If he is ever challenged about this he will do his usual Gish Gallop, plead the 5th or finesse his way out of it like he did in that interview with Emer Keeling.

Nice job on the reworking of the petition.

Yes to the dotting i :-) Maybe they should allow people to sign in their own selection of font colour – lots of sparkly pink.

On the mote and beam front, I think it is the magnitude of what this set in motion that distinguishes Andrew Wakefield.

There have been some high-profile wrongful convictions that have been over-turned by improvements in DNA evidence etc.

Imagine somebody had been convicted of a serious crime on some evidence that is tainted by fraud or manipulated results so both the evidence presented to the jury and therefore their assessment is wrong. Would any of these defenders be arguing: “So, what if this is wrong – look at all the other stuff that is OK and look at the number of criminals who walk free all the time? You need to look at all the convictions where DNA was used that are OK. This person is in prison, my family and I are safe, so that is proof that this conviction has helped me”.

I stress again that Patrick Holford repeatedly claims that he reads all the research so that other people don’t have to and he distils it into advice that people can use to improve their health.

He didn’t understand Wakefield’s research or the research that showed that Wakefield was wrong. Nonetheless, it is time for him to be accountable for his own advice, misguided though it was.

I wonder if he will model himself after his hero and blame Wakefield himself? After all, Wakefield is making a tidy job of trying to offload responsibility onto Profs Walker-Smith and Murch in way that proves it is possible to lower one’s opinion of him.

Why would he?

Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas.

Why slaughter a sacred cow if it is also your cash cow?

When you’ve set yourself up as a shepherd your sheep will follow you into a ditch and you can leave them there after you climb out and go to find yourself another flock (that’s a loose translation from the Albanian).

When they wrote the petition, do you think that they tried to find a font that would let them dot the i in Wakefield with a heart?

I expect Andrew Wakefield to go the Ginola route and start advertising for Head and Shoulders.

How the head of a charity, for the children and for the vulnerable old people, has the nerve not to do the right thing and sit smiling on breakfast sofas for GMTV while pushing his pills.

That’s Britain for you. People tell you lies, they sell you worthless stuff and people love them and defend them and make them wealthy and heap honours on them.