CROI (Retrovirology and Opportunistic Infections, Boston) on XMRV and CFS

[SOC]

Wow. Thanks Rita!

I've only had time to read the conclusions, but these look pretty good at first glance. Switzer et al still seems unable to find XMRV, but I noticed someone is making them tone down their rhetoric to more scientifically appropriate language...."Our results... do not suggest an association..." [my italics] Notice no language about "disproving".

Looking forward to hearing more later this evening when I'm free.

 

[Rita]

Thanks Rita. But the Spanish studies are nothing new, the 2 IrsiCaixa abstracts are the same like the ones from the International XMRV Workshop in September of last year and i think the one by the Madrid group was published already. So do they have anything new? I hope so. Where is the biomarker they said they have? Did they do anything between last September and now? Sorry, if this sounds hard, it's not personal.

Eric You know you what I think, and I would love to be wrong. How can participate Irsi Caixa in a big study with other hospitals that found no XMRV in Spanish population, and last year they presented a study that found in 70% of CFS patients?
I'm a little disappointed about that.

 

[SilverbladeTE]

Silverblade, when this is all over we'll need you to be the court's expert witness

"...and, in closing m'lud, the prosecution summation is: OFF WITH THEIR BALLS!
Prefferably via a cheese grater and chili sauce, for the extra naughty ones."

 

[August59]

"...and, in closing m'lud, the prosecution summation is: OFF WITH THEIR BALLS!
Prefferably via a cheese grater and chili sauce, for the extra naughty ones."

Ohhhh!!!! Ouch!!!!! :Sign Good one:

 

[Esther12]

A positive thing from all this: It seems like XMRV in PC and CFS is being challenged in the same way... this really means that prejudices about CFS are not going to be able to have much impact.

It will be interesting to see how Silverman responds to the contamination studies coming out.

 

[alex3619]

Hi, funny thing happened in the last hour. This contamination-related and other evidence has almost convinced me (not completely but hey) that XMRV is real and causative. Funny how that happens.

All the arguments are about taking one single point, without considering the totality of evidence, and showing how it might, just might, show the XMRV findings are wrong. If this is all they can come up with, it looks like they are failing to disprove XMRV. In the absence of good counter argument, after this long, it puts the positive XMRV research in a better light. I still want to read more anti-XMRV studies though, it is important that the hypothesis be tested properly. They just need to run more effective experiments.

The first thing they should do in my opinion is start looking at biopsies, and the second is to ensure their tests work on the full range of HGRV strains.

I am going to think more about this and then write a blog. I have four in the works now, better get cracking. My last serious project took me three months though - so four blogs is sounding like next year before I am done.

Bye,
Alex

 

[leaves]

Alex just to say that i feel very happy and lucky to have you around )
You Rock!

 

[Cort]

Hi, funny thing happened in the last hour. This contamination-related and other evidence has almost convinced me (not completely but hey) that XMRV is real and causative. Funny how that happens.

All the arguments are about taking one single point, without considering the totality of evidence, and showing how it might, just might, show the XMRV findings are wrong. If this is all they can come up with, it looks like they are failing to disprove XMRV. In the absence of good counter argument, after this long, it puts the positive XMRV research in a better light. I still want to read more anti-XMRV studies though, it is important that the hypothesis be tested properly. They just need to run more effective experiments.

The first thing they should do in my opinion is start looking at biopsies, and the second is to ensure their tests work on the full range of HGRV strains.

I am going to think more about this and then write a blog. I have four in the works now, better get cracking. My last serious project took me three months though - so four blogs is sounding like next year before I am done.

Bye,
Alex

Good luck!

 

[Deatheye]

http://app2.capitalreach.com/esp120...to&dp=player.jsp&e=13744&mediaType=slideVideo

It does strike me as a bit wierd that they turned down WPI (others too?) but at the beginning of the Q&A kinda complain that they disccussion is a bit one sided without some of the people there to comment on it that got positive findings...

 

[SilverbladeTE]

Alex
couple of points

1) In any other field of science, the TINY sample/points used by medical science would be utterly laughable
often samples of up to a million or more very VERY precisely repeated tests are required
Others have, well, an assload of detectors and fine recordings are made to go over a test again and again...

For many reasons, this doesn't happen often in medical science, and in the end, is IMHO, a serious problem as errors and variations are massively amplified in tiny sample sizes, which is why normally you require huge sample sizes in other fields

ie, the confidence in any of these studies, pro or con is not "wide" enough really for anyone to be so cocksure of themselves as some folks seem to be. ie note retraction of the article by the person who thought XMRV had been disproved by the 5 studies few months back (and I like seeing such honesty as makes a change form what we usually suffer from some quarters, lol).

Ideally you'd want to see a single serious massive collection effort to obtain blood/tissue samples from each nation's ME/CFS commmunity to have a bank of research material of assured quality, criteria (not the damn CDC crap one) and many many thousands of samples, enabling large scale comparisons
this is especially important as with HIV if XMRV (MLVs) has regional variations

2) Another big issue is the simple fact it's all so damn reductionist.
What may be true in the lab in a few isolated cells, may not be true in a complex organism where other agents are present (ie hormones, immune responses, temperature fluctuaitons, and changes over time)

my 2 cents, bro

 

[Jemal]

Not all the news on the XMRV front seems to be bad though?

http://www.facebook.com/notes/xmrv-...tects-xmrv-from-cfs-patient/10150114854741797
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150114837486797&comments&ref=mf

The last one looks like the FDA is still cracking at it?

 

[jace]

I've just watched the XMRV section from yesterday.


I'm sure it's been posted before, but here's the CROI program with links to the daily lectures with slides.
http://www.retroconference.org/2011/data/files/webcast_2011.htm

This link is yesterday's Themed Discussion: XMRV: New Findings and Controversies section.
http://app2.capitalreach.com/esp1204/servlet/tc?c=10164&cn=retro&s=20445&&dp=player.jsp&e=13744&mediaType=podiumVideo

Jonathon Stoye is his usual lovable self. The Catalonians present what to me seems like two reasons to believe that they are confirming the presence of XMRV as a pathogen, while Switzer presents two reasons not to.

In his first presentation, Switzer tells us that XMRV has only been found in vivo in America, although an American lab claims to have found it in the UK...

"Alright, so um a lot of controversy's resulted from these studies, and um there's been a lot of explanations offered, including the possibility that people are looking at different populations - the majority of positive cases, the only positive cases have come from the US, nobody's found it outside the US except for one laboratory the same laboratory that found it in the US..."

But what about the Spanish? The German respiratory secrection study? Again (see the CoOp Dx email) this assertion that only the WPI have found XMRV. Hmm.

The lady presenter (I can't work out who she is) opened the question and answer session (at the end) with
"We do want to note that there is a bit of an asymmetry here in that as Jonathon mentioned at the beginning there have been some more positive studies about XMRV, unfortunately none of those individuals are here today to talk about their work so we're just going to try to have a reasonable discussion in their absence."

The question and answer session was fascinating. Towards the end lab workers expressed concern that as XMRV in the 22rv1 cell line was infectious, whether this was a hazard for lab workers who are using it all the time... Ha! and dear Jonathon said
".. and I know I'm negative - or at least I was the last time I looked" Then Switzer said that they were screening lab workers for XMRV infection.

 

[alex3619]

Ideally you'd want to see a single serious massive collection effort to obtain blood/tissue samples from each nation's ME/CFS commmunity to have a bank of research material of assured quality, criteria (not the damn CDC crap one) and many many thousands of samples, enabling large scale comparisons this is especially important as with HIV if XMRV (MLVs) has regional variations
2) Another big issue is the simple fact it's all so damn reductionist.
What may be true in the lab in a few isolated cells, may not be true in a complex organism where other agents are present (ie hormones, immune responses, temperature fluctuaitons, and changes over time)

Hi SilverbladeTE, I think the biggest problem might be the one we have always had - lack of resources. Whether you are testing an XMRV hypothesis, or doing investigative research, you are limited by staff, equipment, cash and time - and time includes competing activities that draw you away. Attempts to invalidate the XMRV hypotheses including establishing alternative hypotheses probably have these limitations in spades. If the researchers trying to "prove", for example, that XMRV was a contaminant had the money and resources (which includes a diversity of molecular biology specialist researchers) to do the research more effectively, there might well be better research findings. This would include broader design of experiments, with additional lines of experimental reasoning and evidence.

Similarly if the researchers doing investigative work in XMRV had more resources, we would be seeing more results from them too.

These all lead to the second issue with those trying to disprove the work that is investigating XMRV. These resource constraints seem to be limiting their choices. For example, and I have said this repeatedly, they should be doing biopsies. Not only is it easier to find XMRV if the investigative research is correct, you don't necessarily need nested PCR to find it due to higher viral loads. This means contamination is less of an issue. In addition, this would make histological examination (looking for viral DNA, RNA or proteins) inside and around cells feasible. That level of scrutiny might well disprove the XMRV research quickly - or strongly support it.

The other point I want to hammer home is that other MLV components, from DNA to protein, have to be tested too. It is not enough to present a plausible hypothesis of XMRV contamination, that is at best a beginning.

Of course SilverbladeTE, I have no disagreement with the two issues I quoted you on. You have to both focus on the details, and look at the overall evidence. You also need very large scale testing. These all require resources - and when have we ever had enough resources?

Bye
Alex

 

[eric_s]

This guy Stoye is a liar! Yes, Jonathan, please sue me. It's just not true that XMRV has not been detected in healthy controls in any other study than Lombardi et al. How can he get through with this?

 

[eric_s]

The male IrsiCaixa presenter said the they've used the IAP test in their study and did not find mouse contamination in their XMRV+ samples. I think this is interesting. So it seems, even if the IAP test might not be the best (Lo thinks mouse mtDNA is better), that it's not a sure fire way to get a contamination finding in any XMRV+ sample.

 

[eric_s]

I think from now on i will refer to Stoye as Mr. Liar No. 1 and whoever joins him will be Mr. Liar No. 2 and so on.

We might do this until one of them wants to take it to court and then we can have a judge determine what the truth is and the world can watch. I'm starting to have had enough of this.

 

[toddm1960]

Eric you know if you repeat a lie long enough and loud enough, soon just enough people believe it's true. Which casts doubt, which leads to less funding........huge shock here people.......it's all about the money, all about funding.

 

[August59]

This guy Stoye is a liar! Yes, Jonathan, please sue me. It's just not true that XMRV has not been detected in healthy controls in any other study than Lombardi et al. How can he get through with this?

Seems like he has been doing it for the last 2 years, at least in respect to XMRV. I still think he is responsible for the loss all of those blood samples that was suppose to be sent to Kerr. I can't remember what study they were for though, but it was quite a few.

 

[free at last]

Aint he just Eric and people wonder if theres not a effort to disinform other reseach scientists that might want to do research in this feild, What Mr stoye isnt keeping a HUGE BIG LOOK OUT FOR ANY DANGEROUSE POSITIVE STUDYS COMING OUT, of course he is. Dont belive for one moment he doesnt know about the german and spanish results. A convienant lapse of memory, or some other reason to say such a thing, this is where not wanting to be wrong comes in, and even tilting the tables in the negative camp to help slide things more there way is being used, its digusting, its immoral, its corrupt its decpetion, and maybe the boston organizers should get complaints about such under hand conduct. Switzer too, germany spain norway the uk. add 4 to that list plz. unbelivable deception and conduct, everyone still trust switzer, erm a conflict of interests seems just a little apparent here. oh let me guess he forgot too. or didnt hear about it, yeah right

 

[free at last]

The male IrsiCaixa presenter said the they've used the IAP test in their study and did not find mouse contamination in their XMRV+ samples. I think this is interesting. So it seems, even if the IAP test might not be the best (Lo thinks mouse mtDNA is better), that it's not a sure fire way to get a contamination finding in any XMRV+ sample.

Im confused by your comments here Eric coffin im sure would press for the IAP test, the spanish did that, and unlike the oaks paper with 100% contaimation detection ( seemed to work well there ? ) the spanish find zero. why is the IAP test not a sure fire way to detect contamination Eric just because the spanish didnt find it, sorry im confused by what you mean