JABS Loonies - Justice, Awareness, Basic Support and Mind Blowing Stupidity

Jackie Fletcher is a brainless moron.

2012-01-27T00:32:00.001Z

Oh, I just can't be fucking bothered. How can people take this shit seriously?

OK. She's got a rabid response into the BMJ, here.

Apparently, a bit was edited out, for reasons of sanity. Some twat, presumably John "Cock" Stone has republished it here.

Some sensible people have commented (which is surprising, for Age of Arseholery - they normally get filtered out) that the dozy bint is mixing up two issues; OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE, I CAN'T BE FUCKING BOTHERED WITH THESE FUCKUNG MORONS ANY MORE. LET'S HOPE THEY GET HIT BY FUCKING BUSES OR SOMETHING. FUCKING, FUCKING MORONS.

If they want to donate their hard-earned cash to Wakefield, fucking let them. They fucking deserve everything they get. Pointless fuckwits.

You know you're in trouble when…

2012-01-11T11:01:00.002Z

…The One Click Group thinks you've lost it.

Yes, one of the most deranged anti-science, anti-vax, conspiracy theory peddling bunch of loons, the One Click Group seems to think Wakefield's finally stepped off the edge of reality.

Since Wakefield has failed to Appeal the GMC decision that found him dishonest in 2010, it seems extraordinary that he is now taking this litigious step in Texas. Is this merely a highly ill-advised mickey mouse Wakefield publicity stunt or has this doctor lost the plot we ask?

Andrew Wakefield reduced to wanking for coins

2012-01-11T07:46:00.002Z

Back in 2007, the brilliant Charlie Brooker wrote;

Four thousand years ago I used to write a website called TV Go Home, which consisted of capsule descriptions of imaginary television programmes - most of them ghastly creations teetering on the brink of plausibility. One of the earliest entries was Wanking For Coins, which was described as "apocalyptic fun as Rowland Rivron tours the seedy backstreets of London's West End persuading the homeless to commit acts of self-degradation in exchange for pennies".

And that's exactly what Andrew Wakefield's doing now. It's now perfectly clear that his attempt to sue Brian Deer, the BMJ and Fiona Godlee is nothing more than a cynical fundraising effort, as can be seen from the new website, DrWakefieldJusticeFund.org.

Yes, as Wakefield clearly has no obvious source of income, he's resorted to performing acts of self degredation (posing, staring at a photoshopped in American Flag as though he's never seen one before (more about this in a moment) and about to have his suit thrown out in the most humiliating way) in order for his sycophantic fans to send him a few dollars to allow him to keep up his expensive lifestyle.

Not convinced? And think it's reasonable for Wakefield to ask for support for a defence fund? Well, it would be reasonable, were he the one being sued. But he's not - he's the one bringing the action. And then take a look at the "contribute" page. Not only can you make a donation, but you can become a member, for an annual subscription! A member of fucking what? A member of the "I'm paying for Andrew Wakefield's mortgage club"?! And all for an annual subscription of between $25 (personal member) and $5000 (corporate champion). How the fuck does he think he can get away with it? An annual subscription for a one off legal action??

The site is run by Ed "Dickhead" Arranga, all round hater of all things British (see his attack on "the British" here - a rant so obnoxious that even John "Cock" Stone called him out on it in the comments, and his personal attack on me here) and general fucktard. He clearly knew about this suit some time ago (as the text of the link above indicates) and the domain name DrWakefieldJusticeFund.org was registered in October last year.

I left a comment on Age of Autism, which surprisingly didn't make it through moderation, asking whether if, as seems extremely likely, Wakefields attempt to sue is thrown out to gales of laughter at the first hurdle, would any remaining funds be redistributed to the donors? I suspect not, as this is clearly an attempt to prop up Wakefield financially, rather than have him reduced to actually wanking for coins in the back streets of Austin - a state of affairs which, if this lawsuit and appeal are any indication, can't be too far away.

I'm now going to take a short break to be violently sick.

Age of Autism misrepresents Guardian journalist

2012-01-07T10:01:00.003Z

The Guardian, fine journal that it is, has published a piece on Andrew Wakefield's misguided attempt to sue the BMJ, Brian Deer and Fiona Godlee. You can read it here, it's a perfectly reasonable feature, giving no opinion on Wakefield's fraud.

However, Age of Autism has republished the majority of the feature on its own site, with the byline "By Ian Sample of The Guardian UK.", implying that Mr Sample has written the piece specifically for Age of Arseholery. Let's face it - this is the kind of thing that John "Cock" Stone or Jake "Arsehole" Crosby would be able to cover (and look like morons) in their sleep - so why republish a piece from a major newspaper, written by a proper journalist, if not to try and steal some credibility on the back of the name?

Andrew Wakefield to make arse of himself by trying to sue Brian Deer, BMJ, Fiona Godlee

2012-01-05T07:24:00.002Z

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!

To be fair, I've been wondering why if, as Wakefield and the antivax loons at AoA claim, Brian Deer's articles a year ago are demonstrably false, Wakefield didn't sue immediately. After all, such allegations could do irreparable damage to his reputation (which was already shot to shit).

A pdf of the complaint can be found here.

One wonders (among other things):

Why Age of Autism hasn't mentioned it yet
Why the accusation of libel hasn't been made in the UK

As ever, Orac has a far more comprehensive summary.

Callous Disregard price countdown...

2011-12-31T12:10:00.001Z

Andrew Wakefield's hardbacked spider swatter, Callous Disregard is now available new at Amazon.com for the tidy sum of $4.97. That's £3.20 in sterling - less than the price of a pint in most Central London pubs.

Oh the fucking irony.

2011-12-14T13:50:00.001Z

From Barry, a typically mindless Age of Autism commenter:

How is that people with no scientific training whatsoever, keep setting the record straight for people who supposedly do?

Try asking Dan Olmsted, Mark Blaxill, Anne Bloody Dachel or John "Cock" Stone, you fucking irony-free dickhead. That's the kind of problem that's got us in this mess in the first place.

Dan Olmsted & crank magnetism

2011-12-13T08:57:00.001Z

Dan Olmsted at Age Of Arseholery has posted a remarkably stupid "From the editor" piece;

A D.C. developer dies at 59; obit notes he had a cell phone built into his ski helmet. I've had two friends die of the same brain cancer. I'm not so sure these things are so safe, are you?

Firstly, Dan, there's no evidence that mobile phone useage causes brain cancer.

Secondly, anecdote is not data.

Thirdly, if this is a newsworthy story, how about a link to a serious news outlet's coverage of it?

Fourthly, how long does someone wear a ski helmet for? Hardly all day, every day is it?

Still, it's a prime example of crank magnetism - belief in one whacko theory leads onto a belief in all kinds of other crap.

You're either a despicable scaremonger, an utter moron, or both, Olmsted. I know where my money's going.

Age Of Autism in attempt to mislead

2011-12-08T13:12:00.001Z

Age of Autism today has a story about an antivaxer - "Dr Lisa Morris" - and her experiences being interviewed by NBC for a piece about "Skipping Vaccines". She makes out she's been misquoted, led to believe that the piece would be more sympathetic to her lunatic point of view - all the usual stuff. Like I give even a quarter of a shit. Still, she talks about where she gets her information on vaccination, and makes it sound all very sciencey - and that name, who could fail to be impressed by "DOCTOR Lisa Morris"?

Lisa Morris is a chiropractor. What the fuck does she know about science or medicine, given that she believes in subluxions - a cause of illness only slightly more plausible than the fucking verucca goblin or the ringworm fairy.

Oh, the irony

2011-12-07T09:04:00.004Z

Click to buy the Age Of Autism t-shirt

I was going to title this post "Jake Crosby is an arsehole", but at the last moment was distracted by a comment of JB Handley's at Age of Autism. (Where else?)

Firstly, Jake "Arsehole" Crosby is bleating that he's been thrown out of a conference for asking what he sees as awkward questions of Seth Mnookin, author of "The Panic Virus". I suspect he was just being an arsehole - but I'd like to see the video footage. However, this is published at Age Of Autism, the online chip-wrapper which praises conferences like Autism One. That's right - Autism One, the organisers of which got seven armed policemen/security guards to throw two anti-anti-vax bloggers out. So, it's OK to do that, but not OK to ask Jake Crosby to leave because he's being deliberately disruptive? (Having read Jake's account of the incident, that's the only conclusion I can come to - that he was deliberately being an arsehole in order to provoke, and, ideally, get thrown out in order to write about it at AoA.)

So, that's why I was going to title this post "Jake Crosby is an arsehole". However, as I said, JB Handley popped up with this gem, which pretty much defines the word "irony".

My heart hurts for parents and families who have had their lives destroyed by idiots masquerading as experts.

Well, quite. Would you like me to list them JB? Actually, just go to Age Of Autism, and hover your mouse over the "Contributors" link in the menu bar. Evil fuckers.

Kent Bastard Heckenlively Is A Liar

2011-10-04T16:14:00.000+01:00

Well no fucking shock there, eh? Kent Heckenlively is a berk(shire hunt) who blogs at Age Of Autism, and shows a quite remarkable propensity for being fucking stupid, and cruel to his autistic daughter (although I'm sure he thinks of it as "searching for a cure").

Anyway, he's got a thing about XMRV, the mouse retrovirus that was (most likely) mistakenly found in patients suffering from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, by a doctor who it seems has been faking results, refusing to give out raw data for checking, and has now been sacked. Sound familiar?

Anyway, Kent's posted a piece entitled "Study Finds XMRV Retrovirus Can Infect Brain Cells", in which he cites a ropey as fuck study; "Susceptibility of Human Primary Neuronal Cells to Xenotropic Murine Leukemia Virus-related (XMRV) Virus Infection" which he claims has been published in that very reputable journal, "The Journal of Virology". Woo, scary - maybe there's something in this then?

Except it hasn't, it's been published in "Virology Journal", a completely different publication which is most famous for publishing a paper regarding Christ's healing of influenza in the Bible.

That's not to say it's wrong, buut it's a deliberate attempt to mislead. Or, in other words…

You lying fuck Heckenlively.

CoMeD press release officially "a load of bollocks"

2011-08-03T16:51:00.001+01:00

I'd not come across CoMeD (The Coalition for Mercury-free Drugs) before. It's an anti-vaccine site which seems to be run by those chemical castrators, the Geiers. I was drawn to its existance by The Bolen Report, a site run by Tim Bolen, self-styled consumer advocate and all round supporter of rabid conspiracy theories. He ought to use the phrase "Nothing Too Mental!" as a strapline. (Go on Tim - you can have that for free.)

It seems that the United Nations has released a document entitled "New draft text for a comprehensive and suitable approach to a global legally binding instrument on mercury".

Here are its stated objectives:

Option 1: The objective of this Convention is to protect human health and the environment from
anthropogenic releases of mercury and its compounds [by minimizing, and where feasible ultimately
eliminating, global anthropogenic mercury releases to air, water and land].
Option 2: The objective of this Convention is to minimize, and ultimately to prevent any potential
adverse effects on human health and the environment from, exposure to the release of mercury and its
compounds by facilitating information dissemination and exchange and the employment of risk
reduction strategies [including the environmentally sound management of mercury throughout its life
cycle], through financial and technical cooperation, taking into account the relevant principles of the
Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, including principles 6, 7, 15 and 16

All pretty sensible - after all, no-one can argue that the release of mercury into the atmosphere is a good thing, right?

The Geiers' press release has it a little differently;

SILVER SPRING, Md., August 1, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ – CoMeD – On Friday, July
22, 2011, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) distributed a revised text for its
comprehensive global treaty on mercury. Advocates for mercury-free drugs were gratified to see
pharmaceuticals listed in “Annex C (Mercury-added product not allowed)” of the proposed treaty.
The Coalition for Mercury-free Drugs (CoMeD) helped initiate this addition through its advocacy
efforts at the United Nations (UN) negotiations held in Chiba, Japan in January 2011. CoMeD
President Rev. Lisa Sykes, the mother of a son diagnosed with vaccine-related mercury poisoning,
described to representatives of over 150 participating nations how: “… unnecessarily injecting
mercury into pregnant women and children, as part of a vaccine or other drug, is an ongoing and
often unrecognized crisis.

It then goes into a long anti-vax rant.

The document I linked to above is, handily, in pdf format, which makes it searchable. Not once does it mention any of the following words: "Geier", "CoMeD", "Vaccine", "inject", "injection", "drug", "drugs", "autism", or any word containing the letters "thim".

So it's got fuck all to do with vaccines, fuck all to do with drugs, fuck all to do with CoMeD, fuck all to do with evil bastards like the Geiers and fuck all to do with "vaccine damage".

Wankers.

John Stone, conspiracy theorist

2011-07-26T09:19:00.001+01:00

John "Cock" Stone has posted another splendid comment on Age of Autism. In response to this;

Personally, I no longer believe this is about the personal integrity of Brian Deer .. nor .. the veracity of all Deer has written or alleged…

Stone replies:

It was always about the British establishment (and whoever lay behind them) being prepared to allow his extravagant and what should have been highly embarrassing performance to continue unimpeded.

The British Establishment and whoever lay behind them?

Come on then John, who's behind the British Establishment? The Bilderberg Group? The New World Order? The Illuminati? David Icke's Lizard People?

He runs further away from the sane/mental divide every time he puts finger to keyboard.

AoA Comment of the Day

2011-07-22T18:48:00.001+01:00

From Benedetta - one of Age of Autism's regular commenters:

I am very glad that Fox News is honest and not part of Murdoch's empire. They have given both sides of the vaccine issue. They have even at times been highly critical of the judgment of the courts involving word games--- of don't cause autism but autism like symptoms.

It is a good thing because watching the news or semi- news shows that I can stand are becoming rather rare. I don't watch CNN because of Anderson Cooper, and I don't watch the morning show that has Matt Laur smug smile either.

So that leaves about only Fox News.

Ha, ha, and ha again. From Wikipedia:

Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as simply Fox (and stylized as FOX), is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.

You get a better class of moron at AoA, I have to say.

Age of Autism tries to smear Brian Deer. Again.

2011-07-22T15:15:00.002+01:00

The head-the-balls over at Age of Autism have been trying to smear Brian Deer for years now, because he's the journalist who's been responsible for bringing to light Andrew Wakefield's lies and deceit in well researched articels for the BMJ and The Sunday Times. The trouble is (for AoA) that they've never been able to demonstrate that anything Mr Deer has written has been false. They've tried to misrepresent what he's written, accusing him of accusing Wakefield of falsifying medical records - which he didn't, he showed that he'd misrepresented the records he'd seen, and in some cases simply made up information which went into his study in order to back up his potentially lucrative theory.

They've now taken a new tack - trying to imply that Mr Deer is involved in some kind of shady journalistic practices, simply because the paper that published his work (not his employer - Mr Deer is a freelance writer and reporter) is owned by the same company which owned the News Of The World, the newspaper recently closed down by News International in the wake of phone hacking allegations / revelations. To this end, they[AoA]'ve put up two blog posts, entitled:

"An Elaborate Fraud, Part 1: In Which a Murdoch Reporter Deceives the Mother of a Severely Autistic Child" and

"An Elaborate Fraud, Part 2: In Which a Murdoch Newspaper’s Deceptive Tactics Infect the British Medical Journal"

and one entitled:

When Does a "Conspiracy Theory" Become a "Conspiracy Fact"?

Let's look at the "Elaborate Fraud" story. Here's part 1.

The piece is written by Dan Olmsted - I'm a little surprised that he's writing this, as he's generally a supporter of the Mercury-Autism link, rather than MMR, but hey, as Orac says, it's always the vaccines - and starts with a short explanation of the BMJ's accusation that Wakefield had committed an elaborate fraud with his initial study on the MMR vaccine.

It explains some of Mr Deer's methods, including:

Deer identified and interviewed parents of some of the children in the anonymous Lancet case series, describing what he said were significant disparities. "I traveled to the family home, 80 miles northeast of London, to hear about child 2 from his mother," Deer wrote of one interview. The child had severe autism and gut problems that she blamed on the MMR.

All well and good so far. But wait, there's apparently a problem.

What Deer did not say in the BMJ article is that he had lied to the mother about his identity, claiming to be someone named "Brian Lawrence" (his middle name). Deer had written a number of critical articles about parents' claims of vaccine injury, and if he gave his real name, he doubtless feared, Child 2's mother would not agree to talk to him. Once she checked his blog, she would be more likely to kick him out of the family home than sit still for what turned into a six-hour inquisition.

OK, so the name "Brian Deer" is very well known among the anti-vax community - Olmsted's quite right. The mother of Child 2 probably wouldn't have agreed to the interview had he given his real name, so he gave a modified version of his real name. If Child 2's mother didn't realise she was talking to Brian Deer, she'd be more likely to talk to him and more likely to set the facts as she saw them out accurately and without bias.

However, yes, Brian Deer, an award winning investigative journalist, researching a story that needed to be as objective as possible, to get the raw facts as accurately as possible, and which might well expose a huge fraud which had put at risk the health of the nation's (and indeed the world's) children, gave a slightly altered version of his name and used a Yahoo email account when talking, openly, for six hours, in the comfort of her own home, to one of the key witnesses in the story. Yes, six hours. Olmsted now describes this as an "inquisition". Yes, it's a deceit, but one that needed to happen in order to get the accurate raw facts of the story.

Now, because this story was destined for the Sunday Times, Olmsted brings up the point about phone hacking, implying somehow that Deer's use of a "fake" name is somehow equivalent.

The Sunday Times is owned by Rupert Murdoch, part of the News International division that has come under a Watergate-size cloud in England for its newsgathering tactics – fraudulently obtaining confidential information, bribing police, hacking 9,000 phone numbers, gaining access to bank accounts, and using large financial settlements to keep some victims quiet.

How is this, in any way, related to Deer's investigation into the dangerous actions of Andrew Wakefield?

Let's see - Deer didn't fraudulently obtain confidential information (he interviewed someone under what's actually his real name - just not the one he's usually known by), he didn't bribe police, he didn't hack into a phone, he didn't get access to anyone's bank details, and didn't pay anyone off.

Olmsted then tries to claim that, when the information that came from this interview was used in the BMJ feature some years later, it breached trhe BMJ's ethics rules, which read;

"Any article that contains personal medical information about an identifiable living individual requires the patient's explicit consent before we can publish it," according to the policy (italics in original).

Yes. This is why the patient is referred to as "Child 2". I certainly can't identify anyone from that description.

Part two of the feature though has an even more non-world-shaking relelation. Let's see what Olmsted has to say:

As she sat down to write the Sunday Times of London on Saturday, November 29, 2003, Rosemary Kessick was beside herself. The day before, a reporter for the paper named Brian Lawrence had come to her home to interview her – and kept at it, relentlessly, for six straight hours. It was more like an inquisition than an interview.

First of all, I'd like to bring up a point here - although Brian Deer didn't identify any of the children involved in Wakefield's fraudulent study, Olmsted just has. By using the name of the child's mother. Olmsted embellishes the story with emotive words like "inquisition" and "relentless". If it had been that unpleasant, why didn't Ms Kessick ask the reporter, whatever he called himself, to leave, at some point in the six hours? Was it because she wanted to tell her story?

Now, I don't know Brian Deer. I've never met him. I have no opinion on whether he's a nice person or not. I'm certain he can be dogged and determined when it comes to getting information, and making sure that information is accurate. I can imagine that he can be a tough interviewer. That doesn't make him guilty of any breach of journalistic ethics.

Olmsted then publishes an email conference between Ms Kessick, Brian "Lawrence" Deer, and various executives at the Sunday Times. It begins with an email from Ms Kessick complaining to the editor of the Sunday Times about the interview style, claiming that Mr Deer

…displayed arrogance in his own perceived ability and knowledge which when probed, consistently revealed a dangerous bigotry and clear ignorance of the many legal and scientific facts salient to the MMR cases.

…and that he was rude and arrogant. Fair enough.

There's also an email from Mr Deer to Ms Kessick, apologising if he came over at all rude.

A few other emails are reproduced, all of which basically say the same thing - "Brian Deer's not a very nice man and I felt he was rude and overbearing when he came to interview me." (I paraphrase, clearly).

OK - maybe that's so, but since when has "being a nice person" been a prerequisite for being an ethical journalist?

To round off his smear attempt, Olmsted admits that Ms Kessick wasn't even quoted in the original Sunday Times story, the interview was mentioned in a followup article when Mr Deer said he had cooperation from the parents (well - talking to a journalist for six hours sounds like cooperation to me), and quotes were only used in the BMJ article in 2011.

Now, if anyone can find anything in there which compares to the News Of The World hacking into the voicemail of a missing (and as it turned out, murdered) schoolgirl to listen to and delete messages please tell me what it is. If there's any evidence of illegal activity - please point it out to me. Otherwise Olmsted, shut the fuck up.

Edit: 26 July.
Sullivan has also covered this at LeftBrainRightBrain - here - and Brian Deer has left a long comment, putting Olmsted right on a few points.

John Stone - Vaccines spread AIDS

2011-07-19T20:44:00.002+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

Oh look - famed vaccine wingnut John Stone has finally admitted his paid up membership of the Fucking Loony Party.

This link is possibly the nuttiest thing he's posted - and that's saying something.

Of course, we ought not forget where the Aids epidemic started.

John Stone (who, in case you'd forgotten, is a cock) has linked to a mental "Vaccines Caused AIDS" video on YouTube entitled "Dr. Maurice Hilleman, explains why Merck's vaccines have spread AIDS & other plagues worldwide". It's here. It's also fucking nuts.

In a supposed interview with Dr Maurice Hilleman, it bangs on about the SV40 "monkey virus" - which has never been demonstrated to have any ill effects in humans - in polio vaccine, and then goes on to suppose that AIDS has been spread by vaccines - despite "Hilleman" never suggesting anything of the sort.

Watch the video - then marvel that John "Cock" Stone thinks that this represents evidence that AIDS was spread by vaccines. The man's a fucking loon.

John Stone - Vaccines spread AIDS

2011-07-19T20:43:00.000+01:00

Of course, we ought not forget where the Aids epidemic started.

Age Of Autism cheers the downfall of News International. How Ironic.

2011-07-13T18:54:00.003+01:00

Age of Autism is cheering that News International (which owns the Sunday Times, which first reported Brian Deer's features on Andrew Wakefield's fraud) is in big trouble. How ironic then, that NI owns The Sun, which happily reported anecdote as fact in order to create fear and doubt, and to sell more chip-wrappers.
(www.ageofautism.com/2011/07/crisis-of-ethics-at-news-international-as-james-murdoch-closes-down-the-news-of-the-world.html)

"growing concern of possible links between MMR and autism and bowel disorders have seen a massive drop in the number of parents opting for the treatment. The connection was made by Dr Andrew Wakefield in 1998. No scientists confirmed his findings but many parents say their children changed dramatically after the injection".
(The Sun, 5th Feb, 2002)

And who's doing the trumpeting? Yes, that arsehole John "Cock" Stone. What a fucking shock there, that Stone doesn't know his arse from Rotherham - and couldn't find either with both hands and a map.

A call for violence from AoA?

2011-07-13T09:23:00.001+01:00

Kent Heckenlively has posted a rather disturbing piece on Age of Autism, in which he calls on God to smite the vaccine-autism unbelievers (ie, rational people), quoting the Bible (psalm 94) and Stephen King (the Stand) to make his point.

It's not unreasonable to see this as a call to extreme God-Botherers to rise up, and, just in case God's a bit too busy to do all that smiting, give him a helping hand and get some smiting of their own done. After all, God's work needs doing, right?

Am I being a bit extreme? I don't think so - look at the actions of the more extreme pro-life (or, as they should properly be called, anti-women's rights) activists. Murder and arson have been in their arsenal for some time. Why should religious anti-vax loons be any different?

(As ever, Orac has a more eloquent discussion of this…)

Following Vaccinations

2011-06-27T18:47:00.001+01:00

Joan Campbell - a regular on the JABS forum has recently launched a new website followingvaccinations.com.

For the last few months, she's been collecting short anecdotes from parents worldwide about (ostensibly) how their children were damaged by vaccines.

Now - it's going to be very difficult for me - and other bloggers, no doubt - to pull this to shreds without being accused of being heartless bastards. If that's how any of this post comes across, it isn't meant to; as I've always said, I have nothing but sympathy and admiration for parents of autistic, and other ill children. The people I feel loathing for are those who are prepared to use those parents in order to further their own twisted, anti-vaccine agenda.

Mrs Campbell is a parent herself - her story is listed, among 900 others - but she's clearly had her head turned by the anti-vax zealots; the Wakefields, the Stones etc of this world, and her new site is deliberately playing right into their hands. For instance, Dan Olmsted has described it on Age of Autism as;

…one of the most important documents ever created about children's health

and

in this case, the plural of anecdote is the truth.

No Dan, it isn't.

While many of them are heart-wrenching stories - which was clearly the intention - there are a lot which don't mention vaccines at all, or do so only tangentially;

…but my son, looking back, showed signs from birth

I believe from the day he was born there was something wrong. He wouldn't breast feed, he wouldn't eat and now that he is 6 yrs old he does not chew at all.

Unable to pinpoint @ an infant which vaccine, but after diagnosed at age 12 with NLD versus Asperger's

the dates sound mysteriously made-up;

My son started having seizures after his one month MMR

or they're just repeating standard anti-vax rhetoric;

I don't think a specific vaccination causes autism. I think it's all the crap in vaccinations, like all the heavy metals that are loaded into it as they are very toxic.

As we're all aware - vaccines can produce adverse effects - no-one's denying this, so some of the stories are to be expected;

My son was always rushed to the e.r after his shots he was lethargic, it was scary.

There are a lot more stories that don't add up - or really have no place in Mrs Campbell's list - but there are an an awful lot more stories of ill children. It's telling that so few of them have mentioned that any kind of expert opinion has agreed with their decision that their children's conditions were in any way vaccine related.

While these are heartbreaking stories, they are not evidence that vaccines cause autism, or any of the other wide range of ailments that the anti-vax zealots like to claim they do.

In case Mr Olmsted is reading this, as you well know, the plural of anecdote, even heartbreaking ones like these, is not truth.

Note: Having just read this through, I just know I'm going to attract hate mail for this post, so I'll say it again - I have nothing but respect and sympathy for parents of ill children. I loathe the anti-vax brigade who've given you spurious information and a "reason" for their conditions, in many cases in order to line their own pockets.

Neither am I accusing parents of lying - although I suspect many of them may be mistaken about aspects of their children's experiences, and have, in their own minds, and with no intent to deliberately deceive, made those mistakes to fit the anti-vaccine story.

AnneDachel.com

2011-06-21T17:08:00.000+01:00

I've just come across

AnneDachel.com

. Woo - it's full of some seriously advanced and dangerous anti-vax wingnuttery…

For those of you who don't know, Anne Dachel is the "Media Editor" at Age of Autism, and is, frankly, so full of shit you could burst her with a pin and fertilise several acres of prime farmland.

I'll be pulling some choice crap apart in the next few days. Stay tuned…

John Stone's most feeble COI so far…

2011-06-14T09:43:00.003+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

John "Cock" Stone's favoured tactic to rehabilitate Andrew Wakefield in the eyes of his adoring public, and to reignite the long dead MMR - Autism "link" that he pulled out of his arse, is to find "undeclared conflicts of interest" involving anyone even remotely involved with any medium which, quite rightly, portrays Wakefield as a fraud, charlatan, liar, incompetent scientist, danger to the public and buffoon.

In March of this year, the BBC broadcast an excellent documentary series entitled "Science Betrayed", episode 2 of which dealt with well known fraud, charlatan, liar, incompetent scientist, danger to the public and buffoon, Andrew Wakefield.

John Stone has finally, three months down the line, managed to concoct an undeclared conflict of interest for one of the co-producers of the show. It goes like this:

Alexandra Feachem (the co-producer of the programme, along with many other excellent science programmes for BBC Radio) is the daughter of…

Sir Richard Feacham, who, as well as being Professor of Global Health at both the University of California, San Francisco, and the University of California, Berkeley, a Visiting Professor at the University of London and an Honorary Professor at the University of Queensland (Wikipedia) is the founder and director of an organisation called…

The Global Health Group, an organisation which, according to its website, has three main focus areas:

The Evidence-to-Policy Initiative (E2Pi)
The Malaria Elimination Initiative
The Health Systems Initiative

Of these, the Evidence-to-Policy Initiative is supported by three-year funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Evidence-To-Policy initiative doesn't have anything to do with vaccines, but…

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation gives a large amount of money to support vaccination programmes worldwide, and, in addition…

Bill Gates once said something true about Andrew Wakefield.

"Well, Dr. Wakefield has been shown to use absolutely fraudulent data. He had a financial interest in some lawsuits. He created a fake paper. The journal allowed it to run."

So, the co-producer's father has (as one of his jobs) a post working for a non-vaccine related organisation which is, in part, funded by someone who once said something you didn't like (but was true) about Andrew Wakefield. And you think that's a conflict of interest that should be declared?

Fucking grow up, you cock.

Australian TV - excellent stuff

2011-06-13T11:09:00.003+01:00

Thanks to Orac's "Respectful insolence" blog, I've watched this excellent piece on Australian anti-vaccine stupidity and evil.

Viera Scheibner (who's frequently quoted as an authority by anti-vax wingnuts, and especially that arsehole John Scudamore at Whale.to) features pretty heavily, and manages to demonstrate pretty effectively how vile and deluded she is.

Please watch this - and point any parents you know who sit on the fence towards it.

Another flop from the anti-vax crowd

2011-06-07T11:39:00.001+01:00

Not only is Wakefield's book being heavily discounted, but it seems that anti-vax wingnuts Dan Olmsted and Mark Blaxill are less popular still. Their dismal load of old bollocks (technical term - keep up) entitled "The Age of Autism: Mercury, Medicine, and a Man-Made Epidemic", which has a recommended retail price of $27.99 (a shade over seventeen quid) is now available, new, hardback, through Amazon.com at just $6.71 - £4.08 (price conversions by xe.com)

Alternatively, if you're in the UK and need a nice colourful fly-swat, why not get it from Amazon.co.uk (unlike Wakefield's tome of toss it's legitimately available in the UK) - just £4.24.

Callous Disregard price countdown…

2011-06-06T08:48:00.001+01:00

I'm sure you'll all be pleased to know that Andrew Wakefield's collection of papier maché in waiting, "Callous Disregard" is now available (new) on Amazon.com for $7.98. That's £4.86 at today's rates (from xe.com).

JB Handley and John Stone in foot shooting incidents

2011-05-31T09:00:00.001+01:00

Both John Stone and JB Handley have recently posted feeble defences of the Elizabeth Birt Center's recent "study" claiming to link vaccine injury to autism.

Stone's post (here) tries to argue that Dr. Paul Offit's statement that children who may have autistic symptoms do not necessarily have a diagnosis of autism is wrong, and surely if a child has an autistic symptom, he or she is autistic, and has hence been compensated for autism.

Handley tries arguing the same thing, in an evidence free, personal attack on Dr. David "Orac" Gorski - here.

Handley says:

Let me repeat myself, Dr. Gorski, the kids ALL HAVE AUTISM.

Err, no JB, they don't, they don't have a diagnosis of autism - and this is an important point.

Let's imagine that Handley and Stone are correct, and that an autism-like symptom constitutes autism, and warrants a diagnosis of autism. Well, then yes, the vaccine injuries compensated for show a much higher prevalence of autism than in the prevalence in the wider community - which anti-vax groups variously put at somewhere between 1 in 50, and 1 in 100. Sounds bad, eh?

But wait - We then need to apply those new "Handley/Stone Criteria" across the whole of the population. Anyone with any autistic trait now has a diagnosis of autism, thus pushing the rate up - hypothetically to as much as 1 in 25 or 1 in 33 - more than likely, around the same prevalence as that found by this "study".

What's this though - 1 in 25? AUTISM EXPLOSION! One might go as far as to say "AUTISM EPIDEMIC!!" I can see the hysterical headlines now, from the likes of AoA:

In 2005, autism rates were 1 in 67 - today they're 1 in 25! What's happening to our kids? It can only be the vaccines!!

Yes - Handley and Stone have shot themselves in the foot by finally managed to demonstrate that increases in rates of autism are down to, yes, changes in diagnostic criteria - and are both arguing for more changes in order to increase the apparent autism rate.

John "Cock" Stone again tries to spin the facts...

2011-04-01T10:25:00.001+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

…in the manner of a clown with some cheap plates from QD Stores, but, as ever, ends up with them crashing around his feet in the manner of an incompetent buffoon. How apt.

He's moaning about Brian Deer again, and how his word has been taken as "the truth", whereas, as he sees it, Mr Deer has conducted a;

seven year campaign against Andrew Wakefield

Yes, Stone, that's called "investigative journalism". Unlike you, who simply writes down any conspiracy theory you can come up while you eat your rusks (or whatever other soft foods you're still allowed) at breakfast.

With no sense of irony, Stone accuses Deer of an

ignorance of basic medical protocol

Which is a bit rich coming from a man who still thinks it's OK to take blood from kids at a jelly and ice-cream party in the name of research.

Anyway, the spark that's ignited his ire this time is a programme on Radio 4 entitled "Science Betrayed", which examines Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent and fucking evil scaremongering. (My synopsis - the official version is: "Dr Adam Rutherford investigates the case of medical misconduct that led to the MMR scare." - much the same thing.)

Stone goes on to accuse the BBC of leaving out all his imagined conflicts of interest, castigating the presenter for not being a medical doctor (maybe not but he's an editor at Nature, has a degree in evolutionary biology and a PhD concentrating on the genetics of the eye. For balance, Mr Stone is an self-proclaimed expert on Mozart), complaining that Mr deer wasn't challenged about any of the points raised (why should he be? - Wakefield has been found fucking guilty, and admitted most of the charges), and then starts bleating on about red baby books - which (apparently) Mr Deer (nor Stone) has seen, and so might exonerate Wakefield.

Before I rip Stone a second arsehole by pointing out all the scientific and legal facts presented in the programme, not one of which he addresses, can I suggest this; If the data in the baby books might show that Wakefield didn't make up the timelines for autism in the kids in his study, and the parents of the kids concerned are so grateful to their beloved Saint Andy, then why the fuck don't they just give him the books, he can show he was right all along, and can sue Brian Deer's arse off for libel and defamation of character? Just a thought.

Anyway, that's just an aside. Let's have a listen to the programme, and pull out some choice lines that for some reason Stone doesn't try to refute:

found guilty of… four counts of dishonesty

Does Stone refute that? No.

… about a dozen counts of causing vulnerable young children to undergo invasive, risky procedures that were not warrented…

Hmmm. No refution of that.

then he was found guilty of buying blood from children at a birthday party

Nnnnope. Still no denial.

…ordering tests when he didn't have the proper medical qualifications

Nope. Still nothing from Stone.

All pretty damning stuff. The recording's only a minute in!!! Four serious medical misconduct charges in a minute, yet Stone conveniently ignores them. Still, let's go on.

A couple of minutes in, Wakefield expresses surprise at the findings, as, apparently do his legal team. I notice they've not overturned any of the findings yet. Still… maybe we'll find out why.

Anyway - now, onto Fiona Godlee, editor of the BMJ, and one of Stone's personal demons at the moment. After all, he's accused her of every kind of conflict of interest under the sun, without once refuting any of the actual points raised by the BMJ. She rightly points out that the GMC panel wasn't set up to, and didn't have a remit to investigate fraudulent behaviour - merely medical misconduct. (As if that wasn't enough to have Wakefield metaphorically strung up).

Dr Rutherford then goes through the history of the Lancet paper, with a description of the findings, and mentioning Wakefield's infamous press conference, and the disclaimer ("no association proved") in the paper. It's pointed out that Wakefield still clings to this disclaimer as an "I didn't do it guv" get out clause - despite his advice to avoid the MMR jab at the press conference.

Let's go back to Stone's piece for a moment - has a denied the truth of any of this so far? No.

OK - about 7 minutes in comes the revelation about the legal aid money, Wakefield being a "hired gun" to find a link, the letter from Wakefield and Barr stating the link between MMR and disintegrative disorder, which was written two weeks before any children were selected for the study.

No - still no refutation from Stone.

Wakefield then flannels around about his massive conflicts of interest (which Stone ignores) while he's confronted with statements he and Richard Barr have made which clearly indicate that he was actively seeking a link between MMR and autism.

Given conflicts of interest are Stone's forté - you'd expect him to pick up on this. But he constantly ignores it, in favour of vague "GlaxoSmithCline advertise in the BMJ and so the BMJ can't be trusted" statements.

Anyway - enough of financial irregularities - what's next for Stone to ignore? Oh yes. Making results up.

"The pathologists original reports indicated no serious gut inflammation in any of the twelve children, contrary to the central point of the Lancet paper."

Surely Stone can claim that this isn't true? Oh. No, he can't. Presumably because it is.

Autistic symptoms didn't match up to MMR timings - Wakefield claims that he didn't see GP records, only the Red Books. In the paper, Wakefield states that he'd checked developmental records from parents, health visitors and GPs.

Now, Stone starts to bluster;

While referrals are generally made with accompanying communications between GP and consultant it is not normal practice for GPs to forward all the patient’s notes.

Do you not see, Stone? Wakefield, in the paper says he checked developmental records from GPs. Whether passing on full notes is normal practice or not, he specifically stated that he'd checked developmental records from GPs. Do I need to say that again? He specifically stated that he'd checked developmental records from GPs.

Brian Deer then makes some interesting points about red books. These are a record of a child's general health, and a record of vaccinations, height and weight, any hospital visits etc. My daughter's got one. Health visitors and doctors do not, as Mr Deer points out, write in diagnoses of behavioural problems as a matter of routine. Reliance on red books for a study of this importance is so incompetent as to be laughable - yet this is what Wakefield is now claiming.

Stone writes;

The developmental records, Personal Child Health Record or Red Books, are routinely brought by the parents of young children to medical appointments of every kind and contain much essential information.

Yes, you cock, but that's a bit disingenuous, isn't it? They are routinely taken to any kind of doctor's appointment, but doctors don't routinely write detailed diagnoses in them.

Now the programme goes on to describe how UCL offered to fund a massive project to replicate the work done in the study - but Wakefield wasn't prepared to take part in that study. This claim is made by Professor Mark Pepys, who Stone claims has conflicts of interest, being part funded by GSK. Ok Stone, if that's the case, and Professor Pepys never made that offer to Dr Wakefield, why doesn't he fucking sue? It's a pretty damning claim, isn't it? Or could it be that Professor Pepys, as a reputable scientist, has paperwork showing it to be true? I know where my money is - and it's not on the three legged donkey lining up in the 3.15 at Newton Abbot that you seem to be wagering everything on.

Stone, like the donkey, is short of legs to stand on. What a cock.

What does tax evasion have to do with quality of research? Oh yes - nothing.

2011-03-24T13:23:00.001Z

The toothless, wheezing old dog that is Age of Autism has its claws out again, this time for Paul Thorsen, a researcher who's worked on various projects that show yet again no association between vaccines and autism. But are they going after him for bad science, or for fabricating evidence? No. They're going after him because he's been charged with tax evasion to the tune of around four million Danish Kroner. Sounds like an awful lot, doesn't it? But... I wonder why they've not bothered to convert it into US dollars or UK pounds for their core readership? Ah - is it because it's a shade under £500,000 - pretty close to the same amount that Andrew Wakefield received for his fraudulent MMR research?

Now, I'm not defending anyone who doesn't pay their tax - far from it. I hope Mr Thorsen, if found guilty, is punished accordingly.

However, this has nothing to do with the quality of his research - it's not as though he was paid that money to make up some spurious association and lie about his data in order to make more millions from his own patents. He's not declared a (substantial) sum of money to the taxman, and is being prosecuted for it. It does not negate the value of his work in any way.

Once again, AoA can't find fault with the science, so they go for the man.

Pathetic bastards.

John Stone in "still dumber than a box of rocks" shock.

2011-03-12T13:27:00.004Z

As I've mentioned before, anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone has pretty much given up on any scientific approaches to showing that vaccines cause autism, and spends his days thinking up weaker and weaker ways to smear anyone even vaguely involved in pointing out Andrew Wakefield's fraud.

His latest attempt is at Age of Autism, where he accuses the BMJ itself of not declaring its competing interests.

Firstly he tries to argue that taking advertising is a undeclared conflict of interest. How can advertising be undeclared John? Look, it's there in front of your eyes. "I'm an advert, trying to sell you something!"

Then he points out that GSK and Merck part fund the BMJ awards. Shock horror - an undisclosed conflict of interest! Except it's not undisclosed. It's there, on the BMJ awards page on the BMJ website. Stone even provides a link to it! How is that possibly undisclosed?

What a moron. Just goes to show - John Stone is a cock.

Age of Autism redesign

2011-01-22T00:18:00.002Z

Anyone had a look at the dog's dinner that is the Age of Autism redesign?

Fuck me it's shit.

Is it up to me to put their muddle headed design thinking alongside their muddle headed thoughts about vaccines, and then go "FUCK ME, YOU'RE FUCKING MORONS!!"??

I dunno - maybe some people like it.

From a design point of view, it stinks.

Age of Autism tells more lies

2011-01-18T17:19:00.002Z

Not content with trying to smear Brian Deer over his exposing of Andrew Wakefield's fraud and failed money-grubbing schemes, Age of Autism has today put up a willfully egregious blog post about an article in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).

The title of this post reads:

NEJM Article Perpetuates Distrust by Mislabeling Victims of Vaccine Adverse Reactions "Antivaccinationists"

Oh, the cruelty - the NEJM clearly has no compassion for the parents!!

Actually, that's not what the article says at all:

Today, the spectrum of antivaccinationists ranges from people who are simply ignorant about science (or “innumerate” — unable to understand and incorporate concepts of risk and probability into science-grounded decision making) to a radical fringe element who use deliberate mistruths, intimidation, falsified data, and threats of violence in efforts to prevent the use of vaccines and to silence critics.

So, what the title really ought to say is:

NEJM accurately labels antivaccinationists as "antivaccionationists", while AoA perpetuates fear by mislabelling autism as "vaccine damage".

There, "Nancy Hokkanen" - I've fixed it for you.

John Stone admits Wakefield is a liar and a fraud

2011-01-07T00:43:00.009Z

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

John "Cock" Stone has tacitly agreed that Wakefield is a liar and a fraud.

If you're a reader of vaccine / anti-vaccine blogs, you'll no doubt be aware that the British Medical Journal has published an excellent piece by Brian Deer about how Andrew Wakefield faked his results, pre-decided his results, didn't declare massive financial conflicts of interests, etc etc. It's a long read, but you can read it here: http://www.bmj.com/content/342/bmj.c5347.full, and it's well worth it.

It's a fascinating read, explaining how Wakefield endangered the health of the nation's (and the world's) children in pursuit of hard cash, from taxpayers (via the legal aid fund) and via private enterprise (through his applications for alternative patents on vaccines).

As you might expect, the anti-vax loons have been all over this, screaming that all Wakefield (or to give him his full medical title, "Wakefield") did was "care for the children"…

Infamous anti-vaxer and internationally regarded halfwit John "Cock" Stone, writing on the anti-vax blog "Age Of Autism" has dribbled a green ink screed, foaming at the mouth, and trying to dismiss Mr Deer's story. Except…

Stone's entire piece is based on his belief that Mr Deer shouldn't have the data, the information about the children involved in the study that he has.

OK, I don't pretend to know how Brian Deer got the information on all the children involved in Wakefield's fraud, and whether it's all entirely legit - although he's spoken to the parents,and I don't see them making complaints about his access - but isn't this a little strange? Let's have a little think…

Stone has written a great long piece rubbishing Brian Deer's article (which demonstrates, with references, the evil that Wakefield did), and - and this is the important bit - doesn't try and refute a single point of fact that Mr Deer made in his article.

John Stone is trying to smear Brian Deer - which we expect, he's tried the same tactic many times over. However, he no longer tries to argue that anything Mr Deer writes is inaccurate.

Conclusion?

John Stone is tacitly agreeing that Wakefield is a liar and a fraud. That's the headline.

Edit: Fixed the link to Age of ~~Stupidity~~ Autism. Thanks to CVB for pointing that out!

Amazing what they let through at AoA sometimes

2010-12-22T18:06:00.000Z

I meant to post this months ago, but never got round to it.

This post somehow made it through the AoA filters back in June when they had their little claws out for me...

Thanks Seanos!

Callous Disregard price countdown

2010-11-25T16:44:00.000Z

Maybe Wakefield could flog more copies of his "handy if you've got a wobbly table" book by advertising it as "It's almost as cheap as bog roll."

It's currently available on Amazon.com, hardback, new, at $8.95. That's £5.67 at today's rate (from xe.com).

Cybertiger loses final appeal

2010-11-18T20:40:00.003Z

How did I miss this one - a story from a couple of months ago now?

Everybody's favourite pointless dickhead, Dr Mark Struthers, has lost his final appeal against his sacking.

Interestingly, his sacking wasn't due to his anti-vaccine, anti-science, AIDS-denying, pro-idiocy views (JabsLoonies Passim), but, by the sound of it, for being a dickhead.

He was sacked for gross misconduct, appealed, and lost, and then took his ex-employers to an industrial tribunal, and lost.

So please join me in raising a belated glass to the sacking of an utter, utter arsehole. And congratulations to "Bedfordshire On Sunday", currently my favourite local paper.

And Struthers' final words on the subject? Yes, he's being an cock again:

“Of course, it was not so much the winning but the taking part that really mattered and I have absolutely no regrets about giving the doctors and their business manager a run for their money."

Twat alert

2010-11-12T18:05:00.000Z

It seems that some anti vaccine wingnut has found this blog today, and has spewed a load of ill thought out nonsense all over the comments.

Going by the name of "Brian Deer" (oh, that's so funny I nearly shit), my poster is claiming a load of the usual bollocks that gets spouted by the anti-vaxers.

I'll summarise the main points, and try and explain to him where he's either missed the point, cherry picking data, or just lying.

1. Measles is not dangerous, as there have only been three deaths from it [in the UK] in the last eighteen years.

Hmm. Has it occurred to you, "Brian", that there have only been 3 deaths from measles in 18 years primarily because we've been vaccinating? Are you also aware that, according to World Health Organisation figures, in 2008 there were 164 000 measles deaths globally – nearly 450 deaths every day or 18 deaths every hour. 450 preventable deaths a day. Think on that one, you callous bastard.

This isn't just about the worried well refusing to vaccinate in this country, where there are generally excellent health facilities for those who do fall sick, and a high level of herd immunity. This is about the morons who preach the evils of vaccination worldwide, and would like to stop vaccination programs in India, aub-Saharan Africa, and other places with less than ideal medical infrastructures.

In the UK and the US, prior to his beloved 18 year period, there were hundreds of thousands of cases of measles, many of them fatal in the 1950s and 60s.

Click for larger version.

Given that vaccination has massively reduced the incidence of measles (to the point that in the UK, until recently, it was no longer endemic), and standards of medical care are constantly improving, it's no surprise that there have been so few deaths from measles in the last 18 years.

That, however, is a situation that my commenter would dearly love to see reversed.

2. Travelling by car is more dangerous than measles - why am I bothering arguing against the anti-vaxers?

Yes, there are more deaths on the road every year (in the UK) than there are from measles. I'll grant you that. However, there isn't a small but vocal group of fucking morons all over the internet trying to ban airbags, seatbelts and crumple zones in cars, and lying about it to vulnerable groups and individuals on the basis that they think they might be dangerous, and / or they have a massive vested interest in keeping their made up "controversy" going. If there was, I'd be pointing out their bloody idiocy as well. Also - see the point about 450 preventable deaths per day.

3. "I don't vaccinate. As i said in a previous post, I lie awake at night fearing rare cancers in the young, diabetes, asthma, arthritis, alzheimer's, Multiple Sclerosis, diabetes T1, autism. These are the increasing modern diseases, that no-one knows what the cause is. I also feel safer. "

This isn't an argument. What you mean is you've listened to a load of anti-vaccine liars, and have had a huge seed of doubt planted in your head. You don't have enough critical thinking faculties to see that there is no good evidence to suggest that any of these conditions are related to vaccines, and no statistical correlation either. None whatsoever.

4. "I cant help it if your choice to vaccinate has a positive externality for my child, at 0 risk to my child. But when you really think about it, you can CALL me scientifically iiliterate , you can call me an idiot, you can show me your degrees in science, just keep vaccinating :)"

This just translates as "I'm a selfish cunt and I know it, la la la, I'm not listening!!!"

5. "Professional research loses credibility with me, if it is sponsored by the very people who sell that vaccine. Selective funding can affect professional research results."

Or; "I'm a paranoid, credulous conspiracy theorist."

6. "Can you tell me if the increased vaccine load, or a component of the vaccine increases the risk of any of these diseases [Rare tumours in the young, asthma, diabeties type 1, Arthritis, MS , autism, nervous system tumours] 20 years after the injection? No? "

Well, idiot boy, given that all the evidence suggests that vaccines do not increase the danger of these conditions, why don't you tell me why you think it does. The onus is on you to show some plausible mechanism for it, or some statistical correlation. Come back when you can.

"Brian" has clearly swallowed the anti-vax bleatings of the likes of JABS without applying any actual thought. One of the main themes running through his slew of comments is that vaccination is more dangerous than measles. Let me run a few figures past you, shall I Brian?

Risk / Benefit analysis of vaccination vs measles (taken from a recent Guardian CiF thread, compiled by DeeTee from (I understand) HPA stats):
If one million kids are given vaccine (MMR):
1000 will have a febrile convulsion.
30 will get thrombocytopenia.
10 will get a severe allergic reaction.
1 will get encephalitis (ADEM).

If one million kids get measles (in Europe, in the 21st century):
200 will die.
100,000 will be ill enough to need hospitalisation.
90,000 will get otitis media.
80,000 will get gastroenteritis.
50,000 will get primary viral or secondary bacterial pneumonia.
5000 will have a febrile convulsion.
1000 will get encephalitis (ADEM or SSPE), 100 of whom will die and 2-300 will have residual brain damage.
1000 will get various other problems such as hepatitis, myocarditis, thrombocytopenia or miscarriage if caught in pregnancy.

Now - wanna rethink?

Excellent piece on the dangers of anti-vaccine wingnuttery

2010-10-12T15:03:00.000+01:00

An excellent piece today in The Guardian on the dangers of anti-vaccine lies. Those hateful people like Stone, Jake Crosby, Jenny McCarthy, Meryl Dorey et al should give it a good read, then think about their actions, and the number of children they're helping to doom to an early death.

Astounding quote mining from John Stone at AoA

2010-10-11T09:46:00.003+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

Age of Autism is full of shit - buy the t-shirt!

John Stone's latest Age of Autism latest post contains a spectacular piece of quote mining.

The story is a piece rubbishing the search for genetic causes for autism, and starts off by criticising a BBC story which covered a link discovered between a genetic condition and ADHD. I must admit, I also felt that the story as reported by the BBC and in other places claimed greater things than the study actually showed, but that didn't immediately invalidate the whole search for genetic causes of conditions for me.

However, Stone then goes on to pull this quote from a Daily Telegraph opinion piece by Steve Jones - professor of genetics at University College London;

"In other words, our chances of being born with a predisposition to a common illness such as diabetes or heart disease are not represented by the roll of a single die, but a gamble involving huge numbers of cards. Some people are dealt a poor mix and suffer as a result. Rather than drawing one fatal error, they lose life's poker game in complicated and unpredictable ways. So many small cards can be shuffled that everyone fails in their own private fashion. Most individual genes say very little about the real risk of illness. As a result, the thousands of people who are paying for tests for susceptibility to particular diseases are wasting their money."

Stone uses this to suggest that all research into genetic causes of disease and conditions is a waste of time. What Professor Jones goes on to say, however, is nothing of the kind.

"Not all the news is bad, however. Some genes, even those that have a small influence, hint at what may be going wrong in the case of a particular malady. Several of those behind a certain age-related blindness that runs in families are involved in the immune system – an unexpected finding that hints at what its cause might be, and where to start looking for a cure.

Even so, many geneticists now think that the constant pressure to sample thousands and thousands more people for a myriad of unknown genes that have a tiny effect may be misplaced. Instead, we would be better off abandoning the scattergun approach, and reading off the entire three thousand million DNA letters of a much smaller number of individuals, healthy and unhealthy, to see in detail what might have gone wrong.

Professor Jones is simply arguing that we're going about the search for genetic causes the wrong way - that genetic causes are more complicated than was at first thought, and we should change approach.

Not quite what you're suggesting, is it John?

Callous Disregard price countdown...

2010-10-06T18:30:00.001+01:00

Andrew Wakefield's useful (if you need to prop a door open) tome of lies and bollocks is now at $10.60 on Amazon.com. According to Google, that's £6.67 (UK cover price £17.40) at today's exchange rates. Anyone want to bet when I'll be able to pick up a copy for a penny?

Excellent resource

2010-10-05T17:51:00.001+01:00

Thanks to Dr Anthony Cox, I've been pointed towards this excellent vaccine resource;

There's a comprehensive history of vaccines, a great section explaining some common vaccine myths / lies, and all kinds of interesting, well explained, um, *stuff*.

Next time someone chucks up a vaccine myth - point them towards this. It won't change the view of the lunatic fringe - the AoA morons, John "Cock" Stone, John "Pigfucker" Scudamore etc - but it's a great resource for nervous new parents.

Tell your friends.

You'd think John Stone would be pro-vaccine, really...

2010-09-22T18:35:00.001+01:00

Given that John "Cock" Stone is a self-proclaimed expert on Mozart, and given what he's written about him, you'd expect him to realise that most of the vaccine-preventable diseases can be extremely nasty - and are potentially fatal. Indeed, according to Stone himself, writing in "The Mozart Compendium" (quote from http://www.freemasons-freemasonry.com/mozart_freemason.html)

John Stone writing in ‘The Mozart Compendium’ lists eleven serious
illnesses which wracked our brother’s short life. The first, in 1762, was
scarlet fever. Bro Mozart was only four. The following year he suffered two
infantile bouts of rheumatic fever. He had whooping cough, when he nearly
suffocated, typhoid, smallpox, hepatitis, and several bouts of rheumatic fever,
among other illnesses.

He now tagteams with Clifford Miller, claiming that so-called "childhood illnesses" are mostly harmless.

What a twat.

Ref: STONE,JOHN, Mozart’s illnesses and death in The
Mozart Compendium(H.C. Robbins Landon ed.),
London: Thames and Hudson, 1990

John Stone flogs dead horse - still a cock - no shock there then

2010-09-18T21:00:00.002+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

Age of Autism is full of shit - buy the t-shirt!

John Stone again seems intent on proving himself incapable of arguing himself out of a wet paper bag. It's taken him two weeks to come up with what's frankly little more than a rehash of his usual "I'm right because I say I'm right - listen to my spin and lies" rants of the last few years.

Since he discovered that former Lib-Dem science spokesman Dr Evan Harris may have had a hand in the bringing low of Stone's personal love interest, Andrew Wakefield, Stone has turned his miniscule intellect on him. Indeed, in the fortnight since Dr Harris wrote a very sensible piece in the Guardian about the Fletcher decision, and how, despite the spin put on it by the likes of Age of Autism, it's not any kind of admission that MMR causes autism, Stone has clearly spent his days and nights frothing over a load of bollocks that AoA have stuck on their blog.

Let's see what the swivel-eyed loon has to say;

In the aftermath of the Fletcher vaccine damage award case, former Liberal-Democrat MP and ‘science’ lobbyist Dr Evan Harris mounted a defence of MMR vaccine in a Guardian ‘political science’ blog (HERE), leaving all the usual questions unanswered, both the manifold questions about vaccine safety and policy

To an extent, yes, they're the "usual questions" - "usual" in that Stone keeps asking them - but they've been answered many, many times. There is no evidence that vaccines, and specifically MMR, cause autism. The only studies that suggest they do have been extremely small, badly conducted ones - usually involving Wakefield, or one of his team - which have been analysed in minute detail, and shown to be science-free rubbish. Plenty of studies have, on the other hand, shown no association.

List of studies supporting (three, with one retracted) and refuting (25) an association

Where does Stone go from there? Well, I'm not entirely sure, as he appears to be talking utter gobbledegook;

…and his own role in its defence including such issues as:

his bureaucratic fall-back position on vaccine damage ignoring legitimate parent concerns
how he helped precipitate the Wakefield affair but has failed to defend key points of GMC’s decision
his defence of controversial proponents of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy diagnosis Drs Meadow and Southall

Taking these points one by one;

What on earth is a "bureaucratic fall-back position on vaccine damage"? Dr Harris has a strong scientific background - I don't think he's likely to say that Stone et al are talking shit because some paper pusher's told him to. The man's a scientist and forms his views from the available evidence - not from rhetoric and quasi-religious belief (unlike Stone). At least, I think this is what Stone means. I could be entirely wrong.
Why, in an article about lack of association between autism and mercury is Dr Harris's involvement in bringing that fraud and liar Andrew Wakefield to book remotely relevant? MMR never had mercury in it. Additionally, why should Dr Harris feel the need to defend the GMC's ruling? Most of the charges were admitted, those that were contested were backed up by evidence, and only halfwits like John "Cock" Stone think otherwise.
What has the article to do with Drs Meadow and Southall?

Do I get the whiff of John Stone just looking for an excuse to throw everything he has (which amounts to the cube root of fuck all) at Dr Harris?

Still - let's carry on.

Stone then starts quoting his own comments on the story, as though they're fact;

Vaccines are not inherently safe and they are not very well tested, as Cochrane points out.

This is Stone cherry picking out of context quotes. He is of the belief that the Cochrane Review of the available evidence on MMR indicates that there are still questions to be asked about the vaccine. There aren't. The abstract of the Cochrane Review actually says:
"Exposure to MMR was unlikely to be associated with Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, autism or aseptic meningitis".

The plain language summary reads as follows:
" No credible evidence of an involvement of MMR with either autism or Crohn's disease was found."

Yes, the Cochrane Review points out that studies are not perfect, but then, that's partly the point of a Cochrane Review - to improve studies in the future. However, there's nothing in the review to suggest that there is any problem with MMR.

What actually happens in the real world is that even serious adverse effects are neither recorded or monitored

Yes they are, you cock. That's what the yellow card system is there for. It can be improved, certainly, but it's there, and unlike the VAERS database (which is often quoted as evidence by anti-vaxers), it's monitored, and results are taken seriously. The chances of a report of someone turning into the Incredible Hulk after a vaccine making it through are minimal.

Apparently Dr Harris ignored this. Are you surprised, Stone? These are points that you make every time you put rabid finger to spittle-flecked keyboard, and they're refuted by scientists and doctors every time. It's not all about you, y'know.

Stone then goes back to his second favourite subject - his fantasy lover, Andrew Wakefield.

No wonder the great interests were all so angry when Andrew Wakefield, John Walker-Smith and Simon Murch of the Royal Free Hospital stepped out of line and actually listened to the parents, and investigated their children’s medical history.

I'm not entirely sure who "the great interests" are supposed to be, but plenty people were angry - not because Wakefield et al were investigating anything, but because their "results" (later shown to be fraudulent, or in plain speak "lies") didn't support the conclusions that were drawn from their work. It's not a conspiracy; Wakefield has been pilloried for unethical behaviour and lying.

Stone then gets on his high horse when Dr Harris doesn't respond to his pointless, repetitive questions about his involvement in helping Wakefield be finally brought before the beak.

John, let me explain something to you. Dr Harris wrote the article. The floor is then open for people to comment on the article, not to demand that they write another article, just for you, on an unrelated topic. I know, next time you rewrite your fucking pointless diatribe, I'll show up, asking you questions about why the Pope has been covering up priestly paedophilia for decades, repeatedly, until my fucking keyboard wears out, then I'll post a diatribe on some shitty, ill-thought out American blog, give myself the pretentious title of "UK Editor" just because I live in the UK, ranting on about how John Stone supports child abuse* because he wouldn't reply to any of my questions.

Stone then proceeds to use the opportunity to rehash a few more of his personal theories and bleatings about the Wakefield affair, continuing to berate Dr Harris for not answering his questions. As I said before John;

"While you remain the internet's equivalent of the man dragging a broomhead down the street on a lead, shouting at invisible goblins and smelling of piss, it's unlikely anyone's going to give you the time of day."

Now that your pet hypotheses are being shot down again and again, why don't you just fuck off?

* True. Opposing potentially life saving vaccines is, in my book, tantamount to child abuse.

Callous Disregard in "not very popular" shock.

2010-09-08T21:14:00.000+01:00

Age of Autism T-Shirt - tell the truth!

Andrew Wakefield's book is now available for less than twelve dollars, new, on Amazon.com. List price $26.95. Twelve dollars is about eight quid. Cheaper than an "Age of Autism Is full Of Shit" T-shirt, but with less street credibility.

Penn & Teller on Vaccines

2010-08-16T18:47:00.000+01:00

Age of Autism T-Shirt - tell the truth!

Orac's got a link to the Penn & Teller "Bullshit!" episode about vaccines.

The second half gets a bit overly snarky at the anti-vax wingnuts they've got lined up - much in the manner of yours truly - but the first half is just straight facts, explained simply (albeit with a little of that P&T snark… No point making TV if that's not there!) and concisely.

If you're one of the anti-vaxers that reads this - and I know there are a fair few - watch this through until the end, with your famously open mind…

Age of Autism will no doubt shortly be publishing some sort of bleating lies about this programme - but it's unlikely they'll actually bother watching it.

Periodic Table of Vaccine Rejectionism

2010-08-15T17:59:00.000+01:00

This is genius. (Courtesy of Orac.)

Age of Autism t-shirt

2010-08-13T00:51:00.000+01:00

It would be so nice to get to the top of the Google search listings for this particular search term...

Age of Autism is full of shit - buy the t-shirt!

So, should anyone fancy helping me on my quest, please feel free to copy the code in the page and paste it into your own blog / website, because, as we all know, Age of Autism is full of shit.

StoneWatch: John Stone spews hate over the parents of dead children

2010-08-06T00:11:00.002+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

Age of Autism is full of shit - buy the t-shirt!

Swivel-eyed anti-vaccine loon John Stone - Age of Autism's UK Editor - recently accused real doctor and journalist Dr Ben Goldacre of offering

"generalised attacks on parents of MMR damaged children"

Well, that's nice isn't it.

Especially when you're the author of this:

An infant dies, it is claimed almost certainly falsely from whooping cough.

[Emphasis mine - Becky]

Nice. This is the story. (Précis: A child has died in Australia, from whooping cough. That vile woman Meryl Dorey of the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN) has been harrassing the family, claiming the child didn't die from Whooping Cough) John Stone, despite having no qualifications in microbiology, immunology, or, in fact, anything, other than being a cock and shouting at Mozart feels free to dismiss a diagnosis from halfway around the world. He doesn't actually suggest what maybe did kill the child.

That's because he's an evil fucking cock.

John Stone manages to demonstrate his complete grasp of "how to be an utter cock"

2010-08-04T17:43:00.007+01:00

Anti-vaccine wingnut John Stone

I've long said that John Stone is a cock. Indeed, this very blog is the number one hit on Google for the phrase "John Stone is a cock". Imagine my joy then, when, just today, John Stone went out of his way to prove to the world in general that he is, indeed, a complete cock.

You see, John Stone has pretty much come to the the conclusion that he's lost the battle when it comes to showing that MMR (or vaccines in general) cause autism. If you look at his green-ink-ravings lately, he hardly ever mentions it, instead going out of his way to merely imply it by smearing journalists, doctors, and anyone else disagrees with him with feeble accusations of "conflict of interest", putting forward points that "prove" this in the manner of an investigative journalist - all the while forgetting to mention that the facts he's twisting have been in the public domain for years, and, crucially, do not demonstrate any sort of conflict of interest.

John Stone hates Dr Ben Goldacre (The medical doctor who writes The Guardian's "Bad Science" column, and who has blasted the media for hyping up the Wakefield "MMR causes Autism" story purely to sell papers), and has been trying to smear him for years, mainly through rants in the Rapid Response section of the British Medical Journal. Stone will have you believe that getting your name in Rapid Responses is equivalent to being "published in a medical journal" - when actually, provided your frothings aren't actually likely to attract legal attention, you're as likely to get your comment published as you are here. Fucking hell, even disgraced ex-GP Mark "Cybertiger" Struthers has had a rabid response accepted, and he's more mental than Stone.

Anyway, today Stone (who now has the grandiose title of "UK Editor for Age of Autism") has gone, all guns blazing, for Dr Goldacre and others who he sees as complicit in his grand MMR cover-up conspiracy. Shame his guns are spud guns.

Writing directly under a banner advert reading "Sponsored by Lee Silsby, the leader in quality compounded medications for autism" - a company who have a vested interest in perpetuating the lies about autism being caused by MMR / mercury / heavy metals - Stone kicks off with what he clearly considers to be a fact that blows Dr Goldacre's career out of the water - who his father is;

After years of secrecy on the matter confirmation has finally come to light that Guardian ‘Bad Science’ journalist Ben Goldacre is the son of Oxford professor of public health Michael J Goldacre

Fuck me! Really? You know, if I'd been unaware of that, I could have discovered it by, for example, reading Wikipedia in November 2008. More to the point, how is this relevant? Well, Stone goes on;

Goldacre senior was a co-author of a study of the effects of GlaxoSmithKline’s notorious Urabe strain version of MMR, Pluserix, after it was suddenly withdrawn from public use in 1992

Oh - I see. Dr Goldacre senior wrote about MMR too! Stone tries to show how legitimate this argument is, by linking to PubMed. Unfortunately he just links to the homepage. Presumably he hopes that anyone dumb enough to believe a word he says will just assume that Dr Goldacre senior is blindly defending MMR. Well, no. The paper is critical of the 'Urabe' strain of MMR, although points out that cases of Aseptic Meningitis in (Urabe) vaccinated children was still only around a quarter of the number that would be expected in wild mumps. Still, hardly a glowing endorsement.

Fresh from this major triumph, Stone heads further into conspiracy theory territory;

His [Ben Goldacre's] early article MMR: Never mind the facts won the accolade of the GlaxoSmithKline sponsored Association of British Science Writers’ award for the best feature article of 2003.

Stone then links to one of his tedious BMJ rants, where he points out that GlaxoSmithKline was a "MMR manufacturer and defendent".

How the fuck is that relevant? Ben Goldacre writes a piece for a newspaper. Some time later, it wins an award, which is sponsored by a pharmaceutical company. Unless Stone's implying that Dr Goldacre took money from GSK to actually write the article? Is that it John? Are you suggesting that? There's an order of events here, which you seem keen to gloss over.

Still, Stone ploughs on;

The article, however, used flawed epidemiology for which he later offered no defence, as well as including an anonymous attack on Andrew Wakefield by one of Wakefield’s colleagues.

What Stone is referring to is his rapid response, which cherry-picked quotes from various studies to make it appear that there was still some doubt over the safety of MMR - when the studies he was quoting from claimed no such thing. Frankly I'd be surprised if Dr Goldacre knew about Stone's accusations, let alone concerned himself with replying to them. It's hardly as though they were valid scientific criticisms in a peer reviewed paper. No, they were the rantings of a fool. John Stone, however has delusions of grandeur (and a massively over-inflated sense of his own wit, intelligence and importance).

Next, Stone goes on the attack (in the manner of an elderly, toothless, three-legged Yorkshire terrier), by quoting one of his favourite lines;

A stock-in-trade has been his generalised attacks on parents of MMR damaged children. His Bad Science blogsite for a long time offered this intimidatory advice to would-be contributors:

“..personal anecdotes about your MMR tragedy will be deleted for your own safety”

Several problems here John. There's no evidence of MMR damage, that's hardly "intimidatory", nor an attack on parents, and you clearly don't recognise a throwaway (if possibly a little insensitive to the hard of thinking like yourself) comment telling readers of the blog that anecdotes will be given short shrift; it's a site about science, not a place for "debating" with alt-medders and the likes of you and Guss The Fuss. Also, this line was removed from the site years ago - hardly the actions of someone for whom abuse of parents was "stock-in-trade".

Next, Stone makes another laugh out loud comment;

A fundamental of Ben Goldacre’s journalistic method is the ad hominem and he always talks across opponents: he can always depend on the greater prominence of his published views and he never answers the many awkward criticisms.

Stone doesn't do irony. John! Your whole piece is one big ad-hom! (I realise that here I can be accused of much the same, but I'd like to point out that the fact that I think John Stone is an unpleasant cock is not why I have a go at him. I have a go at him because his views are so ill thought out, his science so abysmal, his ability to discuss a rational point is non-existent and (most of all) he's endangering the lives of children. My stating that he's a cock isn't ad-hom, if anything it's just random abuse (although I'd actually say it's demonstrable fact).)

We've already discussed what Stone means by "answering awkward criticism". Why not write a paper on your views John, see if you can get it published in a reputable journal, and then maybe the answers to the "awkward criticisms" you dream up over your dining room table might be provided. While you remain the internet's equivalent of the man dragging a broomhead down the street on a lead, shouting at invisible goblins and smelling of piss, it's unlikely anyone's going to give you the time of day.

The Goldacre dynasty seem to be one of several with on-going connections with the MMR affair:

Dynasty - ooh, sounds grand. Stone then goes on to imply (never stating - he knows that there's nothing to his implications and that he'd be sued from here to fucking doomsday if he actually stated any of them outright) that a series of other science writers, MPs, and publishers are connected with the MMR affair. Well, yes, they're connected in that they all were all involved in the demonstrating that Andrew Wakefield was a fraud, his research was fraudulent and unethical, he was paid massive undisclosed figures to find the results that he claimed… etc etc. Funnily enough, Stone doesn't suggest that there was a huge conspiracy to puff up the story, as demonstrated by the Daily Mail, the Express, credulous fools like Melanie Philips, himself, Clifford Miller, etc… No. He just lists a load of people who don't agree with his viewpoint.

Stone's not finished yet, oh no. Back to Dr Goldacre. He repeats another of his favourite quotes;

“people periodically come up to me and say, isn't it funny how that Wakefield MMR paper turned out to be Bad Science after all? And I say: no. The paper always was and still remains a perfectly good small case series report, but it was systematically misrepresented as being more than that, by media that are incapable of interpreting and reporting scientific data.”

Of course, he omits to mention that that comment was made before the evidence of Wakefield's fiddling results, lying to team members and unethical practices came to light. Had Wakefield's research been honest, then yes, it would have been a "perfectly good small case series report". But it wasn't, and it wasn't. However, Stone then goes on to feign incredulity that what Dr Goldacre wrote (before all the evidence came to light) wasn't listened to by the GMC when;

Wakefield and colleagues were found with remarkable ingenuity to be in innumerable respects in breach of the terms of the protocol which they had reasonably pleaded they were not doing.

Actually, they didn't plead that to most of the charges. Read the GMC's verdict. Most of the charges were "Admitted and proved". But you're not going to tell the readers of AoA that, are you John. You're going to make out that Wakefield et al fought until the end. They didn't. They admitted most of the charges when they knew they were fucked.

Right. That's it for tonight.

Unfortunately there are another five paragraphs of Stone's rubbish - they'll have to wait for another day.

An Excuse for Abuse

2010-07-28T17:55:00.004+01:00

Age of Autism is full of shit - buy the t-shirt!

Age of Autism has a contributor called Jake Crosby. He's apparently:

Jake Crosby is a college student with Asperger Syndrome at Brandeis University who is double majoring in History and Health: Science, Society and Policy.

(Hey Jake - I hate to tell you, but if you carry on down the anti-vaccine road, you're fucked when it comes to the "Health: Science" part of your college course.)

He apparently believes journalism involves pointing people towards information about people he doesn't like, that's freely available on the web, then either twisting it to claim it shows something it doesn't, or simply telling people it shows that that person is unreliable.

He's tried it with Orac, and today, he's having a go at Brian Deer - the journalist who uncovered a lot of Andrew Wakefield's lies and deceit - simply because he has a page of photos of himself on his personal website. Sorry Jake, but I don't follow the logic.

Conflicted “journalist” Brian Deer’s website is perhaps one of the biggest resources of disinformation on the internet. Even worse, there is likely no better example of one man’s online shrine to himself than briandeer.com – a cesspool of self-adulation. Nothing quite sums this up better than a particular webpage that reads “Brian’s pictures” at the bottom of the homepage. You’d think it would be the many different photos of news events from his journalistic exploits, but a click of the mouse shows that it is in fact – literally – all him. See for yourself.

Still, it provides an excuse for a load of other dribbling sycophants to have a go at Mr Deer.

How Age of Autism can claim any credibility, or claim to speak for anyone when it publishes shite like this is beyond me.

About me

2010-07-24T23:23:00.004+01:00

For a while now, "offended" parties (John "Cock" Stone, Clifford Miller, commenters on Age of Autism) have been wondering who I am. So here's a picture. It's not a bad likeness.

Other than that, I'm exactly who I've said I am. Clearly I'm not going to give out much more information, as I find Stone's obsession with me creepy enough as it is.

Edit: Click here if you want a t-shirt! :-)

Kim Stagliano Age of Autism shows its her hateful side

2010-07-22T18:27:00.006+01:00

You may have caught the very, very sad story of Saiqa Akhter and her children recently. Ms Akhter is a mother who has been charged with killing her children by choking them with wire, allegedly because they were autistic. It's a terrible story.

However, nothing's been proved yet, no-one's been found guilty, no medical reports have been made public. Nothing.

As a mother myself, I suggest that while nothing can condone this action, any mother who's driven to the extreme of killing her own children is more than likely to be very, very ill herself and in serious need of help - possibly help that's been needed for a long time, but never given.

Whatever the story, it's going to be far more complicated than "woman kills children because they're autistic."

What's the verdict (without hearing testimony, evidence, medical reports etc) of Age of Autism?

The good news is that it happened in Texas and with any luck … this bitch will go to her death courtesy of the Texas Justice system.

Lovely, caring people eh?

No.

Edit: Ironically, the people who support Age of Autism are very often people who believe child abuse murders are usually actually caused by vaccinations.

"Alan Yurko was forced to admit manslaughter to secure release for a crime he didn't do - and to let vaccines off the hook for killing a baby" - Cybertiger

Edit 2: It seems that Kim Stagliano (Managing Editor of Age of Autism) has misjudged her readers on this one, as most of the comments pretty much echo my sentiments above. So I've amended the title.

Autism One hates the UK

2010-07-16T19:14:00.003+01:00

It seems my comments on Teri Arranga being a liar have hit home. A poster on the AutismOne website has left the following comment.

Before getting to the bigger picture in subsequent blogs and newsletters let’s have a final look at Ms. Fisher-of-the-UK. As mentioned, in the newsletter, Ms. Fisher decided it would be “okay” to continue the campaign of terror, which originated in the U.K., against Dr. Wakefield in America.
Ms. Fisher-of-the-UK actively attempts to disrupt events where Dr. Wakefield is scheduled to speak. Let me rephrase that. A British subject attempts to cancel an American event. An event hosted by American organizations, paid by American dollars, attended by American citizens, held on American soil.
Granted, the pharma blowhards are strange and awkward people, but Ms. Fisher’s behavior leaves the borders of bizarre far behind and enters a weirdly alternate universe before the Bill of Rights or 911.
Freedom of Speech is the most treasured American right. We view with great concern foreigners who would attempt to impose their limitations here or threaten anyone’s Constitutional rights.
Enjoy your haggis, blood pudding and tripe, Ms. Fisher-of-the-UK, and let the grownups get to work. This is America where we solve problems by listening to what people have to say. And, in a few years, we will again cross the Atlantic and save the U.K. from itself.

Hmm. Someone's got a bee in their bonnet about the UK. Or maybe that's just jingoistic nationalism. And what does "but Ms. Fisher’s behavior leaves the borders of bizarre far behind and enters a weirdly alternate universe before the Bill of Rights or 911." mean, for fuck's sake?

In America, where you solve problems by listening to what people have to say, it seems that freedom of speech means "the freedom to fucking lie to people in order to scare them into believing your sick and twisted agenda". Without wanting to stoop to your depths (but I'm going to), Mr AutismOne, you've got a fucking history of that in the States, haven't you. How is the Rev Jim Jones these days?

Anyway, who posted this screed? Oh look, it's someone by the name of Ed Arranga. Does Teri have to have her husband fight her battles for her these days? I notice there's not a sign of a retraction, nor a shred of evidence of my bullying...

What a cock. Let's see if I can make this blogpost the numberone search result in Google for Ed Arranga is a dickhead.

Meryl Dorey - "Die in a fire"???

2010-07-12T10:38:00.002+01:00

An interesting communication from Meryl Dorey, head of the AVN (Australian Vaccination Network) has been forwarded onto me. In it, among other bleatings which just went into my brain as "It's not fair! it's not fair! it's not fair!!!" was this paragraph;

"We have had a tumultuous year with our own and our family's personal details published on the internet. Our advertisers and professional members have been subject to severe and vicious harassment due to their support of the AVN. We have had wild accusations made against us stating that we believe in reptilian monsters. And there have been numerous death threats - the most recent of which was published on Twitter recently and retweeted many times stating that I should die in a fire." Ms Dorey concluded.

Wanting Meryl Dorey to die in a fire? That's pretty extreme - I wouldn't wish that on the wackiest of wingnuts (and Meryl fits pretty well into that group). I must see who's doing this. Fortunately, Twitter has pretty good search technology, so let's see what we can find.

Hmm.

Nothing. No results for any combination of "die in a fire", "Meryl", "Dorey", "fountainbeauty" (Meryl's Twitter name), "AVN", or anything else I can think of.

Nothing in Google either.

I suspect Meryl Dorey of making this up, as surely, if it had been "retweeted many times", it would be quite easy to find... Can anyone point me to a single tweet suggesting Meryl Dorey should die in a fire?

PS.

Oh, and as regards the "AVN believe in reptilian monsters" bit - well… Almost. The AVN posted a link to a mad conspiracy theory article about vaccines in Pakistan Daily, which was written by arch-loon David Icke. Who does believe in reptilian monsters. The story's written up in the ThinkingIsReal blog (which you need to be registered for, but you can read it here.

Teri Arranga is a liar

2010-07-05T08:31:00.004+01:00

Woo - I'm in the Autism One newsletter! Teri Arranga - who, I should point out, is a liar - is trying to convince her members that there is a conspiracy of violence to shut down that other liar, Andrew Wakefield.

If Teri would can produce evidence that:

I have sent any more than two emails to the Ritz Carlton Group

I have ever telephoned the Ritz Carlton Group

I have ever sent a fax to the Ritz Carlton Group

I contacted the Ritz Carlton Group on more than one day

I used language that could be construed as "bullying", "intimidating" or "harrassing" in my two emails (actually just one email, sent to two addresses)

The Ritz Carlton told me to "take a hike" - or in fact contacted me in any way

then I will retract my allegation that she is a liar, and that she's lying to the members of Autism One.

Rebecca Fisher: Pharma Blowhard or Concerned Citizen?

You can't be a parent in this community without bumping into them. Every article, TV program, blog or radio show brings them out in force. The mention of "autism" or "Dr. Wakefield" brings them scurrying out from under their rocks snapping and snarling and spitting about the wonders of vaccines and their self-anointed roles as concerned citizens in protecting the pubic health.

It's a scam and we all know it. Most of the bloggers, poseurs, and self-ordained autism experts have ties either directly or indirectly to pharma or mainstream medicine (which is really one and the same thing). Age of Autism has done a remarkable job outing Orac and shedding light on the soft underbelly of the vaccine apologists.

Hmm... Orac is an Oncologist. Demonstrating his links to "mainstream medicine" isn't going to be too hard, even for the morons at AoA…

Rebecca Fisher of the UK has been very busy lately. Blogging here under the title "JABS Loonies - Justice, Awareness, Basic Support and Mind Blowing Stupidity," Rebecca recently left the Internet safety of anonymity to engage in more concrete acts of aggression against our community.

"Concrete acts of aggression"??? What - have I started actually attacking people in the manner of an anti-abortion activist? Or have I started performing colonoscopies on children who don't need them or something?

Rebecca's current mission is attempting to frighten, bully or pressure venues Dr. Wakefield is scheduled to speak at on his current book tour into canceling the event. Hotels are under siege by email, fax, and phone demanding they cancel Dr. Wakefield's appearance.

Maybe, but not from me. I've written a couple of emails, suggesting, not demanding.

For a week before this past Saturday, Rebecca attempted to intimidate the Phoenix Ritz-Carlton site of Dr. Wakefield's latest talk into capitulation. To their credit the Ritz told her, in essence, to take a hike.

No. Last Wednesday I wrote two (non-threatening) emails, one to the contact address on the Ritz-Carlton (Phoenix)'s website, and, because that looked very dodgy (phxrz.leads@ritzcarlton.com) (ETA: Actually, I've just worked that one out - phxrz - Phoenix Ritz. D'oh.), one to the main comments email address for Ritz Carlton hotels (comments@ritzcarlton.com). That's it. I did not phone, I did not fax, I did not try and intimidate anyone for a whole week. The Ritz did not tell me to "take a hike" - they never even replied, which is, of course, their right.

Teri Arranga, you are a liar. You are trying to frighten your members even more than you do already. You are inventing some sort of campaign of violence where none exists.

Rebecca, who also blogs as Becky Fisseux, will continue to act in a dangerous and reckless fashion until she is outed and her connections to pharma publically revealed.

Still the attacks will continue until we take legal and other appropriate actions necessary to incur real costs on those who spread lies and misinformation.

My connections to pharma? You'll have to look a long way Teri. I don't have any.

And "dangerous and reckless"? Coming from someone who promotes reintroducing measles and other lethal diseases as though they were some kind of endangered animal that's a bit fucking rich.

Anyway, here's the email I sent:

Andrew Wakefield June 26 at The Ritz in Phoenix

Dear Sir / Madam,

I'm writing to express my extreme disappointment that such a well thought of hotel as the Ritz is playing host to this event on Saturday.

Disappointingly, The Autism Society of Greater Phoenix has chosen your venue to promote unsupported quack therapies and to support Andrew Wakefield, a man whose scaremongering has led to disastrous falls in vaccination levels among children. Levels have fallen so far that measles - a potentially fatal or crippling disease, even in countries with good levels of health care such as the UK - is now reported as once again being endemic here. Vaccination is arguably the greatest medical invention or discovery of our age, and has without doubt saved more lives worldwide than any other medical procedure. Hosting a book signing by Mr Wakefield would only indicate support for his unethical methods (including taking blood from children at a birthday party, and carrying out colonoscopies on vunerable autistic children for non-medically indicated reasons)

Many anti-vaccine activists want to return us to an age of deaths from preventable illnesses, claiming, against all evidence that vaccines are harmful, simply in order to promote their own agenda.

Andrew Wakefield is not a brave, maverick doctor, fighting the establishment, as The Autism Society of Greater Phoenix would have it; rather he has recently been struck off the medical register for horrific breaches of ethics involving non-indicated clinical procedures on children and undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Should you allow this event to go ahead, I fear your company's reputation will be seriously tarnished, and respectfully ask you to reconsider your decision.

Best regards,

Rebecca Fisher

Andrew Wakefield - GMC ruling: http://www.gmc-uk.org/Wakefield_SPM_and_SANCTION.pdf_32595267.pdf
Vaccine preventable diseases - American Academy Of Paediatrics: http://www.aap.org/pressroom/aappr-photos.htm

A wind-up, surely

2010-07-01T20:11:00.003+01:00

The joys of the junior anti-vaxer.

Is it possible to have a natural immunity to MMR without having contracted the disease or being vaccinated.

No-one has thought to point out that MMR isn't a disease.

Maybe that's a bit harsh - after all, we talk about the "MMR vaccine" in the same way we discuss the "'flu vaccine". Perhaps this is someone asking for some help with a school project. However, JABS is hardly the place to get good information…

Callous Disregard

2010-06-22T19:38:00.002+01:00

That's the "oh so humourous" title of Andrew Wakefield's book. A book about how he was victimised by the medical establishment, etc etc blah blah blah.

He's been reduced to giving it away at signings.

I'm not prepared to pay for a copy - but if you've got a copy and would like to sell it to me, I'll pay one penny, plus postage. (2p if it's signed, and 3p if it's dedicated)

4p if it's dedicated to John "Cock" Stone.

(Actually, if you can get a copy, dedicated and signed by Andrew Wakefield (or to give him his full medical title; "Andrew Wakefield") that reads "John Stone is a cock", I'll give you thirty quid.)

What a cunt, turning a comment about his "callous disregard" for the health of children made by the GMC into the title of a self-loving book...

What. A. Cunt.

Evil bastards on JABS forum - no shock then

2010-06-02T17:55:00.002+01:00

A new poster (mric) has cropped up on the JABS forum, who's made a couple of points pointing out the idiocy of the attitude of a couple of posters when it comes to "natural" diseases. He / she has also made a comment about a close relative who is dying from skin cancer.

In a spectactularly crass and stupid reply, Topaz says;

I am so sorry about your close relative with skin cancer. The doctors always give the most pessimistic take on the outlook and offer up patented cures with uncomfortable and undignified side effects.
There is of course a natural cure used by a doctor who was struck off for being too successful at curing patients the apparent norm these days in Orwellian scientific medicine. It is effective and cheap and cannot be patented.

Topaz then manages to almost trump this vileness by summoning up Scopie's Law as "proof";

http://www.center4cancer.com/skin-cancer-sb.php
http://www.whale.to/cancer/sodium.html

So, suggesting to a new poster that it's their relative's own fault that they're dying because they didn't turn to quackery (those two sites mentioned are pushing maple syrup and bicarbonate of soda as foolproof cures for all cancers, for fuck's sake) is seen as acceptable on JABS now is it? Peddling the conspiracy theory beloved of all alt-med wingnuts (that big pharma can cure cancer easily, it just doesn't want to because it can't make any money from it) to a grieving relative is OK is it?

She's evil - but will she get barred from JABS? Will she fuck.

(In the same post, Topaz is pushing a brew of kitchen herbs as a preventative against bubonic plague… - how fucking far does her wingnuttery go?)

Very, very quiet

2010-05-27T18:29:00.002+01:00

It's gone remarkably quiet at JABS since Andrew Wakefield's erasure from the medical register. Nothing on the forum - and the forum has been updated since the verdict. Neither is there anything on the front page of the site bleating about it.

John "Cock" Stone showed his face over at Bad Science for a while, and left with a flea in his ear after his usual approach of ignoring the relevant facts (misconduct, unethical behaviour, lying etc) and trying to big up the odd sentence that doesn't entirely discredit Wakefield's research (when the rest of the document the quote is pulled from roundly discredits it). Bad Science is a bad place to try that, populated, as it is, by people who tend to look out original sources of information, and point out inaccuracies or misleading statements.

(He also showed up in the comments section of The Guardian's "Comment Is Free" - but he's not posted anything on JABS. I suspect he thinks it's beneath him now he's got a job as UK lapdog to the morons at Age of Autism.)

But I digress…

You'd think that the JABS ranters would be up in arms, but nope - nothing. Maybe this is a good sign. Perhaps Jackie Fletcher has finally realised that "Saint" Andy is nothing but a charlatan, and is quietly phasing the organisation out.

I hope so - she'll be a very brave woman if she does so.

With any luck this sorry tale is now over, and the world can get back to preventing lethal diseases without the bunch of gobshites we've had to put up with since Andrew Wakefield let loose his lies and drivel.

Oh Happy Day!

2010-05-24T11:07:00.002+01:00

Andrew Wakefield has been struck off.

BBC News

Obviously it's not going to stop him spouting his dangerous nonsense, but it's still excellent news.

Fletcher shoots down major JABS argument

2010-05-21T23:44:00.002+01:00

Jackie Fletcher has posted a news article, which she seems to think supports her "dangerous vaccines" agenda.

First of all, a fact:

The MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) triple vaccine was introduced in the UK in 1988 for children aged 12 to 18 months.

Good stuff.

Then, a wild leap into anti-vax territory:

…the vaccine was implicated in the death of Glasgow baby Ryan Mason. Labour MP Michael Martin wrote to the then Scottish minister for education and health, Michael Forsyth, explaining that Ryan died aged six months, 10 days after receiving the vaccine.

Tragic though this is, there's no evidence of causation here.

In fact, the article specifically states:

Later that month, with the post-mortem investigation not complete, officials advised the minister that the baby’s death was probably not vaccine-related.

Then, another fact:

A memo of 1992 records that in 1990 and 1991, for the first time since records began, no child in Scotland died from acute measles-related illness.

So, let's rewrite Jackie's post, shall we?

"MMR vaccine introduced in Scotland. Four years later, measles effectively wiped out."

How good is that?

Of course, there are fucking morons who think it should be re-introduced, in much the same way as the Red Kite has been reintroduced to parts of England.

*sigh*

The Andrew Wakefield Story

2010-05-21T20:21:00.002+01:00

In pictures. Genius.

Vile opportunism

2010-05-18T17:47:00.003+01:00

Aasa (a name which I suspect is simply a misspelling of "arsehole") has posted a link to a very sad story, under the heading "Another Tragedy" - given the context, the JABS website, clearly implying "Another vaccination tragedy".

A mother has been charged with killing her severely disabled and autistic son. If she has (and it's not been shown that she has), she must have been at her wits end - I feel nothing but sympathy for her; few of us can imagine the stresses she's been under for years.

However, this has nothing to do with vaccination. It's not mentioned in the story, it's not implied anywhere, except in the twisted mind of Aasa, who sees fit to post it on JABS, suggesting that there's some link, and co-opting this poor woman's grief for his/her own twisted ends - suggesting to impressionable parents who are pointed towards JABS as a support group that this is how they could end up.

Vile, vile people.

Make your mind up…

2010-03-23T19:27:00.002Z

John "Cock" Stone's new friends at Age of Autism are crowing over a recommendation in the US that doctors stop using Glaxo's Rotovirus vaccine, as it turns out that "FDA [Food and Drug Administration] has learned that DNA from porcine circovirus type 1 (PCV1) is present in Rotarix"

Now, it seems that this has been present for quite some time, there's no evidence that this is a safety risk, and not even AoA has been bleating about this vaccine. However, a potential contaminant has been found, so the FDA is doing the sensible thing and having the vaccine withdrawn. The morons at AoA are cock-a-hoop.

Now…

According to your common or garden pro-disease advocate and conspiracy theorist, vaccines are known to be dangerous by doctors, the government and "big pharma". So why, as soon as a potential problem crops up, is it openly announced on the FDA's website for all to see? It's not as though this is something that AoA or other pro-disease enthusiasts has forced out of them - this is safety information freely given by the very same groups who are accused of a cover-up about vaccine safety.

Kind of blows the whole conspiracy theory out of the water, doesn't it?

How the anti-vaccine lobby resembles the BNP.

2010-03-20T18:16:00.004Z

Anti-vaxers aren't "pro" anything except disease. They're very pro-lethal disease. They'd not admit that though, so I'll let it pass for now.

Have you noticed though, that they like to claim (Jenny McCarthy's a regular offender on this one) that they're pro-"safe vaccines" - although they never explain what would need to be done to make them "safe" in their eyes.

They're lying.

You see, if groups like Generation Rescue and JABS were really pro-safe vaccines, they's either state what should be done to make the vaccines safe - or they'd be putting money into vaccine research - in order to make vacines safer.

They do neither.

I'm now going to turn one of the anti-vaxers' arguments back on them. They're always keen to label the medical "establishment" and anyone who doesn't agree with their point of view as "fascist" [1] [2] [3] (there are plenty more) , but in reality, they're the ones who resemble the fascist British National Party (BNP). The BNP have no positive policies - every one of their policies boils down to "send 'em all back", despite all the evidence that shows that this isn't even remotely addressing the problem, and is even less of a solution. Financial problems? Fault of the immigrants - send 'em all back. Crime? Fault of the immigrants - send 'em all back. Poor school results? Send 'em all back.

The anti-vaxers are the same. Any medical problem - it's the vaccines. Autism? It's the vaccines. AIDS? It's the vaccines. Allergies? It's the vaccines.

See what there is in common here? A need to blame someone else, a lack of positive intent, a lack of reasoned thought, a vitriolic hatred of anyone with differing views…

I'm sure I could go on, but there you have it. Anti-vaxers are the medical equivalent of the BNP.

Armed insurrection by loonies!

2010-02-15T10:05:00.002Z

A question has been posted on JABS;

What are your plans if vaccines become compulsory?

An interesting question, and, if JABS didn't ban all dissenting voices, one which could provoke an interesting discussion. However, Divastrop has a better idea. Rather than discuss the issues, just KILL 'EM ALL!!

I think we the people would have to rise up and overthrow the government if that happened!
It would be totally against human rights, and I would hope that the UN or somebody would get involved otherwise there would be civil war and I don't think I'm being OTT in saying that

Actually, Miss Strop, I think you are going perhaps a teeny bit OTT…

No - Wakefield's findings not replicated.

2010-01-29T13:22:00.002Z

That moron Seonaid has posted a link to an abstract of a paper on Age Of Autism:

Wakefield's Science Proven Valid Again In New Study That Replicates Findings

Here's the piece.

It doesn't show anything of the sort.

What it does show is that people on the autistic spectrum who have chronic gastrointestinal symptoms, erm, have chronic gastrointestinal symptoms.

I'm going to produce a study with the same methodology. I'm going to recruit 100 people with ginger hair, and look at them. Then I'll publish a report proving that people with ginger hair have ginger hair.

It's the same fucking principle.

Wakefield confirmed as Nasty Piece Of Work by GMC

2010-01-29T07:48:00.003Z

OK, I paraphrase. "Dishonest", "misleading", "irresponsible".

Nine hundred plus allegations found "proved" against ninety odd "not proved".

No doubt there will be a foaming, frothing at the mouth backlash from the JABS loons, but at the moment they're all rather quiet.

Alternatively, they may realise they've been lead up the garden path for all these years and quietly accept my offer of an amnesty.

Pigs fuelled and ready for takeoff.

Doing the maths for JABS

2010-01-20T20:15:00.004Z

"Gandalf" asks:

Wouldn't it be interesting if someone (not me) could work out the odds for being vaccine damaged verses actually contracting the disease and then being damaged by it.

OK, lets have a go, for the recent Swine Flu vaccination campaign.

Vaccinations handed out - many hundreds of thousands, if not millions. Credible reports of serious (long lasting) adverse effects or death due to vaccine, none.

Deaths from Swine Flu - around 360.

You do the comparison.

As an aside, it's interesting that the anti-vaxxers and the usual suspects in the press have been crowing, saying the swine flu outbreak wasn't as bad as predicted. None of them have mentioned that part of the reason for this is likely to be the vaccination of many thousands of people in high risk groups. There's no way of knowing for sure, obviously, but it strikes me that there could well have been many more fatalities without vaccination. Just a thought.

Jackie Fletcher gets legal aid, hires 'eminent scientist'

2010-01-04T20:14:00.005Z

According to WiganToday.net, JABS' Jackie Fletcher has "…become the first person in the UK to be granted a form of legal aid to help take a claim to a Vaccine Damage Payment Unit tribunal."

This will be her second attempt to claim damages for her disabled son, whom she claims was damaged by his MMR shot - the first claim collapsed when it turned out she was trying to sue the wrong pharmaceutical company.

WiganToday.net then goes on:

And while the majority of the medical establishment remains set against links between the measles, mumps and rubella jab and conditions such as autism and Crohn's disease, the Fletchers now have the backing of an eminent American scientist who will testify for them.

And who's this eminent scientist you may well ask?

Dr Marcel Kinsbourne. Autism Diva has an interesting post on him and his performance at the autism omnibus hearings. Please read it - it's most amusing. He claims not to know the difference between an indexed and a non-indexed publication, it turns out he's not treated any children for 17 years (at the time of the hearing), and admits that if gut biopsy had not found measles, he would would no longer hold the opinion that this was a case of MMR causing ASD - it was shown that it was impossible for measles to have shown up in the gut biopsies.

So, hardly the expert that WiganToday claims. Presumably they're simply repeating what the Fletchers have told them.

I have every sympathy for Jackie Fletcher having to care for a severely disabled child for eighteen years or so, but hopefully when this is thrown out again she'll be able to admit she's wrong about the cause of that disability.

Edit: Kinsbourne's a favourite of John Scudamore's repository of all things anti-science, Whale.To. I think that says quite a lot about him… :-)

This is all over JABS

2010-01-02T20:05:00.005Z

We are greatly saddened by the sudden death of Harry Horne-Roberts, who died in his sleep last week. It's not hard to imagine the pain, grief and anger they must feel at his passing. Deepest sympathy to his grieving parents.

We're all saddened about this, the death of Harry Horne-Roberts, whose parents believed his autism was caused by MMR - but was shown not to be.

That idiot John Stone (on AoA) is pushing this as a young man made autistic and killed by MMR, but actually, it's a young autistic man who may have received inappropriate treatment for his autism and other health conditions, and has died. There's a very big difference, and Stone (and all those who have reposted his evil, vile vitriol on JABS) know this, but they're co-opting the grief of his parents for their own vile pro-disease agenda.

The original, vile post at Age Of Autism can be found at: http://bit.ly/4s6uRJ

My thoughts, sympathy and best wishes go out to Harry's family, who have been horribly misled by the pro-disease lobby, and I want to throw John Stone into a pit of boiling ordure.

The most ludicrous forum name ever?

2009-12-30T18:16:00.002Z

"Informed" has posted this;

*link to perfectly reasonable article about Crohn's disease*

Increase of 8 percent per year in children diagnosed with Crohn's
disease/Ulcerative colitis between 1994-2005.

Crohn's disease and Ulcerative colitis have been linked to measles
in research in The Royal Free Hospital London 1995( Lancet Medical Journal)

Irish Colitis & Crohn's Support
& Irish Vaccine Informed Parents.

Is Mr/Mrs/Miss "Informed" unaware of the fact that almost all of the authors of that paper have disowned it? Or that the lead on it, one Dr Wakefield, was paid to find those results and has been shown to have MADE UP the results after getting NONSENSE from his testing lab? Oh - and is fairly likely to be STRUCK OFF, after causing a scare that may well have KILLED AND MAIMED HUNDREDS OF CHILDREN?

"Informed"? Hardly, arsehole.

Evidence! Jenny has evidence!

2009-12-28T11:33:00.005Z

Jennyr has posted this - this could be positively earth-shattering!

I have direct evidence that state-funded experts and their lackies will lie in order to avoid negligence claims.

Go on then jennyr, where is it? As the phrase goes; "Evidence, or Shut The Fuck Up". I'm expecting some serious investigative journalism.

While no-one will be terribly surprised, claiming that you have evidence isn't the same as actually having it. So, jennyr, let loose the fluffy bunnies in your head, and show us this evidence.

Religion and Anti-Vax-Nuttery

2009-12-22T19:43:00.004Z

While I'm not usually one to quote "Worldwide Religious News" as a source, as it's Christmas, I'm going to:

Measles kills children of anti-vaccination sect.

Mind you, they're quoting this article in The Scotsman - and a search for the Joseph Marange Apostolic Church throws up all these results.

Once more, anti vax quackery kills children. Are you reading this, John "Cock" Stone, Jackie Fletcher, Clifford Miller, Meryl "Whoop Whoop Wheeeeeee" Dorey et al?

Anti Vax march a massive success

2009-12-12T12:26:00.006Z

As you can see from this photo, the anti-vaccination march in Edinburgh today has been a massive success.

If you can't spot it, the protest is behind the bloke in the brown jacket.

(Thanks to @endless_psych for the photo)

Edit: Mr Psych has written about the protest.

Home education, the JABS way

2009-12-08T19:34:00.005Z

There's a thread on the JABS forum (I say "thread", but until today it's just been one person posting) about home education. Perfectly reasonable really, Janet has been reposting stories about home education and autism / Aspergers. No mention of vaccines, and interesting.

Today, a fairly new poster ("lordboult")posted this:

We had to remove emily from special needs pt of school after spending a year encouraging her,autism via mmr.have home ed for 9 years she has improved in a fantastic way,but,LA hve been rude sarcastic and downright intrusive when each state ment is due,we have had to engage a specialist lawyer as emily is sixteen the la are having a final push!As for badman he is being monitered also he has a vague past and is connected to microsoft,the plot thickens! mike.

While I have no strong opinions on the benefits of home schooling of autistic children, I really hope this bloke is employing tutors… Hardly the way to gain support for home schooling, is it?

Edit: A quick search through the forum reveals some interesting conspiracy nuttery posted by lordboult:

the ghouls are at work again! they obviously have not replicated it correctly! do not move to porton down! In the 60' a man ran into the woods and died of bubonnic plague,shucks another failure.

Flouride has interesting history,I believe developed by farben and co
in germany in the thirties used to 'calm' prisoners etc in experiments(nothing about teeth!)but of course check foryourself,mike.

(I love that mis-spelling of "fluoride" - it seems to act as a flag for advanced frothing)

John Stone and friends lying again

2009-12-07T20:54:00.003Z

While we're on the subject of mendacious bastards, there's a fairly recent post over at John Stone and Clifford Miller's ludicrous "Timecube" inspired blog "ChildHealthSafety". It's simply propagating a vaccine myth that was recently punted round the internet.

See the story [video just below] of previously healthy Desiree Jennings horrifically crippled only days ago by the flu vaccine and just 10 days after getting the shot. Desiree was a cheerleader and led an active life until now.

They then embed the "Desiree Jennings staggers around" video and cite it as clear evidence that the 'flu vaccine causes irreversible neurological damage. Under the title "Flu Vaccine Cripples Healthy US Cheerleader for Life".

Every neurologist asked about this case, and major dystonia charities have come to the conclusion that this is not dystonia, and that the symptoms are psychological, and as John Stone and Clifford Miller like to position themselves as the educated and rational face of anti-vax lunacy, you'd have thought that they'd at least have the decency to issue an apology saying "we were taken in too - sorry", or at the very least, to quietly remove the post. But no, they're keeping it there as "evidence".

John, Clifford - why not read this?

Fortunately, and frankly unsurprisingly, Desiree Jennings has now been "cured" of her condition by a quack. So that's all right then.

C'mon John - I'll accept it's an oversight - apologise, feel a bit ashamed and remove the post, or at least remove the insinuation that this poor girl's condition was caused by a vaccine.

Age of Autism / Generation Rescue come clean

2009-12-07T19:27:00.004Z

I figured that while the JABS forum is a bit quiet, I could turn my hand to a couple of other moronic anti-vaccination / pro-lethal disease organisation, and possibly the most active of them is "Age Of Autism" (AoA).

AoA styles itself as a support forum for parents of autistic kids - when actually it's a vocal anti-vax and pro quack therapy lobby group.

It's also heavily linked with Generation Rescue, that organisation fronted by ex-porn star (that's not ad-hom, that's a matter of record) Jenny McCarthy, who these days spends her days campaigning to "Green Our Vaccines".

Now, as anyone with even a passing familiarity with English grammar knows, "green" is not a verb. Still, we'll let that go for the moment.

McCarthy / Generation Rescue's claim is not that they want vaccines banned (although that's clearly their ultimate aim), but they want to "green" them. They want unspecified "toxins" removed. At no point will they ever tell you exactly what changes would make them happy, but it makes them sound less rabid. Or at least, they think it does. Remember that - they don't want to get rid of vaccines, just make them less "toxic".

AoAs claim not to be linked to Generation Rescue, however, their legal editor, Kent Heckenlively has recently been pushing an initiative - "Green Our Vaccines". Now, unless Mr H and the loons at GR are remarkably in tune with each other when it comes to non-comprehension of the English Language, and mysteriously came up with the same nonsensical slogan at around the same time, I'd say there was quite likely a link.

Mr Heckenlively posts today his response to a few criticisms of the "Green Our Vaccines" initiative, including this spectacular own goal:

The Green Vaccines Initiative doesn’t go far enough – I read with great interest an open letter to me from the Natural Solutions Foundation which made the assertion that there is no such thing as a “safe vaccine.” I find myself in sympathy with such a view and am certainly acting as if there is currently no such thing as a safe vaccine by not getting any myself or having them given to my children. I might eventually take such a position. However, it seems to me that to move things forward we need to change public perception from the belief that vaccines are universally safe, to one that they have troublesome components which render them potentially unsafe to a certain subset of the population, as a prelude to a full and objective look at the safety of the entire vaccination program.

He then goes on to post a link to Generation Rescue's donation page.

So, the point of the program is to establish that no vaccines are safe one step at a time.

It's quite clear then, Age Of Autism is linked to Generation Rescue (as made clear by their legal editor), and their joint programme is intended to get rid of all vaccines. (Which, as we all know, will lead to the re-establishment of epidemic diseases and the deaths of thousands, if not millions of children worldwide.)

Hmm.

Oh, just shut the fuck up

2009-12-05T01:09:00.002Z

http://www.jabs.org.uk/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=4745

How fucking stupid are these people?

Edit: Now I've got a little more time, I should point out that the post referred to contains the suggestion that "fear of dogs" is a side effect of MMR vaccination.

JABS poster in "Fuckwitted Ignorance" shock

2009-11-27T14:49:00.003Z

Seonaid has posted this gem:

I'd think long and hard before going for the swine flu shot if I were you. This vaccine has been rushed through production without proper testing - it contains thimerosal [50% mercury] and a toxic adjuvant called squalene - use of which is supposed to be illegal in this country.

How many ways can you be wrong?

The swine 'flu vaccine has not been "rushed through", and it's been tested at least as thoroughly as seasonal 'flu vaccine. Squalene is not toxic - it's produced naturally in the body - and it's not illegal. I've ignored the thimerosal non-sequiteur, as it's been shown time and time again to not be dangerous at the levels found in vaccines.

Fucking idiot.

H1N1

2009-11-24T18:26:00.002Z

JABS and other anti-vax nuttery sites keep repeating the lie that the Swine Flu virus is more dangerous than Swine Flu itself.

So far in England there have been 142 fatalities from Swine Flu. There have been none from the vaccine.

Do the maths yourself.

H1N1 jab better than expected!

2009-11-24T18:06:00.002Z

Someone* at JABS tells us:

One person has died after being given the Government’s new swine flu vaccination.

Apparently, seven million doses of the vaccine have been given out, and since then, only one person has died! It seems that Swine Flu vaccine is the answer to eternal life!

* That fucking credulous moron Rosemary

Vaccine Lies / AIDS denial

2009-11-16T12:02:00.003Z

Funny how these things so often go hand in hand, isn't it? Prime nutcases Gus The Fuss and John "Pigfucker" Scudamore are just two among the crowd at JABS who regularly put forward loony "alternative" HIV/AIDS ideas - or "dangerous lies" as I prefer to call them.

Well, it seems that this phenomenon isn't confined to the UK. Head of the Australian Vaccination Network, Meryl Dorey also appears to jumped on the AIDS denial bandwagon, judging from a posting on the organisations Yahoo Group:

Actually Katherine, nobody has ever 'seen' the HIV virus

and

the court is definitely out on both the existence of an HIV virus and the connection between what is seen under the electron microscope (whatever that may be) with the symptoms we've come to call AIDS:

No Meryl, the court (or, more commonly, "the jury") is most definitely not still out. Your pathetic lies were shown to be just that years ago, and linking to bonkers denial sites does not make anything you say true.

If anyone would like to do some sensible reading on AIDS myths, try AIDSTruth.org. That's advice Meryl Dorey could usefully follow.

Oh look - spread fear through lies.

2009-11-11T20:55:00.003Z

Jacquia has posted a link, which she describes as:

A miscarriage website with comments from women who miscarried after the Swine flu vaccine.

Following the link, it's a page with comments from women who miscarried after being diagnosed with Swine Flu (H1N1). And the JABS loons are always telling us how it's better to have the disease than the vaccine. Rrrrriiight…

Evil bitch.

JABS and AoA in "Quoting any old shit" shocker

2009-11-07T17:19:00.002Z

Both the JABS Forum and that USA-based hotbed of stupendous idiocy "Age of Autism" have reproduced a press release, via Reuters (which they clearly hope will give it a sheen of legitimacy), regarding chelation, and how it's been shown to be of benefit for autism. Chelation - a potentially dangerous procedure used to remove heavy metals from the body in cases of heavy metal poisoning.

This is a prime example of advocacy groups ignoring good evidence that chelation does no good for autistic kids, that autism is not the same as heavy metal poisoning and that chelation can potentially be lethal - until, eventually, a study comes out supporting their favourite quack therapy. Then they're all over it.

So, who conducted and published this amazing research? Was it conducted by a respected centre of learning? Well, let's see.

SAN DIEGO, Nov. 5 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Two studies published by theSouthwest College of Naturopathic Medicine

Hold on a minute? A college of naturopathic medicine?!

Let's have a look at their website shall we?

Naturopathic medicine blends centuries-old natural, non-toxic therapies with current advances in the study of health and human systems, covering all aspects of family health from prenatal to geriatric care.

Really? What does that actually mean then? Well, apparently, it means this;

Naturopathic doctors diagnose disease and treat patients by using natural modalities such as physical manipulation, clinical nutrition, herbal medicine, homeopathy, counseling, acupuncture, and hydrotherapy, among others. They choose treatment based on the individual patient, not based on the generality of symptoms. This approach has proven successful in treating both chronic and acute conditions.

Ah - quackery. Magic water and back cracking. And AoA and JABS want us to take this bollocks seriously? A study put out by woos and weirdos that contradicts every previous study on the subject? Just so they can carry on making money from their favourite dangerous, useless quack remedy?

Mendacious bastards.

How do these people make the connection?

2009-10-31T18:46:00.002Z

Another new poster on JABS ("Sher") has said:

One year on from receiving her first MMR jab at aged 7, my child has displayed symptoms of severe psychosis, pre-onset of puberty and regressive autism.

Can anyone explain how, if this is true, she has made the connection that it was the vaccine wot dunnit, and not any of the other thousands of experiences her child has had in the last twelve months?

Amusingly, Seonaid tells the truth

2009-10-27T15:13:00.002Z

Yes - it's true! That arch-arsehole Seonaid has finally - although accidentally - posted something true!

The greatest lie ever told..........

VACCINES KILL INNOCENT CHILDREN

Yes, that is indeed a lie. How Jackie Fletcher let this one through her moderation net is beyond me.

Admittedly, I may be quoting out of context, as the post also contains a link to an anti-vax YouTube video presented by an utter wanker with personality of a pelvic floor exercise device and the reasoning skills of a head of lettuce…

Please read this

2009-10-26T10:05:00.003Z

Peter Bowditch, of ratbags.com fame has a page on his site showing highlights from his ten year battle for sanity with the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN). The AVN are the Australian ("NO! I Don't believe it!" I hear you cry, sarcastically) equivalent of JABS ("Now I really don't believe it!!" you scream), but possibly more mental ("Becky, you're making this up!!").

Well - see for yourself - please read this:
Peter Bowditch v AVN.

Warning for the squeamish: Peter has posted some pictures of the results of vaccine-preventable diseases. They're not pretty. Personally, I'm tempted to send them to every anti-vaxer I can think of, with a big red label, saying "Look what you want to happen." Now, where's Fletcher's email address..?

Peter Bowditch deserves a knighthood.

JABS spam

2009-10-25T09:48:00.004Z

Amusingly, while the JABS forum is moderated these days, in order to keep rational discussion to a minimum, it seems Jackie Fletcher is quite happy to let the forum be spammed to the furthest reaches of fuck with dodgy meds advertising. This makes me laugh more than is probably strictly necessary.

(Click the image for a slightly larger version)

Excellent vaccine article

2009-10-20T19:25:00.002+01:00

Thanks to Wired magazine:

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/10/ff_waronscience/

This is the sort of thing that the worried well should be reading - not the shit that comes out of JABS.

MMR given by mistake? I think not.

2009-10-20T17:01:00.004+01:00

A new poster (*cough* SOCKPUPPET *cough*) has posted the following on JABS today:

My beautiful little 3 year old girl has just been given the MMR vaccine instead of the pneumococcal and she's already had the 3 x single jabs for MMR which we've travelled many hours back and fourth and paid out a lot of money to have them singly.

I'm devistated. We chose not to have the MMR and the surgery are well aware of our decision and have on numerous occasions talked to us about it.

Not only has the decision we made now been taken away from us, but our little girl now has the MMR inside her and I can't understand how a mistake like this has happened!

I'm at a low.

I don't know what to do next - any ideas?

First of all, this sounds very unlikely.

Let's see - a doctor gets the wrong vaccine to give a child? Without thinking he just sticks the closest needle to hand into your a three year old? I think not.

To me this stinks of sock puppet, a scare designed to drum up fear in parents.

However, Mr "DelMonte" - presumably you said "yes" to the injection? - if this is actually a true story, I'd suggest you calm down, watch your little girl grow up healthy, in fifteen years wave her off to University, safe in the knowledge that she's safe from nasty diseases that could be passed onto her in that hall of residence she's living in, from her next door neighbour whose parents were so moronic that they didn't get her vaccinated.

Now then - life's a bit better now, isn't it?

(Oh - I'm guessing this is Truth Seeker, given the abysmal spelling…)

Edit: Tellingly, the first reply is from… Truth Seeker. Funny that. His reply? Well it's much the same as mine, but costs more money and sounds like it's coming from the mouth of a brainless arsehole.

If it were me i would buy the MMR nosode from either Helios or Ainsworths homeopathic pharmacy. 200C potency and give 1 tablet a day for at least a week.

So - do nothing.

Admin post: Twitter

2009-10-19T11:54:00.002+01:00

I've finally bitten the bullet and signed up for a Twitter account, so anyone who's interested should be able to find me in their Twitter client of choice by searching for "fisseux".

Kind regards,

Becky

The tragic case of Natalie Morton

2009-10-02T08:47:00.003+01:00

This just shows up the morons at JABS for the evil bloodsuckers they are.

In case you're not aware, Natalie Morton was a UK teenager who died several hours after receiving her Cervarix vaccine. Naturally the anti-vaccination lobby on the web and in the press leapt on this, and assumed correlation meant causation - that the vaccine caused her death. "Look at us" they gloated, "we told you all along that vaccines were dangerous!"

Quite properly, a post mortem examination was carried out, which showed that Natalie had a previously undiagnosed, large, malignant tumour on her heart and lungs, which could have killed her at any point. Any connection to the vaccine has been ruled out.

This, of course, isn't good enough for the JABS crew.

Suba quotes the school's chaplain:

"I have seen Natalie's file and there is nothing on it to suggest that she had any underlying health problems."

There are a couple of problems with this. First of all, the man's the school chaplain. Not actually any kind of health professional. Suba will no doubt be quoting the lollipop lady outside the school next. Or the bloke who runs the sweetshop down the road. Both are equally well placed to give a professional opinion on health as a bloody vicar. (And what's he doing looking at health records any way??)

Assuming that the chaplain did actually say this (and I've seen it quoted in a couple of papers), it seems Suba is unaware of the meaning of the word "undiagnosed". So here's a little lesson for you Suba. "Undiagnosed" means that no-one was previously aware of it. So the health records wouldn't have shown an underlying health problem, because no-one knew about it.

"Jacquia" chimes in, linking to that well known organ of truth and level headedness, the Daily Mail, pointing out that Natalie had

"a rare and grave underlying health problem"

and then dives in with this gem:

I am sick of all our Government's lies, and propaganda!

Ah - conspiracy theories… Just what's needed at this point.

Fortunately, there's a voice of sanity at JABS - "Phoenix", who points out the tumour, and a quote from Natalie's parents:

"We now know that Natalie's death was the result of a serious underlying medical condition"

This, however, isn't good enough for Suba, who is by now trying to assume a rôle as some kind of medical professional:

Nonsense, she would have been in real pain and discomfort if it affected both her chest and lung

and

Everyone is saying that she had a smile from ear to ear and that she had a smile all the time. Not someone you would associate with late stage lung and heart tumour

Oh really Suba? Do you have evidence to back up this assertion of yours?

She (or is Suba a he?) drags the chaplain back into it, and then plays the trick beloved of all anti-vaxers, asking for "independent" verification:

The chaplain of the blue coat school said there was no underlying health conditions. We need a totally independant inquiry from another pathologist.

How is the original pathologist not independent? What you mean, by "independent", Suba, is "someone who agrees with ME!" And obviously, that's just what Natalie's parents would want, isn't it?

(At this point, Truth Seeker chimes in, and uses the opportunity to plug his favourite "I'm not allowing my children to have vaccines unless you accept full responsibility" form - no point in letting a good opportunity for self promotion get away.)

Now it's jennyr's turn - remember jennyr? The one with fluffy bunnies working her brain - it's the only explanation, no-one can really be as vacant as she manages.

She too decides that since it's been demonstrated that there was an underlying cause for Natalie's death, it must be a cover-up.

Be interesting to get a little more information on the pathologist who carried out the post-mortem examination. What is his background, how independent is he from government influences. Will the results be verified by a second/third opinion?

One thing's for certain jennyr - he's not a school chaplain.

Perhaps our health officials should listen to someone who knows what they are talking about for a change

Again, Jenny dear, why not say what you mean? You want them to listen to you.

While this has been a terribly sad incident, it has been investigated quickly and efficiently, and despite the scaremongering of the idiots at the Daily Mail and at JABS, it's been resolved. Stop trying to score points, and let Natalie's parents mourn their daughter in peace.

Edit
Orac has blogged about this, as ever, far, far more eloquently than I ever could. As you probably know, he's a cancer specialist, and has this to say:

Cancer doctors know that it's amazing how large tumors can sometimes grow without causing much, if anything, in the way of symptoms. In sudden death cases like this, moreover, quite frequently in retrospect it is noted that there were symptoms before the death, often for weeks or months beforehand, symptoms such as easy fatigue, vague aches and pains, or other relatively nonspecific symptoms. (Pancreatic cancer is notorious for growing to a deadly extent while producing few, if any, symptoms.) While it is true that many advanced tumors do cause a slow wasting away, there are a number of complications from tumors in the chest that can cause rapid death. The most obvious example that comes to mind is for the tumor to erode into a major blood vessel, resulting in massive internal bleeding. Another mechanical effect that can result in cardiac failure and sudden death is pericardial tamponade, which is what occurs when the sack surrounding the heart fills with fluid and compresses the heart. This fluid can be serum (from a reaction due to the tumor) or blood (from a bleed). Because the pericardial sac is fairly stretchable, a tamponade can develop slowly but then, once the capacity of the pericardium to stretch is exceeded, quite rapidly result in critical right heart failure leading to death. Then there's the fact that the blood in cancer patients often clots too easily; i.e., it's hypercoagulable, due to factors secreted by the tumors That means cancer patients are prone to deep venous thromboses and, worse, to pulmonary embolus, large ones of which can quite easily cause sudden death.

I thought JABS posters were mental...

2009-09-28T16:36:00.004+01:00

...and then I read this.

Please tell me that this is just a load of wind-up merchants winding each other up…

Spin this, you twat

2009-09-22T15:14:00.002+01:00

John Stone, who, as all regular readers know ("hi" to you both) is a cock, has banged on for ages about getting a study done to count autistic adults. He claims that if the MMR jab does not cause autism, the numbers of autistic adults should match those of autistic children. "HAHA!" he gleefully dribbles - "where are your thousands of autistic adults? You can't account for them by diagnostic substitution, can you?"

Um, yes, you can.

So, Stone, you cock, will you now accept that you've been wrong all these years?

(Somehow, I doubt it…)

Annoyingly, the BBC is still linking to JABS…

Spin something negative...

2009-09-16T19:40:00.003+01:00

...for your campaign, into something that supports your cause.

Rosemary, that inveterate cut-and-paster with the son who in the past has suffered from every syndrome under the sun, has posted this:

GPs to be paid £100m for giving swine flu jabs to high-risk groups

Family doctors will be paid more than £100 million to give swine flu vaccines this winter after a deal was brokered with the Government worth £5.25 for every dose.

She fails to point out that most years, doctors are paid around seven pounds per patient for seasonal 'flu vaccines. So, they're actually getting paid less than usual. (Oh - and there's nothing like implying that doctors are going to be claiming up to £100 million each, is there..?)

You evil bitch - making out that teh nasteh doktorz are making evil ££££ by giving teh nasti vaxxines (probably contaminated with teh munki virusez) - when actually, they're taking a pay cut to protect the population from a virus which may still end up killing thousands.

Evil, evil fucking cow. Or maybe just blinded by fucking ignorance. You decide.

"I don't believe it..."

2009-09-02T09:03:00.002+01:00

Following on from yesterday, as if on cue, "Do Not Vaccinate" has made another post which perfectly illustrates my point about anti-vaxers not being prepared to listen to any information that shows their misguided point of view to be wrong.

Do you have any vaccine damage figures? If you could obtain any figures, they wouldn't be accurate as Drs refuse to admit that the problems are caused by these injections.

Any thoughts on how to get through to people like this? Or are the hardcore nutters best left alone while good information campaigns are targeted at the rest of the population?

Fear and ignorance

2009-09-01T18:18:00.002+01:00

The ambiguously named "Do Not Vaccinate" (DNV) has posted something rather telling on JABS today.

I don't have much contact with other children and the only people I know of who've had measles and whooping cough are myself and friends the same age who all made a full recovery. I am concerned about the childhood illnesses, but the vaccines frighten the hell out of me and I would not let my daughter have them under any circumstances.

While it's a bit obvious to say that DNV is unlikely to have much contact with people who didn't make a full recovery from measles, because they're, um, dead, the telling bit is the last sentence. "Vaccines frighten the hell out of me and I would not let my daughter have them under any circumstances."

The reason DNV, and I'm sure a lot more people are frightened, is two-fold. Firstly, having an vaccination is a medical procedure. I'm not, and I'm sure DNV isn't a doctor - we don't instinctively know everything about the human body, and there's always going to be that element of worry with any medical procedure, whether it's having a wisdom tooth removed, heart and lung transplants, or having a vaccination.

The second reason is linked to the first - the fear of vaccines is fermented by morons and agenda pushers like John Stone and Jackie Fletcher (with the help of the Daily Mail and idiot broadcasters like Jeni Barnett). They succeed in their campaign to persuade parents not to vaccinate by deliberately spreading misinformation and lies. It's in human nature to mistrust authority, and lying to parents inflates this mistrust. Positive vaccination stories ("Lots vaccinated, nobody ill!") don't sell papers, while positive and accurate information is rubbished as the voice of the authorities, and not to be trusted. Anyone supporting vaccines is rubbished as a "Big Pharma stooge" - and what's an easier target for vitriol than "Big Business"?

So - parents like DNV aren't vaccinating their children to potentially save their lives because of a lack of good information from what are seen to be "unbiased" sources (don't forget, the likes of Stone and Pigfucker can spin the World Health Organisation as the instrument of Satan and the Bavarian Illuminati), through fear born of ignorance, and because of the mendacity of the JABS regulars and the likes of Jenny McCarthy and Generation Rescue.

An excellent post about H1N1 vaccination issues

2009-08-19T19:39:00.002+01:00

Not from JABS this one, funnily enough, but I thought I should post a link to is, given that it's an informed, balanced piece about the relative dangers of Guillain-Barré Syndrome which you might've read a lot about lately, and is used by the nutters at JABS as some kind of catch all evil these days.

The real dangers of h1N1 vaccine, by an actual proper doctor, not a JABS fuckwit.

Please read it.

General update - and Pigfucker

2009-08-19T18:32:00.002+01:00

It's been depressingly quiet at JABS HQ lately. The usual probable sock puppet new posters, bleating on; "I've decided not to vaccinate, please use this as a reason to bang on about your personal reasons why you're anti-vaccine", the odd new regular poster (and in the case of one incoherent ranter, the ambiguously named "do not vaccinate", "odd" is the right word. Along with "stupid", "ill-informed", and usually "frothing"), and that arsehole of all arseholes, John "Pigfucker" Scudamore.

Pigfucker is quite clearly seeing a decline in the number of hits to his temple of idiocy, "whale.to", and so is back even more regularly, trying to scare the shit out of the new posters and regulars alike with his half-baked theories, quotes from discredited senile ex-intellectuals and lies.

One recent post provides the following crop of shit, all in 300 or so words.

Doctors and nurses are part of Allopathy, and the main med of allopathy is vaccination, so you would expect them to believe in and push vaccination. They don't want to wake up and find out they are the main instigators of autism, and all child disease.

Hmm. So, when you finally suffer from that aneurism, Pigfucker, you will naturally eschew all forms of medical treatment from said doctors and nurses? (Believe me, I hope you have the courage of your convictions and send them away if you survive more than three seconds.)

Let's rephrase that, shall we? "Doctors and nurses believe in science based medicine, rather than ludicrous quackery such as 'zappers' for cancer and vitamin C injections, which you believe can cure all viral illnesses. They train for years to give the best, evidence based care, and while not infallible are your best chance of recovering from serious illness, or preventing said illness in the first place."

Pigfucker has, as ever, omitted any actual evidence for his autism claim, and indeed for any of his other stupidity in this one post. (Yes, this is all one post.)

if they have to admit to vaccine autism it could open Pandora's box--there are 500,000 people in the UK with ASD, just for starters. In my opinion pharma medicine is 98% a hoax, that causes most of the disease on the planet today directly and indirectly.

Ah - now we're getting somewhere. "In my opinion"; The cry of the moron incapable of critical thinking - but blessed with an overactive imagination and a brain like a sponge, who's read far too many wingnut theories on the internet. Pigfucker - provide proper evidence for your ludicrous claims or shut the fuck up and stop trying to scare impressionable teenagers and nervous new parents. If you had all the arcane knowledge you claim to have, you'd be a doctor yourself, feted by your contemporaries, and probably the winner of several Nobel prizes. As it is, you're a pig farmer. What's your next mental hypothesis?

If he said it [Cervarix] was useless he would be out of a job pretty quick, not to mention his income would plummet. See what happened to Wakefield when he said use single jabs instead of triple.

Yes. He was exposed as a fraud and a liar, who fabricated his results, while being paid to produce a specific result, and all the while holding lucrative patents on single vaccines. He was run out of the country like the quack that he is, and will shortly be struck off by the GMC.

You see, Pigfucker? Your feeble claims are shot down at every turn. You're an evil, know-nothing cunt, and I hope you rot in hell.

Handy get-out clause

2009-07-28T10:24:00.002+01:00

That dribbling fool Truth Seeker has posted, in response to a question about how long it takes for adverse effects to show after a measles jab.

Hi, there are no time limits for how long it can take for adverse reactions to show up from vaccinations, it can be immediate or can take years or anything in between.

Which is just a handy way of saying "Any illness that befalls you for the rest of your life I'm going to blame on vaccines."

That's because the arguments at JABS aren't based on any scientific evidence - just blind faith. Anti-vax is a religion to a lot of these idiots.