MMR controversy financially motivated

Andrew Wakefield the doctor behind the contoversial study that linked the MMR vaccine with autism was paid by lawyers before his study and failed to disclose this clear conflict of interest.

ANDREW WAKEFIELD, the former surgeon whose campaign linking the MMR vaccine with autism caused a collapse in immunisation rates, was paid more than £400,000 by lawyers trying to prove that the vaccine was unsafe. The payments, unearthed by The Sunday Times, were part of £3.4m distributed from the legal aid fund to doctors and scientists who had been recruited to support a now failed lawsuit against vaccine manufacturers. Critics this weekend voiced amazement at the sums, which they said created a clear conflict of interest and were the "financial engine" behind a worldwide alarm over the triple measles, mumps and rubella shot.

The consequences of this paper are shown in the following timeline from the independent.

FEBRUARY 1998: Andrew Wakefield's paper is published in The Lancet, linking the MMR triple vaccine with autism * 2000: Demand for single vaccines rises * JANUARY 2001: The Government rejects calls for a single measles vaccine on the NHS * 2001: MMR vaccinations fall to 84.2 per cent of children, down from 92 per cent in 1996 * EARLY 2003: Immunisation rates reach low of 78.9 per cent * NOVEMBER 2003: Dr Simon Murch says there is "unequivocal evidence that MMR is not a risk factor for autism" * 2004: It emerges that while preparing his Lancet paper, Dr Wakefield was being paid by lawyers for parents of children allegedly damaged by MMR * 2004: Immunisation rates rise to 81 per cent * 2004: Number of cases of mumps: 16,436, up from 4,204 the previous year. In 2005 the number is up to 56,390 * MID-2005: Immunisation rates rise to 85 per cent * OCTOBER 2005: Cochrane Library says there is no credible evidence that MMR harms * APRIL 2006: A boy, 13, who had not received the MMR vaccine, becomes the first person to die of measles in 14 years

This shows what can happen when "big legal" get involved in science and is an interesting counterpoint to the general argument that it is "big pharma" who are the evil ones. I think that wherever the incentive is sufficient there will be people and organisations that will both bend and break the rules. It is critical that science remains independent and unbiased, which is why repeatability and peer review are important elements of science publishing. Unfortunately in the Wakefield case peer review was corrupted with one of the referees being paid £40,000. There is good coverage of this here and here

The rules for verbal exchanges are surprisingly enduring

Great article from the economist on the rules of conversation. The fundamentals of which have remained unchanged since Cicero wrote the essay On Duties in 44BC.

said that good conversation required "alternation" among participants. In his essay "On Duties", Cicero remarked that nobody, to his knowledge, had yet set down the rules for ordinary conversation, though many had done so for public speaking. He had a shot at it himself, and quickly arrived at the sort of list that self-help authors have been echoing ever since. The rules we learn from Cicero are these: speak clearly; speak easily but not too much, especially when others want their turn; do not interrupt; be courteous; deal seriously with serious matters and gracefully with lighter ones; never criticise people behind their backs; stick to subjects of general interest; do not talk about yourself; and, above all, never lose your temper.

Unfortunately the rest of the article is behind the economists pay wall. but if anyone would like to talk about it feel free to give me a call, I need to practice my conversational skills. This quote from Samuel Johnson seems to neatly define conversation:

talk beyond that which is necessary to the purposes of actual business.

Thanks Matt

Touch football

You can probably see from the pictures in the sidebar that we played touch football on the beach over new years. My entire body is now either aching from exertion or bruised from falling over. There was no shortage of enthusiasm on the field! The excellent photos were taken by Lena Rudnick

Saddam Hussein Hanged and on youtube

Saddam Hussein has been hanged that in itself is not a surprise not even the rushed nature of it. What also should not be a surprise to anyone is that cell phone footage of the execution has made it onto the internet. It shows the execution for what it is a barbaric act committed by vengeful people. Saddam's executioners are shown taunting him and shouting insults. It is of course a completely different perspective from the official video of the execution which is shown without sound and ends before Saddam is hung. I have written before about the implications of ubiquitous imaging. The proliferation of devices that allow video and images to be captured anywhere and uploaded in instant. You can no longer control the distribution of media. If what you do is ugly it will be shown as ugly no matter how much gloss is applied to the official media. I have always believed that the death penalty is morally wrong and barbaric this video only reinforces that opinion.

PS3

Played with a PS3 demo kiosk at an EB here in Portland the other day. First surprise there was no queue to play it, especially over the Christmas period I thought it would be mobbed. Second not so surprising thing was just how unexciting the experience was, the hype has done Sony way more harm than good. I played Motorstorm the game that was shown about a year ago looking fantastic as a pre-rendered demo at one of the big game shows. All I can say is meh. Silly physics, not bad visually, but nothing to run off and shout about. I certainly hope developers get to grips with the system soon, because right now its incredibly underwhelming after 2 years of hype.

Cost of Vista Content Protection Scheme

This is an excellent analysis of the impact that Windows Vista content protection will have on the entire PC market. It is hard to see Vista being a huge success for Microsoft. It is emerging with all the features and conditions of an OS designed 6 years ago. Just as the market is beginning to understand the harm of content protection schemes and locked content, Microsoft have released an OS that enshrines these principles at its heart.

Executive Summary ----------------- Windows Vista includes an extensive reworking of core OS elements in order to provide content protection for so-called "premium content", typically HD data from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD sources. Providing this protection incurs considerable costs in terms of system performance, system stability, technical support overhead, and hardware and software cost. These issues affect not only users of Vista but the entire PC industry, since the effects of the protection measures extend to cover all hardware and software that will ever come into contact with Vista, even if it's not used directly with Vista (for example hardware in a Macintosh computer or on a Linux server). This document analyses the cost involved in Vista's content protection, and the collateral damage that this incurs throughout the computer industry. Executive Executive Summary --------------------------- The Vista Content Protection specification could very well constitute the longest suicide note in history.

Read the full article

Pejorative image

This picture from CNN's front page shows the italian who met with Alexander Litvinenko the Russian spy who was poisoned in London. Is it just me or could they have found a photo that made him look any more sinister. The uplighting on his face and set of the eyes scream shady character. This is the kind of lighting kids use at campfires using a torch held under the chin whilst telling scary stories. It certainly seems to me that they are trying to create a certain impression of the man before you even read the article. One wonders what the impact of the article would be if the picture was of him on holiday at the beach with his family.

Two men went to find a tree

Hayden and I headed out last Sunday to find a Christmas tree. It seemed like a simple plan, drive out to the national forest, go to the ranger station, get the info and get the tree. It went a bit awry early on, overnight storms had cut the power to a lot of the properties out by the national forest on Mt Hood including the ranger station.

Standing around in the snow outside the ranger station we made the decision to plunge into the forest and go find a tree. I am a fairly urban creature by nature, and had thought that forests were full of trees, well it turns out that they are full of trees, just not necessarily Christmas trees.

After about an hour of walking around the forest we returned to the car, drove deeper into the national forest and tried to scope trees from the warmth of the car. Eventually we spotted a clump of suitable looking trees, leapt out of the car, and with a good deal of examining and debate cut down a suitable tree.

Photoshop CS3 Beta

It is blazing fast on my MacBook pro. not sure about all the feature additions but the UI update is really nice. the snappiness compared to it running under rosetta is amazing.

Michel Gondry and his magic feet

I am not sure why on earth he did this, how he had the time to do this or what inspired him. But famous , eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, direcor and french bloke Michel Gondry has a video of him solving a rubiks cube with his feet in 2 minutes. Watch carefully there is a trick in there.

Chill that beer, quick!

So what's the fastest way to chill a beer. Chuck it in the freezer: 20-25 min, way too slow I'm thirsty Pack it in ice - add some water: 4-6 min Add salt to your ice and water: just over 2 min Via make:

New Scientist!

Wow GreenPrint got mentioned in the New Scientist today. The UK, mainstream weekly science publication. Even better my parents have a subscription. You can read their take here

Technorati Tags: greenprint

GreenPrint Srever is down

On the off chance any one found this blog looking for GreenPrint our managed server is currently down and we are waiting whilst the hosting company hostforweb.com gets their ass in gear and actually does some managing. and its up

GreenPrint knows how to party

WSJ Celebration
Originally uploaded by jkprime.

This is the beginning of the celebration on hearing that we had made Walt Mossberg's column in the WSJ!

David Mellor Cutlery

Love these David Mellor fantastic 1970's chinese cutlery.

GreenPrint TV

We just had the local abc tv affiliate swing by our not so exciting start up office to find out more about GreenPrint. will try and get a copy of the segment once it goes live.

Kay Lyn

Robot candid videos

With the ascension of our inevitable robot overlords must come the emergence of hidden camera/goof video shows of robot overlords falling down. Here is quite possibly the first of that new genre, which no doubt the robotic Jeremy Beadle will present. Asimo will now demonstrate falling down stairs.

MySpaz

How did MySpace get so big when its so bad. Its got an awful interface, its ugly, and difficult to use. The tools they provide for editing pages and layouts are lousy and the community designed ones look they were done by 12 year old girls with a fresh box of pink. Anyway I have 9 MySpace friends/stalkers, and this blog gets syndicated there through a really cool rss widget, from springwidgets You can take a laugh at my MySpace page

MySpaz

How did MySpace get so big when its so bad. Its got an awful interface, its ugly, and difficult to use. The tools they provide for editing pages and layouts are lousy and the community designed ones look they were done by 12 year old girls with a fresh box of pink. Anyway I have 9 MySpace friends/stalkers, and this blog gets syndicated there through a really cool rss widget, from springwidgets You can take a laugh at my MySpace page