United Kingdom: Science Media Centre (including Fiona Fox)

As the authors of the recent PACE reanalysis paper (BMC Psychology) have pointed out, there is no right of reply to SMC ‘expert reaction’ briefings.

I think there is scope for someone to set up a dedicated website providing authors with a right of reply to SMC opinion that is presented as ‘the final word’.

 

This one is my favourite:
Seeding Doubt
How Self-Appointed Guardians of “Sound Science” Tip the Scales Toward Industry
https://theintercept.com/2016/11/15...sound-science-tip-the-scales-toward-industry/

 

For further information about the Science Media Centre and ME/CFS have a look at the paper by Prof Malcolm Hooper from 1st September 2013 entitled Role of the Science Media Centre and the Insurance Industry. This is to be found at www.margaretwilliams.me

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/976731778168782848

 

They produce a handy flier entitled:

Advice for Researchers Experiencing Harassment
http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Advice-for-researchers-experiencing-harrassment-2013.pdf

 

"people who have extreme views about their research" ... like, that it should fulfil the fundamental requirement of being good science ... I mean, how extreme is that!

 

Is that right? Did SW actually found the SMC?

 

Not really (not even really sure what that could mean - he put up the money?), but I think he was involved from even before the beggining, arguing that something like the SMC should be set up, then he was involved with the SMC from the start.

 

If the government wants to cut healthcare costs i can think of a good target

 

Of course agree with you 100%, but I think Stone was trying to be canny here and say if unblinded was to have an effect then it should on the APT arm too as also unblinded. Sounds reasonable but many readers won’t know he purposely neglects to mention is those in the APT arm may have been unblinded like CBT and GET but their therapists weren’t handing out manuals praising how effective the treatment is as the manuals did for the CBT and GET arms.

 

Yes but if a treatment is unblinded, then depending on the patient perception to that treatment, the result could be to inflate the effect, deflate the effect, or be in between and have no effect. If people believed the treatment they were getting in the APT arm was "same as usual", then it's highly possible the "unblinding effect" was simply for there to be no significant effect due to unblinding. i.e. The effect was neutral, which in fact is what you would expect, so to me it supports what the reanalysis claims.

 

Thanks @Barry. Yes, as the three arms were unblinded the effect is neutral. By Stone not mentioning only two of the three unblinded arms were given positive feedback about the treatment introducing bias to these over above the APT and SMC arms Stone is misleading the reader. He is bringing in a straw man by suggesting the reanalysis paper claims it was the unblinded nature of the trials that makes the results uncertain. Their actual claim was by unblinding the trial but only giving positive information about two of the treatment arms, CBT and GET, bias was introduced and could explain why CBT and GET got slightly higher scores on self measures testing.

 

According to http://powerbase.info/index.php/Science_Media_Centre the SMC was founded in April 2002 and SW was one of the original members of the Scientific Advisory Board.

I will also paste the above link onto Barry’s thread below, for any further discussion.

 

http://powerbase.info/index.php/Science_Media_Centre

Contains information regarding the set up of the SMC.

Ever heard of Powerbase? (Public Interest Investigations......interesting?!)

 

Does the Advice for researchers experiencing harassment include advice for SW to avoid Australia?We know of his concerns about ball tampering.

Edit perhaps that should include EC, for reasons that are entirely beyond me.

 

It's shocking. Likening sick people who want to get better to climate change deniers and animal rights activists. It's beyond offensive. If they said the same things about black or LGBT rights campaigners, they'd be rightly lambasted. Why does this go unchallenged just because they're dissing disabled people?

The societal problem with the BPS model (beyond the flaws in science, I mean) is that it's inherently ableist. If you can't heal, it's your own fault. If you're chronically ill, you didn't try hard enough. If you claim benefits, you're playing the sick roll. It's always disabled people who are to blame, and if we speak out about this, we're maligned as militants.

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/978331032914137088

 

Not sure it is valid to infer SW as being a founder member, simply by him being on the Scientific Advisory Board? (But open to being proved wrong).