Trial By Error: More Thoughts on the Interferon Study
7 JANUARY 2019
By David Tuller, DrPH
I was surprised recently when the UK press made a big splash about what was, in the end,
a modest study from a team led by
Carmine Pariante, a professor of psychiatry at Kings College London. I was less surprised when I realized that
the Science Media Centre was involved in disseminating the news. The coverage generated by the SMC’s efforts largely paralleled the overblown claims made by the study authors themselves in linking this paper about hepatitis C patients to possible biological mechanisms underlying what they call “chronic fatigue syndrome.” (The same illness or cluster of related illnesses is also referred to as myalgic encephalomyelitis, CFS/ME and ME/CFS, among other names.)
In
a previous post, I linked to
a critique of the interferon study by “data thug” Nick Brown, so no need to repeat the same points here. (Just so it’s clear, this Nick Brown is NOT the same Nick Brown who serves as editor-in-chief of Archives of Disease in Childhood, which published the Lightning Process study.) However, the study’s publication demonstrated once again how many British journalists follow the lead of SMC-designated “experts” without much or any skepticism, at least when it comes to this particular illness.
