The Expert and Decorum
By
F.
It is not clear why the attorneys for the Department
of Justice waited so long to call Stephen A. Bustin PhD as an expert witness in Cedillo v. Secretary of HHS and why
his reports were filed so late.
It was certainly well known that Michelle Cedillo had evidence
of measles virus genomic RNA in the gut and that her PCR test had been
performed at Dr. John O’Leary’s laboratory.
It was also well known that Dr. Bustin had spent an
enormous amount of time at a significant cost to the MMR vaccine makers attempting
to discredit Dr. O’Leary’s results.
At the trial, Dr. Bustin was repeatedly seen talking
with a British journalist whose sole purpose in life has been to attack and
discredit Dr. Andrew J. Wakefield, the British physician who first suggested
the need to research the role of MMR vaccination in regressive autism
A recent interview by Dr. Bustin may have been timed
to influence upcoming GMC hearings in
What effect it will have on the
***
According to his web site [http://www.sabustin.org/],
Stephen A Bustin PhD is Professor of Molecular Science, Institute of Cell and Molecular
Science Barts and the London, University of London and Visiting Professor
of Molecular Biology School of Health and Social Sciences, Middlesex University.
The web site features a portrait of a smiling Dr. Bustin wearing a gold and red academic gown. Below the portrait and under “Latest News” is a link to “Expert witness evidence at MMR vaccine trial Washington, DC, 20th June 2007"
Just under Dr. Bustin’s address and telephone number is the statement “I am grateful to Quantace for sponsorship of this web site” and a white rectangle with the name Quantace and a leaning halo. [www.quantace.com]
On the evening of
The transcript of the June 20 session (Day
8) became available on line on June 22.
The web site was re-updated on
***
It may be advisable at this point to
access [ftp://autism.uscfc.uscourts.gov/autism/transcripts/day08.pdf] and go to
the Afternoon Session starting on page 1930 for Dr. Bustin’s testimony.
The first three pages are worth reading
as they are relevant to this report.
The ruling on the Bustin testimony that
Special Master Hastings mentioned at the top of page 1932 (Order 61107, filed
It clearly states: “For the purposes of
the Omnibus Autism Proceedings (“OAP”) and for the reasons indicated in the
ruling issued on June 8, 2007, in Cedillo v. Sec’y of HHS, the
undersigned special masters will defer deciding whether we will rely on the
reports of Dr. Bustin (Respondent’s Exhibits WW and XX) as evidence in the OAP.
However the parties may question Dr. Bustin or any other expert witness
concerning the contents of these two reports at the proceedings commencing on
The last paragraph on page 1932 contains
the following statement by Special Master Hastings on lines 23-24 “I will
decide later on whether to give those reports any weight…”
In her cross-examination of Dr. Bustin,
plaintiff’s attorney Sylvia Chin-Caplan inquired about his web site (p. 2047)
and its sponsor, Quantace.
She then asked Dr. Bustin about his work
relative to the now defunct United Kingdom MMR litigation “I think you
indicated that you spent roughly 1,500 hours at 150 pounds sterling” and he
answered “Yes, that is correct” (p. 2050).
When further questioned, Dr. Bustin stated that he received his checks
from the solicitors but that the funds actually came from Merck, Aventis and
GSK. (p. 2053)
Ms. Chin-Caplan went on to ask the witness
about what he was being paid to come and testify in the U.S. and he answered
“It’s $250 an hour while I am here and $125 an hour while I’m traveling and
nothing while I’m sleeping I think. And also my airfare and hotel are being
paid for. (p. 2053)
In a curious exchange with plaintiff’s
attorney, Dr. Bustin stated that his salary was 60,000 pounds, roughly $120,000
(p. 2052). If this is per annum, and if Dr. Bustin works 40 hour weeks, then it
appears that at his full time job, he is making less than 29 pounds sterling an
hour.
At the
***
On
[http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/3562/]
‘The MMR-autism theory? There’s
nothing in it’
Michael Fitzpatrick talks to Stephen
Bustin, whose devastating testimony in
a US court demolished the last shred of evidence against vaccines.
According to Dr. Fitzpatrick “Testimony in a US court last
week by London-based molecular biologist Stephen Bustin comprehensively exposed
the unreliability of O’Leary’s findings, based on an investigation of his
laboratory carried out in early 2004. ‘It has been incredibly frustrating’,
Professor Bustin told me on his return from the
techniques, which have failed to replicate O’Leary’s results, while other
researchers have disputed the existence of ‘autistic enterocolitis’ as a
distinctive disease entity (see footnotes 1-3). All these results are reassuring
to parents of autistic children, whose anxieties have been needlessly provoked
by the
Dr. Fitzpatrick went on to the real purpose of his article
and its interesting timing just before the upcoming GMC hearings in London
“…the testimony of Bustin and other expert witnesses was yet another blow
for the anti-vaccine campaigners as Andrew Wakefield returns to London next
week from his new base in a private clinic in Texas to face charges of professional
misconduct at the General Medical Council.”
A little later, Dr. Fitzpatrick stated “Bustin’s report on
the O’Leary lab was key to the collapse of the anti-MMR litigation in the
***
There will be evidently procedural and
legal questions about all this.
The Bustin statement “For
three years we have been unable [for legal reasons] to reveal our findings. Now
I want to get the message out about the O’Leary/Wakefield research: there’s
nothing in it” will certainly be taken very seriously by Special Masters
According to Special Master Hastings and as clearly stated
above, a decision has not yet been made to admit or not admit the Bustin reports
as evidence in the Court proceedings. For Dr. Bustin to discuss them with a
medical journalist as a fait accompli in such a personally-biased statement is at
least presumptuous if not totally out of order. If the expert witness thought that
he was forcing the hands of the
This indiscretion should also be a concern to the General
Medical Council.
There is obviously an important question that needs to be asked:
Why is it suddenly acceptable for Dr. Bustin to reveal his “findings” in
In addition, there are two questions that Attorneys Matanoski and Babcock of
the United States Department of Justice need to answer:
It was evident from Mr. Matanoski’s remarks
on Day 6 of the trial that he is not a fan of Dr. Wakefield. (p. 1224-1228).
[ftp://autism.uscfc.uscourts.gov/autism/transcripts/day06.pdf]
But even he should be very concerned
about the Spiked Online article.
We sincerely hope that Special Masters
F.
July 12, 2007
Read more about the autism case in America by clicking here
Please reproduce
PDF here
http://www.uscfc.uscourts.gov/OSM/Autism/Order61107.pdf
Thanks