MMR
So the news is out, Measles is back. Excellent. Well done Andrew Wakefield.
In 1998 the original paper that caused the controversy was released.
Go and read it (get it here). It's quite bad. Full of holes.
One conclusion the author claims is that:
"...[autism and MMR] may have occurred together by chance, reflecting a selection bias in a self-referred group;"
This is like me putting an ad in the paper asking "are you black and in jail?" and I get 50 responses. Conclusion, all the black people I have encountered are criminals. They've looked at children who have developed autism and have had the MMR and then said "oh yeah, that's a possible link".
Luckily the media was here (in 2001) to translate this research into something we can all understand, and the author of the paper was running around having press conferences to get people scared, and immunisation rates dropped (like its hot?)
We've since exported him to the US and he's on trial with the GMC for a barrage of misconduct charges. Although god knows how the trial is going.
Despite researchers having to spend 5 years going back and proving that he was an idiot, people still get 3 separate jabs, believe we (scientists) are actually here to wipe out the lower classes and fuck everyone over (using cyanide is way easier) and still live in a state of disbelief. I feel sorry for them, I do.
I'm not claiming this is a coherent/complete argument (its just a rant) - for much better written and cited articles on all pseudoscience, go read badscience.net its eye-opening if you're not "down" with science.
In 1998 the original paper that caused the controversy was released.
Go and read it (get it here). It's quite bad. Full of holes.
One conclusion the author claims is that:
"...[autism and MMR] may have occurred together by chance, reflecting a selection bias in a self-referred group;"
This is like me putting an ad in the paper asking "are you black and in jail?" and I get 50 responses. Conclusion, all the black people I have encountered are criminals. They've looked at children who have developed autism and have had the MMR and then said "oh yeah, that's a possible link".
Luckily the media was here (in 2001) to translate this research into something we can all understand, and the author of the paper was running around having press conferences to get people scared, and immunisation rates dropped (like its hot?)
We've since exported him to the US and he's on trial with the GMC for a barrage of misconduct charges. Although god knows how the trial is going.
Despite researchers having to spend 5 years going back and proving that he was an idiot, people still get 3 separate jabs, believe we (scientists) are actually here to wipe out the lower classes and fuck everyone over (using cyanide is way easier) and still live in a state of disbelief. I feel sorry for them, I do.
I'm not claiming this is a coherent/complete argument (its just a rant) - for much better written and cited articles on all pseudoscience, go read badscience.net its eye-opening if you're not "down" with science.