Published 9 July 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b2782
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b2782

Observations

Chiropractors: clarifying the issues

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

It is quite remarkable that scientists should expect themselves to become exempted from the laws of the land for publishing defamatory comments, be they about an individual or an organisation. Having mustered an army of supporters, including Evan Harris,¹ Simon Singh has redefined the battle as one of free speech and the stifling of scientific debate.² It is nothing of the sort.

The British Chiropractic Association (BCA) neither wished nor intended this matter to end up in the courtroom. When Dr Singh went on the offensive against the BCA and spoke of it promoting bogus treatments that had "not a jot" of evidence to support them,³ it was entirely understandable that the BCA should seek to have what were untrue and defamatory comments withdrawn in order to protect its reputation. It sought from Dr Singh a retraction of the allegations along with a public apology. Scientific debate could then have . . . [Full text of this article]

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• Bonneux, L. (2009). The Singh libel case and 'alternative medicine'. Eur J Public Health 0: ckp175v1-ckp175 [Full text]  
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