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

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The answer may be found in the fact that the team advising the Bagnall (non‐medical) review team at York
was led by Professor Simon Wessely, whose own data‐base was originally provided for the CRD team, a fact
confirmed by the UK’s Chief Medical Officer in a personal communication in September 1999.
Having serious concerns about both the PACE and FINE Trials and the Wessely School studies upon which
they relied, in October 2004 David Sampson, a psychopharmacologist / neurophysiologist and Tutor in
experimental design and statistical analysis (a previous recipient of an MRC grant for his research into
neuropharmacology), submitted a formal complaint to the MRC in which he said:
“I am appalled to have to bring to the attention of the MRC that it would appear that both massage of diagnostic
criteria and experimental protocol… appears to be taking place in two areas of research into CFS/ME. These are
not allegations to be taken lightly and I expect the MRC to launch an immediate investigation”.
Referring to the MRC’s own 2003 Research Advisory Group’s Report (CFS/ME Research Strategy; 1 st May
2003), Sampson’s complaint mentioned that he “noted that the panel which formed the basis of your report
consisted of at least three members who have worked or have been connected with the Cognitive Behavioural Treatment
group at King’s and who plainly condone their CBT policy….The Whiting Review consisted chiefly of studies into CBT
(and the Review) panel were ‘helped in interpreting these studies by an expert in the field of CFS/ME’ who was
responsible for publishing most of the research that they were supposedly reviewing. This I found astounding”.
David Sampson’s complaint to the MRC was not addressed; he was informed by Elizabeth Mitchell (well‐
known to the UK ME/CFS community) effectively that the MRC was not interested in his complaint.
It is perhaps worth noting that during the life of the MRC’s Research Advisory Group (RAG) on CFS/ME in
2002 ‐ 2003, a significant amount of fully referenced documentation about the biomedical nature of ME/CFS
was submitted – some of it by Recorded Delivery ‐‐ to Elizabeth Mitchell at the MRC but was
unacknowledged and wholly ignored.
Since the MRC was not willing to investigate his complaint, at the All Party Parliamentary Group on ME
(APPGME) on 22 nd January 2008 a pre‐publication copy of David Sampson’s analysis of Peter White’s 2001
paper in the Lancet (2001:358:9297:1946‐1953) was put into the hands of the Health Minister in person, who
promised to look into the issues it contained (ie. evidence that Peter White’s 2001 study was flawed and that
his conclusions about the benefit of CBT/GET were not supported by his own data).
Nothing came of the Minister’s personal promise. The Minister in question was Ann Keen MP, who was
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health. It is the case that in June 2009, in The Daily Telegraph’s
“Complete Expenses Files” that documented the expenses claims of elected Members of Parliament, Ann
Keen and her husband were dubbed “Mr and Mrs Expenses”, with the comment: “the husband and wife MPs
claimed almost £40,000 a year on a central London flat although their family home was less than ten miles away”.
Not only did nothing come of the Minister’s promise but, although accepted by the Journal of Chronic
Fatigue Syndrome, David Sampson’s paper was never published because the Journal ceased publication and
was bought by Psychology Press (the Taylor and Francis Group).
Neither did anything come of the Gibson Inquiry’s Report (see below) that in 2006 called for an inquiry into
the vested interests of the Wessely School (and of Peter White in particular), about which Jane Spencer from
the Department of Health recently wrote: “The Department of Health was not involved in producing that report,
and has no plans to respond to its findings”
(http://www.facebook.com/edittopic.php?uid=154801179671&topic=10499&action=4#/topic.php?uid=154801
179671&topic=10550).