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BBC Radio 4: The Life Scientific with Simon Wessely, 14th Feb 2017

Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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I searched pubmed for the list of publications with him as an author. Including comments.

....He is astoundingly bad at this concept of 'retirement'.


But first he has to want to retire.

Thanks for adding these more recent papers, Roger, I didn't have time last night to look for additional papers beyond those I had listed in 2008.
 

Cinders66

Senior Member
Messages
494
I think Wessely knows he can't survive proper scrutiny, and that it is coming big time, and that he can't stop it. It is all now just delaying and obfuscation, in a desperate attempt to mitigate his culpability.

His whole defence will be reduced to: I had honourable intentions. No, really, I did. Please believe me.


He retires in five years. After that I'm guessing he will be unavailable for comment. I'm guessing he's got the two things he needs - lots of friends in high places and an as yet unchallenged narrative in uk to survive this. Neither uk charities has done anything about his latest media either so, here to five years Wessely, then your reputation will shatter.
 

Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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He retires in five years. After that I'm guessing he will be unavailable for comment. I'm guessing he's got the two things he needs - lots of friends in high places and an as yet unchallenged narrative in uk to survive this. Neither uk charities has done anything about his latest media either so, here to five years Wessely, then your reputation will shatter.

Has he said he plans to retire at age 65?

http://www.kcl.ac.uk/hr/diversity/policies.aspx
  • Retirement guidance for employees (Internal content for King's members)

    In line with the government abolition of the default retirement age, the university no longer operates a mandatory retirement age. Therefore, university employees may voluntarily retire at a time of their choosing.

Depending on his pension scheme, he could continue to work until 68 or beyond.

With the changes to State pension age (rising for men and bringing women in line with men) he doesn't reach State pension age, either, until he's 66 (based on a December 1956 dob*).

*Sources: Wikipedia; Prof Wessely's Twitter


Without wishing to stray too far off topic: Planned changes will see the State pension age rise from 66 to 67, then to 68 for both men and women.
 
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Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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There is clearly an organised media campaign against ME/CFS patients...


http://bit.ly/1vSRhOI

BEHIND THE SCENES: SETTING UP THE UK CFS/ME RESEARCH COLLABORATIVE (UK CMRC)
A new Report from Tymes Trust
August 2014


Note:

Support4rs is

http://www.support4rs.com/about-us/


"The Government's preferred provider of security advice and support for the publicly funded Biomedical Research Sector throughout the United Kingdom.

"support4rs is a private company contracted by the UK Government to provide specialist risk management support to Universities, publicly funded Research Organisations and Medical Research Charities that use animals in government approved scientific research.

"A Director of support4rs, Sam Nicholls, has transposed Extremism and Counter Terrorism expertise gained within the UK Police Service, and specifically as the National Coordinator of Operations – Domestic Extremism, leading the UK Police’s national investigatory response, to develop bespoke and specialist risk management support for the Biomedical Research Sector etc"

"Our stakeholders under the BIS contract comprise of the public research sector

Public Research Institutions – not for profit organisations
Universities – that conduct bioscience and biomedical research using animals
Medical Research Charities – which fund biomedical research using animals

However, independently, we work with commercial enterprises to provide consultancy services and support"
 
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Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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For ease of access:

PDF of

BEHIND THE SCENES: SETTING UP THE UK CFS/ME RESEARCH COLLABORATIVE (UK CMRC)

A new Report from Tymes Trust
August 2014
 

Attachments

  • TYMES Trust Behind the Scenes - Research Collaborative.pdf
    104.3 KB · Views: 8

Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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Extract:

BEHIND THE SCENES: SETTING UP THE UK CFS/ME RESEARCH COLLABORATIVE (UK CMRC)

A new Report from Tymes Trust
August 2014

(...)

At the end of January a meeting was held at which 'harassment' of researchers was discussed.

The Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Science Media Centre (SMC) are two of the UK
CMRC Observers. Ed Sykes, SMC Head of Mental Health, attends the meetings of the Executive Board on behalf of the SMC, while Joe McNamara & Neha Issar-Brown attend on behalf of the MRC. The MRC contributed nearly £5000 to the launch of the Collaborative and have stated their willingness to be involved in and contribute further both directly and in kind.

· On the 1st February 2013, an email was sent from the out-going Head of Mental Health at
the SMC. It was a “write up of the main points to come out of” the ‘CFS’ meeting held at
the Wellcome Trust the day before. (quote 13)

· “All the best with this for the future, I hope the launch of the research collaboration goes
well and that it gets easier to do research in this field.” (quote 14)

· Those in attendance at this meeting had included UK CMRC members Peter White of
QMUL, Joe McNamara and Carmel Turner of the MRC and Esther Crawley of Bristol
University. Simon Wessely & Trudie Chalder of IOP, King’s College London were also in
attendance.

· Quotes 15-18 are taken directly from this meeting's records in the email of 1st February.
· (quote 15)

Current situation:

- ‘Coming out’ about the harassment has led to increased support for CFS/ME
researchers, for example, from colleagues who were not aware of the situation.
· (quote 16)

Harassment

- Harassment is most damaging in the form of vexatious FOIs.

- Complaints are also causing problems. Researchers are still dealing with complaints
about them to the GMC.

- House of Lords Debates on CFS/ME can result in Parliamentary Questions which often
require detailed responses

· (quote 17) ….. researchers are using strategies to reduce the impact of harassment and put
the case for research into CFS/ME including:

- Learning about the FOI Act and using strategies to reduce time spent responding, eg
putting minutes of meetings online

- Coming together as a research community to respond to criticisms eg the joint letter in
response to criticisms of Simon Wessely receiving the John Maddox prize.

- Working with trusted journalists to cover the problems associated with CFS/ME
research

- Esther Crawley and Stephen Holgate are establishing a research collaborative including
researchers, charities and other interested parties. There will be a launch event on 22nd
April.

· (quote 18) from Action Points

- SMC – run FOI Act brainstorm

- ALL – look for opportunities to publicise CFS/ME research and give background
information about the condition

- Support4rs – work with Peter White and Simon Wessely to develop resources for
dealing with harassment

- SMC – run a press briefing on biosocial illness to improve public understanding. Fiona
Fox to get information from Trudie Chalder and Rona Ross-Morris.

(...)
 
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Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
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http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/SMC-Anniversary-Brochure.pdf

[5.3MB]

SMC Anniversary Brochure

Page 10-11

Threats of persecution


"There are still many illnesses in which the cause is unknown or disputed - and this usually acts as a spur to further research aimed at achieving a more complete understanding. But there are a handful of disorders in which some patients become convinced that they already know the cause: so deeply convinced that alternative explanations are seen not merely as false but as put forward with malicious intent. Researchers who are investigating or merely discussing these alternatives, they believe, must at all costs be silenced. And “all costs”, in this context, can mean taking action against them as individuals...."
 

Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
Messages
3,061
Location
UK

Dx Revision Watch

Suzy Chapman Owner of Dx Revision Watch
Messages
3,061
Location
UK
Messages
66
Not much has changed since 1994!

CS

... and it so should have given how much delusional and refutable nonsense there's been. The vested interests of the BPS model are clear to see and it's shameful that it's been allowed to continue its impact for so long. If those involved lose their careers and reputations as a result of increasing bio-medical evidence they only have themselves to blame.
 

Countrygirl

Senior Member
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5,429
Location
UK
I didn't realise that AFME awarded about a quarter of a million to Prof Peter White as recently as 2014.

How can they possibly claim to represent people with ME?






C4x8lnEWcAECdVJ.jpg
 

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
So it was you that started it all.

Duly noted for the historical record.

I think that this is an important point. He has admitted that the National Hospital treated it's ME patients with contempt and they hated us.

He has also admitted that the National Hospital missed the muscle (and other) abnormalities in the patients who were referred there. They did not follow on from the work of Behan et al and didn't even attempt to investigate the physical problems patients had which could have saved us all decades of suffering.

These are major statements. It's wasn't a benign neglect. The National made a decision here.

(I was one of the unlucky ME patients seen at the National. Not by SW but by his colleagues).
 
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So they started, and this happens a lot when people don’t know what to do, they started asking psychiatrists to get involved
:rofl: ... and you think that is because people believe you know what you are doing?

and then we started to think about how can we improve treatments, which wasn’t difficult because there wasn’t any.
Nothing new there then.
 
Messages
2,158
Quoting Wessely: 'and then we started to think about how can we improve treatments, which wasn’t difficult because there wasn’t any.'

I think this is very revealing. He is effectively saying, it was easy to dream up any old treatment since there wasn't one to test it against.

Just make up an un-testable theory, design an easy treatment to administer, preferably one which, when it fails, can be ascribed to the patients not wanting to get better.

Bingo! Become the national expert without any effort at all.