Cochrane ME/CFS GET review temporarily withdrawn

[Invisible Woman]

Well done @Trish!

 

[Trish]

Thank you. I write tweets like that not because CG will take any notice, but for her followers to see and ponder.

 

[TiredSam]

I have lived with consequences for 25 years.

She has lived with the cause for 25 years.

 

[Kalliope]

 

[Art Vandelay]

As others have noted, the BPS cabal are engaging in Damage Control 101 here. That is, when you suffer a humiliating defeat, you leak the story to a friendly/gullible journalist which allows you to control the narrative (ie, frame/distort/alter the facts) to minimise the damage.

In this case, the story has been reframed around the theme of "militant activists force Cochrane to back down" as opposed to the real story of "shoddy research under review".

They then rely on the fact that most journalists are too lazy to fact-check the initial story so they repeat and propagate the lie. Mrs Wessely has no doubt been used to spread the story further (and of course lazy journalists won't pick up that she has a conflict of interest).

This demonstrates just how big a set-back this news is for the BPS cabal. If Conchrane falls, they really have very little left. I expect more dirty tactics as their empires continue to crumble.

 

[rvallee]

'Tracy King is a writer, producer and science populariser. Before turning to animation, she ran a successful marketing and PR company, during which time she created major science and critical-thinking events and had an early viral video success with her marketing campaign for Prof. Richard Wiseman’s book Quirkology.' From here: https://www.foundry.com/events/its-not-rocket-science

In other words, she does 'critical' pieces about popular science.

It's got to be a bit embarrassing to be a critic of poor science and professional skeptic and find yourself having defended obviously fraudulent science, especially in the midst of a massive crisis of replicability and specific claims about this research precisely failing on poor methodology, confirmation bias and conflicts of interest.

I expect similar poor defenses from others who have insisted there was nothing wrong there.

 

[rvallee]

Did she read the article?
"
Tovey confirmed to Reuters that he had made a decision to withdraw the review temporarily, saying this would give the authors time to respond to several points in a complaint which “we felt ... raised issues we needed to address”.

“This not about patient pressure,” he added in a telephone interview. “This was a decision we reached with difficulty because we know the incredibly challenging environment this review sits in.”

Gerada is floundering

Can't even have the decency to acknowledge her own conflicts of interest and bias while whining about fake bias.

 

[Adrian]

I have no idea what this means.

Is being a patient a 'role' we can step in and out of? How delightful. I think today I'll be an activist, not a patient. Amazing, my head and body will no longer be in top to toe pain, my muscles will start working as they haven't for 29 years, I'll be able to walk more than a few metres without feeling light headed or my legs going from under me. I'll stop feeling too nauseous to want to eat. A miracle cure. Just become an activist!

I think it means that when a 'patent' title is put on someone their opinion doesn't count any more as they clearly have no knowledge of capacity to reason.

 

[Daisymay]

I think it means that when a 'patent' title is put on someone their opinion doesn't count any more as they clearly have no knowledge of capacity to reason.

And especially so if they are female.

 

[Barry]

By the way, if anyone can help me get the unsavoury image of Sir Simon whispering into Clare's ear whilst she tweets out of my mind I would be most grateful. It came unbidden, and now I can't get rid of it.

Maybe just ponder the notion that whispering in people's ears is his stock in trade, and will have been doing it to many, many people over many, many years, in his life long strategy of winning influence and power. It's by no means just his other half. Probably doesn't help your imagery much though .

 

[Esther12]

I have no idea what this means.

Is being a patient a 'role' we can step in and out of? How delightful. I think today I'll be an activist, not a patient. Amazing, my head and body will no longer be in top to toe pain, my muscles will start working as they haven't for 29 years, I'll be able to walk more than a few metres without feeling light headed or my legs going from under me. I'll stop feeling too nauseous to want to eat. A miracle cure. Just become an activist!

I thikn it's a response to the "respect patients" line she was replying to:



I think that she interpreted that line as meaning 'respect patient views no matter how wrong they are', rather than as 'respect patients enough to engage with them as equals when they identify problems with research'.

 

[Cheshire]

Maybe just ponder the notion that whispering in people's ears is his stock in trade, and will have been doing it to many, many people over many, many years, in his life long strategy of winning influence and power. It's by no means just his other half. Probably doesn't help your imagery much though .

OMG, that's getting worse!

 

[Andy]

So is there a code of conduct for researchers, which we can use to hold the PACE authors, and others, to account for their statements, communications and actions I wonder, or is this idea of CG's only meant to work one way?

 

[SallyC]

Well I've managed to write my email to Reuters, whether it'll do any good is another matter

 

[Binkie4]

@Trish
I am sorry that you have had to be on the receiving end of Clare Gerada’s vileness. You have represented our case so well. Thank you.

 

[TiredSam]

Maybe just ponder the notion that whispering in people's ears is his stock in trade, and will have been doing it to many, many people over many, many years, in his life long strategy of winning influence and power. It's by no means just his other half. Probably doesn't help your imagery much though .

That doesn't help. I can now feel his hot rancid breath on my neck.

 

[large donner]

Deadly serious, I'm afraid. She thinks that because she was misdiagnosed that ME is a wastebasket diagnosis and a kind of identity politics spread by the internet.

Its still irrelevant anyway, this is about junk science. We didn't produce the science from the people who have had it withdrawn from the Cochrane review. Others did, then because other scientists including patients showed their data to be flawed leading to flawed conclusions, conclusions that they themselves claimed, Cochrane took this decision.

 

[Stewart]

By the way, if anyone can help me get the unsavoury image of Sir Simon whispering into Clare's ear whilst she tweets out of my mind I would be most grateful. It came unbidden, and now I can't get rid of it.

Just picture Sir Simon whispering into Michael Sharpe's ear whilst he tweets. No need to thank me - you're welcome.

 

[inox]

Listening to Katarina Lien from todays conference in Sweden - she is up to date on things! Mentioned the (temporarily) withdrawn cochrane review

She was also very clear on what she hears from and sees in patients don't match the story a certain research community tells. And she hopes the reviewers will take this oportunity to re-evalue their work - phrased in a way that makes it very clear she hopes the review goes.

(Since it's in spoken norwegian I dont bother link? but it's about at 13:34 in the second part from today)

 

[chrisb]

The images could get worse. What one needs to know is whose whispers first seduced him and led him astray. You know how concerned we are with grooming.