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Sunday, November 4, 2012

Quack and Burn

There has been interesting and delightful news on the anti-vaxx quack front this past week.  Most recently Dr. Mark Geier of the ghoulish duo, Mark R. Geier and pretend doctor David Geier, has had his license to practise medicine revoked in Missouri and has had his medical license suspended indefinitely in Illinois.  The last remaining state, Hawaii where Mark Geier still holds a valid license has filed a complaint against him.  Todd W. of Harpocrates Speaks has a very nice catalogue of the Geiers' offences.  While the Geiers' creepy clinics are still in operation, one with Mayor Eisenstein of Homefirst, and in spite of their claim, "We are going to open [clinics] everywhere," the loss of all of Mark Geier's licenses to practise medicine and pending action in the one remaining state will ensure that this isn't going to happen.

Another quack, Andrew Wakefield is once again "wanking for coins."  Wakefield and his fawning disciples have hoisted yet another fund-raising scheme for their St. Andy.  This one as the hilariously named, Academic Integrity Fund.  And for $750 one can enjoy dining with the Wakefields AT THEIR TABLE or $250 for being in the same room as the Wakefields to eat tacos and drink frozen margaritas (with cheap house tequila no doubt) at a chain restaurant.

I can't quite seem to figure out what the Academic Integrity Fund funds other than paying for a couple of overwrought, masturbatory blog posts by Wakefield and a couple of others.  Sadly, there are people with more money than brains so he should pull in some payola for his latest venture.

Wakefield has his own Legal Justice Fund which is really just a façade for fawning acolytes to show his fighting spirit against the evil Brian Deer and BMJ.  I doubt his acolytes will even bother to question why there are scores of pages missing from Mr. Deer's testimony and just keep throwing their money at Wakefield.

And whatever happened to his Strategic Autism Initiative (SAI)?  Yet another money suck he created and in his words:
“I have no intention of going away,” he said. “I have set up a new research initiative, the Strategic Autism Initiative, whose aim is to do the science on the environmental causes of autism that the federal agencies want to run away from.”
Not a single study nor publication nor anything to do with autism research has emerged from this so-called non-profit organisation.  It appears as though the SAI has done nothing but fund a few trips for Wakefield to frighten the Minnesota Somali community off of getting the MMR jab for their children and making an empty promise to conduct a study of their autism prevalence.  I guess he can claim partial success by facilitating a measles outbreak in the Minnesota Somali community.

This latest scam is at least the closest thing to just coming right out and saying, "pay me for nothing suckers," than his past "fund-raising" schemes.  And sadly, they will.

25 comments:

  1. How dumb can Andy's disciples be? They continually provide financial support for the Wakefield clan, who are rolling in dough.

    Take a look at the Autism Media Channel website, which Andrew Wakefield and Polly Tommey own:

    http://www.autismmediachannel.com/?channel=101

    It is a lucrative business venture and provides employment for Carmel Wakefield. She is the Advertising Director of the Autism Media Channel and has her own radio program on the channel.

    http://www.linkedin.com/pub/carmel-wakefield/13/859/590

    What's next(?) a telethon?

    ReplyDelete
  2. What's next(?) a telethon?

    Oh my, think of the possibilities.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Wow! I've thought about that and your sarcastic response all night.
      When I thought that shingles could not make me feel more ill, the thought of the telethon DID induce nausea. ;)

      And yes, shingles. Age 51, thought about being immunized two months ago and figured I'd put it off until my annual checkup in December, as I was really short on cash.
      To have irony bite me one on the keister.
      Well, starting between the iliac crest and the kidney region, following dematomes.
      But, out of safety, I banned the grandchildren from the house, lest my 3 month old grandson acquire Varicella infection. Not highly probable, but why take a chance?

      Delete
  3. One can only wish that ONE state would finally have enough and prosecute him for fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. yes, I share that wish - I would imagine that insurance companies are making calculations as we speak...

      Delete
  4. I thought the Academic Integrity Fund was hilarious. Almost as funny as the Andrew Wakefield Award for Courage in Medicine.

    http://briandeer.com/solved/wakefield-award.htm

    Or the Jimmy Saville Children's Fund.

    ReplyDelete
  5. My comment is off-topic. I'm not entirely certain that I like the new format of your blog.

    While the new format does provide listings of topics, it has eliminated the updated comments. I have to click on each recent topic to see if additional comments have been posted and have no idea if anyone has posted a comment on an older thread.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sorry about that; it wasn't intentional. That widget is broken so I had to remove it and hope that gets fixed soon.

      Catherina, I didn't see that our Twitter widget was broken too. I'll look into that as well.

      Delete
  6. The twitter updates are missing too - SM?!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Back on topic. You're going to love this. He's coming to your town soon!!

    http://academicintegrityfund.com/


    Monday morning thoughts
    Posted on November 19, 2012

    By Dr. Andrew Wakefield

    We had a wonderful fundraiser for the Academic Integrity Fund at Z Tejas in downtown Austin last week. My sincere thanks to the organizers of the event on such short notice and to Elizabeth Avellán for her kind words of introduction. We intend for this to become a template for similar events around the country starting in 2013. It you are willing to organize an event in your town, please notify us below and we can send further information. I’ll be there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. our academic speakers come for a travel cost reimbursement and a dinner - do you think Wakefield would be any more expensive?

      Delete
    2. Wakefield lost his country remember Catherina? I'm sure it will take another fundraiser to help him find it again.

      Delete
  8. Did you see a list of their "academic speakers", Catherina?

    Look at what I found on newer posts at The Academic Integrity Fund website.

    Wakefield’s “Academic Integrity Fund” is publicizing what appears to be a new interview with Andy. Each “question” has its own short video clip.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHj4GoMAJxQ&feature=BFa&list=UUfIZ2PofuUgEM79W3fOc6Mg


    ReplyDelete
  9. Relative trends in hospitalizations and mortality among infants by the number of vaccine doses and age, based on the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), 1990–2010
    http://het.sagepub.com/content/31/10/1012.full

    New study: Infants receiving the most vaccines are the most likely to be hospitalized and die

    http://www.naturalnews.com/038457_vaccine_injuries_infant_deaths_scientific_study.html

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anon - why has infant mortality gone down over the past 30 years?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Catherina, brave Anonymous is just regurgitating more VAERS nonsense from Gary Goldman (who bought his computer science PhD). See Some post-holiday antivaccine “science”.

      Delete
    2. I read the nonsense and disregarded it as standard antivax disinformation, as no such real studies exist.
      Only Wakefield style studies.

      The only multiple vaccine administration that has been questioned is the military style vaccination method. All vaccines at the same time.

      Such tripe almost makes me dislike real tripe. :/

      Delete
  11. Happy New Year to you all...

    ReplyDelete
  12. Orac, Gorski is sponsored by pharmaceutical companies himself, drug money behind him. so lets take particular data from that publication by Goldman (what Gorski avoids), e.g. injecting infants with hepB shot at birth (or take anything else from that publication to adress it, to prove it wrong)

    "A disproportionate number of hospitalizations were due to the administration of the at-birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccination: 809 (73%) of the 1115 VAERS cases reported the receipt of hepatitis B vaccine; 242 (30%) of these 809 were reported as hospitalized. Several studies provide evidence of correlations between hepatitis B vaccination and serious adverse reactions, including pediatric multiple sclerosis.6⇓⇓⇓⇓⇓–12 Thus, the newborn dose of hepatitis B vaccine, administered at a time when the immune system is most immature, may be contributing to increased vulnerability to serious adverse reactions causing disproportionately high rates of hospitalizations during the neonatal period. "


    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. First, I am a busy man. I don't have time to look up uncited claims, such as you provide. A poorly defined name of a study, with an author.
      Or do you rely upon the reader to not bother reading any claimed study? I can scrape up enough time to research a study that seems to show a significant result, I don't have time to research what study was performed and where and where it was peer reviewed and the results of said reviews.
      In short, I see interesting claims with zero to back them up for anyone who doesn't have time to waste.

      But then, you posted anonymously, so as to avoid such feedback. Even money, it's a non-peer reviewed work of science fiction, heavy on the fiction.
      As I'm rather well aware of the side effects and ill effects of the hepatitis B vaccine, out of a matter of personal and professional interest.

      Anyone with knowledge of the claimed paper know of it?
      I suspect tripe, as I rather know what tripe tastes like. It's a family occasional treat.

      Delete
    2. Don't worry, "Chemist" is being taken apart here, where he cut and pasted the same comment.

      It is definite tripe, especially with his claim of being a "pharmaceutical chemist" when he clearly demonstrates he has absolutely no understanding of basic science.

      Delete
  13. From what I've read in that other thread, the "chemist" seems to know nothing about what bioavailability, dosage per body mass or the human immune system.
    Sounds more like a leaf grinder who calls himself a chemist.

    Especially when one sees the paper that is quoted discarding an inconvenient data point, with rather interesting and divergent claims on why it was discarded.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Love the Emperors new cloths. Opps mind that autistic child and that one and that one. Could have sworn there was never as many as this in the early 80s (you know before MMR)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Could have sworn there was never as many as this in the early 80's, you know, before the definition of what autism spectrum was changed.
      Oops on your part for not knowing about the facts of the issue at hand.

      Delete
  15. "Could have sworn there was never as many as this in the early 80s (you know before MMR)"

    The MMR vaccine was introduced in the USA in 1971, and was the preferred vaccine for the 1978 Measles Elimination Program. Did you know that the 1970s came before the 1980s? Are you aware that the USA is much larger than the UK? And there were many other countries with various forms of an MMR before 1988?

    Dear brave Anonymous, your brilliance is underwhelming.

    ReplyDelete