Saturday, March 01, 2008

Vic Wulsin:  In Her Own Words

Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati

What is the truth about Vic Wulsin’s involvement in human malariotherapy experiments, which have been compared to Nazi Germany?  If you are predisposed to believe Vic Wulsin, then now is the time to analyze her own words.  The following excerpts are taken from her report to the Heimlich Institute, aptly named “Immunotherapy and Beyond.”  Some of the writing in the report matches Wulsin’s claims about being a critic of the experiments.  Most, however, shows Wulsin writing a business proposal which suggests continued experiments—particularly telling since she now says the concept has no scientific validity.

1.  Wulsin’s own introduction on the report’s first page indicates that she was hired to do more than a “literature review”:

Please notice that she was hired to recommend “requisite next steps in developing” malariotherapy.  Additionally, she said she wanted to “identify the comparative advantage (“market niche”) of the Heimlich Institute.”  When Vic Wulsin said she wrote a “literature review,” she is only telling part of the story.  The report is also a business plan.

2.  In this next excerpt, Wulsin admits to analyzing raw human data from East African subjects:

When she learned about these human experiments, which had been widely condemned by the time she published this report, she did not report them to appropriate oversight agencies.  Insted, she analyzed data, spoke with people working on the experiments, and she even wanted to take site visits to China and East Africa.  This is one year after the Cincinnati Enquirer published a front page article blasting the China experiments as unethical.

3.  As Wulsin has stated, her report does state that evidence indicates malariotherapy will not cure AIDS.  But this statement cannot be taken out of the larger context of the report, and the other things Wulsin supports:

However, shortly after writing that, Wulsin claims that more investigation into East African results is warranted:

So, despite concluding that evidence shows malariotherapy to be ineffective, Wulsin called for more “verification and elaboration.”  Why would she want to do more work if she found the idea as unsound as she now claims?  What were her motives in calling for further investigations?

4.  Despite what she says, Wulsin wanted to continue engaging in malaria experiments.  In this next excerpt, she calls on subjecting the research protocols to ethical guidelines—but she has not explained why she failed to report the ethical problems with the experiments in the first place; further, if what she says now is true (that the idea has no merit), then why bother making such plans for the future?

Notice that she says “fishing expeditions” are “no longer warranted.”  She seems to suggest that they were previously acceptable—despite the fact that this work had already been condemned.  When she found it was ongoing, she participated instead of filing a complaint to the appropriate agency.

5.  In section X of her report, Wulsin suggests several ideas for continuing to work on malariotherapy.  Why would she do this, if what she says today is true?

Why would she rename the project if it is medically unsound and unethical?  Why would she verify and elaborate on East African data?  Why would she want to talk with other mining companies, if this idea is one she did not want to support in any way?

In a recent campaign press release, Team Wulsin stated the following:

This statement is partially true.  As the first excerpt provided above shows, she was not hired to do just a “literature review.”  And again, the “wrong” of which Wulsin has been accused is in not reporting these experiments to appropriate oversight agencies.  Instead, she analyzed raw human data and wrote a business plan.  Was she really fired from the Heimlich Institute?  Is there any proof that she was fired for writing this report, other than her own claims? 

As the still active complaint against Wulsin’s medical license shows, she has been accused of complicity in the experiments for failing to report them. 

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