Antiscience and ethical concerns associated with advocacy of Lyme disease. [View all]

Auwaerter PG, Bakken JS, Dattwyler RJ, Dumler JS, Halperin JJ, McSweegan E, Nadelman RB, O'Connell S, Shapiro ED, Sood SK, Steere AC, Weinstein A, Wormser GP.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21867956

"Similar to other antiscience groups, these advocates have created a pseudoscientific and alternative selection of practitioners, research, and publications and have coordinated public protests, accused opponents of both corruption and conspiracy, and spurred legislative efforts to subvert evidence-based medicine and peer-reviewed science. The relations and actions of some activists, medical practitioners, and commercial bodies involved in Lyme disease advocacy pose a threat to public health."

This is a direct retaliation for this because it was proved that what he is accusing activists of doing is what his organization was found guilty of in a court of law.

Attorney General's Investigation Reveals Flawed Lyme Disease Guideline Process, IDSA Agrees To Reassess Guidelines, Install Independent Arbiter
http://www.ct.gov/ag/cwp/view.asp?a=2795&q=414284

Blumenthal's findings include the following:

The IDSA failed to conduct a conflicts of interest review for any of the panelists prior to their appointment to the 2006 Lyme disease guideline panel;

Subsequent disclosures demonstrate that several of the 2006 Lyme disease panelists had conflicts of interest;

The IDSA failed to follow its own procedures for appointing the 2006 panel chairman and members, enabling the chairman, who held a bias regarding the existence of chronic Lyme, to handpick a likeminded panel without scrutiny by or formal approval of the IDSA's oversight committee;

The IDSA's 2000 and 2006 Lyme disease panels refused to accept or meaningfully consider information regarding the existence of chronic Lyme disease, once removing a panelist from the 2000 panel who dissented from the group's position on chronic Lyme disease to achieve "consensus";

The IDSA blocked appointment of scientists and physicians with divergent views on chronic Lyme who sought to serve on the 2006 guidelines panel by informing them that the panel was fully staffed, even though it was later expanded;

The IDSA portrayed another medical association's Lyme disease guidelines as corroborating its own when it knew that the two panels shared several authors, including the chairmen of both groups, and were working on guidelines at the same time. In allowing its panelists to serve on both groups at the same time, IDSA violated its own conflicts of interest policy.

This should send chills down your spine "Similar to other antiscience groups,". Because it means that if the self appointed scientists engage in the above and you try to stop them you are a terrorist. Terrorists in America can be murdered, held without trial and counsel indefinitely and all your property can be confiscated. Advocates have already lost custody of the their children in some cases for seeking treatment for a chronic, debilitating disease the ISDA says really does not exist and Lyme Disease itself needs minimal treatment.

I have seen with my own eyes people and especially children who were confined to bed, unable to do work or schoolwork get non-standard treatment and get on with their lives. Recovery takes months not days.I also have read about people including children who remained in the same condition indefinitely or got worse and died because doctors hands are tied by the IDSA guidelines, insurance companies and managed care.

How can this be happening here in 2012 in America?