Category Archives: Big Placebo

Oh, Oh, Oh, O’Brien of SensaSlim gives us more hanky panky

Posted in Big Placebo, General, Health, Scam by

Peter O’Brien, SensaSlim director and rumoured buddy of Peter Foster seems unable to break the back of his attention seeking behaviour.

Peter O'Brien

Firstly however, the good news is that the initial defamation case brought by SensaSlim for $800,000 against Ken Harvey was dismissed on Monday. Harvey was awarded costs but with a mere $280,000 in the SensaSlim kitty, he is unlikely to see any returns. There is quite a queue for payments from SensaSlim who misled investors on return potential. It turned out to be zero.

Five days ago we had a SensaSlim saga update which included reference to the press release-masquerading-as-news-until-you-read-the-disclaimer, of O’Brien’s intent to sue Ken Harvey for $1 million dollars. Like all the other articles O’Brien authored on international.to it is now a mere 404 page – and I’ll get onto that. There’s a section in the above post along with most of the disclaimer. It was a kind of desperate sales pitch, personal attack on Harvey and attempt to defend SensaSlim as a genuine product because TGA regulations are geared to prevent harm, not provide efficacy.

He’s right on the last point and the very fact this nonsense continues is a black mark against the “self certification” process of the TGA. This was raised during the recent transparency review of the TGA which you can read and catch up on here. With luck O’Brien has done Aussies a favour by exploiting this appalling hole in our supposed regulatory body for therapeutic goods. Frozen assets, links to crime figures, non existent research from non existent institutes, false claims about a dud product, duped investors, defamed obesity experts, fraud, [all earning ACCC charges of misleading and deceptive conduct under Trade Practices Act 1974], defamation cases dismissed, contempt of court (I’ll get to that also) and the product still remains listed with the TGA.

O’Brien need only insist that the ingredients have been proven and used in weight loss products (and he is), point to the TGA listing (and he is) and feign unfair criticism thus defamation on Dr. Harvey’s part (and he is) to keep making money from a useless product that was a scam from day one. The Australian reported on Tuesday that he is seeking $1.75 million in damages and costs. Check The Australian Skeptics for information on donations to help Ken Harvey or head on over directly to the designated PayPal account.

A TGA representative confirmed the SensaSlim listing as it has “no unsafe products”, and in a typical bureaucratic promise of a glacially paced plan, proffered;

However, the TGA is considering a number of matters regarding the listing of Sensaslim Solution on the Australian Register of Therapeutic goods.

Nonsense. Until the suit against Dr. Harvey (which is another S.L.A.P.P.) is finalised the Complaints Resolution Panel can do nothing. O’Brien continues to profit with the TGA’s blessing. On this point there is a brand new Get Up campaign launched by the founder of The Celestial Teapot skeptic group. Calling on state and federal governments to provide consumer protection from quacks and health scams. It’s a compelling argument and thankfully includes calling to account that Victorian government bastion of all things scam-worthy and useless The Better Health Channel – which tax payers fund. Other states have similar insults.

Back to O’Brien. Yesterday it emerged that the ACCC was launching contempt of court proceedings against Peter O’Brien. It was postulated he has sent more of those ridiculous and at times thuggish “newsletters” he and Adam Troy Adams favoured to franchisees, this time warning that cooperating with the ACCC might be financially costly. Yes you read that correctly. Cooperating with the ACCC to get back money SensaSlim scammed from them might be costly. However we now know the ACCC has been granted an injunction stopping this latest rather ambitious attempt to still scam his already hurting victims. O’Briens cavalry seem to have gotten lost.

Some welcome clarification emerged also. I’ve written a couple of times about some correspondence with an editor from international.to, which is owned by RogersDIGITAL marketing. I’d complained about the content of articles written by Peter O’Brien and glowing comments published beneath. They were eventually deleted, and correspondence ceased which as I said was fine by me. It was their call to resume any exchange. I’d argued elsewhere on the deletions, “…I doubt due to my objections, but rather their own integrity given the balance of developments”.

So a refreshing development came to pass. The “Greg” singing off emails is Greg Rogers from RogersDIGITAL, who was responsible for the impossible to miss disclaimer under O’Brien’s last piece. Not only was O’Brien none to happy with this piece of honesty, but had long been advising Rogers to delete email correspondence. Fairfax write;

Simon White, SC, for the commission, said Greg Rogers, of the online news and classified websites business Rogers Digital, had contacted the commission, concerned at emails from Mr O’Brien telling him he should delete every email after reading it, and warning of the confidential nature of business relations.

”If at any time in the future [he was questioned] you can honestly say every email was erased,” one email said.

Another said he should ”never admit you are paid for a story”.

If Mr Rogers agreed that he would delete all correspondence with himself, SensaSlim and another director, Adam Adams, we can ”move forward and do a lot of business”, Mr O’Brien wrote.

He said if Mr Rogers was interviewed by the ACCC voluntarily then ”you are doing so in violation of confidentiality, both real and implied”. ”I ask you immediately erase all communication.” [….]

“Greg, I have been reading very hostile comments on sites supporting Ken Harvey,” Mr O’Brien wrote. He queried a disclaimer on the story headlined ”Sensaslim director files million dollar law suit against Dr Ken Harvey” [sic] on a Rogers Digital website.

Oh my. All in all things aren’t presently looking up for Peter O’Brien. Although according to one report he has been listed as a creditor by SensaSlim administrators.

One awaits further developments.

Chiropractors adjust vaccine truths

Posted in Anti-Vaccination Lobby, Big Placebo, Chiropractic, Health, Scam by

The World Chiropractic Alliance (WCA) have a “journal”, available for free subscription. It doesn’t actually have any peer reviewed studies, but is more a collection of industry positive, competitor negative and hokery pokery articles that deny credibility. Such as Energy Medicine: Futuristic Healing with ancient roots, by Dana Ullman. We know Dana from Twitter as @homeopathicdana

Today I had an article brought to my attention by New Zealand skeptic and critic of anti-vaccination nonsense, @SkepticalSkotty. He’d had the article brought to his attention by a friend. Like many in the developed world outside Sth. Korea, where it’s illegal to practice the scam, the friend had given chiropractic credence. Quite understandable. Unless one’s in a clinical setting or prone to keep an eye on non evidence based trends, chiropractors are the other “doctors” who work on backs and necks and are subsidised by insurance companies and governments.

The September 2010 article Several nations banning flu shots for babies, provides unique insight into bias, deceptiveness and unprofessional standards. Supposedly having no position on vaccination I was intrigued at the effort to mislead readers into forming a negative view of both seasonal influenza and H1N1 vaccination. The article opens with an accurate observation of a QLD infant death following influenza vaccination, but almost immediately begins to blur the lines. Let’s do some housekeeping, remembering that fifteen children in QLD had an adverse reaction to the vaccine.

In WA where babies were given Fluvax – a combination H1N1 and seasonal ‘flu vaccine – febrile convulsions effected 60 and another 200 presented with higher than normal temperatures post vaccination. Well tolerated in teens and adults Fluvax was certainly not tolerated in babies and small children. One small child, Saba Button, fell into a coma and is now struggling with brain damage. It is the type of tragedy health authorities dread. Soon after the reactions WA suspended administering the vaccine to children under 5 and this was also taken up nationally. The TGA had made some noises toward CSL who manufactured Fluvax. However it wasn’t until FDA officials from the USA turned up investigate CSL’s standards of Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) this year, that one could realistically defend Australian influenza vaccination regimes against quite justified criticism.

These two events were tragic and widespread fevers in vaccinated babies is a huge blow to public confidence. However suggesting that health authorities intend to suppress the truth at the expense of public health is a frequent unsubstantiated claim. Worse is the use of these tragedies by groups like the Australian Vaccination Network – the anti-vax darling of Australian chiropractors – to smear their critics. The day The Australian published Natasha Bita’s article on young Saba Button (May 28th), Meryl Dorey exploited this family to muster anti-vaccination support and to also make false claims about skeptics and Stop the AVN.

Meryl Dorey’s Yahoo! Twitter and Facebook libellous claims

Dorey published an “Action Alert” on Twitter, Facebook and Yahoo! claiming supporters of vaccination were “mobilising” and “organising their forces” to write letters of complaint to The Australian, and thus writing in support was vital. “They do NOT want newspapers or any media outlets to be covering this from a freeedom of choice point of view”, she lied on Yahoo!

Freedom of choice point of view? Since when are facts or a parent’s choice to speak to the media linked to whacky anti-vax lingo’? Dorey was seizing ownership of Saba’s tragedy and using it to engender disgust toward those who criticise her already extensive dossier of lies and deceit. Little wonder many believe she manufactures stories of personal threats.

Not only is this offensive to Saba, her parent’s and those maligned but one must surely question her grasp on reality, not to mention the ethical issues surrounding vaccination, to see a grown woman manipulate her members as pawns in her own delusional neocon’ fantasy. I wrote to Natasha Bita and her colleagues seeking confirmation and on June 21st she confirmed that whilst she had been on holidays no “complaints” had been received, or could be found.

Back to the WCA journal. They failed to stress the vaccine was “suspended” not banned or that other strains would be considered. Onto the second paragraph;

A short time later, Finland also suspended the H1N1 vaccines due to six reports of narcolepsy in children and teens immediately following vaccination. According to The Helsinki Times, “Medical reports suggest that over 750 of those who have been vaccinated have experienced harmful effects.”

Firstly, QLD ADR’s were due to seasonal influenza vaccine. WA’s ADR’s were due to a combination of seasonal and H1N1 vaccines. The vaccine used in Finland was GSK’s H1N1 vaccine Pandemrix. No Australians have been administered Pandemrix and Australia has had no reports of narcolepsy. This distinction wasn’t made by the WCA article. What about those “750 harmful effects” that they quoted. If we read the Helsinki Times piece we see that 2.5 million doses were given. That’s a 0.003% ADR rate. I do rush to add this is not to be dismissed as trivial, but does indicate the risk/benefit ratio. The WCA seems to think that’s an excessively high level for narcolepsy – falling asleep unexpectedly. More so, as we’ll see there are unique Finnish genetic components to this problem that are related to the vaccine.

Yet if we’re talking about removal of insurance coverage for cervical manipulation by chiropractors because of the risk of vertebral/carotid artery tears, stroke and traumatic death – as in the case of Jeremy Youngblood – then an incidence rate of up to 0.005% is a trivial matter. WCA were upset that this brought “…applause from critics who still maintain that chiropractic is linked to strokes”. Chiropractors maintain it’s “a myth”. I hope you got that. Vaccine induced narcolepsy due to genetic predisposition: bad. Higher risk of tearing of the vertebral artery and dying slowly, whilst well documented: is a myth. They write with mind blowing arrogance;

The World Chiropractic Alliance responded by sending the company a copy of its position paper on chiropractic and strokes, and a vast amount of scientifically documented information that dispels the notion that chiropractic is in any way linked to carotid and vertebral artery dissection. “The WCA has been distributing this information ever since the myth about chiropractic and stroke began, and we’ll continue to make sure we counter this campaign of misinformation,” stated WCA founder and CEO Terry A. Rondberg, DC.

Kaiser Permanente, whom I now admire greatly wrote;

Chiropractic manipulation of the cervical spine is associated with vertebral artery dissection and stroke. The incidence is estimated at 1.3-5 events per 100,000 manipulations. Given the paucity of data related to beneficial effects of chiropractic manipulation of the cervical spine and the real potential for catastrophic adverse events, it was decided to exclude chiropractic manipulation of the cervical spine from coverage.

“Paucity of data related to beneficial effects of chiropractic manipulation of the cervical spine and the real potential for catastrophic adverse events”. Damn that reads well. Are chiropractors going to suspend this potentially lethal practice? Hell no – they’ll call it a myth and back that claim with bad science. Are they worried about patient health or patient access to a manipulation that takes seconds? No, they’re upset that they can’t get the big bucks.

Think of how many people around the world would get a cervical manipulation on any one day. At a rate of up to 5 per 100,000 catastrophic injuries and stroke, for no benefit, not to mention all the minor cervical vertebral insults and/or soft tissue injuries you have my permission to feel a little ill dear reader. So, it’s compelling how selective this group of pseudoscientific profiteers can be when it comes to understanding not only risk/benefit ratios but the size of the risk vs the evidence for any benefit.

The WCA article also mentions narcolepsy in Sweden. That also was a rate of 0.003% – a figure they seem intent on not publishing. According to the WHO last April 21st;

The only pandemic influenza vaccine used in Finland and Sweden was Pandemrix, an adjuvanted influenza A (H1N1) 2009 monovalent vaccine manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline.

Narcolepsy is a condition that has a strong genetic linkage, being almost uniquely seen in persons who have the (HLA) DQB1*0602 genotype. Of the cases of narcolepsy tested so far in Finland (n=29), diagnosed during 2009-2010, all have that genotype. The National Institute for Health and Welfare of Finland considers it probable that the Pandemrix vaccine was a contributing factor to this observed increase, and has called for further investigation of other co-factors that may be associated with the increased risk. They consider it most likely that the vaccine increased the risk of narcolepsy in a joint effect in those genetically disposed with some other, still unknown, genetic and/or environmental factors. The final report from the Finnish National Narcolepsy Task Force is expected by 31 August 2011.

Apparently 30% of Finnish have this gene whist 15% of Europeans have it. This wasn’t dismissed as a genetic issue either. There is a nine fold risk in those vaccinated vs unvaccinated. So, GSK aren’t getting any special treatment. Nor does hysteria get to reign. As in Australia it is mainstream medical monitoring and national health responses that ultimately serve to protect the public. But it’ll be late August this year before final European reports are released.

The article goes on to quote a now missing article from the Bharat Chronicle;

The vaccines appear to be causing a pattern of neurological disorders affecting children and teens across the planet

Most facepalmingly, if you pop that sentence into your chosen search facility dear reader, you get over 2,000 hits ranging from Bible prophecy, to natural woo, to wellness, to infant chiropractic to… well you get the idea. Our WCA “journal” is running a junk piece that they probably scavenged from the depths of conspiracy central.

The piece finishes off claiming “Australian authorities” knew of the problem for “several weeks” but withheld the information whilst continuing to encourage vaccination. One assumes they’re referring to WA where ADR’s were reported for two weeks before Saba Button was injured which was around the time the number of ADR’s demanded state wide action. Far better for WCA to publish the insinuation that authorities remained silent about a free vaccine with perhaps the only motivation being to harm the public.

Then it’s back up to QLD for accusatory lies followed by some special pleading;

Health officials at first tried to convince the public that there was no “causal” relationship between the vaccine and the side effects but even the Australian coroner had to admit he couldn’t rule out that the flu shot was responsible for the death of two-year-old Brisbane toddler Ashley Jade Epapara.

Gosh. “Even” the coroner couldn’t rule it out. Appeal to authority also. The truth is no-one can rule it out or rule it in. Period.

Then back to WA with nonsense about attempting to “blame” a bad batch. In fact the possibility of a bad batch must be investigated just as the possibility of the vaccine ingredients and combination was investigated. “This is not a long-term safety issue with vaccines,” University of Western Australia School of Paediatrics and Child Health Associate Professor Peter Richmond told WA today, they add. Quite right. This is most certainly not a problem with vaccines as a long term safety issue. The only long term issue is the capitalisation by anti-vaccination groups.

All in all this is an appalling piece of junk writing that aims only to create the illusion of widespread – or “across the planet” – trends that somehow show vaccines are a health risk. They cant even manage to keep different Australian reports on two very different scenarios straight. Already this year in QLD influenza is back at six times the annual rate. Febrile convulsions and brain damage from vaccine preventable disease are constant realities. It is for this very reason the risk/benefit of vaccination is actually incredibly safe.

No doubt Australia had some serious issues with vaccine manufacture and management of ADR reporting in 2010. This is being dealt with by the proper authorities. The very last thing the present vaccine controversy needs is this band of chiropractic cowboys defending futile and dangerous treatments, whilst attacking sound evidence backed public health measures.

Ultimately there are not any nations “banning” flu shots for babies. Chiropractors have lied again.

SensaSlim Saga Update

Posted in Alternative "medicine" scams, Big Placebo, Health, Scam by

Last we left SensaSlim, it’s ever ambitious team of supporters was getting a dressing down on behalf of The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission securely ensconced within the Federal Court in NSW.

On July 20th, Justice Yates had, according to the ACCC website;

… made orders by consent granting leave for the ACCC to proceed against Sensaslim Australia Pty Ltd (Administrator Appointed) up to 27 July 2011. Orders are extended to 27 July 2011 that Foster, O’Brien and Adams be restrained from taking further steps to make representations regarding the efficacy of the Sensaslim Spray where the basis for the representation is a clinical trial or scientific report, unless the clinical trial was conducted and is the subject of a scientific report which has been published in a peer reviewed scientific journal.

SMH also ran a piece outlining the bans sought by the ACCC against these rather dishonest chaps headed up by one Peter Clarence Foster, one of the least credible exports from our nation girt by sea;

THE consumer watchdog is seeking a 20-year ban on the corporate life of serial conman Peter Foster, over his alleged misleading and deceptive conduct with the weight loss business, Sensaslim Australia.

Lengthy bans are also sought against fellow Sensaslim Spray proponents Peter Leslie O’Brien (15 years) and seven years for Adam Troy Adams. The ACCC has not sought to disqualify a former Sensaslim director, Michael Anthony Boyle from managing corporations, but is seeking a three year ban on him being involved  in businesses which have franchising characteristics. [….]

The ACCC alleged that Sensaslim made false or misleading representations about the profitability of the business to investors who bought franchises. Sensaslim had claimed that franchisees had the potential to earn $4000 a week after they invested $59,950, and there was a ”money back buy-back guarantee”.

The ACCC said there was not the potential to generate the earnings, there were no franchisees generating the projected earnings, and there was no guarantee of a refund. The ACCC also alleges false and misleading conduct by the use of testimonials of the clinical effectiveness of the spray ”when in fact no such [clinical] trial was conducted”, and the failure to disclose Mr Fosters’ involvement in the business.

The next piece of interest was published August 9th, in The Age’s Small Business section. Authorities move to dump conman’s weight-loss spray from market. At this point SensaSlim were eight days overdue in publishing the legally required warning about the action being taken against the company, on the front page of their website.

A HERBAL diet spray linked to notorious conman Peter Foster looks set to be taken off the market, six months after health authorities first received a complaint about it.

Last week, the Therapeutic Goods Administration’s complaints resolution panel called for SensaSlim to be removed from the register of therapeutic goods, which means the spray cannot be advertised or sold.

Executive officer of the panel, Judith Brimer, asked the TGA to cancel its listing after SensaSlim Australia failed to withdraw advertising that lacked approval. A spokeswoman for the TGA said it was considering the request. The panel’s call comes six months after Melbourne academic Ken Harvey first complained about the product, prompting SensaSlim Australia to launch a defamation case against him. [….]

On July 27, the ACCC won orders in the Federal Court for the company to change the front page of its website to inform visitors of the legal action against it. While the notice was required to be posted within five business days, it did not appear on the site yesterday.

Meanwhile, Dr Harvey continues to defend the defamation case launched against him by the company, which is seeking $800,000 damages. Dr Harvey said he hoped the case, which has cost him about $30,000 to date, would be dismissed this month. Supporters are raising money to cover his costs. More than 100 franchisees are believed to have paid $60,000 each to sell SensaSlim, which has sold for about $1200 a litre or $60 for a 50 millilitre bottle.

Their RTG listing is here for your perusal dear reader, the TGA Summary here. Yet, as we know there’s no joke about seasoned con men. The ACCC may get these critters off Australia’s back, reap some monies and give them some bad press overseas but in reality they’ll just keep singing in the hope of scamming the larger European market. A scroll back through some articles here gives a hint at how much energy they put into feigning disgust at having their good names tarnished and pointing to the (still) available ARTG certificate, on the Australian Weight Loss Challenge site. The “challenge” has grown from about four to thirteen participants in just over a month.

Last night a little birdie on Twitter asked if this was real. SensaSlim director files million dollar law suit against Dr. Ken Harvey. Well, yes it is true. But my, what a tantrum Peter O’Brien seems to have had;

In a writ filed in the Supreme Court of Queensland, Mr O’ Brien claimed that Dr Harvey had no grounds for calling for SensaSlim to be withdrawn from sale given that there are no safety issues over it.

“The TGA authorised SensaSlim for sale on the basis of its unique formulation and active ingredients,” Mr O’Brien said. “It is issued with a TGA Listing number approving it for sale  as a weight loss aid.”

The Sensaslim Solution formulation combines five of the most thoroughly researched weight loss ingredients over the past 30 years.   It uses all natural active components extracted from rare fruits and minerals, which together, act to stimulate the body’s natural fat burning processes, reduce cravings of sugar and carbohydrates, maintain energy metabolism, inhibit fat synthesis, increase fat oxidation, encourage lean muscle mass and decrease body weight.

Sensaslim also contains a natural analgesic which acts to desensitise taste receptors on the tongue.

“For any  product to be withdrawn from the market it has to be because of a safety issue, and Dr Harvey knew that,” Mr O’Brien said.

“He was attempting to create headlines and be mischievous and we are calling him to account.” he said. “He is a man pursuing a personal vendetta and is followed by a small group of people who pride themselves on being sceptics and cynics’. “It is one thing for him to disagree with our advertising, but it is completely outrageous to call for a product to be withdrawn from sale simply because he is against all things natural,”

Mr O’Brien said Dr Harvey was a “chronic complainer on the complementary healthcare industry who becomes louder and more vengeful and spiteful as he realises he becomes less relevant.”

“What Dr Harvey can’t tolerate is the growth in the natural nutrition and healthcare industries, at the cost of big pharmaceuticals,” Mr O’Brien said. […..]

Wait on, wait on. What sort of news agency is going to spruik a product and run a personal attack under a seemingly routine type headline? No comment from Dr. Harvey either, which is tacky given he consults and lectures on the various conflicts of interest that do plague pharmaceutical companies. It is entirely correct and proper for Dr. Harvey to call sham products to account as well as highlight the contributing flaws in Australian regulation. This does not equate to a conflict of interest born of bias toward pharmaceuticals.

Dr. Harvey is a man of impressive integrity who has worked in Australia and overseas to ensure consumers are able to access the drugs they need. He’s worked with local S.E. Asian NGO’s helping to lobby their own governments to introduce policies that enable the sort of access we take for granted as well as tackling the horrific reality of counterfeit medication.

This also had a familiar ring to it. Much like the earlier articles about the wonder spray, the expansive jockey story and the Thank you for suing us article written by a certain Peter O’Brien that had me corresponding with an editor from international.to. Or the claims of presenting these stunning clinical trial results to scientists at the 18th European Conference on Obesity in Turkey. I’d been reliably informed they were nowhere to be seen in Turkey. As I wrote back on July 6th.

Interestingly the Thank you for suing us ad piece and the Black Caviar jockey piece by Peter O’Brien have disappeared. Follow those links and you get a 404. The following day I raised concerns with the editor about an article headed, “Obesity scientists told of SensaSlim slimming spray that has the effect of ‘Fooling the Brain’ into Thinking You’re Not Hungry” and another headed “Four Twins, a Jockey and a sensational slimming spray talk Turkey”. I received no reply. Ironically, both these articles now deliver a 404 message also.

However the editor initially responded citing he’d never heard the claims I was making. Despite links provided about the missing evidence, complaints and accusations from Dr. Capehorn. Then when the proverbial hit the fan I received on June 16th;

Thanks for taking the time to provide more details…

Our role is to be objective and your point of view is valuable..  we will not take sides….

What was once a public interest story has certainly grown into something more now that there are court cases, TV segments and reports from customers ( good and bad )..

We will get back to you..  and I would need your permission to enable me to pass on your email to a reporter to pursue ?

All the best

But I never did hear back and don’t really see why I should have. That’s their call. As I pointed out in the prior article, international.to is owned by RogersDIGITAL a marketing company based in Australia. They have had a website overhaul since I last described the pseudo-psychological marketing lingo’ on their site. Presently they have a rather prominent: We publish news, press releases and advertising on websites owned and operated by our media group.

Which might well explain the far more honest footnote to Peter O’Brien’s latest rant on international.to

Editor Note.. This press release was created and submitted by Mr O’Brien. It is not news. It is not our editorial content . IT IS A PRESS RELEASE. It is for information purposes only. http://www.International.to publishes verified press releases upon application to http://www.NewsMediaReleases.com. As with any press release it is marked as such and is not intended as a report or coverage of an event or occurrence.

A press release, news release, media release, press statement or video release is a written or recorded communication directed at members of the news media for the purpose of announcing something ostensibly newsworthy. [….]

So, we can really only wait and see how much of this is a serious endeavour and how much is to maintain the ongoing song pitched to gullible buyers and presumably very angry franchisees.

In short is it just another last ditch push to make money from the sinking ship SensaSlim by coating the hull in fake credibility?

Meryl Dorey: Free Speech champion who censors the truth

Posted in Big Placebo, Denialism, Health, Human Rights by

In recent posts referencing Brian Martin’s defence of the Australian Vaccination Network I’ve stressed that there is a marked disconnect between the many defences against demonstrable falsehoods raised by the AVN and Martin’s contention that;

The methods used by SAVN disturbed me. SAVN essentially rejects free speech critical of vaccination.

Martin advances a weighty defence of Meryl Dorey and the AVN based on unusual comments on a Facebook page. Comments well removed from vaccine efficacy and safety. A late comer to the debate he failed to comprehend the level of manipulation and censorship conducted by Meryl Dorey. Understandably in writing Debating Vaccination he zeroed in on material that sustained his argument. But he did so to the detriment of publishing a robust academic critique of the vaccine controversy.

Martin painfully selected material and apportioned “assumptions” and flaws in reasoning to those volunteers who defend the health of innocent children. What is striking is the sheer lack of evidence refuting anti-vaccination arguments. The debunked Wakefield claims of autism, his “erasure” from the medical registry and his fraudulent callous disregard, are absent from mentions of AVN complaints. The many “vaccine injuries” and pollutants in vaccines from anti-freeze to aborted foetal cells are not sustained. SIDS and “Shaken Maybe Syndrome” as caused by vaccines remain claims void of evidence. Indeed the plethora of ridiculous claims about “vaccine dangers” go unchallenged. “New Yorker Meryl Dorey” floods her members with USA dynamics begging for money to help hospital workers in NY. Her USA members can demand banning of Australian members who admit to vaccinating children. Yet AVN complainant Ken McLeod is dismissed by Martin for quoting international pertussis figures on vaccine efficacy on the basis it is not local.

Martin’s intent was to confirm, indeed prove his own assumption that the AVN are a “citizens group” raising a voice of dissent. As vice president of Whistleblower’s Australia he was lending them credibility. Credibility that he granted the AVN based on a one sided, biased and inaccurate account. As I’ve written before, Martin is certainly a victim of the AVN’s deception and dishonesty. Much of the material Martin used is from SAVN sources with all the scars and imperfections that this emotive argument elicits.

Deleting material that casts Stop AVN in a negative light is unthinkable to members grounded in science, integrity and skepticism. Members who delight in being proven wrong and welcome such as a test of academic maturity or a new doorway to what evidence reveals – a new challenge. In this light Martin had a banquet to select from in forming his “defence” of Australia’s most dangerous public health antagonists.

Dr. Martin did initially contact members of SAVN. However the die was cast and his status as an “enemy of reason” more than apparent. He seemed to be on a fishing expedition and follow up writings confirmed this. His conclusion was drawn up well before looking for evidence, and his work reflects this admirably. However, he never asked if his proposed assumptions were correct. He never asked for explanations or indeed for an account of debate. If he had he would have been afforded (as he has recently been) the viciousness of AVN abuse of SAVN members and children or babies alive and dead. Material they quickly delete from public view but which is kept by certain SAVN members.

Also he would have been afforded countless polite evidence based rebuttals or mere queries from AVN pages that led to the banning of members and deletion of the material. In this light he may have understood the frustration of those seeking to “debate” and perhaps seen the folly of his title “Debating Vaccination”. Or the censoring of input by Meryl Dorey to convey a false impression to readers. A rambling post followed by gushing appraisal and testimonials of same. Calm evidence based rebuttals are known as “typical skeptic nyah nyah” with claims comments aren’t published because they threaten violence – a lie so overdone and so likely of their own construct it is embarrassing;

I approve unfavourable posts – the only ones I don’t let through are those that are abusive, threaten violence or are the typical skeptic nyah-nyah – you’re wrong and we’re right – immature garbage. Your post does not fit into those parameters.

In fact, I recommend reading that thread. Rob pleasantly leads Meryl in and snaps the trap shut. Meryl responds with…. silence. So, I’m not launching into Dr. Martin here. I maintain the reasons for his flawed stance can be at least partially explained by the schemes of Meryl Dorey. Plain, simple censorship and obfuscation. This calculated manipulation is hard to prove in most arenas. Yet a visit to her site and a brief perusal of posted comments shows gaping holes in the sequence.

I replied to Meryl last night. Like most comments I seek to refute her central claim making up the blog post. It was not published. As always one screenshots material one suspects will be deleted. It is this very material Dr. Martin has not accessed in making up his mind on which side the suppression of free speech comes down. On this occasion less than a third of comments (to my knowledge) were published.

This remains the most frustrating and deceptive tactic on Ms. Dorey’s part. Whilst pleading that citizens, government departments, media and medical authorities actively suppress her right to free speech, she quite knowingly denies right of reply to others. This skews perception. Withholds facts and debate strategies. Leaves demonstrable (even if well meaning) falsehoods seemingly unchallenged.

Done properly, comment censorship can turn a demolished post argument into what looks like a post followed by glowing support and ridicule of any opposition. What’s inexcusable is Ms. Dorey’s exploitation of other parents pain and the misleading of her own members and supporters. From Scientology links and promotion of CCHR to theft of donations, most members are distracted by cries of persecution and oppression.

There’s an emotive issue afoot. Meryl is milking the deaths of two children in Bajna and Akhepura villages of Nagaur district in India. They were injected with tainted vaccines. Counterfeit pharmaceuticals are a massive problem in developing nations. Mishandled and diluted vaccines riddled with pollutants do emerge. This is what killed these children – not vaccine ingredients. You decide on the morale and the intelligence of a “vaccine expert” who capitalises on this.

Nonetheless, Dorey persists on exploiting the apparent vaccine injury of young Ella from Iceland. Eventually her mother comments. Again, vaccine ingredients are not the confirmed variable but possible genetic predisposition. Sadly, anti-vaccine lobbyists seize upon these cases as proof positive vaccines will do this to anyone. These cases are rare but certainly make up many of the vaccine injury compensation payouts. The comment included (with language difficulty);

Ella’s dad is now also in contact with a genetic specialist in NIH in USA to see if there was a genetic factor involved (just for our curiousity) and it is thought that one of Ella’s gene is mutated or damaged, one of her gene that builds protein in her imunesystem .

Correctly, the mechanism of the injury is questioned by medically trained personnel and scientists. The replies aren’t terribly helpful and even become quite bizarre. I do wonder what the bulk of the unpublished comments presented. Talk about shouting down and suppression of free speech. I do hope Dr. Martin takes the time to digest this conduct.

But what of my comment? Why did Meryl not publish it? I actually said it is an abuse of the international right to health that Australia has no vaccine injury compensation programme. Surely Meryl can’t disagree. Perhaps it was the facts and challenges I included. What is unusual is that I hadn’t read the comments on Ella not the predisposition admitted by her mother. I feel for this family and I am appalled that Australia has no compensation scheme for similar injuries. I also call Dorey’s bluff on vaccine injury.

On radio back in May she claimed “hundreds possibly thousands of families” had been compensated by the USA Vaccine Injury Compensation Court. Indeed, even the horrid folk at Age of Autism admit to 21 VICP cases and 62 phone interviews. So, I ask Meryl how 21 became “hundreds, possibly thousands”. My first link is to The Encephalitis Society who offer a compelling document on MMR and disease injury. My second to Wakefield’s monovalent vaccine patent – an issue stridently denied by Dorey. It’s not really framed as a good comment. I guess I wasn’t in a happy frame of mind.

On page 23 of Debating Vaccination Dr. Martin writes;

How should scientific research be done? In the 1940s, sociologist Robert Merton enunciated four norms of science: universalism, communalism, disinterestedness and organised scepticism. What these mean is that science should operate on the same principles in different societies, scientists should freely share their findings, scientists should not be committed to particular positions, and the system of science should encourage critical examination of all viewpoints.

Clearly Meryl Dorey and The AVN have little regard for such an approach to reciprocation. Attempts to discuss scientific data or reach a compromise are attacked as biased, brainwashed or malignant. Mature discourse is impossible and clearly the censorship continues unabated.

Suppression of free speech is something Meryl Dorey excels at, not those who challenge her for evidence.

Of Chiropractors and Cockypop

Posted in Big Placebo, Chiropractic, Health, Scam by

Of course we don’t support vaccination, it’s the biggest medical sham since bloodletting!

Written defiantly on the Australian (anti) Vaccination Network Facebook wall by Jason Parkes, Chiropractor.

Jason’s defiance was in response to the July 27th article, Doctors accuse chiropractors of selling anti-vaccination message. It’s not only chilling in it’s partisan arrogance and ignorance but speaks of a discipline that is unprofessional in the extreme and polluted by an “anything goes” mentality. His musing sits, splendidly, somewhere between Meryl Dorey’s accusation that those who question unproven expensive “therapy” are the “ignorant, anti-choice mob”, and likening herself to Abraham Lincoln and Doug Gwyn on the matter of Truth.

Did Parkes face any professional criticism, perhaps from senior members or his employers at Boambee Chiropractic? Was he contacted by the Chiropractors’ Association of Australia and chastised over the inherent danger and risk to public health in his claim or threatened with disciplinary action? The type of discipline that actual doctors, individually accountable for their actions would face? Did vaccine scaremonger chiropractors such as Nimrod Weiner and Warren Sipser who rely on a veneer of credibility ask him to reconsider?

I don’t really know but as of a few seconds ago his comment remains. And yes, that is Meryl Dorey with a straight face accusing someone of being “shockingly unprofessional”, for quoting a chiropractor on informed choice;

Interestingly, the article included;

The CAA’s research arm, the Spinal Research Foundation recently invited Meryl Dorey from the AVN as guest speaker at a conference in Brisbane.

“I spoke with some third-generation chiropractors whose parents and grandparents were pioneers of this healing art in Australia,” she wrote on her site.

“Many of them are completely unvaccinated and they just glowed … They are the best advertisement for chiropractic and natural health you could possibly get.”

The AMA called on Federal Health Minister to review Medicare payments to chiropractors who supported the anti-vaccination lobby. A spokesperson for Nicola Roxon said chiropractors must adhere to their Code of Conduct, which includes clear directions on promoting public health through prevention and separating personal views from patient care.

So, we’re paying for Earth Mama Moonbeam & Co. to gaze at the navel, conjuring up new ways to pocket fees. The Chiropractors’ Association of Australia claim to not have an official position on vaccination. This is simply not true. Chiropractic today, infiltrated by new age quacks seeks above all, to profit. In this light recommending vaccination breaches their cardinal goal in that it would effectively divert patients toward one of the Arch Nemesi – the medical profession.

Indeed any evidence based health profession is fair game in chiropractic scamming. The CAA’s unspoken position on vaccination is to cast as much doubt on it’s safety and efficacy as possible whilst simultaneously exploiting uncertainty by offering to do the impossible. To improve immunity by chiropractic diddlie dee so that patients won’t need vaccination.

Added to this are creatures like Weiner and Sipser. Warren Sipser tripped over his ego and became the subject of the piece The Chiro Kids in The Australian. Already well known for selling his services as an “expert witness” against the necessity of vaccines, he blundered yet again into the real world and damned himself by his own words and actions. Claiming to cure colds, ear infections, colic, bed-wetting, hyperactivity, asthma Sipser produced the globally debunked journal articles on DNA repair and optimisation of the immune system which makes vaccination unnecessary. This is based on the hokus pokus of their 19th century founder – a magnetic healer – who believed in God given energy flows.

Although the article gave a fair and balanced report on arguments for and against the new age sham, the CAA were consequently rather unhappy about individual practitioners speaking to the media. Much like Dorey’s tantrum above suggests, when it’s actually written down in context it is patently absurd.

Despite having zero qualifications in immunology or medicine, Nimrod Weiner from Newtown Community Chiropractic runs public “seminars”, that he advertises via the Australian Vaccination Network called Vaccinations: An informed choice

Despite the de-registration of Andrew Wakefield for his fraudulent work attempting to link autism to the MMR vaccine, the removal of his paper from The Lancet and careful exposure of how he was to benefit financially from his scam, Weiner admires him. Despite the fact this gastroenterologist lodged a patent claim for a monovalent vaccine well before attacking the trivalent vaccine, Weiner refers to Wakefield as “an autism expert”. A board member of Australian Spinal Research Foundation, and the Chiropractic Association of Australia (NSW), Weiner’s rather predatory conduct is a black mark against his entire discipline.

Weiner’s full presentation is here for those interested. Dr. Rachael Dunlop has written an extensive deconstruction which I highly recommend, of a Nimrod Weiner seminar that she attended. His product is doubt. The more he sells the better for God given energy flows. You can get an idea of Weiner’s Nimroddery from this slide;

Yesterday The Medical Observer published Chiropractors under fire for dubious health claims. It noted that the AMA had called upon the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency – AHPRA seeking “urgent action to rein in fringe elements within the chiropractic profession relating to various unsubstantiated claims about their treatments.” The article continued;

AMA president Dr Steve Hambleton said he understood a high number of complaints had also been lodged with AHPRA over claims made by some chiropractors that they could cure diseases by correcting subluxations in the spine. The demands for closer scrutiny of chiropractors have come amid media reports claiming some chiropractors were advising parents against childhood immunisation. […..]

“Claiming you can fix a patient’s genes or that their children don’t need to be vaccinated is dangerous,” said Dr Hambleton. “We need to make sure that if you are a registered practitioner, the claims you make have a scientific basis.” Chiropractors’ Association of Australia president Simon ­Floreani said many people “perceived chiropractors as ‘back-crackers’ only, but we really want to be at the primary care level”. He described Dr Hambleton’s comments as “ill-informed”.

University of NSW emeritus professor of medicine John Dwyer said while many chiropractors were skilled at physical therapy, he backed the AMA’s move, saying there were increasing numbers who accepted the “unscientific nonsense” that spine flexibility caused disease. Past president of the Chiropractors Registration Board of Victoria John Reggars said it was frustrating to see the good results chiropractors could achieve for musculoskeletal conditions overshadowed by the fundamentalist fringe.

Clearly the new woo has infiltrated the CAA and Simon Floreani can “want” all he desires. Until these peddlers of cockypop and belief systems can provide evidence supporting their presence “at the primary care level”, they remain a Clear and Present Danger to Critical Thought and proper health management. I find the intent to reciprocate with the wider health community is summed up well by this predetermined, close minded, sarcastic comment from chiropractor Rob Hutchings, another devotee to the twilight zone of the Australian Vaccination Network;

One wonders if the evidence we don’t bother to read includes Jeremy Youngblood’s death certificate and autopsy report.

Jeremy recently died of a massive stroke, cerebral oedema and pulmonary embolism with bronchopneumonia following a severed vertebral artery whilst undergoing a “routine” chiropractic manipulation.

Is this enough “primary care level” for you, Simon Floreani?

————————

Jeremy Youngblood’s death certificate in PDF.