From: mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin Hulsey)
Subject: Re: 60 min. Cat Shooting
Followup-To: talk.politics.animals
Organization: Dept. Foods & Nutrition, Univ. of GA
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 13:48:36 GMT

In article <1993Jan27.180058.24592@clpd.kodak.com>,
black@che.serum.kodak.com (Robert Black (x37236)) wrote:

[...]
>
>Yesterday I posted a copy of Dr Barnard's letter to Mike Wallace. 
>Here's a copy of his letter to the Executive Producer of 60 Minutes.  It
>may answer additional questions.  Those expecting followups from me will
>have to be patient, as I'm extremely busy.  Also I can't read Dr
>Barnard's mind.  For more detail, those interested parties might try
>calling the number indicated. 

I certainly appreciate your input on this issue Bob.  In two days, you have
provided more useful information than Russell did in months.

>[...]
>
>   1. Mr. Wallace devoted considerable time to making a false
>case that, because the animals were anesthetized when shot, there
>was no possibility of pain. The facts are as follows: Each of
>700 cats was anesthetized long enough to be shot through the
>head.  The anesthesia was then turned off, and no pain-killers of
>any kind were given to survivors in virtually all cases.  (Ap-
>proximately 33 percent of the cats survived for periods ranging
>from 24 hours to several years after wounding.)  The General
>Accounting Office reported that LSU's veterinarian "told us the
>animals from the brain-wound project experienced pain." Pene-
>trating head injuries can be excruciatingly painful.  Although
>the brain tissue does not have nerve endings, its covering tissue
>membranes, the skull, and the scalp are all sensitive to pain,
>and brain swelling can also cause severe pain.

Carey's protocols were reviewed and approved by eight sets of scientists:

1) the IACUC reviewing his protocols
2) the reviewers of his grant proposal
3-8) the editors and reviewers of the six peer-reviewed journals where he
published his results.

Barnard devotes considerable effort to suggest that Carey's protocol was
inconsistent with established veterinary practice.  The following abstract
suggests that administration of anaesthetic in the post-injury period, when
intracranial pressure are apnea are critical considerations, can seriously
worsen matters:

AU Wilson-D-V.
IN Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences, Michigan State
   University College of Veterinary Medicine, East Lansing.
TI Anesthesia for patients with head trauma.
SO Vet-Clin-North-Am-Small-Anim-Pract.  1992 Mar.  22(2).  P 486-91.
AB Patients undergoing anesthesia soon after head trauma are at great
   risk for further neural damage during the anesthetic, especially if
   the head injury is severe or the anesthetic technique is suboptimal.
   Secondary complications of the anesthetic that are often lethal
   include hypoventilation, increases in ICP, airway obstruction, and
   brain-stem herniation.  Anesthetic management of patients with head
   injury must include intravenous induction with barbiturates or
   narcotics, smooth endotracheal intubation, controlled ventilation
   with oxygen, and minimal amounts of inhalational agents.  It is
   important to position the patient so that jugular veins are not
   occluded, in about 10 degrees head up position, and to avoid inducing
   patient coughing and straining.  Recovery from anesthesia should be
   quiet and rapid, with the maintenance of a clear airway and the use
   of as little depressant medication post-operatively as possible.
   Oxygen should be provided.  Author-abstract.

IMO, the issue of the appropriateness of Carey's anesthetic protocol
remains open.  Further details, such as Carey's justification for his
protocol, are needed.

Clearly, better evidence than the heresay of those who thought they heard
screams is needed.

>[...]

>
>   2. The program was grossly unbalanced.

At PCRM press conferences, how much attention is devoted to the opposing
viewpoint?  Answer: zero.

>Below is the actual
>air time given to interviewed doctors:
>
>  Supportive of Experiments        Critical of Experiments
>Dr. Carey:               1:38      Dr. Barnard:  0:49
>Dr. Carey and his Wife:  0:56
>Dr. Jane:                1:16
>Dr. Traystman:           0:19
>Dr. Schwarz:             1:07

Barnard's figures indicate that he received 49 of 365 seconds or 13.4% of
the air time.  Considering that he and his organization represents ~0.4% of
American physicians, I would say that his viewpoint got 13.4/0.4 or 33.5
times more attention than it deserved.

>[...]
>
>   This discovery was not Dr. Carey's. Rather, researcher
>Victor Horsley published the same findings in Nature on May 31,
>1894, nearly a century ago.

Yes, clearly, Carey was at fault for not being aware of these 19th century
results.  Contrary to Barnard's suggestion, the fact that the Horsley
findings were published "nearly a century ago" makes Carey's oversight more
likely, rather than less likely.  Have you ever tried searching 19th
century scientific literature?  It's a bitch.

>Carey knew of Horsley's work, but took the credit for himself.

This charge, as well as the charge of "scientific fraud" that Barnard made
in his previous letter is very serious, and should not be made frivolously.

I will contact Carey, and determine what he makes of these charges.

>   Wallace not only did not confront Carey about his false
>claims of the past, but allowed him to make the new and grandiose
>claim that he was on the brink of "showing that this drug would
>really work when our research funding was shut off." This is
>nonsense.

How does Barnard know this?

>In fact, Carey was criticized for failing to test
>drugs he was supposed to have used during the first contract
>period.

Which has no bearing on activities during the second funding period.  If
performance was so poor during the first funding period, as Barnard
suggests, how did Carey successfully secure funding for a second period?

>Although he did finally use some drugs during the second
>contract, the idea of an "imminent breakthrough" is a fiction.

How does Barnard know this?  How does anybody but Carey and coworkers know
this?

>   Also omitted from the broadcast was the fact that the GAO
>found some of Carey's reported data to be physically impossible

Again, using that top-secret GAO "possibility detector."

>and that much of his data was left out when he published his
>findings, in violation of standards of research integrity.

Another serious charge that remains unproven.

>Carey's procedures were careless in many respects

Barnard's "expert" opinion.

>and deviated from the protocol which the Army had approved.

So what?  The DOD didn't care.  They still want to continue the research.

>   The 6O Minutes staff knew of these problems, but instead
>portrayed Carey as a leading-edge researcher.

And Barnard has provided no evidence to the contrary.

>    Viewers might wonder why experiments which were stopped in
>1989 were covered on 60 Minutes in 1993.

Viewers might also wonder why the experiments were stopped at all.

>The answer seems to be
>that new initiatives by the AMA and other organizations promoting
>animal experimentation, including encouraging member doctors to
>lobby their patients on this issue, coincided in time with the
>beginning of 6O Minutes' interest in this story.

Translation:  The media are finally paying more attention to mainstream
medical opinion, and giving PCRM the attention it deserves, i.e., zero.  

>Dr. Schwarz,
>the AMA's spokesperson on this issue was given substantial air
>time during the segment, and the AMA's skewed version of the LSU
>episode was used by 60 Minutes virtually point-for-point.

See above.

>    4. Wallace insulted researchers and head injury victims by
>suggesting that their only hope is in experiments like Carey's.

Barnard routinely insults researchers and human victims of disease by
falsely suggesting that clinical research is the only useful paradigm. 

>The world of neurosurgical research does not genuflect to Carey's
>sloppy work.

It is merely Barnard's opinion that the work is "sloppy."  Funding agencies
and peer-reviewed journals where Carey published his work think otherwise.

>Modern imaging techniques, such as magnetic reso-
>nance imaging, positron emission tomography and other methods
>have kept clinical study of head injury patients preeminent over
>any other method.

Perhaps this is why a majority of such victims still die.

>    It is unfortunate to find blatant dishonesty in journalists
>who command such a large measure of public trust.

This is the way I felt about the PCRM press conference regarding tentative
associations between milk consumption and diabetes as fact.

>[...]

>Re: the claim that it's unreasonable to presume that Dr Carey could have
>known about the 1894 work of Horsley:

I never made such a claim, and I didn't see such a claim by anyone else. 
He obviously *could* have known, but didn't.  See above.

>(1) Apparently he did know, and...

How do you know?  Did Carey cite the 1894 work in his proposal or
publications?

If a scientist is aware of earlier work that supports his/her findings,
he/she is always anxious to cite it.

The often-repeated criticisms of the animal "rights" movement regarding the
duplicity of animal research are laughable.  It is and always has been
important for scientific results to be independently validated.  Otherwise,
spurious results might be accepted as fact.  The recent fiasco regarding
"cold fusion"  is a prime example.

>(2) even if he didn't, the fact is that Dr Barnard, who has been
>denigrated in this forum as not being knowledgeable enough to evaluate
>the work of others, knew.  Perhaps he should have been consulted?

Medline indicates that Barnard has published two peer-reviewed papers since
1986.  In this same period, Carey has published twelve.  This includes six
from the project in question.

The notion that Carey's project has no potential benefits for humans is
false.  The notion that Barnard is qualified to question the merits of any
research outside the field of clinical psychiatry is also false.

Do you suggest that awareness of a single 19th century publication renders
Barnard "knowledgeable" enough to evaluate Carey's research?

>Perhaps he does know more than his opponents give him credit for?

Perhaps not.

--
mhulsey@hestia.fcs.uga.edu (Martin G. Hulsey)
Neuroscience, NRA-ILA, SSIB, NAASO, IASO
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals