Patrick Holford e-mailed his mailing list today about GETTING TO THE GUTS OF TRUTH ABOUT AUTISM, ALLERGY AND MMR. There’s way too much in this e-mail to address in one post – but I’ll make a start tonight.
Holford objects to Wakefield’s forthcoming GMC disciplinary hearing – arguing that “Dr Andrew Wakefield…is facing a hearing with the General Medical Council, and may be struck off for, in effect, challenging the status quo”. Oddly, Holford, doesn’t find the space to list the any of the allegations against Wakefield: these include allegations that Wakefield “published inadequately founded research, failed to obtain ethical committee approval for the work, obtained funding for it improperly, and subjected children to unnecessary and invasive investigations”. It’s also worth noting that “when [Wakefield] he warned parents to avoid MMR, and published research claiming a link with autism, he did not disclose he was being funded through solicitors seeking evidence to use against vaccine manufacturers”.
So far as I know, no-one is objecting to Wakefield challenging the status quo. While the GMC has (unfortunately) not yet published the charges against Wakefield, ‘challenging the status quo’ is pretty much certain not to be among them. It should be noted that – when the GMC does hold a hearing on the charges against Wakefield – the proceedings will be publicly available: if you believe that Wakefield is being persecuted (or getting off too easy) you will be able to carefully analyse the GMC’s decision. This is in stark contrast to nutritional on-regulators such as BANT.
I’m not entirely sure why Holford doesn’t mention the serious allegations against Wakefield. Given Holford’s previous failure to declare a competing interest in supplement sales, and his (false) claim that Prof. Colquhoun has competing interests in the pharmaceutical industry, Holford should clearly be aware of the importance of declaring such interests. One would also expect that – among the allegations of Wakefield – the claim that he published unfounded research on this controversial and important area would be significant; however, Holford fails to tell his readers about this.
Instead, Holford links to an online petition – telling readers to sign it if they think the GMC action against Wakefield “is wrong, as I do”. There are a couple of odd things to note about this:
- Having looked over the signatures for this petition, it looks rather like Holford didn’t sign it himself, unless he did so anonymously (although I did find one signatory crediting Holford’s work as playing a large part in her sister’s decision not to give the MMR vaccine to her children).
- The petition itself does not focus on the Wakefield case. There are over 700 words in the statement people are asked to sign, and Wakefield is only mentioned once. If Holford wants to offer Wakefield his support, he could surely have started a petition to focus on Wakefield’s own case.
Wakefield will apparently have his GMC hearing next month. The allegations against him are serious: if, for example, Wakefield “subjected children to unnecessary and invasive investigations” then it is only right that he should face disciplinary action. If you’re interested in the case, then follow the hearings instead of trusting Holford’s rather partial summary – one thing that Wakefield won’t be struck off for is ‘challenging the status quo’.
Related posts
Kevin Leitch on Andrew Wakefield and the death of the MMR debacle
Mike Stanton on Patrick Holford and his unusual views on vaccination, MMR and autism
Patrick Holford and Dr Andrew Wakefield’s Discredited Findings: Part 1
Patrick Holford and Dr Andrew Wakefield’s Discredited Findings: Part 2
Patrick Holford Claims Remarkable Benefits for Homeopathic Vaccinations
6 Comments
June 21, 2007 at 10:35 am
I, too, was a little suprised by the absence of Patrick Holford as a signatory. Maybe he will sign up in the near future.
Holford is one of the first people to criticise others for partial readings of research studies or mis-emphasis of findings: it is remarkable that he can sometimes display a less than rigorous approach to what he describes as evidence for some of his assertions.
Regards – Shinga
June 21, 2007 at 6:56 pm
Yeah, fair do, if Holford is championing Wakefield, based on no knowledge at all of the case, then he’s a useless quack.
I wasn’t sure whether Holford is credible: now it’s clear that he has no interest in evidence before he makes up his mind.
June 25, 2007 at 11:03 am
Given the outcome of recent legal rulings in the EU (specifically NL), I am obliged to say that as long as Holford believes what he is saying, then it is neither a lie nor a fraud and that he can not therefore be a quack (which, in legal terms, apparently involves accusations of fraud).
The ‘quality’ of his evidence is such that I would hope that it would not persuade anyone to his point of view but I seem to be mistaken in that.
June 25, 2007 at 11:57 am
certainly, we can’t know what Holford’s intentions were in sending out this e-mail, so I would agree with Shinga that we can’t say that Holford is a quack.
Oddly, some people do seem to find Holford’s e-mail complelling: e.g. sig 5764 states that “The evidence as explained in Mr Holford’s email is very compelling.” Signatory 5784 seems to be a bit confused: “I believe Nigel Thomas is being persecuted and should not be stuck off”.
July 11, 2007 at 10:26 pm
[...] that MMR causes autism. However, I think it’s worth returning to Holford’s claim that “Dr Andrew Wakefield…is facing a hearing with the General Medical Council, and may be struck [...]
September 26, 2007 at 12:54 pm
Have a look at the web-site http://www.cryshame.com/
You can follow the GMC hearing from there.