You know, you hear an awful lot about how “big pharma” (the derogatory term for the pharmaceutical companies that save thousands (millions?) of lives ever year) lie, cheat and suppress any treatments that might damage their bottom line. Advocates of so-called “alternative medicines” (also known as, in most cases, placebos) use this to argue against medicine. (Note the lack of qualifying adjective on “medicine”. As Tim Minchin says, “You know what they call “alternative medicine” that’s been proved to work? Medicine.”)
Now I’m not saying the health care system is perfect, or denying that there may have been cases of fraud. But the alt-med movement has more frauds than you can poke a stick at. And their biggest, that provably costs lives every year, is being investigated for the final time. And, turns out, it was all about the money.
Over 10 years ago, Andrew Wakefield fabricated a story that vaccines caused autism. From this burst the “antivax” movement, scaring parents into not immunising their children. Groups like the AVN are responsible for every death that results, so it’s not surprising they’ve recently been slapped down by the Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC).
But that original study wasn’t just a mistake, it was outright fraud. And now we understand why – in part 2 of an investigative series, Brian Deer has revealed it was all about the money. The very thing that the alt-med movement complains about is at the heart of one of their most cherished campaigns. It’s a long read, but it’s worth it.
So will this cause the AVN and their ilk to change their tune? Nup. They’ll weasel their way around it – because unlike scientists, they won’t change their mind as new evidence comes to hand. But it’s still good to know the issue is put to rest once and for all.
Hey Joel
. Happy new year. Hope you’re dry. Sorry this turned in to a longer speel than I planned – possibly because I’m meant to be writing a thesis 
.
I think we can both agree that good science (and statistics) aka evidence-based medicine is the only type of medicine worthy of the name.
But don’t overstate the case for big pharma. Of course, there’s no question pharmaceutical products have massively improved our lives, perhaps none more so than vaccines. But, in fact, most of the large pharma companies also own “alternative medicine” brands as well. These companies regularly get caught withholding access to information, misleading people, hiding known side-effects, etc. etc. etc.
See, for instance, Merck and Elsevier collaborating to publish fake journals (http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/05/when_big_pharma_pays_a_publisher_to_publ.php), or that only in the last few years have companies been forced to disclose all their clinical trials rather than a selective few (see also, bad statistics). Think for a moment, how far away both of these behaviours are from evidence-based medicine. You point to an (absolutely unacceptable) case of deliberate fraud by a handful of individuals to publish a paper. Here are two mainstream companies collaborating to publish entire fake journals to give to Australian doctors and then to cover it up afterwards. Think of the credibility the Merck now has in the public eye if they want to complain about some alternative quack being misleading or how they expect us to believe them when they promise their latest vaccine work and has few bad side-affects. Who do they have to blame but themselves for this situation?
We could debate why these incidents keep occurring (again I think the word “money” might come up) but its a matter of public record that large pharma have a murky track record.
The point I make is that I think you should defend medicine against incursions of bad science whether from quacks or pharma, and neither have a great track record. For instance, see Marcia Angell (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcia_Angell) who has been critical of both pharma companies and alternative medicine for not doing good science.
I’m currently taking a supplement for some joint problems made by an “alternative medicine” company. I told my mother I wouldn’t unless she showed me some believable research that it works. She found some (independent, peer-reviewed, double blind, placebo-controlled) studies that showed the “active ingredient” of the supplements actually do reduce joint pain [I am, of course, assuming that the authors of the study haven't been deliberately misleading]. As Tim Minchin would rightly say, now all I’m taking is medicine. The thing is, I think I would have had the same reaction had my mother offered me a drug from Merck.