Patients with severe ME/CFS need hope and expert multidisciplinary care, 2025, Miller et al

But I think it does matter. If there are fake actors involved with ulterior motives it undermines the integrity of the whole process. Most people reading that response will feel that there’s something off about it. This could cause them to lose motivation and become less receptive and open to genuine responses. It's demoralising for real people who have gone to the effort of writing genuine, informative and insightful responses.

 

My point is about the use dehumanising language particularly on top misunderstandings of other people and in this case cultures and countries. As soon as you take a disagreement and instead dismiss because others are not or are less than human I am concerned we are slipping into dangerous territory. I hope people can be mindful of this.

 

That's how I feel after spending time on a response. It's clear that the BMJ does not screen these responses, even minimally, despite having a letters editor. I get that none of this is peer-reviewed, but it does undermine the whole rapid response thing if non-genuine (whether produced by a bot or a real person using AI) responses are published.

I don't really follow what you're saying here. I can't tell if this is aimed at me or not. I suspect you might be saying I've dismissed the comment because it's from a Chinese person (or bot, or AI, or whatever).

To be clear: I'm about 97% sure that this is not a genuine response, and that is based on my assessment of numerous factors, including spending an hour last night delving into this person's publication list and other details available online. The fact a Chinese address — which doesn't even seem correct — was given is one of those factors. That's because China has a problem with paper mills and fraudulent / fake science, and this can extend to journal commentaries and responses because these can often be classed as publications. The scale of this problem is not appreciated by the general public https://www.ft.com/content/32440f74-7804-4637-a662-6cdc8f3fba86

I don't want this thread to stray further from the main topic, so I will not comment further on the response from 'Xu Qi'.

 

In a post-AI and papermill world, I think it’s paramount to be able to question the authenticity of media.

I don’t see that as questioning the degree of humanity of people, rather it’s questioning if the output we see is a result of humans or if it’s a result of AI. Any human and culture can use AI.

In this context, dismissing something that is reasonably likely AI, is warranted because we have limited time to invest in the things we engage with, and AI can be used to produce a practically infinite amount of media. If we can’t sort and prioritise, we will essentially dehumanise ourself by denying ourself intellectual and meaningful interaction with other humans at the cost of interactions with machines.

Regardless, the AI-red flags for this comment; completely off topic for the author, only citing references from the original article, and making arbitrary connections to unrelated subjects like tele-medicine, makes it reasonable to dismiss the comment for other reasons; as a PR favour (like the author said themselves), or just publication-padding. So the conclusion is much the same.

 

Just to be fair to The BMJ*, they do screen at least some of the responses. Our (MEAction UK) response had a bit of back and forward with requested edits and removal of sections from the BMJ over areas they thought were likely to:

1. Cause distress (there was originally a bit more in there around Maeve) and
2. Several parts they suggested would be defamation of the authors (especially where we suggested they were not evidence based and promoted misinformation).

We pushed back on some of the wording and they did compromise slightly.


* Not really sure why I'm being fair to them...

 

Yes I saw that your comment was submitted several days ago and thought that they may have screened it. But they don't seem to screen everything, nor do they seem to make appropriate edits, such as to obvious typos.

 

Good luck arguing legal defamation based on the things you describe! Apparently, the BMJ doesn’t support free speech.

 

Their response always seems to be incoherent anger and attack, though - and getting more and more mad at the patients - they people they claim they want to help - to anyone who will listen.

I cannot understand how anyone outside their echo chamber looks at their research, the complete lack of results and that numbers of patients are rising and instead of thinking "hang on a minute..." Says instead "yep, that tracks it's those scientifically literate patients with referenced critiques and papers that at the problem for not (checks notes) believing hard enough"

It's like believing that someone really did walk into a door every night for years without asking any questions at all.

 

The way I understand it, is in the age of the internet and quick answer they don’t.

The overworked GP just looks up:
“Cochrane CFS”
Read the first sentences of the review. And boom they’ve made their decision. They’re not gonna look much further.

Whenever they hear in the media they’re much more likely to click on and be sympathetic too stories about doctors/scientists being “abused” or “harassed” by patients than the opposite.

The google popup whenever u search ME recommending antidepressants and meditation is very likely a major reason behind this as well. (Though I think this has improved within the past two years).

 

while also being disgusted with their clumsiness

 

It could be Maria Pedersen, she’s one of the leaders of the Norwegian National Advisory Unit on CFS/ME (the direct translation from Norwegian is something like «Competency Service»).

Apparently it’s BMJ policy to not publish peer review reports on opinion pieces. And I doubt they’ll share who commissioned it, or who they contacted.

 

I looked up 'those who think bad about others: quotes'

The best one is "Fake people always think others are fake"

 

Overall many good points. Went a bit beyond the evidence on findings. Also, apparently we can throw evidence out the window when it comes to support:

 

That’s a brilliant headline to drive the point home.