MODERATOR EDIT: swearword asterixed.

I approach this question through the lens of drug law reform. Reformers are inundated with headline-making ‘studies’ that indicate harms from drugs and indirectly reinforce prohibition.

But a cursory look at the organisations producing these ‘studies’ shows they are explicitly funded to seek out harms from drugs, and their continued funding depends on getting results.

Time and again, analysis of the ‘studies’ reveals, if not gaping holes in the methodology and conclusions, then at least a tendency to present minuscule ‘harms’ divorced from any comparative context, allowing them to be absurdly exaggerated.

Typically these intrinsically biased studies are done by competent researchers who use tell-tale terms like ‘linked to’ and ‘may be’, and usually finish with a call for further research [funding] on the subject.

A good example is the mass of data purporting to show the great harms of MDMA (ecstasy), compared with statistical comparisons that show the substance to be ten times safer than peanuts, or about a dangerous as taking an international flight.

This use of science to support an agenda reduces my faith in ‘Science’ dramatically and patently fails to convince drug-users to stop using as the official discourse bears little relation to their life experience.

The extent to which governments and corporations ‘buy’ scientific outcomes is one of the more serious challenges to the integrity of science, damaging its effectiveness and credibility.

studies suggest that after placing a bet on a horse, most people are more confident than before about its prospects. What’s changed is that they’ve invested – financially, but also psychologically, since a victory for the horse would be consistent with the decision to make the bet.

As a bonus, I’ve learnt two new phrases – ‘incremental commitment’ and ‘compliance professional’. Burkeman

http://www.aaaai.org/aadmc/ate/category.asp?cat=1161

A couple of months ago, we stayed with relatives, one of whom is a recently retired consultant doctor, a good deal of whose patients had chronic GI conditions. He would, I think, echo Dr Gorski : simply condemning dubious alternative practices tended to be counter productive and damaging to the therapeutic relationship. This was particularly true of cases where diagnoses had been missed or mistaken and consequently referrals delayed, with the patient suffering sometimes years of ill-health, by the time he got to see him. All he felt he could do was give his honest opinion of the state of the evidence for whatever CAM modality his patient might be drawn to and make the kind of request described in the quote from’overshoot’ above. I think many doctors find themselves in a similar position: they don’t want to risk alienating patients for whom they have a duty of care, patients who, sometimes justifiably, feel their health problems have not been taken seriously for too long. And, if they do attack dubious therapies, the water is soon muddied by shrill accusations of ‘vested interests’, big pharma conspiracy, iatrogenic harm etc etc.

I cherish a (fond?) hope that the recent publication of critical assessments of CAM and their coverage in the mainstream media might encourage a more rational, critical and less credulous attitude on the part of us ‘consumers’. Though the worry is that this is a passing fad in MSM. Blogs such as yours are hugely helpful in helping us to educate ourselves about evidence in health matters, just a pity more of it doesn’t reach mainstream media. Patient groups, I think, also have a vital responsibility to educate their members about evidence and the importance of a critical attitude to health claims.

It also makes me think that there are times and circumstances when we wish to be deceived ( a quotation with lots of attributions). Trying to pretend that we have more control over our lives and events than we actually do might be one of them.

Perhaps this also applies if one has invested considerable time, money, and sometimes discomfort in ‘alternative’ medicine?