The report was rushed to publication so it would appear right before the US election.
Les Roberts, the lead researcher from Johns Hopkins, said the article's timing was up to him. ''I emailed it in on Sept. 30 under the condition that it came out before the election,'' Roberts told The Associated Press. ''My motive in doing that was not to skew the election. My motive was that if this came out during the campaign, both candidates would be forced to pledge to protect civilian lives in Iraq. I was opposed to the war and I still think that the war was a bad idea, but I think that our science has transcended our perspectives,'' Roberts said."I was against the war and I insisted this be rushed into print before the election, but I'm not trying to skew the election." Yeah, right.
The Lancet has a history of politicizing medical research.
I'm not sure what Tim Worstall's credentials are, but for what it's worth, here is his informal critique of the Lancet methodology.
Via Roger Simon, here are more detailed critiques from an author with the following credentials:
a economics degree from Western Carolina University--1995, Master in Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University--1997, JD University of Michigan Law School--2001.The commenters at Roger's are taking it apart too.
Then there is context, which politicized science tends to ignore: Compare to Iraqi death and torture under Saddam.
UPDATE: Oxblog attempts to inject some common sense into the discussion.
UPDATE: Another critique of the methodology.
UPDATE: An expansion of the previous critique.
UPDATE: More expansion of the previous critique.
3 Comments:
This 'news' appeared on Yahoo's headlines last night, then it disappeared. I haven't seen it featured on CNN or MSNBC online, but since I don't watch TV News, I don't know what they're up to..
This may be a sign that our media might be using the old-fashioned idea of checking the facts(?)
Still, if this research was bogus, it's very unsettling. The idea that a group of doctors would deliberately publish false information in a medical journal. Not good news.
Judith,
My qualifications to comment on a piece of scientific research?
In my fields (in business, rare earth metals, in academic terms, economics) reasonable.
On medical research ? Not a lot, just a dusting of statistics and the basic lessons of 40 years on the planet. A piece of research is rushed through to appear five days before an election and the results of the research make the incumbent look bad. Doesn't pass the small test does it? Would have said the same if something had come up that made Kerry look bad.
I'm sure there are other and better commentators who will provide more light and truth on this subject than I am able to.
Doesn't stop me having that gut feeling that the paper is wrong. Blogs are, after all, personal opinion.
This reminds me of the time, right in the middle of the Clinton impeachment and Starr investigation, when George Lundberg, the (leftie) editor of JAMA, rushed into publication an article indicating that a high proportion of middle schoolers did not consider oral sex to be sex. He was rightly canned for politicizing the Journal.
--david
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