United Kingdom: Science Media Centre (including Fiona Fox)

It seems to me that any media centre needs to be independent and free to provide the facts. I see from the other thread and the flyer quoted by Sly that they are funded by a long list of industry organisations that would benefit from good press through the centre.
 
Snowdrop said:
the other thread and the flyer quoted by Sly
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it's not a flyer. It was a collection of essays put together to mark the SMCs 10th anniversary.
October 2, 2012
views from the front line – essays on the SMC
As part of the Centre’s 10th anniversary celebrations, a collection of essays on key moments for science and the media from the first decade of the SMC’s existence were commissioned. Written by the scientists, journalists and press officers involved, the essays paint a picture of the effect the SMC has had on UK science-media relations.

download as PDF
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https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/10-year-anniversary/?cli_action=1598088330.042

I thought it a good illustration of their bias that they considered it one of the "key moments for science and the media from the first decade of the SMC’s existence ".
eta:
see this post
https://www.s4me.info/threads/esther-crawley-what-drives-her-plus-quotes.1139/page-6#post-281590
 
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Sly Saint said:
it's not a flyer. It was a collection of essays put together to mark the SMCs 10th anniversary.
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Yes, I knew flyer wasn't quite right but was having trouble coming up with a word to use for it. And that's how I arrived at the date for it, I checked wiki to see when the SMC was founded then added 10 years.

I only mentioned it because I though some who came on here might not be aware that it wasn't recent.
 
Merged thread
Mainly posting this because Fox seems concerned that some scientists are being compared to climate deniers, even when the evidence that they're wrong is not clear. How divisive. There's some more creepy PR spin in there too.

https://www.researchprofessionalnew...e-on-covid-19-but-don-t-demonise-other-views/


Recent weeks have seen journalists and politicians trying to group scientists into camps. As the debate over how to control Covid-19 grows increasingly fractious, commentators point to different views as proof that they have science on their side.

Meanwhile, some scientists have taken to Twitter to rage against peers they disagree with, comparing them to climate deniers and calling on the media to stop giving them space.

I really want science to resist being put into opposing camps. It feels too early for there to be a ‘mainstream’ view of coronavirus versus a ‘maverick’ one.

Comparisons with climate deniers feel especially divisive. Unlike with climate change, I don’t see any strong scientific consensus to deny. Nor do I see groups of scientists questioning the deadliness of the virus.

There is a difference between misinformation peddled by charlatans and divergent scientific approaches. It’s a distinction we should be mindful of.
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The issue of herd immunity is an object lesson in why scientists should resist being politicised. When chief scientist Patrick Vallance used the term in several interviews in March, he was pilloried for proposing it as a strategy to beat the disease—something he has always denied.

Since then, those two words have become ideologically freighted. Scientists have turned down interviews for fear of having their views on herd immunity caricatured. One communications officer described it to me as a “toxic brand”.

All this is unscientific. Herd immunity is simply the term for what happens when a virus cannot spread because it keeps encountering people protected against it. Whether that happens through vaccines, infections or a combination of both is an important scientific question. It is ludicrous to treat it as a dirty word.
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Here's Fiona Fox's blog when she was upset about patients criticising the way the SMC promoted the SMILE trial:

Also normal was the seizing of selected headlines by the critics of science from climate sceptics to ME activists.
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https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/inconvenient-truths/

People will be familiar with other examples like this from the SMC campaign to dismiss concerns about PACE, etc.
 
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"Herd immunity" is not a scientific concept, it is a deliberate dumbing down of a scientific concept for a non-scientific audience.

The real science is about network based effects - there is no magic threshold where the virus just disappears as it is heavily dependent on variables we cannot predict, like human behaviour.
 

It feels too early for there to be a ‘mainstream’ view of coronavirus versus a ‘maverick’ one.

Poor Fox, thinking that good science is based on a mainstream view rather than a maverick one.
It is based on a view that provides the right predictions rather than one that doesn't.

It was not too early in February to see which was which.
I hear echoes of Simon Wessely 'we should avoid saying I told you so'.
It must be unsettling being a mouthpiece for an establishment that has screwed up so badly.
 
Snow Leopard said:
"Herd immunity" is not a scientific concept, it is a deliberate dumbing down of a scientific concept for a non-scientific audience.

The real science is about network based effects - there is no magic threshold where the virus just disappears as it is heavily dependent on variables we cannot predict, like human behaviour.
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And as has been pointed out endlessly since: it has never been achieved without a vaccine or reliable control and prevention. Natural herd immunity through runaway infection is not a thing and has never been a thing.
 
Trial By Error: More on the Lightning Process and the Science Media Centre’s Collusion With UK Journalists

"Alongside Professor Crawley’s testimonial in the SMC’s tenth anniversary celebration was one from the BBC’s Tom Feilden—a prominent reporter who decided to shill for the organization in his spare time. (Kate Kelland of Reuters made a similar decision to flack for the SMC, as discussed here.) In his essay, he described how the SMC packaged a story for him about the harassment experiences of Professor Crawley and other investigators. Before interviewing them, he conducted his own review of the matter:

“I set about researching the issue on the internet. At its heart seemed to be the classification of CFS as a psychiatric condition. The assumption underpinning much of the most vociferous comment from a small cabal of campaigners seemed to be that this amounted to an attempt to dismiss sufferers as either mad or malingerers. The real cause was an, as yet, undiscovered virus, and anyone who demurred was involved in an elaborate conspiracy.”"

https://www.virology.ws/2021/04/22/...-media-centres-collusion-with-uk-journalists/
 
ladycatlover said:
Any chance of adding it to the way back machine or whatever it's called? (sorry very sleep deprived over several days so brain went walkabout - forgotten what name of the thing that saves thing so it doesn't get lost)
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While it has been added to the discussion thread as a file above, this won't be accessible to non-forum members so it's been saved in the Internet Archive here, https://web.archive.org/web/2021041...dia-Centre-Factsheet-CFS-ME-Final-Version.pdf
 
More historic stuff.
David Healy on the SMC (also interesting email exchange with SW).

Science Media Centre

SMC began in 2002 in part to contain negative media coverage of GM Foods which seemed bad for business in UK PLC. One of the other factors cited early on was the rough time certain academics such as Simon Wessely were getting when they put forward views about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). SMC was and is closely linked to Sense about Science, which began at the same time. They had key founders in common.

The Trustees are:

  • Jonathan Baker Professor of Journalism, U of Essex, (ex-Head of Newsgathering, BBC)
  • Adrian Bull External Relations Director, National Nuclear Laboratory
  • Karen Chadwick Head of Commercial Finance, Wellcome Trust
  • Julian Hitchcock Partner, Marriott Harrison LLP
  • Dr Helen Jamison Head of Media Relations, Wellcome Trust
  • Prof. Ottoline Leyser Professor of Plant Development, Sainsbury Laboratory, U of Cambridge
  • Prof. Mike Rawlins Former Chair of NICE
  • Jo Revill Chief Executive, British Society for Immunology
  • Fran Unsworth Director World Service Group, BBC
  • Prof. Simon Wessely Professor of Psychological Medicine, Kings College London
“When a story breaks – whether it’s the latest flu epidemic, health scare or a potential nuclear crisis – the SMC persuades leading experts to drop everything and engage with the story, then contacts journalists at all the major news outlets to offer those experts for interviews or immediate comment”.

“The SMC has a track record of recruiting experts to its media database on topical issues and considerable experience and expertise helping them speak to the media. The SMC should therefore prioritise recruitment of experts working in high-profile fields that attract controversy”.

The people most aware of SMC and SAS up till this have been from the environmental movement – Friends of the Earth etc, as befits the origins of SMC in trying to influence the debate on GM foods.

Their commitment to CFS has been pretty constant too. As one of the comments on What’s going on Here mentions, SMC have recently co-ordinated comments on the PACE study of CFS. This is a British study that has generated more interest in the US than the UK, in part because the authors have resolutely refused to part with the data and because there has been outcome switching worthy of Study 329.

The brand is obviously working because it has spread to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and elsewhere. SMC recently forced the Toronto Star to back down over a story about HPV.

There has been a move to America also which generated this US assessment of its background and M.O. – basically endorsing corporate views. The stated aim is to promote mainstream science but a science that doesn’t question, and get us to question, is worse than salt that has lost its flavor – the appearances of salt are worthless, the appearances of science are dangerous.
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https://davidhealy.org/from-the-grassy-knoll/
 
For me the salient point was actually made by Simon Wessely himself when he said in his email:

If people had given different opinions they would have included them. They always do. The facts are that no one on the list did.

Yes, well, if you compile a list of people for whom you know will just parrot what you want said then of course no one on the 'list' will say anything else will they.
 
Wow, it was a foundational reason? Damn. The investigations into this will be unbelievable, literally.

The government literally created a propaganda network in part to promote denial of a major chronic disease. You could barely make this stuff up in a dystopian novel, it stretches disbelief.

Shocked, but not surprised. Although maybe Wessely just took the opportunity of being at the right place at the right time, which still amounts to the same. What a wretched lot.
 
Article: The Science Media Centre and ME/CFS: Best Scientific Evidence or Biased Opinion?, by David Marks

The Science Media Centre describes itself as: “an independent press office helping to ensure that the public have access to the best scientific evidence and expertise through the news media when science hits the headlines.” (https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/)

Here I examine the SMC’s reports on MECFS-related publications relating to the PACE trial, from 2011 when the trial was published until 2017 when the Journal of Health Psychology published a Special Issue critiquing the trial. What the SMC describes as ‘best scientific evidence’ consists of biased opinions from people with strong vested interests.

My personal take on the experts’ opinions is placed [inside square brackets throughout the text].

https://davidfmarks.com/2021/11/16/...s-best-scientific-evidence-or-biased-opinion/
 
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I’m grateful to Dr Marks for all the time and energy he has been putting into work on the topic. In the case of this blogpost, I think a lot more points could have been made critiquing the SMC comments and the PACE Trial itself: perhaps people will add some in the comments on the blog (I’m not volunteering).
 
David Tuller has also written about the SMC today.


Trial By Error: Is Something Shifting at the Science Media Centre?

For years, London’s Science Media Centre has fiercely promoted research into graded exercise therapy (GET) and cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) for the illness or cluster of illnesses variously referred to as chronic fatigue syndrome, myalgic encephaloymyelitis, CFS/ME, ME/CFS, and other names. Some of the prominent experts in this field have had close relationships with this specialized public relations agency.

(The SMC also promoted Professor Esther Crawley’s disastrous pediatric trial of the Lightning Process but did not note that this study was later slapped with a 3,000-word correction. The agency has never responded to my many questions about this issue.)

But the SMC’s response to the new ME/CFS guidelines from Britain’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) suggests a shift in approach.

continued at link.
 
Smearing MECFS Patients in the Name of Science

"A previous post reviewed the SMC’s ‘expert reactions’ concerning MECFS between 2011 and 2017.

Here I review the Science Media Centre’s continued smearing of MECFS patients in a set of carefully curated ‘expert reactions’ to MECFS research between 2017 and 2020,

I expose here further evidence of a deliberate smear campaign of a vulnerable patient group. This campaign has been steered by the director of the SMC, Fiona Bernadette Fox OBE, with the willing assistance of medical and psychological scientists at prestigious institutions such as Oxford University and King’s College London."

https://davidfmarks.com/2021/11/17/smearing-mecfs-patients-in-the-name-of-science/
 
Sly Saint said:
it's not a flyer. It was a collection of essays put together to mark the SMCs 10th anniversary.
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Didn't find the post in the other thread, but anyway, thought Crawley was worth to be quoted here, too:

"It had started with emails, letters and phone calls. Some were benign; they merely suggested I change research projects. Some were more malevolent. Some were threatening. I switched phone numbers, filed the letters and the emails and talked to the police.
Then the attack became a little more co-ordinated. There were frequent and repetitive Freedom of Information (FOI)
requests. A scan of blogs quickly showed where these had come from."

She goes on to confound unjustified harassment with justified FOI requests, complains and criticism and presents both, harasment and FOI as one co-ordinated campaign.

Then she received support from the SMC which organized a meeting with other researchers experiencing harassment where they discussed, among other things:

"... whether somebody at the top of one of the leading charities might be behind much of it, relying on others with a lower profile to take the abusive actions."

And the attendees...

"... were told that we needed to make better use of the law and consider using the press in our favour - as had researchers harried by animal rights extremists.“

After, with the help of the SMC, she had made the abuse public....

"...The abuse has stopped completely. I never read the activists' blogs, but friends who did told me that they claimed to be 'confused' and 'upset' - possibly because their role had been switched from victim to abuser."

https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/...ews-from-the-front-line-essays-on-the-SMC.pdf , "Threats of persecution", p. 16-17.
 
"Then the attack became a little more co-ordinated. There were frequent and repetitive Freedom of Information (FOI) requests."

This hang-up that people like Crawley have with FOI requests baffles me. There are probably a few hundred thousand people in the UK who have been diagnosed with ME (I don't know the numbers). If someone like Crawley has published a poor piece of "research" and some of those people with ME have actually read it they may all have similar questions about it. The fact that FOI requests are "repetitive" should make researchers aware that the requests are definitely not co-ordinated, and that multiple people have spotted the flaws in the paper they're asking for more info on. People with ME don't have spare energy to do any kind of work which they don't consider essential, so few of them are going to create multiple FOI requests. It makes it much more likely that the people with ME are working individually rather than co-ordinated, in my opinion.

The other major point is, of course, that Crawley's "research" has been used to prop up the denial and minimisation of benefits to sick people. So, people do become desperate, and desperate people may well want more info on such research in order to debunk it if they can.
 
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