Chiropractors sue Simon Singh – prefer legal action to evidence

Via Holfordwatch and the Quackometer I have learnt that the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) are attempting to sue Simon Singh for libel due to allegations contained in an article he wrote “Beware the Spinal Trap”.  This follows attempts by chiropactors in New Zealand to sue David Colquhoun after he criticised their lack of evidence in the New Zealand Medical Journal.

BCA member Dr (quack doctor) Antoni Jakubowski has claimed that:

It wasn’t a decision taken lightly, I know that a lot of thought went into this. It’s a terrible shame he made those comments and he has been given a full opportunity to take them back. However, he hasn’t.

According to the Quackometer the claims that Mr Jakubowski objects to are in the following excerpts from the original article that has now been taken down from the Guardian’s website

You might think that modern chiropractors restrict themselves to treating back problems, but in fact they still possess some quite wacky ideas. The fundamentalists argue that they can cure anything. And even the more moderate chiropractors have ideas above their station. The British Chiropractic Association claims that their members can help treat children with colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged crying, even though there is not a jot of evidence. This organisation is the respectable face of the chiropractic profession and yet it happily promotes bogus treatments.
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But what about chiropractic in the context of treating back problems? Manipulating the spine can cure some problems, but results are mixed. To be fair, conventional approaches, such as physiotherapy, also struggle to treat back problems with any consistency. Nevertheless, conventional therapy is still preferable because of the serious dangers associated with chiropractic

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I will leave you with one message for Chiropractic Awareness Week – if spinal manipulation were a drug with such serious adverse effects and so little demonstrable benefit, then it would almost certainly have been taken off the market.

These claims are expounded on in Dr Singh’s and Professor Ernst’s book ‘Trick or Treatment‘ that devotes a whole chapter to chiropractic therapy.  The discussion and conclusions in this chapter are evidence based, something which does not bode well for the BCAs legal action

The decision to conduct arguments under the cloak of libel threats and silence evidence based arguments using legal muscle is a damning indictment of quack therapies.  We have seen time and time again how unscrupulous quacks, when presented with compelling evidence that their therapies are baseless and actions dangerous, resort to legal threats to silence criticism.  This is contemptible.  Science and medicine rely on evidence to ensure that patients receive treatment that is both effective and has the risk minimised.  The willingness of quacks to prevent patients from getting this information betrays a contempt for the best interests of their customers and suggests that reputation and financial reward are more important to them than the welfare of the public.

I hope that this action proves ruinous for the BCA and forces quacks to come to terms with evidence based debate.