Lucija Tomljenovic

A list of retracted anti-vaccine papers – bad science and bad research

by Michael Simpson
2021-09-01
Andrew Wakefield, Christopher Shaw, Retraction, Vaccines

Retracted anti-vaccine papers are a staple of my articles published here. Usually, they try to create some fake link between vaccines and autism, but these papers try to say anything that casts vaccines in a bad light.

As we know, real science has established that there is no link between vaccines and autism. Anti-vaccine papers generally try to show this link without epidemiological or clinical studies – they just try to make some specious biologically implausible claims trying to link something about vaccines to autism.

Much of the anti-vaccine research is so bad, so poorly designed, that it’s relegated to low-quality, predatory journals which have laughably poor peer-review systems. Even in those locations, we can find the occasional retracted anti-vaccine papers, because they are often so bad that even these predatory publishers are embarrassed.

So, I present to you, the loyal reader, a list of retracted anti-vaccine papers (and I use that term very carefully). It’s not a comprehensive list, it’s just what I’ve seen over the past few years. If you know of a retracted paper that I missed, leave a citation in the comments.

Aluminum in vaccines is not linked to autism – James Lyons-Weiler is wrong again

by Michael Simpson
2021-08-18
2 Comments
Autism, Christopher Shaw, James Lyons-Weiler, Vaccines

Here we go again. Anti-vaccine pseudoscientist, James Lyons-Weiler, publishes a paper that says something about aluminum about vaccines, and the anti-vaccine crowd genuflects in his general direction. The anti-vaccine side has nearly zero evidence supporting their claims, so they have to cling to anything they can get.

The anti-vaccine religion is littered with these false authorities that have few credentials or experience in vaccines, yet, because of a “Ph.D.” after their name, the anti-vaxxers make it appear they speak for millions of scientists. There’s Tetyana Obukhanych, a former immunologist who has published no peer-reviewed articles about vaccines, who has denied all of her scientific education and training, and who makes egregious and simplistic mistakes about vaccines in all of her proclamations.

Christopher Shaw and Lucija Tomljenovic are multiple-retracted “researchers” who shill for the anti-vaccine religion by publishing weak and easily critiqued research that doesn’t even stand up to the tiniest of criticism. We’ve often speculated as to why the University of British Columbia, where they do their “research,” hasn’t ended their relationship.

Look, I’m not impressed by credentials and degrees. I don’t care if someone is a janitor or a Ph.D. in immunology at Harvard University. If you deny established scientific consensus based on your whims, cherry picking evidence, or rhetoric, you have nothing. You bring nothing to a scientific discussion. If you want to overturn the scientific consensus on vaccines then you better be an expert in the area of vaccines, and you better have a broad, robust body of evidence that shows problems with the scientific consensus.

Now, it’s time to look at this new false authority in the land of vaccines, James Lyons-Weiler and his ideas about aluminum and autism. Is he another false authority and pseudoscientist? Or does his new paper give us something new to examine about vaccines? Yes. No.

List of anti-vaccine physicians – beware of false information

Recently, the vaccine deniers have pushed a list of anti-vaccine doctors, which gets copy-pasted from one website to another, and are similar to those lists of “scientists” who deny Darwinian evolution or climate change. But is this really made up of respected physicians and researchers? Does it really contain doctors who are experts or authorities on vaccines?

Well, thanks to Zared Schwartz, a senior at the University of Florida studying microbiology, cell science, and neurobehavioral, who took it upon himself to look up each of these individuals and see if they’ve got anything to offer in the discussions about vaccines. Guess what? It doesn’t appear so.

So if you run across this list of anti-vaccine doctors and researchers, wondering if any of them speak from authority, just check them out on this list.

HPV vaccine unrelated to primary ovarian insufficiency – debunking anti-vaccine myth

The HPV vaccine causes infertility through primary ovarian insufficiency (POI) – a belief unsupported by evidence. And the claim appears to be based on anti-vaccine ideology instead of real science.

Yes, I know, this story seems to repeat itself, but stay tuned, this is a good one. So let’s examine this myth from a scientific aspect and show how the HPV vaccine is actually unrelated to POI.

HPV vaccine myths and tropes – all the debunkings and refutations

by Michael Simpson
2020-10-13
Christopher Shaw, HPV vaccine, Robert F Kennedy Jr, Vaccines

Recently, I wrote about the overwhelming evidence regarding Gardasil’s safety and effectiveness. Unfortunately, that will never stop the HPV vaccine myths from becoming a thing.

I’ve ripped through the nearly 200 articles on the HPV vaccine I have written to put together some of the best debunkings and refutations of HPV vaccine myths and tropes pushed by our anti-vaccine friends.

So here we go. Read More »HPV vaccine myths and tropes – all the debunkings and refutations

Vaccine adjuvants – another misguided FOIA request from ICAN

This article about an FOIA request for information about vaccine adjuvants was written by Dorit Rubinstein Reiss, Professor of Law at the University of California Hastings College of the Law (San Francisco, CA), who is a frequent contributor to this and many other blogs, providing in-depth, and intellectually stimulating, articles about vaccines, medical issues, social policy, and the law.

Professor Reiss writes extensively in law journals about the social and legal policies of vaccination. Additionally, Reiss is also a member of the Parent Advisory Board of Voices for Vaccines, a parent-led organization that supports and advocates for on-time vaccination and the reduction of vaccine-preventable disease.

In August 2020, the anti-vaccine organization, the Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN), posted on their site a letter from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) dated July 19, 2019, under the (misleading) title that “NIH Concedes It Has No Studies Assessing The Safety of Injecting Aluminum Adjuvants.”

As in the past, ICAN’s use of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request result is highly misleading, in at least three ways. First, FOIA is not a mechanism for science query, only a way to get existing administrative records, and this is a misuse of FOIA. Second, there are abundant scientific studies on the safety of aluminum vaccine adjuvants, but this request was not a way to get them. And third, even if there were no studies on the safety of aluminum adjuvants in vaccines, vaccines are tested as a whole, and the safety data on them cover all their ingredients.Read More »Vaccine adjuvants – another misguided FOIA request from ICAN

Tetanus vaccine did not cause mass sterilization in Kenya – anti-vax lies

And here comes another anti-vaccine lie – oft-retracted pseudoscientists are pushing a claim that the tetanus vaccine was used for mass sterilization in Kenya. Yes, you read that right.

This false claim about the tetanus vaccine comes from an anti-vaccine pseudoscience paper foisted onto the world by Christopher Shaw and Lucija Tomljenovic. These two University of British Columbia (UBC) researchers in the Department of Ophthalmology (you know, the study of eyes) have no background or training in any area vaccine research, including immunology, epidemiology, microbiology, virology or anything else remotely related to vaccine science.

Along with many others, these two represent the epitome of low-quality anti-vaccine “research” – they are truly false authorities.

Yet, every time these anti-vaccine shills publish anti-vaccine pseudoscience articles in low ranked journals, the anti-vaccine religion jump all over it and try to use those articles as “science” to dismiss the scientific fact of vaccine safety and effectiveness.

Shaw and Tomljenovic have a long record of retracted articles, which were generally published in low impact factor, predatory “pay-to-play” journals, and pushing anti-vaccine pseudoscience that has been hammered by respected scientific organizations like the World Health Organization (WHO).

Retracted anti-vaccine papers – ultimate list of pseudoscience and bias

by Michael Simpson
2020-01-16
Andrew Wakefield, Christopher Shaw, Retraction, Vaccines

Much of the anti-vaccine research is so bad, so poorly designed, that it’s relegated to low quality, predatory journals which have laughably poor peer-review systems. Even then, we can find the occasional retracted anti-vaccine papers, because they are often so bad that even these predatory publishers are embarrassed.

Tetyana Obukhanych – another anti-vaccine appeal to false authority

The old Skeptical Raptor took a bit of a break to recharge their batteries to tackle all of the pseudoscience that will be coming out in 2020. In lieu of new content, I will be republishing the top 10 most read articles on this blog during 2019. Here’s number 1 – the queen of the false authority of the anti-vaxxers – Tetyana Obukhanych.

One of their favorite pseudoscientists of the anti-vaccine religion is Tetyana Obukhanych, someone who appears to have great credentials. Unfortunately, once you dig below the surface of her claims, there is no credible evidence in support.

One of the most irritating problems I have with the anti-vaccine movement is their over-reliance on false authorities – they overrate publications (often in worthless predatory journals) or commentary from someone who appears to have all of the credentials to be a part of the discussion on vaccines, but really isn’t close to being a real vaccine scientist.

Nevertheless, credentials don’t matter – an “authority” on vaccines must follow the evidence that vaccines are safe and effective unless those “authorities” can provide robust, peer-reviewed, published evidence that vaccines aren’t. Someone like Tetyana Obukhanych almost never does.

For example, Christopher Shaw and Lucija Tomljenovic, two researchers in the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of British Columbia, have, for all intents and purposes, sterling credentials in medicine and science. However, they publish nonsense research (usually filled with the weakest of epidemiology trying to show a population-level correlation between vaccines and adverse events) in low ranked scientific journals.

Following in the footsteps of Shaw, Tomljenovic, James Lyons-Weiler, and Christopher Exley, let’s take a look at the background and education of the anti-vaccine hero, Tetyana Obukhanych.Read More »Tetyana Obukhanych – another anti-vaccine appeal to false authority

Gardasil safety facts – debunking myths about the HPV vaccine

by Michael Simpson
2019-10-23
Cancer, Christopher Shaw, HPV vaccine, Vaccines

I’ve written nearly a metric tonne of articles about Gardasil safety facts over the past eight years. Most of my posts covered peer-reviewed studies and meta-reviews that support the overall HPV vaccine safety and effectiveness profiles. It is settled science.

There are so many myths, memes, and tropes about HPV vaccine safety, all of them based on anecdotes, false claims, and stories – all of them lack the support of robust scientific evidence.

For example, there have been several recent stories about the claimed dangers of the HPV vaccine, like Colton Berrett’s tragic suicide after contracting transverse myelitis. The parents blamed Gardasil for Colton’s disease, despite the fact that there is simply no evidence of such a link. Of all of the vaccines on the market, the anti-vaccine world appears to reserve their most unscientific hatred for Gardasil.

There is one common point about my boatload of articles about Gardasil safety facts – they are backed by literally dozens of powerful, unbiased, statistically significant, repeated clinical and epidemiological studies.