Not surprisingly, Peter Gøtzsche has had some defenders.
“A scandal has erupted within the Cochrane Collaboration, the world’s most prestigious scientific organisation devoted to independent reviews of health care interventions. One of its highest profile board members has been sacked, resulting in four other board members staging a mass exodus.”
Maryanne Demasi, PhD on Cochrane – A sinking ship?
Who is Maryanne Demasi?
“DISCLOSURE: Maryanne Demasi is a science reporter and a researcher working with Prof Peter C. Gøtzsche, the Nordic Cochrane Centre, and was present in Edinburgh at the time of the meeting, but not present in the discussion room.”
Oh…
Someone who works with Peter Gøtzsche is defending him. That doesn’t sound too surprising.
It is also not surprising the way that some folks are describing Peter Gøtzsche’s expulsion, saying that it was only about his behavior and not his work.
But the problem wasn’t that he wrote a critique of a Cochrane HPV meta-analsysis, but that his critique was so poorly done!
“I think it’s a hatchet job by people with several axes to grind, that needed better editorial peer review. I would be surprised if Cochrane’s investigation and update resulted in changed conclusions.”
Hilda Bastian on The HPV Vaccine: A Critique of a Critique of a Meta-Analysis
A hatchet job by people with several axes to grind…
Not the kind of work you would expect from a member of the Governing Board of the Cochrane Collaboration, especially after most of the same charges were refuted when they were made against the European Medicines Agency.
And it wasn’t even the first time that he was accused of harming the Cochrane Collaboration .
“Cochrane wishes to state unequivocally that the views Professor Gøtzsche has expressed on the benefits and harms of psychiatric drugs are not those of the organization. As primarily a research organization Cochrane does not make clinical recommendations and we have not done so on this issue.”
Statement from Cochrane
How many times has the Cochrane Collaboration had to distance itself from the views of its Board Members?
How many times has the Cochrane Collaboration had to distance itself from the views and work of Peter Gøtzsche and the Nordic Cochrane Collaboration?
More on Peter Gøtzsche
- Trish Greenhalgh: The Cochrane Collaboration—what crisis?
- Boilover: The Cochrane HPV Vaccine Fire Isn’t Really About the Evidence – but it’s Critical to Science
- Turmoil erupts over expulsion of member from leading evidence-based medicine group
- Statin Critic Accused Of Image Manipulation In Earlier Research
- Controversial Australian science journalist admits to duplication in her PhD thesis
- Demasi cleared, but images in science continue to attract intense scrutiny
- The HPV Vaccine: A Critique of a Critique of a Meta-Analysis
- Gøtzsche’s quixotic antiscreening campaign: nonscientific and contrary to Cochrane principles
- Cochrane distances itself from controversial views on psychiatric drugs
- Cochrane’s Editor in Chief responds to BMJ EBM article criticizing HPV review
- Cochrane’s Editor in Chief responds to a BMJ Evidence – Based Medicine article criticizing the Cochrane Review of HPV vaccines
- Cochrane editors hit back at criticisms of HPV vaccine review
- The HPV Vaccine: A Critique of a Critique of a Meta-Analysis
- EMA response to Nordic Cochrane letter on HPV vaccines – maladministration
- EMA response to Nordic Cochrane letter on HPV vaccines – conflicts of interest
- Statement from Cochrane
- Cochrane distances itself from controversial views on psychiatric drugs