Actual News Story on Vaccines

Isn't it sad when a media outlet that most Americans would have a visceral revulsion to actually carries news that is much more factually correct, and doesn't give in to the false "both sides" fallacy when it comes to vaccines?  There is a reason that whenever the anit-vax pro-disease nutters have one of their "experts" on, they are generally either not an actual doctor, or they are discredited because of their non-reality based practices.

With apologies to Tim Minchin: You know what you call alternative medicine that works? Medicine!

NBC Today: Doctors will refuse to see unvaccinated?

Some doctors are taking a stand.  While viscerally I agree with this policy, keep in mind that there are some people who just can't get vaccines for health reasons (which is why everyone else should ensure herd immunity, a fact that escapes the pro-disease nutters).  I hope that instead of taking a black and white approach, there is some common sense applied to this policy.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Bad Astronomy: More good and bad news about measles and vaccinations

I don't think I can expand any more on Dr. Plait's article...  I am reprinting it in its entirety here so that I can catch the full list of related links.  And yes, I realize this is an old post of his, but it is worth it for me to catch up on posting and put this one up!  Also, if you care at all about public health, this should be a call to action for you.  Write to Representative Keenan and ask him to withdraw his support for this.

More good and bad news about measles and vaccinations

Reporting on the latest news about vaccinations is frustrating. For every step forward we take a step back.

1) First, the good: vaccination rate for measles in the UK has risen to its highest level in 13 years according to the UK Health Protection Agency. The rate — 90% among two-year-olds — is pretty good. I’ll note that this is for the first of two vaccinations needed; for the second dose the uptake is lower, 85%.

One bit of bad news about this is the reason behind the rate increase is thought to be due to a series of measles outbreaks in Europe. It’s an irony of life that vaccines are a victim of their own success: inoculations have been so successful in eliminating some diseases that people take for granted the diseases are gone. But they’re not gone, they’re waiting. When vaccination rates drop low enough, we see more measles. And pertussis. And the flu, and polio.

And when this happens, people get sick, and some die. A teenager in the UK recently died of measles. He had a compromised immune system, which means he relied on us, the rest of the population, to keep up herd immunity.

We failed him.

2) In Massachusetts, it is a requirement by law that children be vaccinated to enter public school. The only exceptions are due to health reasons (for example, an allergy to ingredients of vaccines) or for religious reasons. I disagree with religious exemptions when it comes to medicine — as I’ve said here and here and here– but the Massachusetts legislature is about to consider a bill that will make things much worse. The bill, if passed, will amend the previously existing law. In its entirety, the bill says:

Notwithstanding the provisions of this section a child shall, upon written request of a parent to the school, be admitted to school.

What this means is that if a parent has decided for whatever reason not to vaccinate their child, all they have to do is write a letter and the kid must be allowed to attend school. I expect the reasoning behind this bill is to allow parents more freedom, but what it will actually do is greatly increase the risk of other children at Massachusetts schools for contracting serious and potentially life-threatening diseases.

The sponsor, John Keenan (D-Salem), appears to be a public safety-conscious man, having sponsored many bills to increase public safety. Going over his record I find myself agreeing with many of his policies. But this one strikes me as a bad idea.

Harpocrates Speaks has much more on this. If you live in Massachusetts, I suggest you read his article and contact your local representative about this issue.

Tip o’ the syringe to J Thomas and Todd W.

---

Related posts:
- Confirmed measles cases in US tops 150
- Pertussis can kill and you can stop it
- How to be inoculated against antivax conventions
- The Panic Virus

Sorry About the Silence

Dear reader,

My apologies for the sudden silence and lack of posts.  Due to numerous unforseen circumstances, I have neglected to pass along news and updates.  I am just writing this entry to let you know that I shall endeavour to update this page with a few more entries and updates in the near future.  There has been quite a bit of news that needs to be covered, as well as some upcoming web page updates that I need to accomplish.  Please bear with me as I get these incorporated and taken care of.

Also, while Avicenna and I are the primary bloggers here, I am always looking for more people to help out.  There are many team members listed on this blog, however I have not heard much from them.  I am leaving them on the blog since I owe a certian amount of allegiance to them, but I am always looking for more people.  Please feel free to drop me a line at Larian@LarianLeQuella.com if you are interested in contributing.  Thank you.

Vaccine Times: Flash News

Several stories from Vaccine Times.  The last one really caught my eye.  $41Million is really nothing in the scheme of international budgets.  To spend so little to prevent such suffering is almost criminal.  And the other stories also have significance.

READ FULL STORY HERE.

150 sick, 4 childrend dead of whooping cough in Papua New Guinea – Four children have been killed by whooping cough so far this year in Papua New Guinea, according to Ausralia Network News.  The outbreak started in mid-March and has sickened over 150 people. Local health officials say that few children have been immunized against whooping cough in the area.

150,000 children die of vaccine-preventable diseases in Pakistan each year – The reasons why parents do not get their children vaccinated include poverty, low rates of female literacy, poor environmental hygiene and bad governance and lack of accountability in Extended Program on Immunization (EPI). To put this into perspective, Yankee Stadium holds about 50,000 people, so that’s 3 Yankee stadiums full of children dead each and every year of vaccine-preventable diseases. Yet, most anti-vaxers maintain that these vaccine-preventable diseases are mostly harmless.

FDA approves the first vaccine to prevent meningococcal disease in infants and toddlers – The FDA has approved Menactra for use in infants as young as 9 months old; it was already approved for use in people ages 2 through 55 years. The vaccine protects against 4 types of the germ that causes meningitis (A,C,Y and W-135); currently there is no vaccine that protects agains group B. Meningitis is an extremely dangerous disease: even with appropriate antibiotics and intensive care, between 10 percent and 15 percent of people who develop meningococcal disease die from the infection, while another 10 percent to 20 percent suffer complications such as brain damage or loss of limb or hearing. The safety of Menactra in children as young as 9 months was evaluated in four clinical studies in which over 3,700 participants received the vaccine. The most common adverse events reported in children who received Menactra at 9 months and 12 months of age were injection-site tenderness and irritability.

The World Bank approves additional $41M for Pakistan’s polio drive – The Board of Directors of The World Bank has recently approved $41 Million in funds to support Pakistan’s Third Partnership for Polio Eradication Project (TPPEP) which seeks to immunize 32 million children against the crippling disease with the goal of eradicating the disease from the country. The Global Polio Eradication Initiative has successfully reduced global polio cases by 99% in  a little under 20 years, however 4 countries still experience large numbers of the disease, and Pakistan is one of the 4. Here’s to hoping polio goes the way of smallpox.

Vaccine Times: Vaccine News

Again, the Vaccine Times manages to dig up great stories about vaccines saving lives, and the charitable efforts of individuals involved in the effort.  Generally I am not a supporter of the oppressive power that some rulers in specific parts of the world have over their people, but I think a small measure of respect is due to wanting to alleviate some other suffering in the world.  Remember, this is not a political site, but rather one that focuses on the good and facts about vaccines (well, and also about the veracity of evolution, but this post doesn't touch on that at all).

Bill Gates & Abu Dhabi prince pledge $50,000,000 each to vaccination effort – The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the prince of Abu Dhabi have pledged $50,000,000 each to vaccinate children in Afghanistan and Pakistan against polio and other diseases. About one third of this sum will go towards polio eradication efforts, while the rest will go toward other diseases, such as pneumonia, diphtheria, whooping cough and other diseases.

UK study shows adjuvanted H1N1 vaccine induces a faster and higher immune response than non-adjuvanted vaccine – A head-to-head comparison of the two H1N1 vaccines given to adults during the 2009 pandemic finds that the squalene-containing, adjuvanted split-virus vaccine achieved a more rapid and stronger immune response than the whole-virus vaccine, even though it contained only half the antigenic load (H1N1 virus parts). Both vaccines were well tolerated with no vaccine-related serious side effects. However, the adjuvanted vaccine produced more injection-site symptoms and general symptoms (muscle pain, chills, headaches, and malaise) than the whole-virus vaccine.

18 million doses of polio vaccine given out in Congo polio immunization drive – The third wave of the polio vaccination drive in Congo has been underway over the past few weeks. The immunization effort was started in response to a polio outbreak that has killed 187 people so far. A total of 18,000,000 doses of vaccines have been provided to the country by UNICEF and have been administered during the 3 rounds of vaccinations which started back in November 2010.

The Vaccine Times Oct-Dec 2010 Issue

Just doing my part to spread the word about this great project.  If there is any support that you can offer, even just sharing this link around, please do so.

The Vaccine Times Oct-Dec 2010 Issue

Hello dear friends; The Vaccine Times team would like to wish you a happy and safe holiday season. It is with great pleasure that we share with you the brand new, second issue of The Vaccine Times (Oct-Dec 2010). Please click the image below to download.

The Vaccine Times Oct-Dec 2010

Your continued help and support is still needed

Over the past few months we have received a lot of support from friends, such as yourself, in the pro-health community. Interest in our publication has been fairly high and the feedback has been positive. We are extremely happy to inform you that we have surpassed 100 free subscribers, on target with the goal we had set for us for the second issue. The number of subscribers to the free e-mail list is crucial, if we are to attract prospective customers who might want to buy ad space, so the new goal is to reach 200 by the next issue. You all can help us meet this goal by spreading the word in the Internet, via Facebook, Twitter, websites and blogs.

However, the Times is not yet financially viable; we have been unable to secure any funding so far, which would allow us to spread the pro-health message to the largest audience possible. As such, we extend an appeal to any organized skeptical, medical or other organizations in the pro-health community who want to support our efforts and help use make the print Vaccine Times a reality by advertising with us. If we can raise just $1,000, that would guarantee printing and mailing of the smallest order the printing company will accept, for one full year. Anything over that would possibly enable us to advertise in some other print publication and help us reach prospective paid subscribers. Anything over that goes towards my yacht.

What is new with The Vaccine Times

Since the first issue was released, this website has been set up, which also replaces the Vaccine Central Blog. We are also present on Twitter as @VaccineTimes. The Vaccine Times blog is available now, as a subscription for Amazon Kindle. We are also thinking about setting up The Vaccine Times newspaper as a Kindle publication, although we might need some help from people with XML skills to help us set it up properly. If you have skills in that area, please get in touch with us.

An online Cafepress store for Vaccine Times branded merchandise is now available; you can support the project by purchasing merchandise bearing our designs. A small commission fee goes our way, so if you feel that is something you’d like to do please visit our store.

We are working to have everything in place to start taking print subscription orders at the beginning of the year 2011. We hope that between ad revenue, subscription revenue and merchandise revenue we will generate enough funds to make The Vaccine Times viable. Please keep an eye on the blog and on Twitter for announcements regarding paid subscriptions.

You can help

We are very grateful for your support so far, without it we would’ve probably called it quits a while back. Nevertheless, you can do more, at very little cost to you, to help us. Besides subscribing to the paid printed version when it becomes available, there are a few other things you can do to help us that will not cost you anything (besides a few minutes of your time). Here is a short list:

• Share ideas on how to reach our target market – As you may know, our target market for the paid print Times are pediatricians and other medical professionals. We need ideas about where to get a usable list of pediatricians, and how to go about reaching out to them, all while keeping in mind that cost is a major limiting factor at the present time. Any idea is welcome, no matter how remote you might think it is; please e-mail us at vaccinetimes@gmail.com .
• Subscribe to the Vaccine Times blog RSS feed – If you use an RSS aggregator to stay in touch with the latest news, please consider adding The Vaccine Times feed to your list. It is free, and a growing number of subscribers, and hopefully commenters, does wonders for motivation.
• Follow @VaccineTimes on Twitter- Twitter is the best way for us to communicate with each other. We do not want to abuse the privilege of having your e-mail address on our list by inundating you with too many e-mails. Twitter makes it easy to send out small announcements and requests. If you have a Twitter account, following @VaccineTimes takes literally 5 seconds. If you do not have a Twitter account, you should consider setting one up. It is free, and it is a great way to stay in touch.
• Spread the word – Post a Facebook update with a link to vaccinetimes.com; post a Twitter message with the same content; Print copies and leave them hanging around on the copy room at work; give them out at church; give one to your baby’s pediatrician and tell them you’d better have this available as reading material than People Magazine in their waiting room etc.
• If you work for a major skeptical, or other pro-health, organization – You can help by convincing your organization to:
  • Order a batch of 25 (or more), for about $200 (or more), and hand them out at your next local event (e-mail vaccinetimes@gmail.com for details)
  • Purchase some add space. Do you have a skeptical event, or some other event, you want to advertise? Send us the ad in JPEG format and we’ll include it in the next run of the Times. Check out this link for current prices.
  • If you are a podcaster, plug the Vaccine Times in your podcast (and let us know so we can return the favor on the blog).
  • If you are a blogger, link to vaccinetimes.com.
  • If you are a commercially successful podcaster or blogger, then you can support The Vaccine Times, by buying up a quarter-page, half-page, or full-page ad.

From Vaccine Central: Vaccine Times

I don't own a Kindle (yet), but this will be on there ASAP.  I am sending this out via ll the channels I can, you should too!

Introducing The Vaccine Times

For a while now, I have been hinting at a Super Secret Project I’ve been working on. It is finally time to unveil the secret. I give to you the first issue of  The Vaccine Times, a quarterly newspaper-like publication, for parents, by parents.

The goal is to get The Vaccine Times in front of as many parent eyeballs as possible. Nevertheless, that is not an easy task. Most parents don’t read skeptical blogs, or follow skeptics on Twitter. After much thinking, I’ve come up with the strategy that I think offers me the best chance to make The Vaccine Times successful: pediatricians.
Most parents will go to the pediatrician’s office on a regular basis. Most of them will be waiting in the waiting room and perusing whatever magazines the office offers them to peruse while waiting. So, all I have to get the printed version of The Vaccine Times into pediatrician’s offices. I have to get pediatricians to subscribe to the printed version of The Times, in order to expose parents, the end-goal of this whole exercise, to this information. That is much harder than it sounds!
The Vaccine Times, will always be available for free in PDF format to individuals. I hope to be able to use the subsciption-based, printed version as my ongoing source of revenue to fund the whole enterprise, but the main goal is to get this information to the parents, for free in electronic format, or for a fee if they choose to subscribe to the printed version.
That will not be easy, nor cheap to do. Printing publications such as this one, can’t be done on one’s home printer. Presentation is everything; if it doesn’t look professional it won’t be picked up. This first issue will be my test issue. I need all the feedback, comments and recommendations you can get me, about anything you can think off: design, layout, revenue generating activities, advertising, marketing, printing, editing and on, and on. And I am going to need support.
How can you support the Vaccine Times?
1 – If you are an individual, spread the word.  Print copies and leave them hanging around on the copy room at work, give them out at church, give one to your baby’s pediatrician and tell them you’d better have this available as reading material than People in their waiting room. Tweet about it; post an update on Facebook.
2 – If you own a Kindle, an indirect way to provide financial support is to subscribe to the Kindle Version of the Vaccine Central blog. It cost $1.99 per month, and I get a portion of it, although I’m not sure how much of that makes it to me yet. That money will be used to finance The Vaccine Times. And even if you don’t want to subscribe, leave a review of the blog at it’s Amazon Page.

3 – If you have any expertise with publishing, contact me at vaccinetimes@gmail.com, and let me know how you can become involved. If this is to grow, I’m going to need help. I currently, desperately need an experienced editor.

4 – If you work for a major skeptical organization, you can help. You can order a batch of 25, for about $200. That will allow me to print 50 copies. Your organization gets 25, and I get another 25 to send around to market The Vaccine Times to other organizations who may sign up for another 25 copies at the same price and so on. This way, your organization gets to support this enterprise and gets a few copies to give out at your local skeptical events. Yet another way your organization can help is by buying up some add space. Do you have a skeptical event, or something else you want to advertise? Send me the add in JPEG format and I’ll include it in the next run of the Times. I haven’t figured out a pricing structure yet, but as a starter I’ll go for $25 for a one-time quarter page add, or $50 for a one-time half page add.
I don’t have a price for a full page add. Since I am not setting up a not-profit, and cannot accept donations legally, I am thinking of using that option as a way for a sponsoring organization to support The Vaccine Times, without flat out donating money. Anyone who is interested in supporting through a full page add, contact me via e-mail and we’ll work out a reasonable price.
5 – If you are  a podcaster, plug the Vaccine Times in your podcast. If you are a blogger, link to this entry. If you are a commercially succesful podcaster or blogger, then you can support The Vaccine Times, by buying up a quarter-page, or a half-page add.

6 – I am using the free, open-source Scribus Desktop Publishing software to design The Times. If you can provide a copy of the Scribus manual, which sells for $45 on Amazon, that would help immensely. If you have a copy lying around that you no longer need, you can mail it to me. Contact me at vaccinetimes@gmail.com for arrangements.

7 – I am currently not soliciting monetary donations. I think that if this idea is to work, The Times will have to be able to stand on its own two feet. People have to get something for the money they give, be they individuals who are getting a blog they enjoy reading on their Kindle, or organizations who are willing to pay for a batch of the printed copies, because they enjoy the material.
8 – I need advice about Customer Relationship Management, best software for managing subscriptions, cheapest ways to accept Credit Card subscriptions from prospective customers and such. Free rules, for obvious reasons.

The next step is setting up the second issue by mid-December or so, and figuring out how to run a print publication in the mean time, from advertising and marketing, to CRM, to figuring out all the services that need to go in place to support the Times. This is going to get very messy, very soon, and unless I get some support from those of you in the skeptical community who have experience with this sort of thing, I will not succeed. And this is going to require a little start-up cash, in the range of at least $5,000 I estimate; and I have no idea where that will come from.
You can get in touch with me in various ways. E-mails can be sent to vaccinetimes@gmail.com OR leartshaka@zoho.com. You can leave a comment here on this blog entry, or you can send me messages on Twitter (@Skepdude). Please give all the feedback you can think off, especially I am interested in constructive criticism. We learn from our mistakes, not our successes so don’t hold back, point my mistakes out, ALL of them. You won’t hurt my feelings, I promise you that.
I will soon have an update with instructions on how to purchase add space, subscribe, mailing address, payment options (most likely it will initially be limited to Paypal and check or money order), and all that nice stuff. Until then, please spread the word about The Vaccine Times.

We all love Dr. nancy Snyderman

I didn't know about this post over at the JREF Forums for a while, but it recently got bumped up so I got a chance to read it.  Seems Dr. Snyderman has some great things to say, and some good ole fashioned smack down on idiots.

Dr. Nancy Snyderman is NBC's chief medical editor. This morning she did a profile of Dr. Paul Offit, author of the new book Autism's False Prophets.

The profile was pretty good, not great, it missed a few points. But check out what happened during the "outro" after the report. Dr. Snyderman had mentioned that she personally had been "physically ambushed" by anti-vaccine people, and then she totally got into Matt Lauer's face about referring to the vacccines/autism thing as "controversial."

It was a sight to behold:

Dr. Nancy Snyderman: Its time for everyone to redirect the questions toward finding the cause of autism. It is NOT, however, vaccinations.

Matt Lauer: Controversial subject, Nancy.

Snyderman: NOT controversial subject!

Lauer: Well but controversial for parents who still believe.

Snyderman: It is not controversial, Matt! It's time for kids to get their vaccines.

Lauer: If it weren't controversial you wouldn't be ambushed.

Snyderman: No! It's not controversial. I really mean that. The science is the science. We are going to start to see outbreaks of polio and measles in this country if we don't start talking about the real problem. It's NOT controversial.

Lauer: We will talk about it more here, Nancy, thanks.

Snyderman: You bet, Matt.

Lauer: We're back right after this.

Kudos, Dr. Snyderman, kudos.

There is a complete video online as well.  The good part where she smacks down Lauer at the end starts around 5:00  http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/27453507#27453507  (Flash & Javascript required, of course, as for most web videos.)

If you click on the title of this blog, then you can go to the thread where this discussion is going on at the JREF.  There are a few more posts about Dr. Snyderman as well as a few more NBC spots and the Nightline show.  There is also the cranks that still think that vaccines are poison and such.  Their posts are almost funny if it wasn't for the public danger they represent.

More vaccination news, some good, some not so good

I have a couple of news items from Dr. Plait's blog today. One is a collection of vaccine news, but another is a story that should hit home to people.

More vaccination news, some good, some not so good

Some vaccine news I missed in the past few days…

1) A pertussis outbreak in California has already killed two infants. This event resonates with what happened in Australia a year ago; vaccination rates are low, and the victims are too young to be vaccinated themselves. With herd immunities compromised, the littlest and most defenseless reap the effects. This is not necessarily caused by the antivaxxers, but it’s worth noting.

2) There is apparently a small outbreak of polio in Tajikistan. Vaccinations are critical, but so is sanitation.

3) PBS airs a documentary called "The Vaccine Wars" tonight. It’s about what you think it’s about. Check your local listings.

4) H1N1 is still out there, and still hurting and killing kids.

5) A bunch of kids got pretty sick after vaccinations in Australia. It’s unclear what happened, and officials are investigating it.

6) The good news? At least for Finland, it’s good: 97% of kids there are vaccinated. For everything. Amazing.

Tip o’ the needle to Antti Säämänen, Doug Troy, William Mount, and Greg Stitz.

Help a kid with leukemia… and help many, many more

Heather Steingruebl is a BABloggee. She contacted me and told me some chilling news: her daughter Elise was recently diagnosed with leukemia. She’s being treated, and I know we all hope things go well for her.

But in the meantime, this makes Elise susceptible to many preventable diseases. We need people to get vaccinated! As Heather says,

Vaccinate. Elise and thousands of kids like her are counting on not dying from things like measles and whooping cough while they fight cancer. Unless it’s a specific health risk to you or your child, just vaccinate. Please.

She also implores people to get on the bone marrow donation registry. Search around online for information on how to do this. I plan on doing this myself.

My heart goes out to her and her family, as it does to anyone affected by this awful illness. I’m going to find out what booster shots I need, because I take this issue very seriously. I hope you do too.

Science writer Simon Singh wins libel appeal

More good news for the forces of reality.

A science writer has won the right to rely on the defence of fair comment in a libel action, in a landmark ruling at the Court of Appeal.

Simon Singh was accused of libel by the British Chiropractic Association over an article in the Guardian in 2008.

Dr Singh questioned the claims of some chiropractors over the treatment of certain childhood conditions.

The High Court had said the words were fact not opinion - meaning Dr Singh could not use the fair comment defence.

However, the Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge, Master of the Rolls Lord Neuberger and Lord Justice Sedley ruled High Court judge Mr Justice Eady had "erred in his approach" last May, and allowed Dr Singh's appeal.

BBC News science correspondent Pallab Ghosh says that, had Justice Eady's ruling stood, it would have made it difficult for any scientist or science journalist to question claims made by companies or organisations without opening themselves up to a libel action that would be hard to win.

Dr Singh described the ruling as "brilliant", but added that the action had cost £200,000 "just to define the meaning of a few words".

"After two years of battling in this libel case, at last we've got a good decision. So instead of battling uphill we're fighting with the wind behind us," he said.

"The Court of Appeal's made a very wise decision, but it just shouldn't be so horrendously expensive for a journalist or an academic journal or a scientist to defend what they mean.

"That's why people back off from saying what they really mean."

The British Chiropractic Association said it was disappointed to lose the appeal but it was "not the end of the road".

BCA president Richard Brown said: "We are considering whether to seek permission to appeal to the Supreme Court and subsequently proceed to trial.

"Our original argument remains that our reputation has been damaged. The BCA brought this claim only to uphold its good name and protect its reputation, honesty and integrity".

In the article in April 2008, Dr Singh suggested there was a lack of evidence for the claims some chiropractors made on treating certain childhood conditions such as colic and asthma.

The BCA alleged that Dr Singh had effectively accused its leaders of knowingly supporting bogus treatments.

The case has become a cause celebre for the science community and led to calls for defamation law to be rewritten so it does not interfere with scientific debates.

His high-profile supporters include Stephen Fry, Ricky Gervais and Harry Hill, all from the world of entertainment.

Dr Singh said: "The judges are clearly unhappy on how libel laws can impact on discussion, on how this libel suit has quashed debate about chiropractics to a large extent.

"They're particularly unhappy about the way scientific discussion can be silenced by libel laws. That's a real boost to the libel reform campaign."

Coalition for Libel Reform spokeswoman Tracey Brown said: "This case has brought out of the woodwork the fact that so many other discussions are being killed, from discussions of cardiology to human rights to medicines.

"We're now pushing ahead for bigger changes to the law so that we have the kind of public interest defence that means it wouldn't have taken two years and £200,000 to find out whether Simon can defend himself."

British scientific organisation the Royal Institution welcomed the judgement.

Director of programmes Gail Cardew said: "It will encourage scientists and the public to discuss evidence freely without fear of legal threat."

Weekend News! (11 JUL 09)

I generally don't intend to blog on weekends (I have a family and all those social obligations to fulfill), but today I am making an exception. Not because I have something exciting to share or because it's a particularly news worthy day, but just to get back into the swing of things, and to remind readers that this site is mainly updated on weekdays.

Also, on the evolution page, the "standard rebuttals" page was getting unmanageable, so I broke it down into three specific sections. One section is the standard rebuttals that we put together on our own. Then there is one section that lists 25 rebuttals as written by Dr. Michael Shermer of Skeptic Magazine (and also a writer for Scientific American). Another section takes on 15 specific items, and was written by John Rennie for Scientific American. I hope this makes the evolution page a little more manageable for our readers. Please send us feedback on this if you would like to see more.

Anyway, on Monday, you'll get news and information again. Also, I am going to attempt (at the risk of my sanity) to go to the age of autism site, and tear apart random articles of theirs, should I find the time in the future. I know that generally our sources have been a little narrow, but with the sheer amount of lies and distortion out there, it's hard to find anything that passes the baloney detection kit... So, just to give you a look into the crazy, we'll attempt to delve into their strange little world. Maybe not now, but eventually, just so we aren't accused of only going to one source.

Also, we are still looking for more guest writers. While I enjoy finding and researching things, it does take up a lot of time, and since this is strictly a volunteer project, I am finding my real life obligations taking away from this from time to time. I sincerely apprecite IVAN3MAN's help and Todd W.'s help, but the more the merrier.