{"id":30516,"date":"2010-11-07T09:13:04","date_gmt":"2010-11-07T09:13:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/vaccine-wars-the-nccam-drops-the-ball\/"},"modified":"2010-11-07T09:13:04","modified_gmt":"2010-11-07T09:13:04","slug":"vaccine-wars-the-nccam-drops-the-ball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/medicine\/vaccine-wars-the-nccam-drops-the-ball.php","title":{"rendered":"Vaccine Wars: the NCCAM Drops the Ball"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you go to the <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/\">website<\/a> of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), you\u2019ll find that one of its self-identified roles is to \u201cprovide information about CAM.\u201d NCCAM Director Josephine Briggs is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=4100\">proud to assert<\/a> that the website fulfills this expectation. As many readers will recall, three of your bloggers <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=4575\">visited the NCCAM last April<\/a>, after having received an invitation from Dr. Briggs. We differed from her in our opinion of the website: one of our suggestions was that the NCCAM could do a better job providing American citizens with useful and accurate information about \u201cCAM.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>We cited, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=4474\">among several examples<\/a>, the website offering little response to the dangerous problem of widespread misinformation about childhood immunizations. As Dr. Novella subsequently reported, it seemed that we\u2019d scored a point on that one:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u2026Dr. Briggs did agree that anti-vaccine sentiments are common in the world of CAM and that the NCCAM can do more to combat this. Information countering anti-vaccine propaganda would be a welcome addition to the NCCAM site.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In anticipation of SBM\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=7838\">Vaccine Awareness Week<\/a>, I decided to find out whether such a welcome addition has come to fruition. The short answer: <em>nope<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<h3>Go where the Money Is(n&#8217;t)<\/h3>\n<p>I looked on the NCCAM website in places where common sense would dictate that such content might be found:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/atoz.htm\">Health Topics A-Z<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/decisions\">Be an Informed Consumer<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/children\/\">Complementary and Alternative Medicine Use in Children<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/providers\">Resources for Health Care Providers<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/news\/alerts\">Alerts and Advisories<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/providers\/forpatients.htm\">For your patients<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In each case I searched for the terms \u201cvaccine,\u201d \u201cvaccination,\u201d \u201cimmunization,\u201d \u201cautism,\u201d \u201cMMR,\u201d \u201cthimerosal,\u201d \u201cmercury,\u201d and variations of those words. No dice. I found a couple of mentions of vaccinations by using the general NCCAM website search function; Drs. Novella, Gorski, and I had been aware of these when we visited Dr. Briggs in April, but for completeness\u2019 sake I\u2019ll cite them here. One is in an essay titled <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/flu\/ataglance.htm\">Colds and Flu and CAM: At a Glance<\/a>, dated January, 2010. It states, correctly, that \u201cVaccination is the best protection against contracting the flu,\u201d but it offers no further comment. There is no rebuttal of vaccine myths, nor even an acknowledgment that such myths exist. Another is in a <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/about\/offices\/od\/2009-10.htm\">Message from the Director<\/a> from October, 2009, which appears to be the precursor of the \u201cColds and Flu\u201d essay. Here, Dr. Briggs briefly acknowledges vaccine myths:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Vaccination is the best protection against contracting the flu. I know that many people are very concerned about the safety of the flu vaccines, but let me echo the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as other prominent public health leaders, in assuring you that the vaccines for both the seasonal flu as well as H1N1 have a very good safety track record. Over the years, hundreds of millions of Americans have received the flu vaccine, and the development of the H1N1 vaccine followed the same path of safety and effectiveness testing and approval.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>One wonders why that language is absent from the subsequent, larger essay. Not that including it would have addressed the problem of vaccine myths in general, as suggested by the search terms that I chose.<\/p>\n<h3>\u201cWhole Medical Systems\u201d lack Whole Discussions<\/h3>\n<p>On the NCCAM website there are other notable failures to respond to public misinformation about immunizations. In the <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/homeopathy\/\">Homeopathy<\/a> treatise there is no mention that homeopaths have famously railed against vaccinations ever since Constantine Hering, the \u201cfather of American homeopathy,\u201d called them \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=eSu0AAAAIAAJ&amp;pg=PA390&amp;lpg=PA390&amp;dq=constantine+Hering+vaccination&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=m2x5PBjS0F&amp;sig=7PmIFrLyOxy4UKhfJmz3THR_LbQ&amp;hl=en&amp;ei=DOnyS-uNO8SBlAfr_bzzDA&amp;sa=X&amp;oi=book_result&amp;ct=result&amp;resnum=7&amp;ved=0CDIQ6AEwBg\">always a poisoning<\/a>.\u201d Nor is there any mention of Hering\u2019s invention, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.napoleon.org.uk\/alternative.htm\">homeopathic nosodes<\/a>,\u201d also called \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.americanchronicle.com\/articles\/view\/194319\">homeopathic vaccinations<\/a>,\u201d which homeopaths such as <a href=\"http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20011109184730\/www.utne.com\/bBody1.tmpl?command=search&amp;db=dArticle.db&amp;eqheadlinedata=Homeopathic+Remedies+for+Anthrax\">Dana Ullman<\/a> claim to be effective in preventing infectious diseases.<\/p>\n<p>A similar failure exists in the <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/naturopathy\/\">Naturopathy<\/a> treatise. Many influential naturopaths are <a href=\"http:\/\/www.quackwatch.org\/01QuackeryRelatedTopics\/Naturopathy\/immu.html\">anti-vaccine<\/a>; they advocate \u201chomeopathic nosodes\u201d or other implausible\u00a0measures. I wonder if Dr. Briggs had any inkling of this when she <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=6115\">flattered<\/a> the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians\u2014whose <a href=\"http:\/\/www.quackwatch.org\/01QuackeryRelatedTopics\/Naturopathy\/aanpimmu.html\">Position Paper on Childhood Vaccinations<\/a> is certain to mislead and frighten parents\u2014with her presence at their annual convention in August.<\/p>\n<h3>Credentialing Nonsense<\/h3>\n<p>Linked from the \u201cBe an Informed Consumer\u201d page on the NCCAM website is an essay titled <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/health\/decisions\/credentialing.htm\">Credentialing CAM Providers: Understanding CAM Education, Training, Regulation, and Licensing<\/a>. In it we are told that<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>A physician&#8217;s credentials\u2014the licenses, certificates, and diplomas on the office walls\u2014tell us about that person&#8217;s professional qualifications to advise and treat us. We seek similar assurances when we choose a complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) practitioner\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>The essay hedges a bit, but is careful to suggest that \u201cCAM\u201d credentials are every bit as trustworthy as those held by real doctors:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Regulations, licenses, or certificates do not guarantee safe, effective treatment from any provider\u2014conventional or CAM.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>We are told that \u201cnaturopathic physicians\u201d are licensed in 15 states and the District of Columbia, that they have undergone apparently rigorous training in \u201cnatural sciences and clinical sciences,\u201d and that they have passed an apparently rigorous, standardized exam offered to \u201cgraduates of accredited programs\u201d by their national organization, the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians. The essay makes similar statements about homeopaths and chiropractors\u2014another group with a well-documented <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chirobase.org\/06DD\/chiroimmu.html\">distaste for vaccinations<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Such claims of training and credentialing are <a href=\"http:\/\/www.quackwatch.org\/01QuackeryRelatedTopics\/Naturopathy\/atwood.html\">deceptive<\/a>, because the fields are bastions of pseudoscience. In the words of Edzard Ernst, \u201cthe most meticulous regulation of nonsense must still result in nonsense.\u201d Yet an unsuspecting person looking for responsible information about \u201cCAM\u201d on the NCCAM website would be led to believe, along with all the other nonsense, that the anti-vaccination views of naturopaths, homeopaths, and chiropractors are valid and based on science.<\/p>\n<p>It is no surprise that the NCCAM \u201cCredentialing\u201d essay relies heavily upon the writings of attorney Michael H. Cohen, a champion of quackery\u00a0about whom <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=438\">we&#8217;ve heard before<\/a> on SBM.<\/p>\n<h3>Why?<\/h3>\n<p>I used to suppose that the NCCAM website ignoring vaccination hysteria was a matter of na\u00efvet\u00e9: most NCCAM functionaries know little of the practices and practitioners with which they are expected to be familiar. This probably remains true to a large extent, but we know that Dr. Briggs, at least, is aware of the intimate relation between \u201cCAM\u201d advocacy and the anti-vax movement. Perhaps she hasn\u2019t got around to making the promised changes on the website, but if so, why not? Widespread fear mongering about vaccines being poisons and causing autism is a far more important public health issue than whether or not glucosamine is useful for osteoarthritis, or whether acupuncture might be useful for fibromyalgia, or any of the rest of the standard, breezy, NCCAM fare. The refutation of dangerous myths about vaccines ought to be a priority.<\/p>\n<p>During our visit, Dr. Briggs, who has been at the NCCAM only since 2008, made a point of denying that she feels pressure from Congressional \u201cCAM\u201d demagogues such as Dan Burton and Tom Harkin. That may seem true in the day-to-day grind of her job, but such pressure has permeated the culture of the NCCAM since before its formal inception, as documented many times here on SBM and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.csicop.org\/si\/show\/ongoing_problem_with_the_national_center\">elsewhere<\/a>. Rep. Burton conducted <a href=\"http:\/\/www.access.gpo.gov\/congress\/house\/house07ch106.html\">numerous pro-quack hearings<\/a> during his tenure as chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform. His bullying of NIH directors is largely responsible for two of the most unethical trials ever funded by the NCCAM, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=92\">Gonzalez trial<\/a> for cancer of the pancreas and the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2438277\/?tool=pubmed\">Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy<\/a>. Burton is also a champion of quacks who claim that <a href=\"http:\/\/frwebgate.access.gpo.gov\/cgi-bin\/getdoc.cgi?dbname=107_house_hearings&amp;docid=f:76856.pdf\">vaccines cause autism<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Harkin was the creator of both the NCCAM and its predecessor, the Office of Alternative Medicine (OAM). He <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=86\">famously stacked<\/a> the OAM advisory panel with four pseudoscientific zealots who would be become known as \u201cHarkinites.\u201d He <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=396\">worries<\/a> that the NCCAM hasn\u2019t spent its time \u201cseeking out and approving [alternative methods].\u201d He hypes \u201cintegrative medicine\u201d as the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=394\">Next Big Thing<\/a>, the answer to<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>the dogmas and biases that have made our current health care system \u2013 based overwhelmingly on conventional medicine \u2013 in so many ways wasteful and dysfunctional.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In particular, assert Sen. Harkin and other advocates, \u201cintegrative medicine\u201d will mean <em>preventative<\/em> medicine. I\u2019ve <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=399\">discussed this deception<\/a> previously: it\u2019s worse than a Damned Lie. I can\u2019t help but restate, for the occasion of Vaccine Awareness Week, an unending source of ironic amusement\u00a0for your SBM bloggers and for rational thinkers everywhere: immunizations, also called vaccinations (for the first of their kind, made from cowpox exudate), are the most effective preventative health measures ever devised; yet \u201calternative medicine\u201d pushers of every stripe, who claim special, proprietary knowledge about achieving \u2018wellness,\u2019 can dependably be counted on to oppose them.<\/p>\n<h3>A Web of Misinformation<\/h3>\n<p>The NCCAM, whether Dr. Briggs would like to admit it or not, is heavily influenced by such sentiments. We\u2019ve already seen how the Center\u2019s website whitewashes naturopaths, homeopaths, and chiropractors. We\u2019ve seen how Dan Burton has single-handedly forced the NCCAM to fund horrible trials and to employ investigators who are <a href=\"http:\/\/w3.health.state.ny.us\/opmc\/factions.nsf\/58220a7f9eeaafab85256b180058c032\/f566901672739a1a85256a4a0047d2e6\/$FILE\/ATT82H5C\/lc171787.pdf\">charlatans<\/a> and even <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencebasedmedicine.org\/?p=547\">criminals<\/a>. We know that National Advisory Council for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NACCAM) has been and continues to be, as <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/about\/naccam\/charter.htm#jump4\">a matter of law<\/a>, a bastion of naturopaths, chiropractors, and other quacks.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWait a minute,\u201d someone might be thinking, \u201cyou can\u2019t conclude from your cited evidence that Harkin himself is anti-vax.\u201d That\u2019s true, but it doesn\u2019t matter. What\u2019s important, for the purposes of this discussion, is the company that he and the NCCAM keep. Let\u2019s illustrate this by citing an example from the <a href=\"http:\/\/nccam.nih.gov\/about\/naccam\/roster.htm\">current membership<\/a> of the Advisory Council.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/people\/bios\/kahn.shtml\">Janet Kahn<\/a> is the Executive Director of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/\">Integrated Healthcare Policy Consortium<\/a> (IHPC). The organization was founded in 2001 at the completion of the \u201cNational Policy Dialogue to Advance Integrated Health Care: Finding Common Ground,\u201d whose <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/resources\/NPDFR.pdf\">report<\/a> was co-authored by two naturopaths. As was true of that report, the IHPC <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/about\/agenda.shtml\">agenda<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/about\/about.shtml\">beliefs<\/a> are exactly in line with those of Harkin and other \u201cintegrative medicine\u201d enthusiasts. The IHPC has a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/people\/fpc_people.shtml\">Federal Policy Committee<\/a> whose goal is to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/fptf\/fpc.shtml\">fearlessly and tirelessly<\/a> \u201ctransform the very architecture of the US healthcare system.\u201d This, the IHPC intends, will be accomplished by legislative fiat: practitioners of implausible methods will simply be shoehorned into mainstream health care, bypassing science and rational practice standards.<\/p>\n<p>Now let\u2019s close the anti-vax\/NCCAM circle. If you\u2019ve looked at the many documents linked from this post, you might have noticed the name <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ihpc.info\/people\/bios\/traub1.shtml\">Michael Traub<\/a>. He is a naturopath and homeopath who is on the IHPC\u2019s Board of Directors, Federal Policy Committee, and Steering Committee. He was co-author of the \u201cNational Policy Dialogue\u201d report cited just above. He is a past-President of the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians, and last summer <a href=\"http:\/\/www.naturopathic.org\/content.asp?admin=Y&amp;contentid=363\">shared the podium<\/a> with NCCAM Director Briggs.<\/p>\n<p>In 1994, Traub published an article, titled \u201cHomeopathic prophylaxis,\u201d for the <em>Journal of Naturopathic Medicine<\/em>. As <a href=\"http:\/\/www.quackwatch.org\/01QuackeryRelatedTopics\/Naturopathy\/immu.html\">previously explained<\/a>,<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>[The] article suggests that homeopathic products are safer and more effective than vaccination for preventing disease. The article&#8217;s author (Michael Traub, N.D.) taught public health at the National College of Naturopathic Medicine and helped formulate the AANP&#8217;s position papers on immunization and homeopathy. He recommends tetanus vaccine but advises against measles, mumps, rubella, and diphtheria. After paying homage to a homeopathic treatise on &#8220;vaccinosis&#8221; published more than 100 years ago, Traub&#8217;s article details the use of homeopathic nosodes for preventing diphtheria, whooping cough, polio, influenza, tuberculosis, and pneumoccal pneumonia. Nosodes are products made by repeatedly diluting samples of pathological tissues, bacteria, fungi, ova, parasites, virus particles, yeast, disease products (such as pus), or excretions. The protocol Traub describes uses &#8220;200C potencies&#8221; which means that the nosodes are made by serially diluting the original substance 1-to-100 a total of 200 times. (After the 12th dilution, no molecule of original substance remains.) Traub states that he no longer recommends nosodes but uses other &#8220;preventive&#8221; homeopathic strategies.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>That Traub hasn\u2019t substantially changed his tune since 1994 is suggested by the title of a 2004 article, \u201cAlternatives to Flu Shots\u201d\u2014I won\u2019t pay to read it, but you can find it linked from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.holisticprimarycare.net\/component\/search\/Michael%2BTraub\/%252F?ordering=&amp;searchphrase=all\">here<\/a>\u2014and by Traub\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.holisticprimarycare.net\/topics\/topics-h-n\/naturopathic-perspective\/799-naturopathic-doctor-vs-h1n1-virus\">recent report<\/a> of his own bout with apparent H1N1 flu, which can most generously be described as ditzy. Circle closed; there are many more.<\/p>\n<h3>Conclusion<\/h3>\n<p>Is it possible that the ubiquitous influence of \u201cCAM\u201d and its fellow traveler, anti-vaccination hysteria, is the real reason that the NCCAM website lacks responsible, definitive information about immunizations and pseudo-immunizations? If this is not the case, and if Dr. Briggs reads this, I hope she\u2019ll be reminded of our discussion in April and consider this a challenge to show us that she is a player. I also hope that she&#8217;ll remember that her constituents are approximately 300 million American citizens, not merely tiny fringe groups of homeopaths, naturopaths, and Jenny McCarthy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you go to the website of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), you\u2019ll find that one of its self-identified roles is to \u201cprovide information about CAM.\u201d NCCAM Director Josephine Briggs is proud to assert that the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/medicine\/vaccine-wars-the-nccam-drops-the-ball.php\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"limit_modified_date":"","last_modified_date":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-medicine"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30516"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30516\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}