Dr Mikovits excellent reply to Science Journal Request for Retraction of XMRV paper

[Bob]

RedRuth, there is often an anti-science viewpoint on this forum.

That's strange, I have completely the opposite impression, overall.

I guess quotes such as this: "Unfortunately, we haven't seen most of Mikovits' research because she cannot get it published due to the wonderfully objective and non-political nature of the scientific establishment." tend to tilt me in that direction.

I am in favour of good science, and that's what that sentence that you have quoted demonstrates.

If you could explain to me good reasons why Mikovits' cannot get her work published, then maybe I will change my opinions.

And yet the PACE Trial has been published. Is this what you would call good science?

I do not have an anti-science viewpoint at all. It's quite the opposite. I support good science, and criticise bad science.

That's quite the opposite of having an 'anti-science viewpoint'.

 

[Jemal]

1. Unquestioning support of Mikovits by some people here.

Not everyone gives her unquestioning support. But there are those that do, yes. To them she is a hero, because she is fighting for us and has gotten us a lot of attention, while we are used to neglect and psychologists.

 

[RedRuth]

What abuse of scientists?

Two of my friends have died from CFS/ME. Both young men in their thirtuies. One was a suicide because he could not stand the pain and suffering and contempt from the medical establishment any longer. He was bedbound and housebound for years. he could not hold a conversation he was so weak. He got no help.

And you think we abuse scientists? get real!

Yes I do think some people on this forum abuse scientists. How is this not being real?

 

[Bob]

Like I said, academic interest. My sister asked me to look into the subject when she thought she might be a CFS sufferer. I didn't really have any intention of posting here but as I said, I'm really shocked at the 1. Unquestioning support of Mikovits by some people here. 2. The abuse of scientists.

I can assure you that the support of Mikovits is not unquestioning. In fact, it's quite the opposite.
Please don't take the negative comments about scientists personally. Sometimes people generalise, without meaning to.

 

[RedRuth]

Not everyone gives her unquestioning support. But there are those that do, yes. To them she is a hero, because she is fighting for us and has gotten us a lot of attention, while we are used to neglect and psychologists.

See I totally understand this BUT it's going to seriously backfire if (as seems increasingly likely) she's shown to be wrong. I also have to say that her credibility destroying move of associating with the anti vaxxers doesn't bode well.

 

[floydguy]

Why did you put ''scientists'' in inverted commas?

I ask you RedRuth why should scientists get a free pass? There's an element that seems to think that "science" is as pure as the driven snow. Politics is involved in the conduct of science as much as other activities. "Science" is not handed down from above. I think you are extremely naive to think that money and corruption are not involved in the "Scientific Process".

Ask yourself why the British Government would consider research and other aspects of ME to be a state secret not to be revealed until 2071?

Why would Science ask take the unusual step to write an editorial about Mikovit's work without evidence of malfeasance?

You really need to read Osler's Web to have a clue as to what is going on.

This whole canard about there can't be a conspiracy because too many people would know and the government can't keep a secret, etc, etc is ridiculous. Did you that Harry Truman was unaware of the Manhattan Project despite being on the Intelligence Committee and Vice President of the United States. He didn't find out until becoming President. Secrets can be kept when needed.

It must be nice to have such rose colored glasses. Where can I get a pair?

 

[Jemal]

Yes I do think some people on this forum abuse scientists. How is this not being real?

Before I got ill and before this XMRV mess, I thought very highly off scientists. But as soon as I started reading some of the research, that sometimes came to some outrageous conclusions, I started to understand they are only human like the rest of us

I am seeing some enormous egos and arrogance from both sides. My brother is a professor and I see the same in him (it wasn't always in him, I have seen him change when he got his title and his research became more and more published).

 

[eric_s]

I didn't really have any intention of posting here but as I said, I'm really shocked at the 1. Unquestioning support of Mikovits by some people here. 2. The abuse of scientists.

I'm not a retrovirolgist (I'm a molecular cell biologist) but I can follow most of the science.

I think you may have a wrong expression. Maybe what you see is people who have formed their opinion over the last one and a half year and now, after all of this, have a certain view of things.

What would you expect if scientists like John Coffin say it's time to leave XMRV behind? When the CDC says they have found it, in their latest prostate cancer study, and they also say it's not contamination. Should science then just forget about this virus that the CDC has found in the population?

Or when around Christmas of last year Towers said it's now proven the XMRV the WPI found was contamination. And now the WPI has uploaded new sequences to Genbank that probably can't be explained this way. And all the time there were the variants Lo and Alter found anyway, that could not be explained by Towers et al.

Or Peterson leaves the WPI after being angry for having been left in the dark regarding XMRV, when he was the one who didn't want to sign a confidentiality agreement. And now he is involved in a negative study that leads to Science asking the WPI, his former colleagues, to retract their paper.

Those are just some examples that come to my mind. Is it then not justified people think something is not right here and this should not be the way things go? No, it's not "how science works". I have no experience, but i think the XMRV story is not usual, such a drama is not the norm and rather rare.

There are multiple groups who have found HGRVs and they all stick to their findings. It's not as easy as "Judy Mikovits was wrong, it's over". And yes, in such a moment i think we have to back the WPI without hesitating and pondering things for 3 years. Because then it will be too late. We don't have to back them because we're 100% sure they are right, but because they well might be and we must be sure we will get to the truth.

 

[RedRuth]

If you could explain to me good reasons why Mikovits' cannot get her work published,

We all get our work bounced! Usually because it's crap. Unless you've seen the reviewers comments and her work, you can't really comment. But didn't she get something published recently?

 

[currer]

Yes I do think some people on this forum abuse scientists. How is this not being real?

Abuse is real suffering. What my friends went through. Enough to make one kill himself.
Not a post you dont like.

 

[Jemal]

See I totally understand this BUT it's going to seriously backfire if (as seems increasingly likely) she's shown to be wrong. I also have to say that her credibility destroying move of associating with the anti vaxxers doesn't bode well.

I am not an anti vaxxer and have 6 month old twins that are getting all their vaccinations. However, I have read a lot about vaccinations lately and I am starting to have some doubts. There have been some incidents, some diseases do look to be epidemics and then there is that Dutch virology professor that launches the hypothesis that XMRV might have spread through vaccinations... I don't think he's a nutcase.

 

[Bob]

Really? What evidence have you got for that? Didn't she publish again recently?

Hi RedRuth,
Judy Mikovits and the WPI say that they can't get Judy's papers published. So it's only anecdotal evidence. But either they can't get published of they are not telling the truth.
I believe that Mikovits has loads of further interesting research that she has carried out, and it hasn't been published.
Yes, I think that there was one recent paper. (Sorry memory not working - I can't remember what it was.)
But there is much more that isn't published, so they say.
I don't understand why.
She has published new XMRV sequences recently though.

 

[RedRuth]

I don't think we should, scientists can certainly be dishonest. Fortunately the way science research works means that fraud or incompetence or just spurious results come to light eventually. Reproducibility is everything, this is Mikovits' problem ......................................... not a conspiracy.

 

[Jemal]

The WPI recently published a study, yes:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21576403

I don't think we should, scientists can certainly be dishonest. Fortunately the way science research works means that fraud or incompetence or just spurious results come to light eventually. Reproducibility is everything, this is Mikovits' problem ......................................... not a conspiracy.

I agree with the last part. I don't think there's a giant conspiracy, but I also think there's organisations and people that would like XMRV to vanish. And there are probably organisations and people that want to claim certain discoveries or patent their own tests to make a profit.

 

[eric_s]

By the way, RedRuth, i think it has been mentioned before, but Harvey Alter said at the ME/CFS State of the Knowledge Workshop some weeks ago that there is no evidence for contamination in the Mikovits and Lo labs. Isn't it a bit premature then to say "Mikovits is wrong"? I mean do you have some information he does not have?

 

[Bob]

We all get our work bounced! Usually because it's crap. Unless you've seen the reviewers comments and her work, you can't really comment. But didn't she get something published recently?

But Mikovits is a high calibre scientist, and she can't get anything published.
I don't know the answers, but it does seem to many of us that politics is at play, rather than science, for many different reasons.

 

[LJS]

H LJS,
Would you say that the WPI's newly published sequences are VP62?

Yes, take a look at the supporting online material for the science paper published today, it is VP62.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/suppl/2011/05/31/science.1204963.DC1/1204963s.pdf

 

[floydguy]

I don't think we should, scientists can certainly be dishonest. Fortunately the way science research works means that fraud or incompetence or just spurious results come to light eventually. Reproducibility is everything, this is Mikovits' problem ......................................... not a conspiracy.

Lo/Alter reproduced it. That is the problem with the negative side. How do they explain that? Contamination? Fine prove that a world class lab has gotten contaminated. Prove that this contaminant is not infectious and isn't a public health issue.

 

[Bob]

I don't think we should, scientists can certainly be dishonest. Fortunately the way science research works means that fraud or incompetence or just spurious results come to light eventually. Reproducibility is everything, this is Mikovits' problem ......................................... not a conspiracy.

How is that Mikovits' problem exactly?

I would have thought this is science's problem?

 

[omerbasket]

I think that Dr. Mikovits' response is very-well written, and that her arguments are very strong.