Media coverage of Matthees PACE recovery reanalysis: post links here

TiredSam

TiredSam

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deleder2k said:
In The Times: "At times the dispute has become so bitter that scientists have complained of death threats."


Wasn't this said to be bull**** by the tribunal?
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The article gets some very good points in, but also reads as if the editor has insisted on some "balance". Many of the points that we don't agree with seem worded to invite correction, for example it doesn't say "scientists have received death threats", but "scientists have complained of death threats", which is true, they did complain. Now in the comments section or on the letters page it can be added that in court this complaints were found to be without substance and the existence of this "small group of people" found to be wildly speculative.

We all know who the small group of people with fixed views who are prepared to torture the data are, now it's time to make sure everyone else does too. We used to look at articles much worse than this as a good opportunity to get our points across in the comments section - how much better is this one ;)
 
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Gijs

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Can't White or Chalder not speak for themselves anymore these days? I have seen Wessely and now George defending the Pace Trial in the media. It looks like rhetorical red herring. E.g. if a CEO of a football club is talking positive in de media after the coach of the team had lost to many games, mostly he will be fired!
 
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Keith Geraghty

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Complementary and alternative healthcare use by participants in the PACE trial of treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome

Lewith, G., Stuart, B., Chalder, T., McDermott, C. and White, P. (2016) Complementary and alternative healthcare use by participants in the PACE trial of treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 87, 37-42. (doi:10.1016/j.jpsychores.2016.06.005). (PMID:27411750).

dear oh dear of dear - do journalists really think co-authors and friends of Peter White are the best people to comment on PACE?
 
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Keith Geraghty

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Just thinking - does the above article mean that White and Co shared data from PACE with Lewith also -- add him to the list of people White shared the data with - while denying the rest of us.

The Times article says he wasnt involved in the PACE trial - but he was involved in publishing results from it, ie this article -- whats with that for framing the distance between commentator and independent comment?
 
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Chrisb

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Keith Geraghty said:
dear oh dear of dear - do journalists really think co-authors and friends of Peter White are the best people to comment on PACE?
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Would we have any reason to presume that the journalist would have been aware of any connection between Lewith and White.

Is it not more likely that he was given a contact number and trusted in the "professional" integrity of those who gave it to him? That is assuming that the response was not already printed on the handout.
 
trishrhymes

trishrhymes

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Jonathan Edwards said:
"He was defended by George Lewith, professor of primary care at Southampton University, who was not involved in the original research. He said the field was in danger of becoming politicised. “I’ve worked in the area for ten years, and I’ve been appalled by what has happened. There’s a small group of people with fixed and opposing views, and they want to torture the data until it proves what they believe. I think there’s a great danger people will stop doing research because it’s so confrontational.”

Maybe someone should pass on to my old friend George that his old friend Jo thinks he is making a fool of himself. The only people with fixed views who tortured the data to prove what they believe were the PACE authors. If George does not understand the basic incompetence of the PACE trial design he has no business being a professor and should go back to being a first year student. The truth is that at last the PACE trial is being unpoliticised. It is now an issue of science and it is seen to be very bad science. If people who do bad science are discouraged by confrontation we should all give three cheers. Every single scientist from another discipline I have met who has encountered the PACE story agrees that the trial is hopelessly flawed. It is only the ME/CFS physicians who are frightened by not having something to recommend who support it.
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I was foolish/desperate enough about my ME many years ago to see Dr Lewith a couple of times. He used his magic black box (hocus pocus) to 'diagnose' and decide which of his many expensive potions to prescribe. They didn't help and made me so nauseous I gave up. I wonder whether he's still doing this. If so, what on earth Southampton is doing giving him a professorship.

Jonathan Edwards, please can you get in touch with him and set him straight! And I'd love you to write a letter to the newspaper that quoted him too. We need these people to be challenged/ridiculed in public.
 
trishrhymes

trishrhymes

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Keith Geraghty said:
Just thinking - does the above article mean that White and Co shared data from PACE with Lewith also -- add him to the list of people White shared the data with - while denying the rest of us.

The Times article says he wasnt involved in the PACE trial - but he was involved in publishing results from it, ie this article -- whats with that for framing the distance between commentator and independent comment?
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Interesting! Keith, can you write to the newspaper pointing this out, and maybe suggesting a more independent expert they could contact instead!
 
trishrhymes

trishrhymes

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Keith Geraghty said:
I doubt they would do much now its printed - but you go ahead and contact them if you wish, I've already taken some action on this - but others are free to point this connection out to the journalist in question.
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OK fair enough. I'm all out of energy at the moment, but it's good to know you've taken action.
 
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worldbackwards

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trishrhymes said:
I was foolish/desperate enough about my ME many years ago to see Dr Lewith a couple of times. He used his magic black box (hocus pocus) to 'diagnose' and decide which of his many expensive potions to prescribe. They didn't help and made me so nauseous I gave up. I wonder whether he's still doing this. If so, what on earth Southampton is doing giving him a professorship.
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He may possibly be the only person who's ever made anyone worse with Homeopathy.
 
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Yogi

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I think this is a major step and It's so funny:redface::lol::redface::rofl:that Peter White's defence of the PACE trial rests on moving into the alternative and complimentary medicine field.

Thing about complimentary medicine is some of it can be helpful and homeopathy may not work but it isn't dangerous. Patients sometimes do not have choice with CBT/GET and it can be enforced.

Lewith and White (Chalder, Sharpe et al) are showing themselves to be not only quacks but dangerous quacks.

Not this type:


But this:

 
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Yogi

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At a CBT/GET clinic in KCL, QMUL, Oxford:

"Never mind the IOM report, metabolomics and the 5000 biomedical papers- You vexatious militant patients have "false illness beliefs" and if you do not accept the righteous way of the PACE trial you are "anti-psychiatry" and you must convert to our biopsychosocial beliefs now and accept CBT and GET with gratitude."

 
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