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letter Nijmegen to Whitemoore

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
their techniques failed to detect XMRV in a positive blood sample.They failed to report that in their study

and yet they state in this letter that their "solid, sensitive PCRs efficiently detected XMRV in a cell line, as well as in positive samples that were provided to us by Dr Judy Mikovits..."

???

I don't have access to their paper right now, could someone check please?
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
Sorry Gerwyn, I have failed to phrase my question well. It does look like I don't understand they are talking about samples sent to the WPI from Nijmegen. :Retro smile:

Your answer however does address what I meant to say. They should never have published.

One more question. Should Nijmegen have waited for a response from the WPI before trying to publish? i.e. once the WPI had test Nijmegen's samples. Is that the normal protocol? :confused:
 
G

Gerwyn

Guest
and yet they state in this letter that their "solid, sensitive PCRs efficiently detected XMRV in a cell line, as well as in positive samples that were provided to us by Dr Judy Mikovits..."

???

I don't have access to their paper right now, could someone check please?

They now say that the sample sent by Judy M tested positive.Yet they did not use that sample as a control in their study or mention any of that in the paper.instead they used a synthetic clone as their control at god knows what concentration.If they had used Judy M,s sample as their control then their paper would have been accepted anywhere.more to the point the debate would now be over from a virological point of view! The problem is that they would have had to report all the data on the WPI positive control in their study.Now they merely have to say thet her samples tested positive using their methods! They would say that now would n,t they yet they dont provide the objective evidence that science demands. if they has a positive control all they needed to do was say so in their study prove it and game over! I dont know what everyone else thinks but I cannot believe that a scientist would not mention that they detected xmrv in the wpi sample and prove that their methods work.instead they used a synthetic clone! That is scientifically illiterate and akin to shooting yourself in both feet deliberately!
 

lansbergen

Senior Member
Messages
2,512
This was posted on a dutch forum today. https://listserv.surfnet.nl/archives/me-platform.html

Nijmegenaren worden een beetje moe van die onprofessionele Amerikanen

Een virus in het bloed of niet? CVS-onderzoekers in Nijmegen en Amerika maken er ruzie over.

Door Ellen de Visser, Volkskrant 1 mei 2010

De Amerikaanse bevindingen over het verband tussen het chronisch
vermoeidheids-syndroom (CVS) en een retro-virus zijn de afgelopen maanden
door drie Europese studies weerlegd, maar opmerkelijk genoeg zien
internationale bloedbanken in het Amerikaanse onderzoek alsnog aanleiding
voor maatregelen. De Canadese organisatie voor de bloedvoorziening besloot
begin deze maand om patinten die CVS hebben of hebben gehad, te weren als
bloeddonor.

Australi en Nieuw-Zeeland overwegen dezelfde stap. De Europese organisaties
beraden zich, aldus een woordvoerder van het Nederlandse Sanquin. 'De
wetenschappelijke onderbouwing is inderdaad dun, maar we willen het bloed zo
veilig mogelijk houden.'

'Onbegrijpelijk', zegt Jos van der Meer, hoogleraar interne geneeskunde aan
het UMC St Radboud. Nadat het Amerikaanse Whittemore Petterson Institute
(WPI) bij tweederde van de onderzochte CVS-patinten het XMRV-virus had
aangetroffen en daarover publiceerde in Science, deed Van der Meer met zijn
collega's het onderzoek over. Zij vonden niets. Twee Britse
onderzoeksgroepen kwamen eerder tot dezelfde uitkomst.

Maar de publicatie van de Nederlandse studie, twee maanden geleden in het
Bri*tish Medical Journal, heeft de discussie niet beslecht. Het WPI gedraagt
zich 'uiterst onprofessioneel, zegt van der Meer, door iedereen die de
Amerikaanse resultaten bekritiseert, 'zeer agressief te bejegenen. Het
besluit van de bloedbanken werpt nog eens extra olie op het vuur.

Twee weken geleden stuurde WPI-directeur Annette Whittemore een brief aan de
Britse hoogleraar retrovirologie Myra McClure. McClure vond geen virus in
het bloed van CVS-patinten, en Whit*temore stelde haar voor om
bloedmonsters uit te wisselen. Zij vroeg zich af of de hoogleraar de juiste
technieken had gebruikt om het virus op te sporen. In die brief, die op de
site van het WPI verscheen, wordt de Nederlandse studie onderuitgehaald. Het
WPI blijkt met de Nijmeegse onderzoekers wel monsters te hebben
uitgewisseld, en de Amerikanen vonden in drie van de tien Nederlandse
monsters XMRV. De Nijmeegse onder*zoekers ontvingen ook positieve Amerikaans
bloedmonsters om te achterhalen of zij het betrokken virus wel konden
opsporen. Maar over dat alles zwegen zij in hun publicatie, aldus
Whittemore.

Van der Meer noemt het 'buitengewoon onwetenschappelijk' dat de integriteit
van zijn onderzoeksgroep in een brief aan een ander in twijfel wordt
getrokken. Nijmegen heeft deze week een brief teruggeschreven (en die ook
maar op de eigen website geplaatst).

'We hebben inderdaad bloedmonsters naar het WPI gestuurd', licht hij toe.
'De Amerikanen vonden het virus in twee van de zeven monsters van patinten
en in een van de drie monsters uit de controlegroep. Dat betekent voor beide
groepen een score van 30 procent; dus is

er geen verschil in incidentie tussen patinten- en controlegroep. We hebben
de publicatie uitgesteld en nogmaals de drie betrokken monsters
gecontroleerd, maar die bleven negatief. We zagen geen reden om de
publicatie aan te passen.'

In de positieve monsters die de Amerikanen opstuurden, vonden de
Nijmegenaren wel XMRV. Ook in de positieve cellijn van prostaatkanker die ze
kregen van het urologielab van het ziekenhuis, kon het virus worden
aangetoond. 'Het kan dus niet aan onze meetmethode liggen. We hebben
bovendien dezelfde methode gebruikt als de Amerikanen.'

Internationale onderzoekers hebben Science brieven geschreven over de
methodologische tekortkomingen van de Amerikaanse studie. Die Nijmeegse
brief is geaccepteerd. Het onderzoek had in minstens twee laboratoria moeten
plaatsvinden, zegt Van der Meer. 'Als je veel met een bepaald virus werkt,
is de kans dat je de eigen monsters ermee besmet levensgroot. Bij positieve
testresultaten, zeker als ze van groot belang zijn, moet j e nooit op een
lab afgaan, dat weet iedere wetenschapper. Ik begrijp niet dat Science
daarmee akkoord is gegaan.'

Van der Meer zegt dat hij het WPI heeft voorgesteld om de complete bestanden
uit te wisselen. 'Daar is nog niet op gereageerd.' Onderzoek van onder meer
de Amerikaanse gezondheidsdienst CDC moet de komende tijd duidelijk maken
wie gelijk heeft. Het Amerikaanse ministerie van Gezondheidszorg bestudeert
momenteel of XMRV via bloed kan wor*den overgedragen. Voorlopig kunnen
CVS-patinten gewoon bloed geven, aldus de CDC op zijn website.

De vraag is of ze dat doen, zegt Van der Meer. Mogelijk worden ze al geweerd
omdat een goede gezondheid voorwaarde is voor bloeddonatie. Bovendien: het
laatste wat CVS-patinten willen, is hun hemoglobinegehalte laten dalen,
zegt hij. 'Ik zou patinten afraden donor te worden.'
 
G

Gerwyn

Guest
and yet they state in this letter that their "solid, sensitive PCRs efficiently detected XMRV in a cell line, as well as in positive samples that were provided to us by Dr Judy Mikovits..."

???

I don't have access to their paper right now, could someone check please?

XMRV concentration in a cell line is many orders of magnitude higher than in blood and they even amplified that.They however chose not to amplyfy their blood sample at all.The cell lines were actively cultured(ensuring viral replication) further amplyfying the titre.The fact that they could detect XMRV in a prostate cell line is irrelevant as far as PCR is concerned.If they really do not know that then their knowledge as virologists is at least questionable.
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
I now understand.

What a bunch of ..... fill in the gap yourself. I am appalled. I will be surprised if anyone disagrees with your assessment Gerwyn. :Retro mad:
 

Adam

Senior Member
Messages
495
Location
Sheffield UK
XMRVDB (XMRV Denialist Bait)

I now understand.

What a bunch of ..... fill in the gap yourself. I am appalled. I will be surprised if anyone disagrees with your assessment Gerwyn. :Retro mad:

Let's see if anyone walks into your trap V99?

Naughty. Naughty. ;)
 

Countrygirl

Senior Member
Messages
5,427
Location
UK
=natasa778;75694]and yet they state in this letter that their "solid, sensitive PCRs efficiently detected XMRV in a cell line, as well as in positive samples that were provided to us by Dr Judy Mikovits..."

???

I don't have access to their paper right now, could someone check please?

I was about to ask this as well. Thanks Natasa.

I was also struck by the statement that Dr Judy claims that sporadic and epidemic cases may not be the same illness. I don't see why this should be said, if she didn't state it, so has she changed her mind since the Lisbon conference? I understood that she maintains that XMRV accounts for both types of onset. This is a very important piece of information to my unscientific mind.

The letter also states that Dr Judy had not tested sporadic cases.

What was the date of the Lisbon conference, please, as I cannot recall?

Can anyone answer these questions please?
 

Alexia

Senior Member
Messages
168
Location
Portugal
This was posted on a dutch forum today. https://listserv.surfnet.nl/archives/me-platform.html

Nijmegenaren worden een beetje moe van die ‘onprofessionele’ Amerikanen

Een virus in het bloed of niet? CVS-onderzoekers in Nijmegen en Amerika maken er ruzie over.

Door Ellen de Visser, Volkskrant 1 mei 2010

.'
Thanks Lansbergen, The problem with the media in the Netherlands is that they always make the opinions of Van der Meer prevail in the news... I suppose we just need more studies confirming the WPI results.
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
Countrygirl

What was the date of the Lisbon conference, please, as I cannot recall?

I think it was Oct 19, but I don't think Mikovits knew where all the samples came from until December? Anyone?
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
Yep, 19 Oct 2009. Tri-Society Annual Conference http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WDF-4X8C4P6-12&_user=10&_coverDate=11%2F30%2F2009&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1318505647&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=5a27da586bbce5afb789591a405f4fa7

This is a quote from the talk Mikovits gave on Pro Health January 23rd 2010.
So we used patients who came literally from around the world and this was actually not correct in the Science paper because I didn't know there were international people in the repository at the time. When they come to Incline Village it's assumed that they are from Nevada, and when we decoded this over the Christmas holidays we found 12 or 15 states, the UK, Ireland, Germany and Australia as well. So we had both international and people literally from all over this country, not necessarily Reno, Nevada, where the associated outbreak that we know occurred there in the early '80s.

This is a quote from the IACFS/ME Newsletter Apr 2010 Q & A
A: Contrary to the assumptions and misinformation about the samples in the WPI repository. These samples were NOT solely from the incline village outbreak. All samples were drawn from patients coming to Sierra Internal medicine between 2006 AND 2008. Fewer that 20 of the 101 were from the original outbreak and more than 75 were sporadic cases of CFS from patients who came to Dr. Peterson from 12 states and Canada. The 101 were representative of patients satisfying CCC and Fukuda criteria throughout the US. At least 5 doctors from across the US including Dr Klimas and Dr Cheney had patients in the repository and in the study. The 101 patients were selected at random from the hundreds in the repository. The main consideration was that we had samples that could be cultured (retroviruses cannot multiply unless a cell divides and several samples from a given patient.

and another

...more than 75 of the 101 patients in our study were not involved in cluster outbreaks.
 
G

Gerwyn

Guest
I was about to ask this as well. Thanks Natasa.

I was also struck by the statement that Dr Judy claims that sporadic and epidemic cases may not be the same illness. I don't see why this should be said, if she didn't state it, so has she changed her mind since the Lisbon conference? I understood that she maintains that XMRV accounts for both types of onset. This is a very important piece of information to my unscientific mind.

The letter also states that Dr Judy had not tested sporadic cases.

What was the date of the Lisbon conference, please, as I cannot recall?

Can anyone answer these questions please?

Dr Judy Did,t claim that.it was raised by the Dutch professor.Judy,s answer was then subjected to "interpretation"
 

lansbergen

Senior Member
Messages
2,512
Door Ellen de Visser, Volkskrant 1 mei 2010

Internationale onderzoekers hebben Science brieven geschreven over de
methodologische tekortkomingen van de Amerikaanse studie. Die Nijmeegse
brief is geaccepteerd. '

Does anyone know anything about a letter from Nijmegen about the american study being accepted by science?
 
G

Gerwyn

Guest
The main consideration was that we had samples that could be cultured (retroviruses cannot multiply unless a cell divides and several samples from a given patient.

yet Mclure and Groom did not appear to know this!
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
The BMJ Kuppevald paper was first rejected by Lancet - is that correct?
Yep

Here is the quote
At the moment you reported your findings on the Nijmegen samples, our paper was under consideration of the BMJ (after being rejected after a 5-week review process by the Lancet).
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
This is a quote from the letter to McClure from Annette Whittemore.

The patients in the Science study were well defined in the paper as having CFS by the Fukuda and Canadian consensus definitions of ME/CFS. More importantly the patient samples did not come from the “Lake Tahoe outbreak” as you assert, but rather from patients who had become ill while living in various parts of the United States.

It contradicts the previous comments from Mikovits.
These samples were NOT solely from the incline village outbreak.

I guess Annette probably got this wrong, but they keep saying they were from all over the USA.




This is from their website. I think this has been on there for some time now. http://www.wpinstitute.org/xmrv/xmrv_qa.html
NEW Who were the patients and healthy controls in the recent XMRV study published in Science? [view answer...]
Every patient sample used in the study (taken from the nationwide WPI repository gathered from several regional physician practices) had a physician's diagnosis of CFS. To further validate the samples, the research team used the well-established CDC and Canadian Consensus Criteria for CFS in every case. The healthy controls were healthy people who came to a doctor's office for a routine sample or from DNA used in routine diagnostics.
.