While I would dispute the motives Wessely attributes to people who claim to have mcs and electromagnetic sensitivities, these conditions do not exist. There are numerous studies that back this statement.
Why do I mention the above? Not to necessarily get into a debate about MCS and EMS but to show that since these conditions are not recognized by medical science, this puts less credibility on Martin Pall and is possibly why his letter was rejected.
It seems people, IMHO, are way too quick to find any criticism of Wessley. When we pick on everything Wessely does, it's like the boy who cried wolf. People will dismiss any of our points. We need to prioritize our criticism and maybe this topic is one of those priorities, I don't know. I am not a defender of Wessely s work but at what point do we start getting diminishing returns when we criticize him?
Can we access Wessely's full paper? I would feel more comfortable about expressing my opinions after getting as much information as possible. My opinions are flexible depending on what data is available.
If anyone is interested in some of the science the following is a good source of information. I will add more if/when I have the energy.
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org...-health-effects-of-electromagnetic-radiation/
Barb
Why do I mention the above? Not to necessarily get into a debate about MCS and EMS but to show that since these conditions are not recognized by medical science, this puts less credibility on Martin Pall and is possibly why his letter was rejected.
It seems people, IMHO, are way too quick to find any criticism of Wessley. When we pick on everything Wessely does, it's like the boy who cried wolf. People will dismiss any of our points. We need to prioritize our criticism and maybe this topic is one of those priorities, I don't know. I am not a defender of Wessely s work but at what point do we start getting diminishing returns when we criticize him?
Can we access Wessely's full paper? I would feel more comfortable about expressing my opinions after getting as much information as possible. My opinions are flexible depending on what data is available.
If anyone is interested in some of the science the following is a good source of information. I will add more if/when I have the energy.
Numerous studies and systematic reviews have been done; they are summarized in a Wikipedia article. Just to give one example, a systematic review published in Psychosomatic Medicine in 2006 analyzed 31 double blind studies comparing real radiation to sham radiation. Patients couldn’t tell the difference. 24 of the studies found no effect, 7 reported “some” supporting evidence (2 of which could not be replicated on subsequent trials by the same researchers), 3 were false positives attributed to statistical artefacts, and the final 2 had mutually incompatible results. They concluded:
The symptoms described by “electromagnetic hypersensitivity” sufferers can be severe and are sometimes disabling. However, it has proved difficult to show under blind conditions that exposure to EMF can trigger these symptoms. This suggests that “electromagnetic hypersensitivity” is unrelated to the presence of EMF.
Patients who think they are suffering from EMF exposure are suffering, but not from EMF. The suffering is real, but the cause is not what they think, and treatments based on illusory causes are not likely to help except through placebo effects.
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org...-health-effects-of-electromagnetic-radiation/
Barb