Hilary's Desk

The subject of a previous blog on Paul Offit, was his porkies in his new book "Deadly choices" Dr Offit has authored another document, where, amongst various dictatorial objectives, he wants to force yearly "exemption reviews" by a "state-approved counselor" (inquisitor/brainwasher), to brow-beat parents who chose not to vaccinate - who will no doubt then be billed by the state.  Because such birds of a feather flock together, it wasn't surprising to see that Nikki Turner made a similar recommendation to the Parliamentary Select Committee.  As you see from Offit's darling dial staring at you from this press release, this new document is HIS work. There are other signatories, but you can forget them.  This is classic Offitism, written in the same tone and vein as all his books, and true to form contains similar fiction. Open up at page two and read: Read Full Blog

A few days ago, I set my husband a task. To read Paul Offit’s book called, “Deadly Choices How the anti-vaccine movement threatens us all” By half way through he was unamused. Beguiled by his sighs of discontent, I decided to stop my current track of writing. and start reading. Naturally I started with the Prologue, where the first sentence read; “There’s a war going on out there – a quiet, deadly war.”  Read Full Blog

On March 1, The Wall Street Journal ran an article on fever  which was discussing the American Academy of Pediatric’s latest policy document on fever and antipyretic use.  which is exactly the snow-job you’d expect of an organisation wedded at the hip to Big Pharma. Out of interest, I submitted an e-response to Pediatrics. In the event of it not being put up, here is a copy below: Read Full Blog

Warning.  Having an opinion is dangerous.  Have you noticed the plethora of "needed" (choke) rules, regulations and safety requirements which stalk anyone who might want to do something adventurous?  Take for instance a group who sets up a children's adventure camp.  They analyse any possible problems, and try to cover every eventuality. Parents sign their kids up, (great, pay money, someone else can baby-sit my kids), but there's an accident, and a child dies.  Fingers are pointed and people are sued.  Therefore, in future there will be disclaimers. "We've done our best, but if you sign up, it's your risk." Everywhere we turn now, we see disclaimers.  And the cultivation of an assumption that anything without a disclaimer could invite liability. Read Full Blog

While the medical profession has finally caught on, that the more "educated" a parent makes themselves on the issues around vaccination, the more likely they are to chose not to vaccinate, they are utterly offended that people can chose not to vaccinate.  Furthermore, their take on the issue of "choice" is off the wall.  Their solution to parents not making the 'right' choice, is to back parents into the wall and take pot shots at them with "Refusal to vaccinate" letters (see bottom), which read like legal documents, but are not.  These "refusal to vaccinate" letters come out of such skewed thinking patterns as can be seen in this statement in May this year, from the biggest vaccine defender of them all, Dr Paul Offit: Read Full Blog

Today, Pediatrics published a retrospective study with the above title, which purportedly provides the "strongest clinical evidence to date that on-time..." and that these results offer reassuring information" etc etc... I received an alert, and downloaded the study. And started reading. Most of the tables you can't make much of, since they simply tell you end-points and you have no way of knowing whether those end points are even accurate or not. I burst out laughing in the first paragraph of the results though when I read this: "A total of 491 (47%) of 1047 children met the study definition for timely receipt. An additional 235 (23%) received all recommended vaccines during the study period but not on time. The remaining 311 (20%) did not receive all recommended vaccines during the study period." Read Full Blog

In a move worthy of a Monty Python Movie, Dr Jay Gordon has earned my hero award for the decade, for his two 2009 April fool’s press releases sent to a subscription only obscure list called Lactnet, for lactation consultants and doctor who support breastfeeding. Jay is a breastfeeding advocate and passionate about the WHO code, and ethical medicine. He and many of his colleagues are very unhappy at the way the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) lives off money, earned from ordinary people who are duped into believing that formula is fantastic, and "vaccines vanquish victims". As an April fool’s joke, Jay sent out a spoof April Fool’s press release titled “AAP severs ties with Formula Industry” which read:  Read Full Blog

In the document we mentioned yesterday,  was the comment that readers should feel free to reproduce, edit and distribute the information in any way they please.

We appreciate their transparency, and welcome the opportunity to post our own “Policy” statement on the issue. 

Over time, we will bring to readers attention, medical information and analysis which we are confident will blow a whole lot of holes into the assumptions stated in All Star’s “firm” beliefs.  Read Full Blog