Hey there skeptifans. Here are the Fails and Wins you sent me this week.

Now you can be a card carrying skeptic.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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Browsing the aisle of a local retailer, recently, started me thinking about beauty products and how skeptical I am of some their claims. The shelves are stocked with dozens of different facial moisturizers alone, ranging in brand, size, and price. Actually, it’s surprising how wide the range of pricing is–from products that cost $5 for a large bottle, to tiny bottles selling for $30+. Now, I’m lucky that I don’t actually have any significant skin problems; however, I do find that I occasionally have dark circles under my eyes. There were plenty of different eye creams to choose from. But I wondered; why the big difference in price? Do they work? Is the higher price just trying to convince me it must be good? And, most importantly, where can I find reliable information to help answer my questions?

No makeup reveals slight dark circles under my eyes.

My little container of eye cream.

Well, fortunately, The Token Skeptic has covered this topic in a recent episode, On Myths and Makeup – Pseudoscience and Cosmetics. It’s a great episode that covers pseudoscience in beauty products as well as tricks used to market them. For quite a while I’ve been wondering if there are skeptical blogs dedicated to the topic of beauty and the episode points to a few, including The Beauty Brains and The Skeptical Beauty.

Personally, I love buying makeup. Different eye shadows, pencils, liners, bronzers, blush, and lipstick feels like having an artist’s kit of tools, paint, and brushes–which I guess it kind of is–and since I’m an illustrator and designer, I find it so much fun to apply different styles to my face. It’s kind of like photoshop…but for meatspace!

When it comes to products that start to use sciency-sounding jargon, I’m not a big fan. Though, to be fair, I’m not really (yet) in the market for anti-wrinkle/aging creams or other products that aim to fix beauty woes. But it’s really nice to hear some clarification and pointers on buying beauty products without getting ripped off. Like a lot of consumers, I actually enjoy using beauty products; I have a few face creams that I like simply because they’re part of a sort of mini-ritual that I enjoy in the same way I might sit down for a cup of tea. Most of the body lotions I have aren’t to treat anything–they just have a pleasant fragrance or pretty shimmer to them.

But, it turns out I’m right to question the big difference in pricing. Making a product expensive is a marketing strategy and doesn’t mean there’s a difference in quality. Like many industries, there’s a lot of bunk out there, but with the help of skeptical blogs like these, consumers have resources for learning how to make science-based decisions about their purchases.

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Hey there skeptifans. Here are the Fails and Wins you sent me this week.

3 reasons to reconsider vitamin pills
Thanks to Lorne for this Win. It seems that almost everyone takes some form of vitamin supplement. According to the common sense, vitamins are always good and more is better. But what is the evidence supporting vitamin supplements? And why do we downplay the risks associated with taking too much? This article quickly covers the issues, and hopefully makes you think twice about your daily multivitamin.

Acupuncture may help ease chronic pain in young people
Acupuncture has seemingly been studied to death….and yet it will not die. It has a zombie like ability to live again as credulous reporters and health professionals write about the benefits after reading a poorly controlled study. Acupuncture produces a strong placebo effect and that’s it, and when studied with proper controls this has been verified again and again. Why won’t it just die already?

Woman sues after arm amputated following holistic procedure
Mark sent in this sad story. A woman lost her arm after visiting an osteopath who told her not to seek medical treatment for the pain she was feeling. Osteopathy, like a lot of other alternative medicine fields, extols the belief that the body can heal itself. This concept seems to go hand in hand with a distrust in real medicine. This distrust leads to many of the cases we report about, and points to the ultimate harm of alternative medicine – failing to seek proper treatment.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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I sometimes answer friends requests for analysis, such as I can offer, on Facebook and such.  Today this article was forwarded to me:

Study: Whooping cough outbreak linked to vaccinated children

Go read it. It is short.  The conclusion it draws have also been picked up by the Natural News

Now that that is done, here was my quick analysis:

As a vaccine does not give 100% protection this is not unusual – all it takes is a drop in herd immunity and outbreaks occur among the vaccinated – what the study did not report on is the severity of the illness in the vaccinated vs. the unvaccinated which I suspect was attenuated due to the prior immune response. It is also a warning against skipping a dose and it may point to further boosters being required for immunity to continue.

What is more, the researchers, unlike the DJ author Elliot Freeman,  did not extrapolate the results of the study to imply that those who are unvaccinated are at greater risk for whooping cough than those who are vaccinated: the study did not address this. It is pure fantasy to suggest that this is the case.

Finally, the original Reuters article did not make the distinction between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated, but between different ages of vaccinated kids: “immunized children between eight and 12 years old were more likely to catch the bacterial disease than kids of other ages.” This was not made entirely clear in the article, I will admit, so Freeman could have extrapolated incorrectly based on this mistake, so I went to the source.

It is clear in the abstract that the comparison in age groups was between vaccinated children and the dip occurred in the 8-12 year range, right before the second boost at 11-12 years was required (it also rebounded after the second booster shot to a more acceptable level: “Vaccine Effectiveness was 41%, 24%, 79%, for ages 2-7, 8-12, 13-18″).

Reuters and Freeman did not do their homework or were sloppy in reporting. What is important about this study is that the vaccine schedule may need to be amended to have an earlier booster. I say may because this is one study and we need to confirm the results to know they are real.

Mike Adams in the Natural News goes farther, no surprise there, and states outright that vaccinated children had higher rates of pertussis than unvaccinated children, which is not stated in either the Reuters article or the original research.  He is just making this stuff up.

In the case of the NYT article cited by Freeman, several plausible solutions were given for the increase of pertussis cases in NY state that he chose to ignore and instead imply that the vaccine did not work properly.

As for the shot at the flu vaccine: again, Freeman should read the entire article on Science Daily(which is a press release site and not even just an abstract publisher) or even go to the original Plos article which is free here.

We find a bit of a milder conclusion than Freeman insinuates:

“Because all the investigations in this study are “observational,” the people who had been vaccinated might share another unknown characteristic that is actually responsible for increasing their risk of developing pH1N1 illness (“confounding”). Furthermore, the results reported in this study might have arisen by chance, although the consistency of results across the studies makes this unlikely. Thus, the finding of an association between prior receipt of 2008–09 TIV and an increased risk of pH1N1 illness is not conclusive and needs to be investigated further, particularly since some other observational studies conducted in other countries have reported that seasonal vaccination had no influence or may have been associated with reduced chances of pH1N1 illness. “

What the studies were testing was not the H1N1 vaccine, but a seasonal vaccine that did not contain it – as not everyone gets vaccinated and compliance is highest among those at greatest risk, I can see a confounding factor existing: populations at highest risk for the flu are also getting the seasonal vaccine so they are also independently at higher risk for getting the H1N1 strain. This may not be true, but surely the answer to this is not to withhold the seasonal flu strain but to include H1N1 in the vaccine.

So, in reading the same sources that Freeman  has quoted I can come to a more supportable conclusion: the pertussis vaccine might wear off so make sure your boosters are up to date, and the more people we have vaccinated with more comprehensive vaccines, the safer we will be.

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Hey there skeptifans. Here are the Fails and Wins this week.

Herbal remedy used to treat kidney ailments causes kidney ailments
What’s the harm in using untested natural remedies? They may have side effects, and sometimes even cause the thing you’re trying to cure! Birthwort (AKA aristolochia) is an “ancient” treatment for all kinds of ailments, including kidney troubles. But the real trouble is that it can cause serious kidney failure. Just another reminder that natural and safe have nothing to do with one another.

Alberta PC’s promise coverage for alternative medicine.
The PC’s have taken a pretty un-skeptical position on alternative medicine. Material on their website promises that “Alternative medicine plays an increasingly important role in preventative health, and needs to be considered in a holistic approach to wellness – especially in cases where naturopathic, homeopathic, chiropractic, and other therapies help patients attain personal health goals. Qualified patients will be able to claim up to $500 per year for these treatments starting in 2013.” Alberta’s election has the whole country watching. It will be interesting to see if this issue comes out in the debates.  Thanks to John for the link.

Indian skeptic charged with “blasphemy” for revealing secret behind “miracle” of weeping cross
Weeping statues are an old trick, one which has been repeatedly debunked. So when a weeping cross turned up in Mumbai the president of the Indian Rationalist Association, Sanal Edamaruku, set out to explain how it was done. In this case, it didn’t seem that anyone was intentionally behind the hoax. The water was coming from a nearby drain. But when Sanal criticized members of the Catholic church for endorsing the “miracle”, he was arrested for blasphemy. I haven’t been able to find any recent updates on Sanal’s case, but lets hope officials are able to see that he has the truth on his side.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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This is the first of a series of posts adapting a presentation made at The Ontario Public Health Convention in April, 2011. The presentation, “Fighting in the Trenches: Countering Anti-Vaccine Sentiment with Social Media” was a panel discussion from Skeptic North contributors Scott Gavura and Kimberly Hébert:

One of the best parts of the infectious disease outbreak movie Contagion was the decision to include an antivaccinationist, conspiracy-minded, alternative health advocate, played by Jude Law. Law gave a character-perfect performance of someone intent on deliberately and selfishly thwarting public health advice, putting lives at risk as a consequence. Sadly, the writers didn’t have to look far for real world examples: It’s hard to forget Mike “Health Ranger” Adams’s paranoid music video produced in 2009, at the height of H1N1, when he decided to put every antivaccine argument into one performance.

But the “Health Ranger” is just the current manifestation of antivaccine sentiment which has been around since vaccines were invented:

When a theory has been confirmed so completely by facts as has the proposition that vaccination effectually performed will prevent an individual from contracting small-pox, or at least so fundamentally modify the disease that it is no longer a serious malady, there is in many minds a natural distaste to fight the battle again or to be constantly defending the position against the attacks of ill-informed or prejudiced persons.

- British Medical Journal, July 24, 1897

But this battle is still being fought, after over 100 years of immunization, and over two dozen diseases becoming vaccine-preventable.  The anti-vaccine movement is a real movement, and it’s doing what it can to create fear, uncertainty and doubt regarding public health messaging. There is evidence that antivaccinationists can influence vaccination decisions. The arrival of social media over the past decade means there’s the need for public health advocates to adapt their messaging to a new medium. What seems clear is that “traditional” public health tactics, with static messaging, warnings, and arguments from authority, are dwindling in their effectiveness. All aspects of medicine are moving towards models of shared decision-making. This is an overdue change, and it’s been facilitated by the widespread availability of health information. Information is no longer hidden from public access. Want the approved product monograph for a vaccine? It’s available online. Even the primary literature is becoming more freely accessible.

Unfortunately, the power of the Web 2.0 and social media has made it easier for antivaccinationists to foster antivaccine fears and sentiment. In order to combat this misinformation, the movement’s tactics and tropes must be understood, so they can be called out.

The Tactics

There are several excellent websites, including Respectful Insolence and Science-Based Medicine, that have dozens if not hundreds of posts on the tactics anti-vaccine movement. And there are several excellent vaccine posts here at Skeptic North.  Anna Kata, an anthropologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, complied much of the movement’s actions in the recent paper, Anti-vaccine activists, Web 2.0, and the postmodern paradigm – An overview of tactics and tropes used online by the anti-vaccination movement. She neatly categorizes the disingenuous tactics and messaging used by the antivaccine movement. Tactics include:

• Skewering the science of vaccine safety and efficacy, while trying to create legitimacy for unfounded or discredited theories of harm. Antivaccine advocates denigrate legitimate scientific studies, and the scientific process in general, why also trying to bolster scientific credibility for their own theories. Pseudoscientific conferences, like those offered by AutismOne, give the veneer of legitimacy to disproven beliefs.
• Shifting the hypotheses and the villain, from MMR, to thimerosal, to other “toxins”, and more recently, “too many, too soon”.
• Censoring criticism, whether it’s at Age of Autism, Mothering.com, or other antivaccine sites that delete comments or restrict access to their events, creating virtual or real echo chambers.
• Attacking the opposition, whether it’s David Gorski at Science-Based Medicine or lawsuits against physician Paul Offit or journalist Amy Wallace.

The Tropes

Tropes are language or literary devices that are intended to achieve a specific effect.  Not quite a a cliché, they’re recurring themes that, in the context of the anti-vaccination movement, are used to create fear, uncertainty and doubt about vaccines. Kata’s paper included 14 tropes – I estimate there are at least 30, if not more. Recognizing antivaccine tropes is a key skill in countering antivaccine propaganda.

1. “I’m not anti-vaccine, I’m pro-safe vaccine”

Antivaccine advocates are reluctant to admit that they fundamentally oppose vaccination. So a common tactic is denying the opposition of vaccines, but instead arguing that one is in favour of safer vaccines. This trope, when taken literally, is hard to argue with – who could be against products that are safer? This is a straw man argument. No public health advocate argues against safe vaccines. Yet 100% safety in anything is impossible to guarantee. Vaccines have risks and benefits, with the benefits dramatically outweighing the risks. But to antivaccinationists, “evidence” is listed to imply that vaccines could be easily made safer – if only manufacturers would listen!  But looking more closely at the arguments reveals misleading information and distorted representations of scientific information.

Further Reading: Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carrey, and “Green Our Vaccines”: Anti-vaccine, not “pro-safe vaccine” (Science-Based Medicine), The annals of “I’m not anti-vaccine,” part 9 (Respectful Insolence), Once again: Antivaccine, not pro-safe vaccine (Respectful Insolence), “Green Our Vaccines”: “Pro-safe vaccine” or anti-vaccine? You be the judge! (Respectful Insolence)

2. “Vaccines are Toxic!” aka The Toxin Gambit

This is an argument with a false composition:

1. “x” is toxic
2. vaccines contain “x”
3. Therefore, vaccines are toxic

Antivaccinationists cannot or will not understand that “the dose makes the poison”. Instead they link the consequences of exposure to vaccine ingredients at other settings and doses, declaring vaccines to be unsafe in he process.  The goalposts keep moving with this trope: The toxin used to be thimerosal. Now that thimerosal has been removed from almost all vaccines, and the incidence of autism hasn’t changed, other ingredients are blamed. Whether it’s formaldehyde, squalene, aluminum, or some other component, the scientific evidence doesn’t stop claims like, “FDA Approved H1N1 Vaccines Contain Ingredients Known to Cause Cancer and Death!” This argument is just a distraction from the main issue of the antivaccinationist: The vaccine itself. It’s always the vaccine.

One particularly misleading tactic used by antivaccinationists to emphasize vaccine toxicity are “vaccine calculators” that are crafted to frighten you into avoiding vaccinations.

Further Reading: Toxic myths about vaccines (Science-Based Medicine), The “toxin gambit” on steroids (Respectful Insolence), A Defense of Childhood Influenza Vaccination and Squalene-Containing Adjuvants; Joseph Mercola’s “Dirty Little Secret” (Science-Based Medicine), Cries the antivaccinationist: Why are we injecting TOXINS into our babies? (revisited) (Respectful Insolence)

3. “Vaccines should be 100% safe”

If a vaccine cannot be shown to be 100% safe, it is suspect, according to this trope. Another straw man argument, it ignores any meaningful evaluation of risk and benefit. It further ignores the fact that no health care professional denies that vaccines are not risk free. However, they are much safer than the diseases from which they are designed to protect. While few doubt the benefit that seatbelts offer, the fact that they do not prevent deaths under all circumstances is usually not cited as reason to avoid using them. In fact, it’s because of the actual evaluation of risk and benefit that some vaccines are not appropriate for some individuals under some circumstances. Rather than use science-based information, NVIC’s Physician’s Warranty of Vaccine Safety is a tool created by antivaccinationists for parents to give to their physician. With a combination of misleading and demonstrably incorrect statements, no physician is likely to sign the document, providing the impression that vaccines are unsafe. Antivaccinationists will also point to adverse event surveillance systems and the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program as evidence of the harms of vaccines, again ignoring any serious evaluation of benefit and risk.

Further reading: Institute for Vaccine Safety, Vaccine Safety (Every Child by Two), Adverse Effects of Vaccines: Evidence and Causality (Institute of Medicine), Yet another bad day for the anti-vaccine movement 2011 (Respectful Insolence)

4. “You can’t prove vaccines are safe”

This argument flips the onus onto vaccine advocates, implying that because there is no clear cause of certain conditions or events, then vaccines are suspect. It’s another faulty argument:

1. There is no conclusive cause of autism
2. Children receive vaccines
3. Therefore, vaccines are a potential cause of autism

There is truth to the statement that it is impossible  to completely prove a negative hypothesis. However, when huge epidemiological studies fail to detect any causal relationship, it’s reasonable, based on the evidence, to conclude that no relationship exists. Multiple lines of evidence support this conclusion. The burden of proof is now on the group making the association – and no credible scientific evidence exists to support that hypothesis. In fact, epidemiological evidence suggests that vaccination is very safe – one of the safest health interventions we make.

Further reading: Vaccine safety information and resources (CCIAP), The incredible shrinking vaccine-autism hypothesis shrinks some more (Science-Based Medicine), The HPV Vaccine (Gardasil) Safety Revisited (Science-Based Medicine)

5. “Vaccines didn’t save us” aka “Vaccines don’t work”

This is a frequent and deceptive tactic, suggesting that sanitation and other public health measures can protect against disease adequately, and therefore the vaccine isn’t responsible for the decrease in the incidence of a disease. While it’s true that sanitary measures are essential components to preventing the spread of some diseases (e.g., influenza), it glosses over the scientific evidence demonstrating that most spread regardless of hygiene. Varicella would continue to infect up to 90% of the population by age 12 if it were not for vaccines. Graphs which are purported to demonstrate a lack of vaccine efficacy are drawn to be deliberately misleading.

Further reading: “Vaccines didn’t save us” (a.k.a. “vaccines don’t work”): Intellectual dishonesty at its most naked (Science-Based Medicine), Historical Comparisons of Morbidity and Mortality for Vaccine-Preventable Diseases in the United States (JAMA), Are vaccines effective? (Skeptic’s dictionary), Outbreaks (Science-Based Medicine), Analysis of Anti-Vax Graphs (Vic Skeptics), Measles Elimination in Canada (J Inf Disease), Measles Elimination in the United States (J Inf Disease), Measles deaths, pre-vaccine (Mystery Rays from Outer Space)

6. “Vaccines are unnatural”

A popular argument from alternative practitioners like homeopaths, chiropractors, and naturopaths, this trope is the naturalistic fallacy: Natural is good. Vaccines are unnatural, and therefore bad. Immunity conferred by (surviving a) disease is perceived to be superior and desirable to vaccination. This has led, unbelievably, to events like pox parties where infectious material is shared.The argument is an odd one in that vaccines induce an immune response, so that it’s the body’s own “natural” immunity which is then primed to identify and fight any future pathogen exposure. The naturalistic argument is among the weakest arguments: Deadly nightshade, botulism, and smallpox are all natural. But most people, if given the choice, would prefer to avoid them.

Further reading: Appeal to Nature (Fallacy Files), Moral Non-Naturalism (Stanford), “Pox packages,” child abuse, and the violation of federal law (Respectful Insolence), Vaccines are “transhumanism” that subverts evolution? (Respectful Insolence)

7. “You’re choosing between diseases and vaccine injuries”

This trope frames the discussion in a misleading way, excluding other possibilities, and creating a false dichotomy:

“I do believe sadly it’s going to take some diseases coming back to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe. If the vaccine companies are not listening to us, it’s their f___ing fault that the diseases are coming back. They’re making a product that’s s___. If you give us a safe vaccine, we’ll use it. It shouldn’t be polio versus autism.” – Jenny McCarthy, Time Magazine, 2009

Jenny McCarthy sees the resurgence of communicable disease as an acceptable consequence of her antivaccination drive. She rejects any responsibility from stoking anti-vaccine fears, when it’s clear that to McCarthy and other antivaccine advocates, no vaccine is safe enough to administer. Yet if there is no credible evidence linking vaccines to autism (as is the case) then there is no “choice” that needs to be made between the DPT vaccine and autism.  Rather, the decision to take the vaccine should be based on an evaluation of the benefits and known risks – which is overwhelmingly positive for vaccines.

Further reading: In Jenny McCarthy’s own words (Science-Based Medicine), Jenny McCarthy Body Count, Dana McCaffery: dead from whooping cough (pertussis)

8. “Galileo was persecuted too!”

“To our community, Andrew Wakefield is Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ rolled up into one” -  J. B. Handley, co-founder of Generation Rescue

Also known as the Semmelweiss gambit or the Copernicus gambit, this is yet another logical fallacy: If your idea is criticized and ridiculed, it must be correct, even if (or perhaps especially when) all the scientific evidence points to the contrary. There are a number of ways this analogy is incorrect:

• Galileo Galilei was persecuted by the church, for ideas which contradicted church dogma – not scientific evidence.
• Galileo was an educated scientist and astronomer, not a critic armed with the 16th century equivalent of degree from Google U.
• There is no necessary link between being perceived as wrong, and actually being correct.
• Given the infinite number of incorrect statements for every established fact, the idea that an idea is being criticized for not being correct means it is more likely that idea is incorrect, rather than correct.

More current examples of the Galileo gambit cited by antivaccinationists include the discovery by Warren and Marshall that the main contributor to stomach and duodenal ulcers is the bacterium Helicobacter pylori. While there was initial skepticism of the idea, data emerged to change the scientific consensus, and in less that a decade, H. pylori was established and accepted as a cause of ulcers. Importantly, this change occurred because scientific evidence established it to be real.  In contrast, antivaccinationism arguments are fundamentally hand-waving excuses to distract from the fact that the demonstrated benefits of vaccination greatly outweigh the risks of use. A more appropriate quote on Galileo is:

“Alas, to wear the mantle of Galileo it is not enough that you be persecuted by an unkind establishment, you must also be right.” — Robert L. Park

Perhaps not surprisingly, the stridently antivaccine organization Age of Autism has a Galileo Award. Its 2008 winner? Andrew Wakefield.

Further reading: The Galileo Gambit (Respectful Insolence), Galileo Gambit (Rational Wiki), Galileo Syndrome and the Principle of Exclusion (Neurologica), The Galileo Gambit (Smoke and Mirrors)

9. “Science was wrong before!”

“Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus” – “False in one thing, false in all”.  This argument is referred to as the thalidomide gambit (aka Gavura’s law), or the Vioxx gambit.

“Established science” refers the accumulated knowledge, that is supported by objective evidence, and is amended or updated when new evidence emerges. When scientific knowledge changes, it’s because newer theories provide a better explanation for observed effects than prior models (see the Galileo gambit, above). The argument that “science was wrong before” is usually used to defend statements which have usually been disproven. It confuses “science doesn’t know everything” with “science doesn’t know anything”, which reminds me of a classic Dara O’Briain clip.  Any reference to “science was wrong before”, thalidomide, or Vioxx when it comes to antivaccination is a sign that the statement being made has no scientific evidence to support it. Science has been wrong before, but the scientific process isn’t wrong. If new evidence emerges to change the scientific consensus, it’s because of that process – not from ignoring it. Rational Wiki explains it as follows:

The fact that science can be “wrong” in this way is a feature, not a bug, as one of the differences between science and pseudoscience is that science is self-correcting whereas pseudoscience continues to put forth the same debunked points over and over again. These pseudoscientists present “science” as a monolithic entity with no difference between different types of science and the uncertainties associated with each field.

Further reading: Oh yeah? Thalidomide! Where’s your science now? (Science-Based Medicine), The appeal to “science was wrong before” (Skeptico), Science was wrong before (Rational Wiki), A crank’s favorite gambit: Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus (Respectful Insolence)

 10. “So many people can’t all be wrong” aka “argumentum ad populum”

This is a simple argument from popularity, sometimes called an appeal to a widespread belief or an appeal to common practice. When a statement is prefaced with “Everybody knows,” you’re looking at an argument from popularity. Science is not a popularity contest, and popularity does not indicate the validity of an idea. Rather, ideas must be evaluated based on their own merits, and the scientific evidence that support them. This argument is regularly used to defend practices which are popular but not supported by any scientific evidence, like homeopathy, integrative medicine, and also antivaccinationism. The argument from popularity is also the basis for different antivaccine petitions. Unfortunately for the antivaccine movement,, what is accepted science is not determined by vote.

Further reading: Fallacy: Appeal to Popularity (Nizkor Project), Argumentum ad populum (RationalWiki)

11. “Skeptics believe…”

This phrase sets up a straw man argument which misrepresent pro-vaccine arguments and create easier targets to attack:

• “You believe all vaccines are safe and effective”
• “You believe we should just accept what our government tells us”
• “You don’t think autism is a real issue”
• “You believe in mandatory vaccination”
• “You believe it’s fine to inject a neurotoxin into an infant”

Illustrated nicely by Mike Adams the “Health Ranger”, and neatly rebutted by Steven Novella, these are arguments of the antivaccinationists’ own creation which appear everywhere on antivaccination websites. By creating false arguments, antivaccinationists use this tactic to avoid providing credible scientific arguments to support their own positions.

Further reading: Straw Man Fallacy (Skeptic’s Dictionary), Straw Man (Fallacy Files), A pyromaniac in a field of straw man or a black hole of burning stupid incinerating every straw man in the universe? Mike Adams attacks skepticism (Respectful Insolence)

12. “You’re in the Pocket of Big Pharma”

Any critic of the antivaccine movement will inevitably be called a shill for Big Pharma. It’s probably the most common ad hominem attack use by antivaccinationists, accusing public health supporters of being supported (financially or otherwise) by pharmaceutical companies. This accusation shifts the discussion to one where the public health advocate must act defensively regarding their motives, freeing the antivaccinationist from actually responding to the scientific evidence. It’s been used to attempt to deliberately poison the reputations of public health advocates such as David Gorski, Paul Offit,and others. But whether or not someone actually is being supported by a pharmaceutical company has no relationship to the scientific evidence. Antivaccinationists, lacking credible evidence to support their position, use ad hominems like the pharma shill gambit to avoid responding meaningfully to the scientific evidence.

Further reading: The “pharma shill” gambit (Science-Based Medicine), The price of opposing medical pseudoscience (Science-Based Medicine), I love it when you call me Big Pharma (ZDogg MD)

 13. “I don’t believe in coincidences”

This argument posits that correlation equals causation, another logical fallacy. With anti-vaccine arguments, this involves anecdotes about negative events which have occurred following vaccination, and the vaccine was blamed as a consequence. The anti-vaccine movie The Greater Good is essentially written around this premise. Recall during 2009 that the H1N1 vaccine was linked by antivaccinationists to numerous harms, including miscarriage. However, given the incidence of miscarriage (or heart attack, or stroke, or indigestion, or any other event) in the population, we can expect a huge number of medical events to occur following the administration of any vaccine, simply by chance alone. So the only way to determine if something is causal is to study it. Bradford Hill established nine criteria for evaluating causality, which serve as a useful template to evaluate harms attributed to vaccines:

1. Strength of the association: How strong is the association between cause and effect?
2. Consistency of the association: Do other studies support the same association? What about a control group?
3. Specificity: Does altering only the cause alter the effect?
4. Temporal relationship: Does the cause precede the effect?
5. Biological gradient: Is there a dose-response relationship?
6. Biological plausibility: Does it make sense? Does it violate well established scientific evidence?
7. Coherence: Does the evidence fit with what is known of the natural history of the disease?
8. Experimental evidence: Are there any clinical studies supporting the association?
9. Reasoning by analogy: Is the observed association supported by similar associations?

In the case of vaccine-related harms like vaccines and autism, no causal relationship exists.

Further reading: Statistics for Skeptics Part 2 – Correlation vs. Causation (Skeptic North), Evidence in Medicine: Correlation and Causation (Science-Based Medicine), Causation and Hill’s Criteria (Science-Based Medicine)

14. “I’m an expert on my own child”

This argument is used to denigrate scientific evidence and genuine knowledge about vaccine safety, arguing that relevant expertise is inappropriate or unnecessary. A postmodern argument, it redefines expertise in ways that may be empowering, or at least offer more flexibility to the anti-vaccine argument. In some ways this argument can also illustrate the Dunning-Kruger effect, a cognitive bias where those with little education on a topic actually rate their own understanding of the evidence higher than average. This comes across clearly in antivaccination arguments, where advocates project absolute certainty in their beliefs. Public health advocates and vaccine supporters, who understand the data and the evidence, may in fact seem more tentative, given the imperative to be accurate in their responses. This argument also seems popular among alternative health providers (e.g., homeopaths, naturopaths, and chiropractors) with antivaccine roots that may not promote science-based perspectives on vaccines.

Further reading: A black hole of antivaccine misinformation (Respectful Insolence), Alternative Vaccination Schedules (Science-Based Medicine), Pseudo-expertise versus science-based medicine (Science-Based Medicine), Nine Questions, Nine Answers (Science-Based Medicine)

 Conclusion

There are at least 14 antivaccine tropes which continue to be used in antivaccine arguments. More likely exist, but this covers the most common ones encountered. One of the most effective ways to combat antivaccinationism is to identify and to call out tropes when you see them. Don’t debate them: Pseudoscience and logical fallacies are not a serious argument against the established scientific evidence. That evidence is clear: There is no credible evidence to suggest vaccines cause autism, or that the risks of vaccines outweigh the benefits of vaccination in most circumstances. Antivaccinationists have been dodging the facts, and offering tropes instead of evidence to support their arguments for over 100 years. It’s time to stop this threat to public health.

Reference:

Kata A (2011). Anti-vaccine activists, Web 2.0, and the postmodern paradigm – An overview of tactics and tropes used online by the anti-vaccination movement. Vaccine PMID: 22172504

Photo from flickr user captaincinema, adapted for use under a CC licence.

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The following is a guest post contributed by Iain Martel of the Centre for Inquiry Canada’s Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism (CASS).

“Homeopathy: There’s Nothing in it” is the slogan for the 10:23 campaign, a British-based global campaign to educate the public to the fact that homeopathic preparations are typically so dilute that there is not a single molecule of the supposed active ingredient left in a standard dose. The slogan could now be used to describe the core contention of a $30 million class action lawsuit here in Canada.

The suit has been filed by leading class-action law firm Roy, Elliott, O’Connor (REO), in partnership with Centre for Inquiry Canada. It follows an open letter sent by CFI’s Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism (CASS) to Shoppers Drug Mart, demanding that it cease selling worthless homeopathic products such as Oscillococcinum, Boiron Inc.’s popular homeopathic flu remedy. In the new lawsuit against both Shoppers and Boiron, REO alleges that the two companies have, through their marketing of Oscillococcinum, committed no fewer than twelve separate violations of consumer protection acts.

The heart of the case is the claim that Oscillococcinum (“Oscillo”) does not in fact contain the active ingredient Boiron lists on its packaging. The packaging for Oscillo lists the active ingredient as “Anas Barbariae Hepatis et Cordis extractum 200C”. Put into plain English, this describes a dilution of an initial extract of the heart and liver of the Barbary (or Muscovy) duck. Set aside for the moment the fact that there is no evidence whatsoever that Barbary duck organs have any effect on influenza, and focus on the dilution. Even by homeopathic standards, the level of dilution in Oscillo is extreme: “200C” indicates a serial dilution of one part in 100, repeated 200 times. That is, the final product represents a theoretical dilution level of one part in 10⁴⁰⁰. Given that the entire observable universe only contains an estimated 10⁸⁰ atoms, it is clear that almost all of these dilutions involve simply diluting water with water – there is no trace of duck heart or liver left after the first dozen or so dilutions. So the claimed active ingredient in Oscillo is neither “active” nor an “ingredient”. Rather, since each 1g pill contains 0.85g sucrose and 0.15g lactose, Oscillo is in fact 100% sugar. By misrepresenting their sugar pills as containing an active ingredient, Boiron violates numerous consumer protection laws.

A further complaint in the lawsuit concerns the use of the term “200C”. This violates the Weights and Measures Act and the Food and Drug Act, for “C” is not a recognized unit of measurement for medicinal ingredients (indeed, though it is displayed as a  measurement, “200C” actually describes a process, not a measurement). Moreover, the measurement is confusing and misleading, for a higher number actually designates a lower amount – there is less of the ingredient, the higher the dilution. (Of course, in the upside-down world of homeopathy, higher dilutions are supposedly more potent, but fortunately the law inhabits this world, where less really is less.)

Finally, but most importantly, the suit points out that not a single scientific study has reliably shown that the active ingredient listed for Oscillo is effective at treating influenza, or at relieving flu symptoms. And even if the active ingredient were effective, this would be irrelevant, for Oscillo contains no active ingredient! Boiron thus grossly misstates the health benefits of its product, deceiving consumers into thinking they are buying an effective medicine.

At $14.99 for six 1g pills ($2,500 per kg), Oscillo is hardly cheap: compared to a 2kg bag of sugar for $3 ($1.50 per kg), it would appear to be at least 160,000% overpriced! By selling grossly overpriced sugar pills as effective medicine, both Boiron and Shoppers Drug Mart have profited greatly from customers, few of whom can have any idea of how those pills were prepared or what they contain (unless they were buying them for a homeopathic “overdose”, that is!). While these customers were not denied potentially life-saving treatment as a result of their ill-advised purchases – unlike those who rely on homeopathic “vaccines” or treatment for illnesses more serious than seasonal colds and flus – they were duped out of money that could have been spent on products that would actually provide relief. We believe that this revenue was gained unlawfully, and that neither Shoppers nor Boiron has the right to hold it. (If you know anyone who has unwittingly bought Oscillo, and is willing to be a part of this case, please contact CFI.)

As we enter World Homeopathy Awareness Week – in which homeopaths try to raise awareness for anything but how empty their claims are – we hope that this case will increase awareness of the misleading nature of Boiron’s marketing, and that it will persuade Shoppers Drug Mart to get out of the snake oil business. As CASS wrote in its open letter to Shoppers:

“Continuing to profit on homeopathic products is a blatant display of poor practice, bad corporate citizenship, and disregard for … customers’ health.”

For more information, visit the Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism. See also CFI’s media release.

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Photo by flickr user rkrichardson.

In their toolbox homeopaths have sugar, water, and oodles of imagination. They tell us they have some science in there too, and they root around in there quite a bit looking for it. Personally, I’ve yet to see a homeopath wield that tool with any competency at all.

Oh, and one more thing. They have lawyers.

Today I want to highlight two recent incidents outside of Canada, in which homeopaths are attempting to shut down valid criticism through abuse of the legal process.

In Lisbon, Portugal, blogger Luis Graves Rodrigues is being sued by a homeopathic pharmacy he mentioned in a post back in 2007. In the original blog post, he wrote about widely advertised crackdowns by Portuguese authorities on counterfeit products sold in open markets, and contrasted this action with the ability of a homeopathic pharmacy to:

“…sell openly and with impunity, or better “foist” onto the public, mysterious preparations at astronomical prices, though they are little more than concoctions of water and no one has been able to demonstrate their efficacy or even their effect.” [My translation]

Mr. Rodrigues goes on to explain his outrage at a regulatory system that allows homeopathic products to be sold as medicine, even though the Portuguese health regulator requires that homeopathic products be labeled as being “without proven therapeutic indications”. Counterfeit CD’s bad; counterfeit medicine, no problem. Sounds familiar…

The homeopathic pharmacy that he mentioned has, nearly 5 years later, accused Mr. Rodrigues of defamation and consequently he must appear in court on April 17^th. I’m sure Mr.Rodrigues will not disappoint in defending himself:

“This is obviously a very clear strategy of intimidation, which seeks nothing more than the continuation of their sale of “snake oil” with impunity, while trying to silence the constitutional freedom to express an opinion that is scientifically justified – which will be clearly demonstrated at the trial”. [My translation]

We will keep you updated on the outcome. In the meantime my next few glasses of port and vinho verde will be raised in solidarity with Mr. Rodrigues and every other Portuguese skeptic who speaks out against quackery.

More Contemptible Legal Thuggery

Meanwhile in Australia, homeopath Francine Scrayen has had her lawyers send a cease and desist letter to blogger, Dan Buzzard. It really is a wonder that she was able to find the lawyers in her toolbox so easily, when she was never able to find anything that would have saved the life of her patient, Penelope Dingle. Tragically, Ms. Dingle ultimately died of rectal cancer on August 25, 2005 and by all accounts suffered horrifically and unnecessarily.

What makes this case of legal thuggery truly sickening and contemptible, is that Ms Scrayen is implicated in Penelope’s death.

These allegations aren’t only being made by bloggers and Penelope’s surviving family, but notably by Penelope herself. Over the course of her treatment by Ms Scrayen, Penelope maintained diaries that documented every contact between her and her homeopath. It seems that she did so, because she was convinced that she would need the notes for a book she would later write about her miraculous homeopathic cure. Further, when it became clear to Penelope that she would die as a result of following Ms. Scrayen’s treatment and advice, she wrote a series of letters in which she makes clear that she wanted Ms. Scrayen to take responsibility for her bad advice.

“Fact
Had I performed the enema you instructed me to do, the surgeon told me it would have split my bowel. Had this happened, in my weakened state it would have been unlikely I could have survived the massive infection that would have ensued.
The surgeon said “if your bowel had split, you would have died. I could not have saved you.”
I’d like you to ponder this.

Fact
Had I waited another 48 hours as you instructed me, for the remedy to work and “for the stop to go,” I would have died. The surgeon said I could not have survived another 48 hours, which means I would have died on Monday October 13, 2003.
Ponder on this too.”

After her death, Penelope’s siblings brought her diaries and her letters to the Coroner and demanded an inquest be held. Blogger Dan Buzzard wrote about the Coroner’s report and pulled no punches in expressing his disgust at Francine Scrayen’s actions. The Coroner concluded:

“I accept that Mrs Scrayen believed that the deceased had suffered from haemorrhoids years earlier and the bleeding and pain was “an old symptom coming back”, but a competent health professional would have been alarmed by the developing symptoms and would have strongly advised that appropriate medical investigations be conducted without delay.

Mrs Scrayen was not a competent health professional. I accept that Mrs Scrayen had minimal understanding of relevant health issues, unfortunately that did not prevent her from treating the deceased as a patient.  “

…

“Sadly in the period April and May 2003 it appears that the deceased decided to reject the mainstream treatment offered by Professor Platell and turned to homeopathic remedies offered by Mrs Scrayen. I am satisfied that Mrs Scrayen did convince the deceased that the homeopathy treatment which she was providing could provide a cure for her cancer.

In the months of April, May and June 2003 the deceased became increasingly reliant on Mrs Scrayen and by July 2003 she was in contact with her almost every single day. By this stage the relationship between the deceased and Mrs Scrayen had gone far beyond a normal patient/health provider relationship and the deceased had become increasingly dependent on Mrs Scrayen.”

…

“During the period in 2003 while the deceased was relying on the treatment provided by Mrs Scrayen, not only did she lose whatever chances of life she had, she suffered extreme and unnecessary pain. Evidence at the inquest was to the effect that had surgery been performed earlier much of that gross pain would have been avoided.

This situation was made even worse by the fact that Mrs Scrayen’s advice to the deceased was that she should avoid or take a minimum of pain reducing medications. The deceased accepted this advice and only reluctantly used minimal analgesia.”

This is the information that Francine Scrayen doesn’t want you to know. She doesn’t want anyone to know that she failed to recognize the seriousness of Penelope’s developing symptoms. She doesn’t want you to know that the Coroner concluded that she was not a competent health professional in any way. She doesn’t want you to know that she told Penelope that homeopathy would cure her cancer. She doesn’t want you to know that she convinced Penelope that taking medication for her intense pain would interfere with the cure she was promised. She doesn’t want you to know that she persisted with her life threatening advice, even when Penelope was so close to death that only emergency surgery would save her life.

Can anyone reasonably hold the opinion that Francine Scrayen is being unfairly criticized?

NOTE: In the next few days, I’ll be posting a summary of the circumstances that led to Penelope Dingle’s death as outlined in the Coroner’s report.

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Hey there skeptifans! You may have noticed that the Fails and Wins have not been coming on a weekly basis. I apologize, life has been a bit busy for me lately. Thankfully, this hasn’t stopped you from faithfully sending in your links, and I want to thank all of you for keeping my inbox full! And I’d like to especially call out Fails and Wins regulars Lorne and Art (and many others I’m sure I’m forgetting!) for always having links for me each week.

From the excellent web comic, Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.

Teen Exorcists Give The Devil A Helluva Time In Arizona
This story has a lot of Fail. Three Arizona teen sisters have taken up an unusual hobby…performing exorcisms. They are encouraged by their reverend father, and the media who has been eating this story up. Credulous reporters have been giving the girls TV time and print space, with very little critical thinking going on. At least this article from HuffPo had a win at the end with a quote from CFI member Jim Underdown, “The only people who get possessed by demons — and subsequently cured — are those who believe it’s possible. You never hear about it happening to atheists.”

To Find Out About Food Allergies, First Use The Right Test
Anna sent in this Win from NPR’s food blog, The Salt. It references a recent article in the Canadian Medical Association Journal which urged doctors to stick to proven allergy tests, and avoid some of the unscientific tests that are out there on the internet. You can read the article here but it requires a paid membership. The Salt article goes on to clarify existing guidelines, point out the difference between an allergy and other sensitivities, and explains some of the uncertainties with current best methods. These uncertainties are fertile soil for alt-med and snake-oil salesmen, so it’s nice to see an article that doesn’t cite popular but unproven treatments of that type.

Quackbuster Joe Schwarcz takes on charlatans
Maclean’s ran this nice piece on noted Canadian skeptic Joe Schwarcz. Schwarz heads up McGill’s Office for Science and Society, which recently received a sizable grant. Recently Schwarcz has been taking on Health Canada for their stance on issuing DIN numbers to homeopathic products — an issue we’ve discussed a lot here at Skeptic North. Let’s hope this grant money helps with the fight!

World Homeopathy Awareness Week
Speaking of homeopathy, April 10th marks the start of World Homeopathy Awareness Week. It’s a week where homeopaths focus their promotion of their magic shaken water. It’s also a week where skeptics unite to educate people about what is actually in homeopathic medicines….nothing but water. Stay tuned to this blog and other skeptic sites to find how how you can get involved.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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My post earlier this week on the removal of Jenna Talackova from competition in the Miss Universe Canada pageant has become the most read article on my own blog since I began blogging a year and a half ago.  The story, at first just a whisper here and there, has blossomed into quite a sensation. However, in many cases, writers have missed the larger issue of the lack of protection for transexuals in our current human rights legislation.

It is one of the unfortunate things about our society that we need to have specific legislation to protect individuals from discrimination. I like to think the best of people, and I believe that the majority don’t give a damn about anyone else’s colour, religion, gender, sexual orientation or anything else that identifies some one as being different in some way. Unfortunately, there is a large enough percentage of the population that does care. It is for defence against these that we need legislation for protection. It is also unfortunate that this legislation cannot just say that discrimination in general is wrong and illegal. The legislation works on the principle of exclusion. If a reason against discrimination is not specifically defined, it does not exist.

While the story about Miss Talackova is in almost every mainstream media source, the existence of NDP Member Randall Garrison’s Bill C-279 has been almost entirely ignored by everyone other than bloggers.

Bill C-279 states, in part:

An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code (gender identity and gender expression)
Her Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows:
CANADIAN HUMAN RIGHTS ACT
1. Section 2 of the Canadian Human Rights Act is replaced by the following:
2. The purpose of this Act is to extend the laws in Canada to give effect, within the purview of matters coming within the legislative authority of Parliament, to the principle that all individuals should have an opportunity equal with other individuals to make for themselves the lives that they are able and wish to have and to have their needs accommodated, consistent with their duties and obligations as members of society, without being hindered in or prevented from doing so by discriminatory practices based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation,gender identity, gender expression, marital status, family status, disability or conviction for an offence for which a pardon has been granted.
2. Subsection 3(1) of the Act is replaced by the following:
3. (1) For all purposes of this Act, the prohibited grounds of discrimination are race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation,gender identity, gender expression, marital status, family status, disability and conviction for which a pardon has been granted.
CRIMINAL CODE
3. Subsection 318(4) of the Criminal Code is replaced by the following:
(4) In this section, “identifiable group” means any section of the public distinguished by colour, race, religion, ethnic origin, gender identity, gender expression or sexual orientation.
4. Subparagraph 718.2(a)(i) of the Act is replaced by the following:
(i) evidence that the offence was motivated by bias, prejudice or hate based on race, national or ethnic origin, language, colour, religion, sex, age, mental or physical disability, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, or any other similar factor,

The Bill seeks to add those 4 words to the relevant sections of the pre-existing acts that protect people against discrimination. For most of us, the concept of discrimination  on gender identity and expression is totally foreign. However, in some areas it is quite common, and like all forms of prejudice, the effects can be devastating.  Natalie Reed, a writer at Freethought Blogs is a women who has personal experience with the effects of prejudice.

How many trans people (including myself) have been openly and loudly misgendered at the welfare office? How many trans women have been kicked out of women’s shelters on the basis of being “really men” and forced to humiliate themselves and risk violence or sexual assault trying to be accommodated by men’s shelters? How many have been turned away from food banks on the basis that they don’t have “proper” identification? How many of us, exposed to this bigotry, humiliation, invalidation and risk simply stop trying to seek work or assistance, and end up falling between the cracks of the system, all because nobody can even be bothered to acknowledge this crucial gap in Canadian human rights law? And what good are marriage or adoption rights when you don’t even the basic necessities to take care of yourself, let alone a family?

She lists some of her friends who have struggled with these issues.

Sonya: She can’t find work because her identification doesn’t match her presented gender. Her identification doesn’t match her presented gender because she has not yet had lower surgery, required to obtain an updated gender marker on one’s birth certificate. She hasn’t yet had lower surgery because she can’t afford to see a psychiatrist for her required assessment and approval. She can’t afford to see a psychiatrist because she does not have work, and lives on the pittance offered by Quebec’s income assistance

Catherine and Emily: who have to work tirelessly to sustain struggling independently owned businesses in order to scrape by because nobody will hire them.

Emily: despite her staggering and beautiful intelligence has had her bright academic future derailed by the negative preconceptions that exist even amongst the educated towards those who don’t quite fit into our expectations about gender. Where once she would have been assured an eventual tenure-tracked position, her future now hangs in anxious uncertainty, and her ability to earn (deserved) respect from her peers has been hamstringed by the potential to see her as a “tranny” first.

Kaitlyn Borgas: once a prominent and rising star chef in the upper class Vancouver restaurant circuit, forced into unemployment and poverty, her once weighted name dragged through the mud and now attended by derisive, snide giggling and hateful gossip, subjected to insensitive and insulting newspaper columns, ending up sending out scores of resumes to jobs for which she was grossly overqualified, only to not even be called in for an interview, as her family struggled to survive.

Saige: a woman I knew from the Vancouver trans community who ended up taking her own life last year due to simply being unable to cope living in such a hostile environment.

Kimberly Nixon: rejected from her position at Vancouver Rape Relief for being transsexual and therefore not a “real” woman and not able to “understand” the experiences of other women who had experienced rape or sexual assault.

Kimberly filed a human rights complaint that she ultimately lost because the organization were not restricted from rejecting her based upon her gender identity. That fact alone indicates the need for legislation.

Natalie’s blog is an excellent source for understanding issues around being transgendered and the difficulties these individuals face in our society.

Spread the word – contract your MPs and the media and see if we can get some traction for this Bill and the needed protection for our transgendered neighbours.

Cross posted at PEI Curmudgeon.

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