus Giroux, 2008).

• 24 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 10, 2008 at 13:52

  MMR: Major mumps outbreak proves the vaccine doesn’t work
  10 April 2008
  At a time when health officials are quietly admitting that there could be a link between the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine and autism, a new study has also discovered that it doesn’t work.

  Researchers investigating a large outbreak of mumps in 2006, when 6,584 cases were reported among college students, have discovered that virtually every sufferer had been vaccinated twice against the disease.

  The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reveals that at least 84 per cent of young adults aged between 18 and 24 years had received two-dose vaccines against mumps. And in 2006 – when the outbreak occurred – the national two-dose coverage among adolescents reached 87 per cent, the highest in US history, and just one point below that needed for ‘herd immunity’.
  CDC researchers speculate that the outbreak – primarily among 18- to 24-year-olds – was the result of the ‘wrong type of mumps’. The vaccine is supposed to protect against A-virus mumps, whereas the outbreak in 2006 was caused by the G-virus strain.

  Despite its limitations, the CDC team reckons that all children need a third dose of MMR – even though the two-dose vaccine was introduced following a 1980 mumps outbreak among children who had received a single vaccine dose.

  It may be a measure that will be hard to introduce at a time when health officials are accepting that the MMR vaccine can cause autism among children with a ‘mitochondrial disorder’.

  (Source: New England Journal of Medicine, 2008; 358: 1580-9).

• 25 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 10, 2008 at 13:53

  Cancer Drugs: Why ‘wonder’ treatments almost never are
  10 April 2008
  New ‘wonder’ cancer drugs may be nothing of the sort – and could be given miracle status by zealous drug companies anxious to get their new drug on the market before all the proper studies have been carried out.

  In the past 10 years, 25 studies on cancer drugs have been stopped early by the sponsoring drug company because, they have said, results looked ‘promising’.

  Researchers who investigated the pattern discovered that the trials were stopped, on average, after just 30 months, and had been tested on a fraction of patients that were originally enlisted.

  Lead researcher Dr Giovanni Aplone commented: “Data on effectiveness and potential side effects can be missed by stopping a trial early.”

  He said that the true effectiveness and safety of any drug could be established only after years – and not months – of study, and usually among much larger groups than those used for the trials. Most of the studies that were ended prematurely had tested the drug on just 40 per cent of those who had been initially recruited.

  (Source: Annals of Oncology, 2008; March 28: doi: 10.1093/annonc/mdn069).

• 26 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 10, 2008 at 14:08

  Just posted 3 sample items which I hope you will not “moderate” David.
  Just wanted to show that Improbable Science might want to consider some of the lies sold to us by big money interests in pharma.

  Makes a change from constantly having a pop at alternative medicine which doesnt result in long term conditions due to over / wrong prescribing, and which results in thousands of deaths every year even when prescribed “correctly”.

  Perhaps you can turn your energies onto the hand that appears to be feeding you?

  …let me start you off with over prescription of Ritalin and the great fluoride deception

• 27 David Colquhoun // Apr 10, 2008 at 14:43

  You really should check before accusing me of taking money from phams. Perhaps you should look at the interchange on that topic with Patrick Holford. Which of us has the vested interest?

  I’d also recommend that you read my blog more carefully. If you did you would see that I criticise pharma almost as much as I criticise the alternative industry (they are both industries - the main difference is that the alternative industry lies all the time to shift the product, whereas pharma lies only some of the time).

  I can’t answer your question about the halting of cancer trials because I don’t know what stopping rule they uses -there are perfectly good statistical ways to deal with that dilemma. I’m willing to bet that you haven’t read the originals either, but are merely repeating the headlines.

• 28 Dr Aust // Apr 10, 2008 at 15:43

  Hear hear, DC.

  One of the hallmarks of the AltMed / Nutri-Balls / Natural Therapy lot is that:

  (i) they never met a “natural” therapy they didn’t like;
  (ii) they never met an “allopathic” remedy they did.

  In contrast, conventional science and medicine generally, and the BadSci lobby, will call time on bullshit, or bad science to be less Anglo-Saxon, wherever it can be found… for instance, see Ben Goldacre’s discussion of fluoride. And you can find extensive discussion of Pharma’s disease-mongering over GERD, or ritalin, or SSRIs, in the mainstream medical literature as well as on the BadSci forums.

  And now a question:

  When did you EVER see a complementary therapist, or natural therapy advocate, discussing the possibility that compelmentary theraies are ineffective or over-sold?

  Anyone?

  Thought not.

  When the Complementary Therapy crew stop pushing bullshit, and develop any meaningful level of self-critique, they might get less of a flaying. Until then, as John Wayne would say, ” not hardly”.

• 29 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 14, 2008 at 08:47

  Well Dr Aust (I guess you feel the need to include the magic letters DR in your username to add to your credibility), you seem to think that the “AltMed / Nutri-Balls / Natural Therapy lot” are something different to your superior “allopathic crew”.
  You may want to find out how many of your Dr, physiotherapist, Nurse, Midwife, Oncologist, etc etc colleagues are ALSO part of the “Altmed Lot”. Why is it that mainstream health practitioners are increasingly incorporating CAM into their practice, maybe its because they have found that many of them WORK!
  Example is Nutritional therapy. It is easy for “educated ” professionals like yourself to scoff at treating many conditions with nutrition, however I would ask how many hours of nutritional input do doctors have in their training?
  As is often said, the medical establishment serves as the retail arm of the pharma industry and the core of medic training is to dispense patented medicines.
  As Im sure you will know, the OTHER part of the Hippocratic oath is “Let your food be your medicine and your medicine be your food”.

  How many times do doctors apply this strategy rather than writing a prescription?

• 30 David Colquhoun // Apr 14, 2008 at 10:18

  It is, sadly, true,that there are a few corrupt clinicians who act as mouthpieces for big pharma (but not many pharmacologists). My guess that is nothing like the number of alternative people who act as salespeople for the truly enormous alternative industry. That is specially true in the peddling of unnecessary “supplements” by nutritional gurus who often qute blatantly have strong financial interests in the recommendations that they make.

• 31 Dr Aust // Apr 14, 2008 at 12:08

  *sigh*

  bigpharma-bigbucks, if you check on my blog you will see I am a PhD type working in a medical school. I use the alias “Dr Aust” because I picked it after about 20 seconds thought two years ago and I can’t be arsed changing it.

  I am not a clinician and have no direct vested interest in selling you pills. I do not work for a PharmaCo, and have never had a single penny of money off them either.

  One thing I do know a bit about is what medical students are taught, since I do the teaching. They are taught about nutrition throughout their courses. And from my wife - who is a doctor - and my GP friends I know that doctors DO dispense basic nutritional advice - the simple stuff that is actually known to be soundly based, like “eat more complex carbohydrates” “eat less saturated fat”, “eat more fruit and veg”, and “oily fish is good for you”. They also do “lifestyle advice”, like taking exercise, and do various kinds of “counselling”-type talk.

  The line about “doctors exist to push pills for PharmaCos” is a tired piece of nonsense. Apart from anything else, it is cheaper for the NHS if doctors DON’T put people on expensive drugs. Most doctors are far more interested in NOT medicating patients unnecessarily than in dosing them full of pharmaceuticals. The demand for “pills for ills” increasingly comes from the patients, fuelled by a societal trend towards demanding quick-fix solutions. The complex supplement regimes peddled by tossers like Patrick Holford are just another example of this rather unhelpful Zeitgeist.

• 32 superburger // Apr 14, 2008 at 16:02

  also interesting to compare the attitude of the GMC towards a GP involved in recommending nutritional supplements (in which they have a direct financial interest) to a patient with that of the BANT (whose code of ethics seemingly permits people to take payment from pill companies for pills they give to customers)

• 33 jdc325 // Apr 14, 2008 at 16:45

  I’m not sure this is the right question: “how many hours of nutritional input do doctors have in their training?”

  Presumably, MDs receive sufficient training to give basic advice and are able to refer patients to Registered Dietitians if necessary.

  RDs must have a BSc in Nutrition / Dietetics. There are no requirements whatsoever for Nutritionists to receive any training.

• 34 dvd20 // Apr 15, 2008 at 11:38

  Just to say I thought your article was great on HR gobbledegook and I now work in HR! Actually, I have a perfect view of both science and HR as I am a senior research scientist whose funding ran out and now manage a new University programme for training (yes, training!) principal investigators! It actually makes sense to give PIs all the information they need to manage groups rather than trying to get competitors to help them out, so I have been designing an appropriate Programme for them see http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/offices/personnel/staffdev/pi/. It is early days yet but people seem to find it helpful.
  In the HR world where verbosity currently rules and management-speak dominates, it may be possible to change this balance in HE and create an efficient, leaner and less grotesque HR function if you actually encourage more academics and scientists in! HR is a very wide remit and presents a short circuit into HE management. In my view, only by encouraging academics to leap across the divide and join in – can that divide begin to close.

  Dr Denise V. Dear,
  Academic Development Consultant - PI programme,
  University Teaching Associate,
  Staff Development,
  University of Cambridge,
  25, Trumpington Street,
  Cambridge.
  CB2 1QA
  01223 765786
  dvd20@admin.cam.ac.uk

• 35 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 17, 2008 at 13:48

  More big pharma fuelled rubbish:

  ‘Killer’ Vitamins: It’s bad science, but everyone believes it
  17 April 2008
  So are you about to die if you take an antioxidant vitamin supplement, such as A, C and E? A study that has been pounced on by the world’s media suggests you may. It says that not only do the vitamins not make you healthier or help you live longer, they may even shorten your life.

  The study looked at 67 medical trials, involving 232,550 people, most of whom were taking a high-dose antioxidant because they had a health problem, such as heart disease, gastrointestinal ailments or neurological complaints.
  Overall, 13.1 per cent of participants who were taking an antioxidant died, compared with 10.5 per cent of deaths among those who were either taking a placebo or no nutritional.

  As a result, say the researchers, vitamins must be more carefully controlled, and their use restricted.

  This is just the news that opponents of the booming nutritionals industry wanted to hear, and at a time when worldwide bans and restrictions are being considered by the EU and others.

  Better yet, the study is from the prestigious Cochrane Collaboration, which styles itself as the independent and scientific evaluator of medicine and therapies.

  But there’s a story behind the headlines, and it’s one that nobody is getting to read. Dr Robert Verkerk, scientific director of the Alliance for Natural Health, which is fighting to keep high-dose vitamins on the healthshop shelves, has found a range of faults with the Cochrane review.

  * The ‘new’ study isn’t new at all. It was first published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in February last year. The only difference is that the ‘new’ Cochrane review includes one less study. So the anti-nutritional lobby has had strong press coverage twice from the same data.
  * Despite its claims to be an independent review, the Cochrane study excluded 405 studies into vitamins because there were no deaths, and another 69 because they weren’t ‘randomised’ trials. As it is, the review looked only at studies that involved sick people, taking very high-dose synthetic vitamins, and which had participants dying. This does not replicate average use, and does not give the researchers the authority to claim that supplements shouldn’t be taken by healthy people.
  * The studies look only at synthetic vitamins, and did not include those that are sourced from plants, such as flavonoids, anthocyanins, and sulforaphanes, which are included in leading-edge supplements, usually produced by small independent companies.
  * The review flies in the face of many other studies that have established that high-dose vitamins are effective in reducing the risk of lethal diseases, such as cancer and heart disease.

  (Source: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2008, 2: No. CD007176; Alliance for Natural Health)

• 36 David Colquhoun // Apr 17, 2008 at 14:38

  I see that bigpharma-bigbucks is again on the side of the enormous nutritional supplement industry, much if which is, of course, owned by the industry that he loves to deride. What a gift for them! By recommending their pills for diseases, but describing them as “supplements”, not drugs, they are able to get away from all that tedious stuff about producing evidence for the truth of their claims. That is how Boots get away (so far) with their ludicrous claims that CoQ10 peps you up.

• 37 Dr Aust // Apr 17, 2008 at 15:38

  bp-bb, your conspiracy mania is playing up again.

  For those that haven’t actually looked up the Cochrane review, the authors are Danish academics (not “Pharma shills”) and have precisely no “big Pharma” funding, or connections.

  Celebrity vitamin peddler-in-chief Patrick Holford was even forced to admit on R4 that his viewpoint on supplements was “less independent” that that of Professor Gluud, one of the study authors.

  Quite contrary to our resident conspiracist’s ravings, the Cochrane study was in fact funded by this Danish Foundation for (objective) Research into Complementary Therapies. Strange but true.

• 38 Dr Aust // Apr 17, 2008 at 15:45

  PS Sarah Boseley over at the Guardian has just penned one of her best ever pieces detailing just exactly why Bp-bb and Co. are frantically trying to rubbish and smear the Cochrane review. Solid gold stuff.

• 39 David Colquhoun // Apr 17, 2008 at 19:08

  bigpharma-bigbucks has sent two more comments, one immensely long, but simply repeating points that have already been made at length. The most striking thing to be is the alarming similarity of the tricks used by both the regular pharmaceutical industry and the alternative industry. The difference is that at least some of the products of the former do some good. I wonder if you will opt for a herbal general anaesthetic if you need a hip replacement. Or homeopathic treatment if you are unfortunate enough to get malaria.

• 40 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 18, 2008 at 09:32

  Ah I see you are now acting as spokesman for me now David. Not necessary, as I am quite able to put forward my own view without your censorship. oh sorry, its “moderation” isnt it….

  You and I both know that my posts were most definitely not repeating things, and even if they were, this is allegedly a forum for discussion isnt it? Or just a shop window for your own belief system and biased rantings?

  Strange how those who are allegedly seeking truth have to suppress the views of others who may be as eloquent as themselves in expressing a different view.

  I guess looking at other views is not part of your agenda and easy targets are the best you can do, so my challenge will remain unanswered for now.

  What is funny is that you felt the need to comment on my 2 posts anyway, as if that in some way justified your censorship, and avoided me directly accusing you of ignoring them, and thus compromising your own self image as a “truth seeker”.
  And bravo for the tired cheap shot at the end, knowing full well that you wouldnt print my response anyway. For the record, you should understand the difference between surgery and practice of medicine for non urgent disease. I also would not want my NHS GP to perform surgery on me. (incidentally hypnosis was used extensively AND successfully for anesthetic purposes as far back as the 19th century), and I would certainly not be getting ANY vaccinations for malaria having seen what is in them, though its unlikely I would need this in this part of England.

  Perhaps I will just forward my comments to others on this forum direct as you have not afforded me the courtesy to do so.

• 41 Dr Aust // Apr 18, 2008 at 17:39

  You are safe, BP-bb. There are NO vaccines available for malaria. If there were, perhaps we could save some of the millions round the world, notably in Africa, who suffer and die from the disease.

  If you go on a trekking holiday to a malarial part of Thailand, we Pharma-Shills would recommend prophylactic antimalarial DRUGS (see threads passim). That’s what I take for trips to malarial regions, anyway.

  If you want to take a useless homeopathic remedy instead, I hope you are lucky and do not get bitten by a malarial mosquito. I also hope you don’t come home to clog up our local tropical diseases unit with an eminently preventable disease brought on by stupidity.

• 42 bigpharma-bigbucks // Apr 19, 2008 at 00:50

  New malaria vaccine raises high hopes

  Prospects for a malaria vaccine have been boosted by “tantalising” results from a trial in 2000 children in Mozambique. Although the vaccine reduced the risk of infection by only 30% compared with a control vaccine - this is far better than any previous result.

  “With 300 million people in Africa with malaria, a 30% reduction in infection is pretty substantial,” says Ripley Ballou, vice president of clinical development at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), the company co-developing and testing the vaccine.

  Even more impressive, say the investigators, is that the vaccine reduced the risk that the children - aged one to four - would develop the most severe and lethal form of malaria by 57%.

  Better still, the risk of severe disease in recipients aged less than two saw a 77% reduction. The investigators are delighted by this because, ultimately, they want to give the vaccine to infants in their first year of life to maximise early protection.
  Orders of magnitude

  “We’ve found these results to be quite tantalising,” says Pedro Alonso of the Hospital Clinic of the University of Barcelona, and head of the team. “This is clearly the best result we’ve seen with a candidate malaria vaccine,” he said in a press briefing, organised by the international Malaria Vaccine Initiative, GSK and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

  The vaccine attacks Plasmodium falciparum - the parasite which causes malaria - at the early infection stage, when it has just been injected into human blood by the bite of a carrier mosquito.

  The vaccine, named RTS,S/AS02A carries two short proteins, called RTS and S, mimicking a key surface component of the sporozoite usually recognised by the immune system.

  Incorporated into the empty shell of a hepatitis B vaccine, the new vaccine is thought to trigger production of antibodies and white blood cells that recognise and neutralise the sporozoites.
  Manifestation decreased

  “It works by preventing the parasite from emerging from the liver, or at least diminishing the load of parasites emerging,” says Joe Cohen, inventor of the vaccine at GSK.

  “The next parasitic stages are controlled and manifestation of the disease is greatly decreased,” he adds.

  The development partners hope to begin larger, phase III trials as soon as possible, working steadily towards the goal of a vaccine for infants. “One million children under five die each year from malaria,” says Melinda Moree of the Malaria Vaccine Initiative.

  Journal reference: The Lancet (vol 364, p 1411)

  So with the greatest of respect “DA” …fuck you!

• 43 Dr Aust // Apr 19, 2008 at 12:25

  Very erudite sign-off, Bp-bb.

  And I’m surprised and delighted to see you approving of the efforts of BigPharma, in the form of the GSK vaccine development operation.

  Yes, there is an experimental vaccine in development. (”Experimental” is the key word missing from the headline of the story you cut and pasted - lazy journalism.) That is not what I call a vaccine, in its normal sense of “something non-experimental, widely available, and which offers a reasonably high degree of protection against the disease”.

  When (if?) the experimental vaccine is actually finished trials, and licenced for mass production, it will be “a vaccine”.

  There have been many attempts over the years to develop a malaria vaccine, sadly all unsuccessful. This is the latest try.

  If it actually does make it through Phase III trials (not a certainty) it will be a big improvement on “no vaccine” for people in malaria-endemic areas, though only a stage on the road given the very partial protection it appears to provide.

  The wider point is that I actually understand the difference between “an experimental treatment in the research stage” and “a fully tested and validated treatment ready to be rolled out”. Your statements on this and other threads make it very clear that you do not.

  Incidentally, for people from malaria-free countries like the UK travelling to malaria-endemic areas, a vaccine like this is quite clearly NOT going to replace malaria prophylaxis with drugs even if it is gets to the market.

• 44 David Colquhoun // Apr 19, 2008 at 16:07

  I guess I should have referred to homeopathic, or acupuncture general anaesthesia, not herbal. Nevertheless, I expect that Bp-bb would opt for something like halothane rather than opium and henbane.

  I don’t think anyone disputes that herbal things can be effective, and there is evidence that a few actually are effective. But not many. Herbal medicine is, in my view, just pharmacology circa 1900, from the time before it was realised how to do proper clinical trials, and the time before it was realised how important it was for the patient to standardise potency.

• 45 Anna // Apr 24, 2008 at 11:23

  Nice post

• 46 bigpharma-bigbucks // May 2, 2008 at 11:13

  Typical response I would expect. unfortunately your poor attempts at mind reading of myself are most unscientific. If you had read one of my (uncensored by yourself) posts you would see I wrote
  QUOTE: I also would not want my NHS GP to perform surgery on me. (incidentally hypnosis was used extensively AND successfully for anesthetic purposes as far back as the 19th century), END QUOTE.

  Rather than sarcasm about herbal remedies many of which are very effective, how about looking at killers like aspartame, which only got FDA approval because Donald Rumsfeld was Searle Chairman.

  And Im guessing these clinical trials are the same ones that allow around 40,000 Britons each year to die from reactions to prescription drugs? And the 150,000 which are disabled or need hospital treatment after taking a drug?
  And lets not get into thalidomide, or pemoline (took 23 years to realise liver toxicity), ketoconazole (took 15 years to realise it caused heart complications). The list goes on…
  And how many clinical trials take into account combinations of drugs?

  For a site which claims to look at bad science, all Ive seen is smugness and unflinching belief that science has all the answers.
  Which it doesnt…

• 47 David Colquhoun // May 2, 2008 at 11:29

  The one thing that is blindingly obvious is that science has not got all the answers,

  The difference is that scientists, unlike bigpharma-bigbucks, don’t feel free to invent the answer when there is none.

  The irony is that BB resembles rather closely the marketing people in the pharmaceutical industry that he loathes so much. They too feel free to invent evidence if there isn’t any, and to misrepresent what evidence there is.

• 48 bigpharma-bigbucks // May 2, 2008 at 18:23

  {Another long post cut down, because it is getting so repetitive DC]

  And you still havent provided any evidence that alternative treatments dont work as requested in my censored post.

• 49 David Colquhoun // May 2, 2008 at 20:49

  I just had to post the final sentence of BB’s last long submission, because nothing shows more clearly his/her lack of comprehension about how one goes about separating truth from fiction,

• 50 drsquared2b // Sep 28, 2008 at 15:38

  Have we (UCL) been infiltrated? UCLU now has a new complementary medicine society (although the UCLU website seems unsure whether their medicine is complimentary or complementary…). Their events include regular case discussions with students/staff from Westminster. See
  http://www.freewebs.com/uclucomplementarymedicine/index.htm
  I’m appalled. Why has UCLU accepted their affiliation?

• 51 David Colquhoun // Sep 29, 2008 at 22:32

  drsquared2b. Yes I had a horrified mail from an undergraduate a while back when she discovered this society, but nothing can be done about it. It makes one worry about the selection process a bit though. I just hope their medicine is better than their spelling. I called in on their stand at the Freshers’ Fayre [sic] and may get invited to speak there. If so please come and bring your friends. I may need allies.

• 52 notawitchdoctor // Nov 11, 2008 at 23:28

  Funny seeing a ‘colleague’ being so angry on this thread. I’m not sure what that is about. We are all here to be in dialogue with each other. Herbalists are a funny bunch, and many of them make me question my profession. However, be assured that not all of us are as angry as bp-bb. I’m not angry at all. Just curious as to how we can bring plant medicines into the 21st century.

  I would like to say this: Medicine should be first and foremost about compassion. I don’t care about anything but human beings getting first-class health-care. The NHS does not have the resources to care for everyone. I worked in the busiest surgical ward in my local hospital for 3 years and saw the short-comings of the system: Old people not being fed or given something to drink, medicines being badly prescribed by junior doctors, pharmaceutical toxicity, problems with surgery, psychological problems not being dealt with…. etc etc, ad infinitum.

  I came home from my job on many days and cried at the sheer frustration of not being able to help the people I wanted to help. For the ‘anti-woo’ set: there are SO many shortcomings in modern orthodox medicine. These need to be addressed properly.

  I have a dream that one day people will be given the care they deserve, in private rooms, with proper consultations by specialists who have time to talk to them and doctors and nurses who can support this work. For all of the skeptics: in the meantime, some of us do really care what happens to people when they are ill and we are investigating every way we can make their suffering a little less. If I can help one of my patients feel better, I consider what I do a success.

  Perhaps academic discussions about evidence are moot when you consider the scope of human suffering? I find this a very difficult subject. Dr. Colquhoun?

• 53 Alan Henness // Dec 13, 2008 at 00:41

  Any progress in getting invited to talk to the complementary medicine society? Maria and I would love to come to support you!

• 54 David Colquhoun // Dec 14, 2008 at 07:04

  Well I offered but so far they have had only George Lewith and a Christmas visit to the RLHH, so I’m not holding my breath.

• 55 Dr Aust // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:34

  I suppose George L is the sort of acceptable academic face of homeopathic apologism. Personally I lost any respect for him when he started making noises about how double-blinded placebo trials were not an adequate way to assess CAM interventions.

  Perhaps he combined the talk with one of his visits to his Harley Street alternative clinic?

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