MAGICAL MEDICINE: HOW TO MAKE AN ILLNESS ... - Invest in ME

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opinion get published in what appear to be respectable, peer‐reviewed journals? These papers consistently
ignore massive amounts of contrary data and opinion and cannot, therefore, lay claim to objective
assessment of the literature. .. This is by far the largest failure of the peer‐review system that I am aware of.
I am almost tempted to call this failure inexplicable…I can’t help speculate on…the abject failure of the
psychogenic advocates to uphold even the minimum of scientific standards”.
In what is regarded by many people as a medico‐political scandal of immense magnitude, for what is
deemed to be their “abject failure to uphold even the minimum of scientific standards” the Wessely School have
been lauded and honoured by those who share their beliefs.
As noted above, in 2004 Peter White was awarded an MBE for his work on CFS, the citation being “For
services to medical education”.
On 27 th August 2003, Professor George Szmukler, Dean of the Institute of Psychiatry (who has co‐authored
papers with Simon Wessely’s wife), wrote to the Countess of Mar about Simon Wessely in the following
terms:
“I would like to say a few things about Professor Wessely. Questions about CFS/ME should be resolved through
research, with rigorous scrutiny of the methods, findings and conclusions by the community of scientists devoted to the
field. By these standards, Professor Wessely must be judged one of the outstanding medical researchers in the UK, and
indeed internationally. His research has been regularly and continuously funded by bodies such as the Medical
Research Council and the Wellcome Trust which exercise the most demanding levels of peer review. Similarly, the
publication of Professor Wesselyʹs research findings has consistently and predominantly been in journals in which
submissions are again subject to the most exacting scrutiny by his scientific peers. Professor Wessely has been awarded
a Research Medal by the Royal College of Physicians (specifically for work on CFS) and he has served on many
prestigious scientific committees further attesting to the high regard in which he is held by the scientific community”
(http://www.meactionuk.org.uk/Mar_Szmukler_Correspondence.htm).
On 16 th October 2009, the President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Professor Dinesh Bhugra,
announced that The Psychiatric Academic Award of the Year had been presented to Professor Michael
Sharpe “for his dedication to enhancing psychiatry’s relevance and reputation amongst medical colleagues, and
mentoring the next generation of psychiatrists”. Professor Simon Wessely was a short‐listed nominee. Professor
Bhugra said: “On behalf of the College, I want to congratulate all this year’s winners and shortlisted nominees”.
Such self‐serving awards to these psychiatrists – from people within their own circle who encourage and
support each others’ activities ‐‐ seem to ridicule and even to obliterate the profound, continuous suffering
of people with ME/CFS. Is it any wonder that so many people with ME/CFS are driven to suicide?
That the Wessely School has been inordinately successful in disseminating their own beliefs about ME/CFS,
cannot be in doubt. On 2 nd February 2010 The Guardian carried a feature by “Dr Crippen” in which he
commented scathingly about the assisted suicide of severely‐affected ME patient Lynn Gilderdale, referring
to “myalgic encephalomyelitis” disparagingly in inverted commas as “a condition that many doctors only
recognise as an inappropriately named psychiatric illness”.
Responding to his critics, on 3 rd February 2010 “Dr Crippen” wrote: “Yes, some doctors have closed their minds
to the condition; the main problem is that the militant ME brigade…will not listen to any opinion other than the one
that entirely agrees with their own. They stand like children, with their fingers firmly in their ears shouting ‘la la la la
la la’ until everyone else stops talking. Thus they bring the whole condition into disrepute”.
This drew many notable responses including: “It is doctors with false illness beliefs (who) stand like children, with
their fingers in their ears shouting ‘la la la la la la’ until everybody else stops talking (who) bring the whole condition
into disrepute” and one that referred to “a herd‐like mentality among doctors who are more interested in how they
appear to their colleagues…than in doing the right thing by their patients”.