Mag joins fight to keep libel laws out of science
Sydney Morning Herald
Tuesday August 4, 2009
AN AUSTRALIAN science magazine has taken a leading role in an international campaign to keep libel laws out of science by republishing an article by a journalist being sued by the British Chiropractic Association.Simon Singh is being personally sued for an article in The Guardian newspaper last year in which he criticised the association for claiming spinal manipulation could treat children for conditions including colic, asthma and ear infections.The editor of Cosmos magazine, Wilson da Silva, said medical claims should be supported by evidence, and the public had a right to know if they were not."Rather than suing a journalist for libel, the British Chiropractic Association should mount a robust scientific defence," he said.In the reprinted article, on legal advice, Mr Singh's description of the treatments as "bogus" has been changed to "utter nonsense", which was the meaning he had originally intended.An adverse court ruling in May, that Dr Singh hopes to appeal, found that the word bogus could imply the association had been deliberately dishonest.Mr da Silva said the article, published in this month's issue of Cosmos, had also been translated into French, German and Swedish and posted on at least 86 other websites worldwide, many of them by science bloggers."If the aim [of the lawsuit] was to silence journalists and shut down debate, then clearly the effort has backfired."Dr Singh, co-author of Trick or Treatment? Alternative Medicine on Trial, said the case, which has cost more than $200,000, had been a huge strain on his time and energy. "However, the support that I have received from family, friends, readers, bloggers, scientists, journalists and those who care about free speech has been incredible."The British Chiropractic Association said it had never claimed chiropractic could cure childhood conditions such as asthma or colic, and there was a "significant amount" of research showing it could help.These studies, however, were analysed in the British Medical Journal last month, with an editorial concluding that "demolition" of this evidence was "complete"."Weak science sheltered from criticism by officious laws means bad medicine," it said.Marc Cohen, professor of complementary medicine at RMIT University in Melbourne, however, said clinical trials to test therapies were expensive and could be flawed, and some complementary therapies were based on thousands of years of clinical experience."Scientific evidence is not the be-all and end-all of medical decision making."The Chiropractors' Association of Australia said practitioners here had five years of university training and were government registered and regulated.
© 2009 Sydney Morning Herald
