Vaccines are Genocide leaflet

A glossy leaflet has appeared in my block called VACCINES ARE GENOCIDE by Dr Charlie Ward. That's him in the photo with his lovely wife.

It starts:

Dear friend. This document contains valuable alternative resources regarding the monumental lies and deceptions that have been told to us by the Government and the (controlled) Mainstream Media over the COVID-19 "Pandemic" (which actually isn't one)... to further justify ever more extreme restrictions on our human rights.

That's a bit scary. Tell us more, Dr Charlie. I like my human rights.

Apparently

The World Economic Forum appeared to be waiting for this exact event to impose a one-world centralised government.

The WEF has been criticised for many things including forming a wealthy global elite, being undemocratic and lack of financial transparency. So they're an easy target. But given that the Tories have spent the last four years shafting this country up the arse to get us out of Europe, how likely would they be to spread propaganda for a one-world government? Sovereignty and blue passports and the fishing industry and all that. God bless her Maj.

The leaflet then claims

Did you know that the "Coronavirus test" returned a positive result for samples from goats and paw-paw fruits?

Well yes, there were some faulty test kits in Tanzania that did this. Possibly. We don't know that this is true given that the President said he was sending a plane to Madagascar for a herbal cure and may have some other agenda behind questioning the efficacy of the tests. He refuses to say where they came from. He has also told the people to pray the virus away.

Also, sheeple,

Did you know that Bill Gates, the public face of the vaccination push, is NOT medically qualified? He is NOT a doctor.

So only doctors should be allowed to comment on the scientific accuracy of COVID and vaccine facts? Should we listen only to experts? In which case, mate, what is your area of expertise? What's your doctorate in?

His website says he has worked in the hotel industry for 30 years and now 'moves physical currency for many high-net worth individuals and governments worldwide'.

Far be it from me to be cynical but that's not any kind of scientific training I'm aware of. Moving physical currency sounds like a load of tenners hidden in the back of a van. 

Anyway, back to The Science. He continues

Did you know that a challenge was issued to Boris Johnson on 22nd June 2020 to prove that the "COVID-19 coronavirus" actually exists by fulfilling the Kochs Postulate method of isolating and purifying a disease?

Ooh, now that sounds like proper science. The Kochs Postulate is a real thing. It was written in 1890 about bacteria. Not viruses. They hadn't even been discovered then. What's more, viruses, unlike bacteria, need host cells to replicate in so they can't be isolated in the Koch way. It's a bit like saying Boris should order someone to wave a divining rod over samples of the alleged virus to see if it moves.

More on this from the excellent Full Fact website.

What gives so-called Doctor Charlie the right to print this leaflet? He says:

I Stand Under Article 61 of Magna Carta 1215

Of course you do, mate. Magna Carta is probably the most misquoted and abused historical document ever produced.

Article 61 applied to 25 barons, not the general population. It was never incorporated into statutory law and was not included in later versions of Magna Carta, including the 1225 version, parts of which formed the basis of common law today. It does not grant the right to lawful dissent and rebellion that Doctor Charlie and others like him claim. You can read all of Article 61 here. The police must love it when anti-lockdown protestors quote it at them.

However, well done Dr C for calling it Magna Carta not The Magna Carta, a very common mistake. 

So much for history. There's nothing in the leaflet that explains why vaccines are genocide, which races or groups are being killed. There's a bit of ranting about face masks and quarantine but nothing at all about vaccines. Maybe he's saving that for the next leaflet. Breath is bated.

In case Dr Charlie's word isn't good enough for you Doubting Thomases, he cites two unassailable experts,  Rachel Elnaugh of Dragon's Den and Denise Welch of Loose Women. Both of whom are, I believe, virology and public health experts of long standing.

His site also promotes 5G and EMF protection and a Detox Toxins and Metals liquid. Because when conspiracy theories come, they come not single spies, but in battalions, to misquote Claudius (Hamlet).

Also, for some reason, you can watch his wedding video on the website (I didn't, sorry, the spirit of scientific enquiry goes only so far). And yes, he does have a book out.

On one level this incoherent pick and mix rant is funny. It didn't take me more than five minutes to check up on the goats and Koch and Article 61.The online world is full of guff like this. But if only a few people pick up the leaflet and it casts doubt on vaccines, social distancing, lockdown and other hygiene regulations, then it has done its job. Infection and hospitalisation rates have gone through the roof in the last couple of weeks where I live.

It doesn't help that this government has handled the pandemic spectacularly badly, that people are scared and confused about the ever-changing rules, and losing trust. Dr C and his like are opportunistic, exploiting this weakness. Almost like a virus.

The leaflet ends Do You Understand?

Yes I do, Dr C, I understand very well, thank you for asking.

NONSENSE ON STILTS 2018

Here we go again, then. The annual round-up of the good, the bad and the ugly in healthcare, nutrition and general daftness.

Let’s start with some good news: this is a great thread by Simon Singh on Skeptic successes in the past few years. 

HEALTH

Following a consultation, the Charity Commission has decided that charities must support their alternative medicine claims with good scientific evidence.

In other good news, homeopathy is no longer publicly funded on the NHS – and about bloody time too - but of course they won’t go down without a fight: homeopaths are going to take the NHS to court. 

Homeopathic vets also had a hissy fit because the RCVS demands its members use evidence-based treatments. Because science doesn’t know everything, right? Even though vets are scientists. 

Cancer patients using alt med rather than conventional treatments have a worse survival rate. And it’s not just people self-treating; research finds that ‘Doctors who are attracted to homeopathy despite a lack of evidence may be generally less good at keeping up to date on treatment guidelines and safety alerts or be less willing to work with colleagues to improve. Doctors who offer it to patients tend to do worst on scores for effective use of conventional medicines.'

Mixing alt med with real meds is like running an unsupervised and potentially deadly experiment.  Natural does not equal better. Or safe. Look at what happened to that great self-doser Dr Jekyll.

Twenty years on, the legacy of the MMR vaccine and autism scare lies continues to take its toll across Europe. Cases of measles have hit a record high, according to the World Health Organization. Experts blame the surge in infections on a drop in the number of people being vaccinated. Although, inevitably, it’s a bit morecomplicated than that.

There has been some interesting research on how anti-vax attitudes correlate with belief in conspiracy theories and how this may affect pro-vax campaigns. It’s not surprising that there would be cross-overs as the same mindset is transferrable from one false belief to another.

It wouldn’t be a Skeptic Round-up without some mention of La Paltrow. Don’t put coffee up your bum even if she tells you to. And don’t use live bee stings either, even if she says ‘I’m open to anything. I’ve been stung by bees. It’s actually pretty incredible if you research it.’ Probably not so incredible for the bees, though.

Paltrow says anyone who challenges the healing powers of her 'wellness' products is against the empowerment of women. As if that passive aggressive act would shut down all debate. Lucky for us, her main challenger is a woman.  The wonderful Dr Jen Gunter attended the GOOP conference and reported from the frontline of 'wellness' where she found that the Goop store is “90% quackatorium, and there was no evidence supporting Gwyneth Paltrow’s claim that Goop does not engage in pseudoscience as a commercial venture."

There is some good news. Goop has agreed to pay a substantial settlement over unproven claims about the health benefits of its infamous vaginal eggs.  ‘Under the settlement Goop is banned from making any claims regarding the efficacy of its products without reliable scientific evidence.’

Enough about her.

Plain packaging doesn’t decrease the number of smokers – quite the opposite. It’s also failed in France and Australia. It certainly wouldn’t have deterred me when I smoked. The intention may be to deter new smokers (children) but it's impossible to determine accurately whether any one factor has an influence on either current or potential smokers.

A naturopath treated a child with rabid dog saliva to cure behavioural problems, claiming he was in a ‘dog state’. She claimed that "The dog that bit him may have recently been vaccinated with the rabies vaccine or the dog bite in and of itself may have affected the boy with the rabies miasm … Either is possible and the phenomenon is well-known in homeopathy. A bite from an animal, with or without rabies vaccination has the potential to imprint an altered state in the person who was bitten, in some ways similar to a rabies infection."

A miasm is a homeopathic term for ‘the ghost of the disease state still rampant in the energy system.’  The non-homeopathic definition of the word is ‘noxious exhalations from putrescent organic matter; poisonous effluvia or germs polluting the atmosphere’. Pretty much sums it up. Just as well it wasn’t a werewolf that bit him.

Another naturopath is promoting peat tampons. Just don’t go there. 

DIET

Weight loss magnets – at last, what we’ve all been waiting for! Oh, wait a minute … This is why magnets don’t work like that.

Taking fish oil supplements for a healthy heart is nonsense says a Cochrane report.

Is sugar the new heroin? Normally everything ‘bad’ is compared with smoking these days. And ‘bad’ has become shorthand for ‘I disapprove of…’ Sugar is not addictive. Repeat. Sugar is not addictive. Sugar is not addictive.

The truth about Public Health England’s sugar reduction scheme: ‘The idea is to reduce sugar content in most foods by 20 per cent by 2020. The first target was a five per cent reduction by 2017 but this has not happened. It was never likely to happen. Instead, there has been a two per cent reduction across the eight categories that PHE is most interested in… Food companies need little incentive to shrink their products while keeping the price the same (Nestlé and Mars were frantically shrinking their products before the sugar reduction plan officially began - and before Brexit). But the government is now encouraging them to do it. Indeed, it is effectively compelling them to do it because that is the only realistic way of cutting sugar content in chocolate, confectionery and biscuits, which are the main sources of sugar.’

In some cases, the sugar content has gone down but overall calories have gone up. If you take the sugar out you have to put something in so that the product doesn’t taste like cardboard smeared in brown fat.

And other research states "We were unable to find evidence that any sugar tax actually implemented anywhere in the world has led to improvements in health." Sorry, Jamie Oliver. 

Water has become a big fad this year. There has been a new raw water craze. Mmm yummy poo and germs and bits of twig and insects and insect poo.

Need a mental boost? Try rosemary water. Only £4 a bottle. Check out the science section: ‘The herb features in Greek mythology, the New Testament, and Shakespearean drama’. Yes, it did say science.

Or there’s alkaline water that has been treated to have a higher pH level than the usual 6.5-7.5. The makers say it provides “better hydration” and is “designed to obtain optimum body balance” because it “uses specialized electronic cells coated with a variety of rare earth minerals to produce scientifically engineered water”.

Science says: “Your body regulates its [blood] pH in a very narrow range because all our enzymes are designed to work at pH 7.4. If our pH varied too much we wouldn’t survive… you’re literally just flushing money down the drain”.

GENERAL NONSENSE

A sceptical look at the long history of Personality Testing – including the bunk that is Myers-Briggs which is basically corporate astrology. 

Exorcism is on the rise. These truly are the Dark Ages.

A Mexican priest claims: ‘The vast majority of people who see him have normal problems or mental illnesses, and he says he has sent people to seek psychiatric help. But he says 2-3% show signs of demonic “vexation” … His subjects, he says, have problems that cannot be explained in normal medical terms. One, who he believes may have been cursed by her mother-in-law, feels an almost constant sensation of daggers entering her legs, knitting needles in her arms, and a clenched hand at her chin. Another was so obsessed by self-gratification that he masturbated 40 times a day. “Normally speaking it is humanly impossible … so that is a satanic thing”.’

I do like the term ‘vexation’ and will attempt to use it in general conversation. How does the woman know what daggers entering her legs actually feel like, or knitting needles in her arms? As a knitter, I can say that it would be bloody hard to stab with a knitting needle, they’re just not sharp enough. I’d use an embroidery needle.

It’s not just Mexico where exorcism is on the rise. A top Irish exorcist called for more exorcists because ‘there has been increasing evidence of the malicious activity of the evil one’. Pope Francis gave formal recognition to the International Association of Exorcists in 2014. According to Fr Collins, ‘it’s only in recent years that the demand has risen exponentially’ and he blames ‘a growing apostasy within the Church’. Scare tactics, then. Come back to Church or the Evil One will get you.

The ‘malicious activities of the evil one’ has a great ring to it. I shall be using it to refer to anyone I don’t like in future.

According to vets, the government is being very economical with the truth about the efficacy of badger culling: “Badger culling has not worked. They are issuing barefaced lies in this matter." The former head of DEFRA’s wildlife epidemiology unit who advised the department on its TB strategy for more than 40 years says: "Defra has been cherry-picking the science since they started culling. The fact that they are rolling it out on such a vast scale is a travesty of the available science." 

The Indian education minister says evolution is ‘scientifically wrong’ because no one has ever seen an ape turn into a man. He seems to be confusing science with shape-shifting. I have however seen a man turn into an ape on several occasions. Generally after the application of alcohol.

This debunks the myth that women talk more than men. Men of course have much more important things to say. At great length. Even when we’re the expert in the subject and they just read an article by Jordan Peterson and shut up or I’ll send you death threats on social media for daring to mention this. 

The ‘psychology’ of the power stance has also been debunked. Politicians should keep on doing it. So much of what comes out of their mouths is inane/terrifying/depressing that they might as well give us a laugh.

So-called ‘healing crystals’ often come from ethically and environmentally dubious sources. So they’re not just pretty shiny things.

Koko the gorilla’s language skills were not at all as we’d been lead to believe, more a mixture of wishful thinking and ignorance about how language actually works. Damn it.  Who doesn’t love a chatty gorilla with a pet kitten? 

There is no evidence that tech is as ‘addictive as cocaine’. Nor are cupcakes, ice cream, power, carbs, World of Warcraft, sugar etc etc. Claims are often based on a misunderstanding of what addiction is and an oversimplified description of what the brain chemical dopamine does, according to clinical psychologist Vaughan Bell.

Hunt’s screen time limits for kids is yet more evidence free policy, yet another moral panic: ‘the recognition of so-called gaming disorder by the World Health Organisation is premature.’.

Andy Przybylski, associate professor and director of research at the Oxford Internet Institute said: “The thing that is very, very important to understand about this is that these correlations are extremely small,” he said. “And 99% of a child’s wellbeing has nothing measurable to do with screens, no matter how you measure them.”

It turns out it’s a myth that Victorian doctors treated hysterical women with vibrators. Damn, that’s another fun one out the window then.

There are times when I so wish magic was real. A coven of New York witches put a hex on US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and, just to make the story even more fun, a Catholic priest and exorcist in California countered the spell by saying prayers for the justice at Mass, saying "This is a conjuring of evil - not about free speech."

They claim that similar hexes on Trump have been successful "We feel the rituals were a success as they sought to expose Trump for what he is, and that has happened on many levels; from the Russia probe to the exposé on his finances to Stormy Daniels."

It is of course impossible to tell without an unhexed control Trump whether they worked or not.

A real treat to end with– an archive of occult recordings. Everything from the voice of Alistair Crowley to voices beyond the grave to all manner of spooky shit. Enjoy.

For vaccination against nonsense, dangerous or otherwise, join us at London Skeptics in the Pub  or find your local Skeptics group. London is the original SitP and 2019 sees the twentieth anniversary of our founding. There will be celebrations and they will not be carb-free.

Nonsense on Stilts 2017

Another year, another round-up of the dangerous and the daft. There was so much to choose from this year so this is just the tip of the iceberg of nonsense on stilts. As ever, it’s divided into health, diet and general craziness.

HEALTH

The Queen of Quacks, Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop business has spewed out some terrible old cobblers this year, some of which is potentially very harmful. Here is her nonsense about toxic tampons debunked by the excellent Dr Jen Gunter.

Advice given at her ‘health’ conference can be fatal and just in case you thought it couldn’t get any more insane, she is now selling psychic vampire repellent. Yes, really. 

Also in America, anti-vaxxers offered $100,000 for proof that vaccines work. Oh dear. The fact that they’re alive to perpetrate such arrant nonsense is proof enough, isn’t it? One word, anti-vaxxers: polio. Ever been in an iron lung? No. Why is that?

If further proof were needed, the tedious and notorious anti-vaxxer Wakefield managed to cause a measles epidemic in the US.

Earlier in the year it looked like homeopathy would escape an NHS prescribing ban despite cutbacks and despite the Chief Medical Officersaying it’s ‘rubbish’. But reason and science have for once prevailed. NHS England has called for homeopathy to be blacklisted as a useless waste of money. Very well done to the Good Thinking Society for their campaigning work on this.

Vets also joined the campaign against homeopathy and then later in the year the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons issued a new position statement on the veterinary use of complementary and alternative medicines, homeopathy in particular, saying that vets must offer treatments that "are underpinned by a recognised evidence base or sound scientific principles." The new position statement makes it very clear that homeopathy falls below this benchmark: "Homeopathy exists without a recognised body of evidence for its use. Furthermore, it is not based on sound scientific principles."

One of the newer health fads is turmeric. Eat it, drink it, medicate with it. Harmless nonsense for people with more money than sense? Not when a naturopath kills a woman with a turmeric injection or when claims are made for it curing cancer.

I had an awkward conversation not so long ago with a woman who swears by turmeric lattes every day and demanded to know how I dare challenge ‘all the thousands of research papers’ that show it works. To her I say: show me this evidence. It could be a long wait.

And while we’re on spices, cinnamon won’t help you magically lose weight either. Sorry. 

The long-enduring myth that women synchronise periods was debunked. There is no ‘dominant super uterus in a group of women that makes everyone adjust their cycles’. So Super Uterus won’t be making an appearance in the next DC movie, damn it. She’d be so much more interesting than Superman, the most boring of all the supers.

As if UKIP wasn’t bad enough, one of their ‘politicians’ now sells industrial strength bleach as a medical cure at £22 for 60ml. David Colquhoun, professor of pharmacology at University College London, said “You don’t absorb oxygen through your stomach. There’s not the slightest reason to think it works for anything.” Assemble your own joke using the words UKIP, toxic, liars and why is Farage constantly on the news when they have zero seats in Parliament?

A wealthy autism charity is risking children’s lives, offering to pay for them to attend clinics offering pseudoscientific treatments and bogus diets, and it appears to endorse links between vaccines and autism. One of the treatments promoted is MMS, which the National Autism Society describes as a “bleach banned for human consumption”. There are claims it has been linked to at least one death. The Food Standards Agency has warned about its use, calling it an “industrial-strength bleach”. Yes, we’re looking at you, Mr UKIP.

There is yet more evidence that chiropractic is harmful and potentially deadly, and now chiropractors trying to scare women about our clothes, saying skinny jeans, handbags and big fluffy hoods are wrecking our backs. Dr Mary O'Keeffe, a back pain expert at the University of Limerick, says their research is "complete scaremongering and there is no scientific evidence to support any of it".

Earlier this year, a quack claiming to cure cancer by Skype (for money, of course) was found guilty under the Cancer Act and is now facing jail.

The spread of fake health ‘news’ is putting lives at risk. Some of the claims may contravene the Cancer Act 1939: you can report any claims that break the law to Advertising Standards.

DIET

I’m happy to report that the backlash against the vile, smug, judgemental and dangerous clean eating movement is gaining momentum. But nature abhors a vacuum so as soon as one diet fad dies, another rises to take its place. But calling them diets is so last year. Now it’s all about Wellness. There are endless books, videos and evangelists promoting their own brands of ‘better living’ which are really just diets wrapped up in very expensive merchandising and ingredients. Because wellness means thinness. There are no overweight Wellness gurus.

Celebrity-endorsed fad diets (sorry, Wellness programmes) are nothing new. Lord Byron’s apple cider vinegar diet was taken up by his many fans in the early nineteenth century and now it’s back. But without the poetry. Which is a blessing.

The low fat versus low carb battle rages on with both sides claiming the other will kill you. Some of the research is very flawed and the screaming headlines don’t help.  There is more and more conspiracy talk about Big Sugar.  The sugar lobby is undeniably powerful but conspiracy theorists have attributed it god-like powers to ensure that we poor fools think saturated fat is the devil. 

As Anthony Warner, aka the Angry Chef, says, this would require ‘paying off the medical establishment, the World Health Organisation, numerous charities, public health bodies and nutrition researchers around the world, and keep producing systematic reviews that show links between consumption of saturated fats and increased risk of heart disease.’ 

The amount of rage generated by daring to question the low carbers should set off the alarm bells that this is not just about food – as Dr Margaret McCartney found out to her cost on Twitter when she dared to write this reasonable piece about the lack of evidence. This is my piece on the cult-like ferocity of the low-carbers.

What no one has pointed out is that if we care about the planet, we should be eating fewer animal products, not more. High protein/high fat means more eggs, fish/seafood, meat and dairy when we should be aiming for a more plant-based diet. And shouldn’t we give at least a moment’s thought to the fact that there are still more underweight 5-19 year olds in the world than obese ones?

There’s a myth doing the rounds that sugar and other carbs ‘feed’ cancer. They don’t.

Do artificial sweeteners cause dementia and strokes? No.  

Does sugar cause or worsen Alzheimer’s? According to the tabloids, yes it does. According to the Alzheimer’s Society “What we don’t know is whether changes in brain glucose metabolism play a role in causing or worsening Alzheimer’s disease or whether the changes are just a by-product of damage already occurring to brain cells.”

Another potentially dangerous diet fad is the Ketogenic diet, which claims to cure everything from cancer to Alzheimer’s to pretty much anything you can name. Here’s a good video explaining what it is and why it is not a miracle (yes, he is a vegan but everything he says about keto stands up).

Yet another bit of dangerous garbage is the idea that everything bad that happens can be cured with an alkaline diet. And while we’re at it, you can’t cure cancer with ‘alkaline’ baking soda either.

Back to the Angry Chef who this time gets quite rightly angry about PETA claiming dairy products cause autism.

The Pioppi diet has gained popularity this year. As the British Dietetic Association commented: “the authors may well be the only people in the history of the planet who have been to Italy and come back with a diet named after an Italian village that excludes pasta, rice and bread – but includes coconuts”. Here’s conclusive proof that coconuts have never been part of a traditional European diet.

Do we need more protein in our diets? Only if you want to make very expensive wee wee.

RANDOM NONSENSE

A Church says starve for three days to cure homosexuality and that people are just claiming to be gay to get attention because they see celebrities doing it. This really doesn’t help when nearly half of lesbian, gay, bi and trans young people are bullied for being LGBT at school and when homophobic attacks in the UK rose by 147% in three months after the Brexit vote.

On a more cheery note there’s the daftness of dopamine dressing – dress yourself happy with bright colours. Unless you’re me and hate them. It’s yet another case of if you believe something you make it true, like wearing lucky pants can make you feel more confident and so perform better.

For a change, a bit of abuse of history instead of science: why lazy journos comparing Trump with Roman emperors are wrong.

Slimming pants! This is hilarious. There is no way that any of these claims stand up – detox, lose cellulite, lose weight, all the usual suspects. Plus, you look like a twat. No wonder they're on offer.

Men are better at understanding projection and therefore physics because they have to learn to pee standing up, according to three 'scientists'. “Playful urination practices – from seeing how high you can pee to games such as Peeball (where men compete using their urine to destroy a ball placed in a urinal) – may give boys an advantage over girls when it comes to physics,” the academics wrote. They said this is significant, since the physics curriculum often uses projectile motion as the starting point for more sophisticated mechanics concepts such as force, energy and momentum.

If only the average man's aim was that good. And I’m not sure about the phrase ‘playful urination practices’. Oh, and correlation, causation, yadda yadda.

Not so funny is this: the United Nations pulled staff out of two districts in southern Malawi where a vampire scare triggered mob violence in which at least five people were killed.

No werewolf sightings this year but belief in ghosts is on the increase in America. Add your own Trump-based joke.

Eight out of ten UK water companies still use dowsing rods to 'find' water. Yes, really. I often consult the spirits of the dead for cooking tips. Who doesn’t? 

A lot of the media and some skeptics have dismissed dowsing as mediaeval. Here’s a good explanation of why that’s a lazy assumption. Have they looked at a cathedral or an illuminated manuscript lately? Mediaeval people were not morons, they just had less access to information than we do – although some of us still choose to ignore it. What’s more, ‘records of dowsing do not begin until the 16th century, and its popularity does not appear to have peaked until the 19th and 20th centuries’.

DNA sampling reveals that nine yeti specimens were in fact eight bears and a dog. Damn. 

Finally, an ancient fairy curse causes dips in the road in Ireland, according to an Irish MP. I love this one and really wish it were true. He said “if someone told me to go out and knock a fairy fort or touch it, I would starve first.” The council’s road department said the dip was due to an “underlying subsoil/geotechnical problem.” They’ll be sorry when their socks go missing and their cows’ milk dries up.

That’s it for another year. To help inoculate yourself against nonsense, this is a very good primer on how to read and understand a scientific paper and this is a handy 12 point guide to spotting bad science. Happy hunting.

Join us at London Skeptics in the Pub for a monthly dose of sanity.