Archive by Author

Wakefield on Ethics: “I’m perfectly willing to accept my understanding was wrong.”

11 Apr

Remarkably, Wakefield has now admitted that he may have ‘misunderstood’ the ethical guidelines for research on children. Apparently, Wakefield “was not aware of ‘detailed guidance’ on the treatment of children provided by the British Paediatric Association” and is “perfectly willing to accept [his] understanding [of ethics] wrong”. Wakefield thus seems to be claiming ignorance of the fact that that certain research practices – such as when he allegedly “paid children at party £5 to give blood samples” – are unethical. Partly because of Wakefield’s apparent violation of ethical guidelines, he is accused “of acting against the clinical interests of the children who took part in his trial.”

This is bizarre. Frankly, one wonders as to how a researcher could not realise that practises such as paying kids for their blood at a birthday party might – just perhaps – be a teeny bit ethically problematic. But, even putting that aside, one should remember that Wakefield has been quick to claim [PDF] that

My actions were at times taken in the best interests of children potentially damaged by the MMR vaccine….I remain dedicated to helping these children and resolving the issue of whether vaccines are involved in this disorder or not. I will not be intimidated or coerced into stopping this work prematurely.

If Wakefield was doing this research ‘for the children’, one would have expected him to pay more attention to the ethical guidelines for research on children – and thus to the interests of the children involved in his research. Continue reading →

Autism and diagnostic substitution

11 Apr

As we all know, one of the planks underpinning the platform of the vaccine/autism hypotheses is the idea of an autism epidemic. This ‘supporting idea’ says that there was a sudden, massive increase in the amount of people with autism. This is as opposed to a sudden massive increase in the amount of people _diagnosed_ as autistic, or even more accurately, a sudden, massive increase in the amount of people _eligible_ to be diagnosed.

This was all in and around 1992 when two things happened. The first thing is that the vaccine schedule was altered. The second thing is that the DSM was altered, widening the criteria and allowing in many more people to collect an autism diagnosis then pre-1992.

The first idea – that there was a de facto increase in the amount of people with autism – is the one favoured by those who think autism is caused by/triggered by vaccines. Personally, I feel that numbers two and three have more validity. But the anti-vaccine people need to have an epidemic in order for the vaccine hypotheses to hold water. No epidemic = no sharp rise = no need for an obscure hypothesis to account for it.

However, as Professor Grinker points out in Unstrange Minds:

Doctors now have a more heightened awareness of autism and are diagnosing it with more frequency, and public schools….which first started using the category of autism during the 1991 – 1992 school year are reporting it more often….Epidemiologists are also counting it better.

Unstrange Minds, Page 4

Five big pieces of the awareness puzzle started to come into play. Another one (and yes, I’m stretching this a bit) is what’s called the ‘Rainman‘ phenomenon. This refers to the first real emergence of autism in popular media which purportedly led to many more people becoming aware of autism within their own communities.

As part of Unstrange Minds, Grinker went to Korea and looked at the autism experience there. This is part of what he found:

When [Milal School] was being built in the mid-1990s, some of the wealthy residents of this quiet neighborhood south of the Kangnam River in Seoul picketed the site, cut the school’s phone lines, physically assaulted school administrators, and filed a lawsuit to halt construction, because they believed that the presence in the neighborhood of children with disabilities would lower property values. The school opened in 1997, but only with a compromise. It was required to alter its architecture so that the children were completely hidden from public view. Some of the protestors were brutally honest. They said they didn’t want their children to see or meet a child with autism.

Its my opinion that this sort of thing was not too uncommon in the not-too-distant-past of the West. I know from my own experience that offering services for some forms of mental illness are protested against by residents close to the proposed services in the UK. People fear what they don’t understand.

In the case of autism, I think we in the West are past Korea’s point. We are very much more accepting of autism as an existing state and thus people are more prepared to see it and more people _do_ see it. Would you have wanted to take your autistic child out for a walk to the shops if you lived in Korea in the mid-90s? No, me neither. In this country in 2008 I do so with no worries at all.

But believing these things are accurate and having evidence to support that belief are two different things.

Professor Dorothy Bishop of Oxford University led a team to study:

whether some children who previously had other diagnoses are now being diagnosed with autism. We applied contemporary autism diagnostic criteria to adults with a history of developmental language disorder, to discover whether diagnostic substitution has taken place.

The results were eyebrow-raising. In total, 12 (31%) of the participants would’ve been diagnosed as being on the spectrum, of which 8 (21%) would have been diagnosed with ‘classic’ autism.

Bishop et al are quick to point out that:

….it would be rash to conclude that increasing prevalence of autism is entirely explicable in terms of broadening diagnostic criteria

which is very true but it also an inescapable conclusion that, in the words of some of the anti-vaccine believers, these kids were ‘missed’. Or as Bishop et al put it:

….this study provides direct evidence of diagnostic substitution, indicating that many children who were diagnosed with severe language disorders in the 1980s and 1990s displayed behaviours that would be regarded as meriting a diagnosis of ASD according to contemporary criteria. This appears to be a direct result of changing diagnostic criteria from DSM-III through DSM-IIIR and DSM-IV.

One aspect of the study has already caused it to be ignored by the anti-vaccine believers. The fact that Professor Bishop is a Wellcome Research Fellow. I wanted to talk to her about this and find out what that meant. She replied that:

The Wellcome Trust is not involved with manufacture of pharmaceuticals – that’s a common misperception….

And she attached a brief commentary on the subject that is produced by the Trust.

We do not make pharmaceuticals.

The Wellcome Trust is frequently and erroneously thought to be a drugs company, or to have been the charitable arm of a drugs company.

The confusion stems from the fact that from 1936 the label ‘Wellcome’ was shared by two entities, both founded by the same man:

1) the Wellcome pharmaceutical company (confusingly known as the Wellcome Foundation Limited in the UK)
2) the Wellcome Trust.

The Wellcome Trust (the charity) was established by the will of Henry Wellcome to be the sole shareholder of the pharmaceutical company, and to use the profits for charitable aims. Until 1986, the Wellcome Trust was the sole owner of the pharmaceutical company, which generated all of the charity’s income.

In 1986, the first of two share sales created a public limited company, Wellcome plc, which owned the Wellcome pharmaceutical company. The second sale took place in 1992, reducing the Wellcome Trust’s shareholding to around 25 per cent of Wellcome plc. Further asset diversification resulted from the 1995 merger of Wellcome plc with Glaxo plc, creating Glaxo Wellcome plc, which subsequently merged with SmithKline Beecham plc to create GlaxoSmithKline plc.

The Wellcome Trust maintains a small stake in GlaxoSmithKline, as part of a broad portfolio of investments that includes equities, property and other forms of corporate investment. It has always made all of its funding decisions completely independently of the pharmaceutical company.

Professor Bishop is the first to point out the limitations of this study – its small sample size. But this is, as she states, direct evidence of diagnostic substitution and, should the percentages be mirrored elsewhere, somewhere between 20% – 30% of the ‘epidemic’ could in fact be attributed to diagnostic substitution.

A little something for Autism Awareness Month

10 Apr

 The invitation for the birthday party arrived a couple of weeks before the date. I use the couple of days before the party to try and explain things to Tom. We watch  an episode of Something Special where Tom gets a refresher course on birthday cakes and Happy Birthday and Bullet gets a refresher course on ensuring that if you are going to watch a dvd to death, don’t pick a beloved one that can only be got via mail order. I ask Tom what his friend likes to play with . He pauses and then announces.

 “W bread and Tom bread!”

  I am tempted to buy a loaf of Warburtons, but decide it probably wouldn’t go down well as a good present for a five year old.

  After rejecting musical instruments (too noisy), baby toys (too patronising perhaps), drawing things (what if he has motor difficulties) and playdough I opt for a set of toy kitchen scales. Upon getting home and trying to wrap it I realise it wasn’t the greatest idea to pick something that is almost impossible to cover with ease. The difficulties involved in the logistics of this are solved by passing it to my husband to sort out. I am secretly gratified when he returns it to me with a small tear at the top, “because it wouldn’t wrap well.”

 We arrive at the village hall where the party is about ten minutes before it was due to start, thanks to traffic being worse than we anticipated. I kiss Jacob goodbye, asking his dad to take him somewhere nice whilst the party is going on and I then walk with Tom into the room. He is very quiet and stands stock still, not moving. The mother of the birthday lad steps forward to greet us.

 “Tom” I say and sign “say “hello”

 He looks towards the fire extinguisher (I will be compelled to read the instructions and manufacturing information on this extinguisher later) and addresses an “ErHeh” to that. The mother smiles at him. Then there is a flurry of movement and a small lad comes racing up.

 “Oh!” he announces happily. “Here is Tom! I been waiting for Tom and now he’s here!”

 Tom appears to ignore him. I ask him to say “hello” to the lad and get no response. I point out the balloons (much loved by Tom) and step back.

 Five minutes later he has picked up a balloon and is running round following the birthday lad, the pair of them giggling and racing round the room. There is no conversation, no set games, just two little boys who like each other and want to run as fast as they can. When Musical Bumps is announced Tom sees this as another opportunity to run round and likes that part so much he keeps running long after the music has stopped and all the other children have sat down.

 A few days later we are in town. As we walk up the street Tom pulls in one direction.

“A go a number 20!” he announces. This is what he calls the shopping centre. “A number 4!”

 “Ok” I tell him “We shall go to the shopping centre. We shall go in the lift.”

 He is quiet for a minute and then announces.

 “A balloon! A W candle a Tom balloon!”

 The party, it seems, was a great success.

Doing the right thing

9 Apr

David Kirby and Dan Olmsted that is. Kudos to them. See Orac’s blog for details.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss

8 Apr

I got email from Ginger Taylor today. She’d read one of my posts on the ongoing Poling/HHS scenario.

I wanted to make sure you had see this from the VICP table.

It is part of the description of what vaccine induced encephalopathy is:

(1) A significant change in mental status that is not medication related; specifically a confusional state, or a delirium, or a psychosis;
(2) A significantly decreased level of consciousness, which is independent of a seizure and cannot be attributed to the effects of medication; and
(3) A seizure associated with loss of consciousness.

(D) A “significantly decreased level of consciousness” is indicated by the presence of at least one of the following clinical signs for at least 24 hours or greater (see paragraphs (2)(I)(A) and (2)(I)(B) of this section for applicable timeframes):

(1) Decreased or absent response to environment (responds, if at all, only to loud voice or painful stimuli);
(2) Decreased or absent eye contact (does not fix gaze upon family members or other individuals); or
(3) Inconsistent or absent responses to external stimuli (does not recognize familiar people or things).

As a matter of fact, I _had_ seen the table. Why Ginger wanted me to read it again I’m not sure. It doesn’t add anything new to the list of symptoms that both the HHS document and the Case Report document and thus we’re still no nearer a diagnosis of autism.

Anyway, after that she carried on:

That is an exact description of what most of us observed in our children when they regressed. When I went into my peds office with my son hanging limp in my arms and not responding to external stimuli, with absent eye contact, and dramatic change in mental status and a very marked decreased level of consciousness, and told him it all started after his vaccines, he should have diagnosed him with encephalopathy. A medical condition, that my medical doctor was charged with diagnosing.

But pediatricians are not taught to look for vaccine injury. Only autism. Because no one is responsible for autism. So instead he sent him to a speech therapist and a psychologist that diagnosed him under a DSM IV code of autism. He passed the buck because if he had done his diagnostic job correctly, he would have indited himself and the vaccine program.

And my doctor was a good doctor. He was not a shlub.

He would’ve indicted the vaccine program for what? Indicating a known vaccine injury was present? Huh?

This to me is the crux of the title of my post – meet the old boss, same as the old boss. People such as Ginger are not interested in _autism_ . They are not interested in being advocates for _autism_ . What they want is either a recognition that their docs screwed up and diagnosed their kids with the wrong thing (this is fine by me. The sooner these people are off the autism communities back the better) or for autism itself to be redefined to meet their own children’s symptoms. This is not fine with me.

This is nothing new. Way back in 2001, Bernard et al published Autism: A Novel Form of Mercury Poisoning which attempted the same ‘trick’ as is being attempted here – redefine autism to meet your own beliefs rather than see if what you believe fits the already established facts. As we have all been witness to, time has not been kind to the thiomersal hypotheses. Neither has it been kind to the MMR hypotheses.

Anyway, Ginger carried on:

Things are changing VERY quickly Kevin. The atmosphere here is much different than from what i understand is happening in the UK. Major networks are not ready to report on it yet, but they are listening to us now. Calling and asking questions even. Main stream docs were talking to me about integrating DAN methods into their practices before the AAP’s announcement last week. All of the sudden parents are getting their phone calls returned very quickly from sources that have blown them off for a long time. And I can’t keep up with my email.

I thought this would be a decade or more of fighting all this, but it looks to be more like the cascade of events when the Soviet Union fell. It is gaining speed. The Polings were the first major crack in the dam and now huge chunks are coming out faster and faster.

Kirby was right, the debate is over.

I had a quick grin at the sheer arrogance of comparing the autism/vaccine hypotheses to the collapse of communism in the old Soviet block but really, this again is nothing new. If I had a pound for every time someone had posted on here that ‘this is it, its all over’ I’d be richer by a fair few pounds. Of course, they always come to nothing.

The devil is in the details. And in the science. Mito connections to autism are nothing new. Attempts to ‘talk up’ and muddy the wide picture whilst failing to look at the details are nothing new. The media talking to people is hardly anything new (I had an interview myself recently and have had several in the past). Attempting to twist autism away from what is already known about it into something new to make it fit into yet another set of beliefs is not new.

I’ll say it again as I have before. Its a very exciting time for the media and bloggers as we have lots of cool stuff to talk about. However, none of that stuff is new science. And when it comes to vaccines causing autism that’s what is needed. Science.

David Kirby is right (and wrong)

6 Apr

David Kirby has an excellent title for his blog post: ‘CDC Has Lost Control of the Autism Argument’.

I happen to to think he is 100% gold-plated correct. In fact I would go even further than that – the CDC, the FDA and the AAP have become, on this issue, little short of a laughing stock. They have bungled, mismanaged, failed to address and not known how to retort at just above every step of the process.

Controversially perhaps I think a lot of it has to do with the bureaucratic nature of these monoliths – they need to reform their way of working. They’re slow and outdated in their PR and media handling. That is not to say that the people working within these systems are terrible useless people – clearly they are not – but they operate within a system that cannot seem to effectively communicate the scientific truth behind the various vaccine hypotheses.

And now we truly _do_ have various vaccine hypotheses. Once it was ‘….nothing more than mercury poisoning.’. Then it was the MMR too. Then it was a combination of both. Then it wasn’t _just_ mercury in vaccines it was all the other ingredients too.

Now we have another twist: the mito/autism/vaccine hypothesis which I have no doubt has sent scores of parents all over the Western world forking out for yet another set of tests and will no doubt prompt yet another set of questionable treatments repackaged and rebranded for autism.

I think its worth while remembering at this point that, despite the furore over the last few weeks, one thing has not changed: *the science* .

All the talk shows and Larry King appearances and cloak and dagger leaked reports are all very exciting and good blogger fodder for people like me and David but the bottom line is this: no new science has been added to the equation regarding any vaccine/autism hypothesis. So, when I read the Larry King transcript and saw David snapping ‘the debate is over!’ I raised an eyebrow as I couldn’t recall any new science being brought along that night (or any other night) that had caused the debate to be over.

Anyway, back to David’s HuffPo entry. Now, I’ve swapped very courteous emails with David Kirby and whilst I have also posted quite angrily about him too I think he cares about people. Which is why when I read a paragraph such as the following I get perplexed. Here’s David:

A recent government decision to award nine-year-old Hannah Poling taxpayer dollars for her multiple vaccine-induced autism, has left parents anxious and alarmed….

A recent government decision. Hmm. Lets see what the Special Masters who are overseeing the Autism Omnibus (of whom Hannah Polings case was until recently a part of) said:

….reports have erroneously stated that the Office of the Special Masters has recently issued a “decision,” “opinion,” or “ruling” concerning the issue of whether a Vaccine Act claimant’s autism symptoms were caused by one or more vaccinations. The OSM has not issued any such decision, ruling or opinion.

No decision.

And David Kirby also refers to Hannah Poling’s ‘multiple vaccine-induced autism’. Lets see what the OSM says:

this court has issued no decision on the issue of vaccine causation of autism

But maybe by ‘government’ David means the HHS? Not the courts? If thats so, can David – or anyone else – point out to me where in any HHS statement they note that have decided to award Hannah Poling money for ‘vaccine-induced autism’?

Or maybe David means someone else when he refers to ‘government’?

And lets also be clear. Not only has the OSM _nor_ the HHS referred to ‘vaccine-induced autism’, neither has any aspect of the medical literature written about Hannah Poling (or any other claimant).

So yes, I find David’s over-exuberance perplexing on occasion. I am also concerned that paragraphs such as the above are muddying waters that need to be crystal clear right now. We serve no one by misleading them either intentionally or not.

Kathleen Seidel

5 Apr

There’s no point at all in my rehashing what has happened to Kathleen. We all know. The blogging communities response has been swift and fierce – rightly so. I don’t imagine the lawyer in question has made many friends in his profession over the last couple of days.

I wanted to write a blistering, thundering post too because, believe me, that’s how I felt after reading the subpoena Kathleen received. I consider her a friend and ally of a good many years now – as I do Dave. They both do what they do because they care. They care about their own autistic children and they care about all of our autistic children and they do what is right – they question what is suspicious and they support what is worthwhile.

But I can’t write a blistering, thundering post. The last few weeks have been something of an education for me on how the world works. I am even having to be incredibly careful about how I write this post, a tribute to the tenacity of my friend Kathleen.

Where my American friends can rest easy in the knowledge that their law supports them in their right to speak freely, mine does not. Where Kathleen can put together such an excellent response, I – and all other British bloggers – cannot. Unless we are very rich, or insured or employed by a paper that is insured, we are totally stymied.

Please rest assured that I have very recent knowledge of this process. To the extent that whilst I can say that I have first hand knowledge I cannot discuss it, I cannot (and will not) name names. I don’t like this but I have no option. This is modern Britain. Bloggers can be silenced. I hope that Kathleen is never, ever silenced. The world needs truth and integrity.

Autism Omnibus: Special Masters Speak

4 Apr

A new document has been uploaded to the Autism Omnibus hearing section by the Special Masters. It regards the Poling case. I want to pick out a couple of sections (thanks to M and MS for this tip):

We do note, however, that under the statutory provision in question,information from a Vaccine-Act proceeding may be disclosed if the person who supplied such information provides “express written consent” for such disclosure. 42 U.S.C. 5 300aa-12(d)(4)(A). Thus, for example, in the six autism “test cases” discussed above, we are able to disclose the names of the cases in this pdate, because the families in question have provided such “express written consent.” Therefore, in the case that is the subject of the media reports, if the parties who supplied documents and information in the case provide their written consent, we may then be able to appropriately disclose documents in the case. Until such consent is provided, however, we cannot disclose any information. We reiterate that this court has issued no decision on the issue of vaccine causation of autism

And:

In recent weeks, there have been a number of reports in the media concerning a certain Vaccine Act case, currently pending before the court. Some of those reports have erroneously stated that the Office of the Special Masters has recently issued a “decision,” “opinion,” or “ruling” concerning the issue of whether a Vaccine Act claimant’s autism symptoms were caused by one or more vaccinations. The OSM has not issued any such decision, ruling or opinion. (All Vaccine Act decisions and opinions are posted on the Court’s web site at www.uscourts.gov/vaccine-opinions-decisions) Pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 300aa=12(d)(4)(A), officials of this court are generally prohibited from revealing any information concerning vaccine Act case, until a written decision concerning the case has been issued. Accordingly we cannot provide any details concerning this matter at this time

Jenny McCarthy on Larry King Live

3 Apr

Well, she’s just an actress…and unfortunately, we place too much value on the opinions of actors in this country.

~ Erik Nanstiel, Feb 2006

Now Erik was discussing Sigourney Weaver (the future Mrs Leitch if she ever stops stalking me) and her role in Snowcake but I thought it might serve as an interesting comparison for how another actress, Jenny McCarthy, is currently viewed.

In point of fact, I entirely agree with Erik, we _do_ place far too much importance on what acctresses and actors say. For example, on Larry King Live last night jenny McCarthy spoke quite a lot but didn’t actually _say_ much at all.

For example:

It’s a global epidemic…

Really? Where is the science that supports that position? Because there is an _awful_ lot of evidence that entirely refutes it.

I went online and I found a community called Defeat Autism Now……I believed enough — even though my pediatrician at the time said it’s all bull — and followed this treatment and my son got better

Yeah, that and all the ABA, and the Indigo/Crystal beliefs:

The day I found out I was an adult Indigo will stay with me forever. I was walking hand in hand with my son down a Los Angeles street when this women approached me and said, “You’re an Indigo and your son is a Crystal.” I immediately replied, “Yes!” and the woman smiled at me and walked away. I stood there for a moment, because I had no idea what the heck an Indigo and Crystal was, but I seemed so sure of it when I had blurted out “Yes!” After doing some of my own research on the word Indigo, I realized not only was I an early Indigo but my son was in fact a Crystal child.

A what?

The Indigo child concept was first publicized in 1999 by the book The Indigo Children: The New Kids Have Arrived, written by the husband-and-wife team of Lee Carroll and Jan Tober. Carroll insists that the concept was obtained via conversations with a spiritual entity known as Kryon.

Wikipedia

Except, the website that carries all her beliefs has been quietly vanished. If you want to find this info now, you have to look in Google Cache.

Onwards,

I’m not, nor is the autism community, anti-vaccine. We’re anti-toxin and we’re anti-schedule.

The autism community? Who _is_ this woman with the ego to think she speaks for the entire autism community? Good grief. And as for the section of the community she speaks for not being anti-vaccine? Try these on Jenny:

!http://www.kevinleitch.co.uk/images/eoh/PowerOfTruthRallySign.jpg!
!http://www.autismrally.com/IMG_5365.jpg!
!http://www.autismrally.com/IMG_5426.jpg!

All taken from the sort of rally you’re promoting later on in the show.


JM:

And isn’t it ironic, in 1983 there was 10 shots and now there’s 36 and the rise of autism happened at the same time?

Ironic like this?

No, its not ironic. Its another example of correlation not implying causation – you can see another graphic example on the ‘canards’ page of this very website.

JM:

I believe that parents’ anecdotal information is science-based information

Yeah. Its not.

JM:

environmental toxins play a role. Viruses play a role. Those are all triggers. But vaccines play the largest role right now

No evidence of any kind was presented to back this up. Later on McCarthy sneered at the AAP for talking about studies that weren’t ‘independent’ (what she meant by that is anyone’s guess) but in short succession she said that parental anecdote was good science and that vaccines play ‘the largest’ role in causing autism.

David Kirby was sitting right next to McCarthy and yet neither of them mentioned his HuffPo entry in which said:

And, if 20% of autism cases are mito related, and 6% of those cases regressed because of vaccines, that would mean that at least 1% of all autism cases were vaccine related.

1%.

Lets compare that to the approximately 40% already genetically accounted for. I don’t think its difficult to process which is the larger number.

And after that Dear Reader I simply can’t carry on ploughing through the rest of McCarthy’s contributions. They range from the offensive to the inane.

But here’s an offer for Ms McCarthy – and David, I know you’re a reader so feel free to pass this on:

Come and pay my family and me a visit Ms McCarthy. Just you and maybe your son – no media, no journos, no cameras, no Hollywood bullshit. You and I can have a proper well mannered debate whilst our kids play and see if we still feel the same afterwards. What about it? Got the balls?

Ginger Taylor – The Smearing Continues….

3 Apr

Thanks to anonymous person who alerted me to the fact something was wrong here.

Short recap: Janny McCarthy and David Kirby were guests on a US shows called Larry King Live where they had some kind of debate (although it really sounds a bit like it was a shouting match) with some AAP guys.

Ginger reported it thusly and laid into an AAP guy called Dave Tayloe, Jr.. Here’s Taylor’s opinion on the man:

Tayloe is just dangerous.

This man has GOT to be removed from the position that he has been elected to before he takes office. I would take Karp in a second over this guy. Karp was wrong, but he wasn’t crazy person saying insane things with a smile wrong.

But then the real fun starts:

UPDATE: OMG! Turns out the Vaccine Injury Compensation Court exists in part due to the 3.5 million dollar malpractice suit that Dr. David Tayloe lost in 1985 when a child he gave the DPT shot to magically got permanent brain injury!! That Asshole just got on TV and implied that he had never SEEN a vaccine injury in his practice!!!

Dangerous….crazy…asshole…..

And having a court force him for giving a shot to a kid who could not handle it was still not enough to teach him the lesson that not all vaccines are safe for every child, because he went on the Today show and said that ALL VACCINES ARE SAFE FOR EVERY CHILD!!!!

The information Ginger Taylor posts regarding this lawsuit is here. But here’s a key section:

$3,500,000 Jury Verdict, May 1, 1985

The Defendant Pediatrician, David Tayloe, who at that time was the President of the National Pediatric Association, strenuously fought this case all the way to a jury verdict….

Now if you visit the AAP site you will find out that in 1985, the man who appeared on Larry King Live (named David Tayloe Jr) had only qualified in 1977. And yet a bare 8 years later we’re supposed to think he was the President of the National Pediatric Association? I suspect it might have been this mans father. David Tayloe Snr.

You might also note that:

Dave [Tayloe Jr] has served in the leadership of the NC Chapter since 1985.

Straight from a failed multi-million dollar lawsuit into a leadership position huh? I really don’t think so.

If I was a blogger like Ginger Taylor I might call her names for (yet again, in the space of one week) irresponsibly publishing information about a man that will serve to inflame the sensibilities of people who really need to calm down. Taylor is developing something of a reputation for this of late.

She might be right, it might conceivably be the same David Tayloe but I have to say it sounds very, very unlikely. Did Ginger Taylor do any background reading on this or was she simply too fired up from Jenny McCarthy saying a rude word to bother?

Oh and AAP? I bet you’re really really pleased with your decision to meet the DAN! brigade now, right? Thanks once again for deciding to sacrifice credibility and evidence based medicine to try and ‘meet halfway’ a bunch of people bending over backwards to shit on you the first chance they get.

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