Canadian physicians dismiss Wind Turbine Syndrome as “anecdotes”
Oct 21, 2010
Print ArticleGreen Cream of Medicine Weighs in on Wind Turbine Syndrome
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Attention all you knuckleheads in Ontario, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and elsewhere in Canada who fled your homes because of Wind Turbine Syndrome: You blew it!
The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE), a 4,000-member, nationwide group of clean green-scrubbed clinicians, has concluded your health problems are “anecdotal.” (Please overlook the fact of the non sequiturs in their “Fact,” below. They’re only docs, after all, not logicians.)
Yeah, you left your home—or you’re stuck in your acoustically toxic home and can’t sell the damn thing—for reasons that fail to rise above mere “anecdote.” By implication, you are an anecdote, your health problems are anecdote, and your “claimed” suffering is anecdote. (Anecdotes, by the way, are but a cat’s whisker removed from a joke. Remember that.)
In sum, you’re a dummy.
“There is no scientific data that proves these claims.” (Don’t you just love medical doctors? Spilling with knowledge. Compassion. Wisdom. Minds—minds, um, like a steel trap.)
Where does this leave Pierpont’s book, “Wind Turbine Syndrome”? According to this crowd, it ain’t—drum roll, please!—”science.” Johns Hopkins MD, Princeton PhD (Population Biology), National Merit Scholar and cum laude graduate Yale University in science—but her book ain’t science. It’s . . . fluff. Just stories. As in, “That’s a sort of interesting, mildly entertaining little story. Tee hee. Now, let’s get real. How would you like your green eggs & ham?”
All you poor saps who think you have Wind Turbine Syndrome: it’s been one big huge terrible mistake. You can go back home now. Or, if you’re already home, quit fakin’ it, for pete’s sake!
And, don’t forget to send CAPE a note of very deepest heartfelt thanks for puncturing this suppurating clinical hoax: webmaster@cape.ca.
Comment by Quixote on 10/21/2010 at 10:23 pm
And these “idiots” actually have the “nerve” to call themselves Professional Physicians?
I would suggest that a truly Professional Physician would be insulted by having one of these uninformed bias Doctors speak in the medical forum and call truly “ill people’s symptoms” just anecdotal.
Every one of these Doctors names should be published so that ordinary people can see “who not to go and see for Medical help!”
Comment by Brad Blake on 10/22/2010 at 12:23 am
This will some day be considered as archaic and ignorant as we now view the old cigarette ads that featured doctors promoting their favorite lung killers. It is sad that medical leaders, including Dr. Dora Mills, Maine’s Public Health Director, turn their backs on any study of WTS even with evidence documented by Dr. Nissenbaum in Mars Hill.
Comment by Rucio on 10/22/2010 at 8:24 am
“There [are] no scientific data that prove[] these claims.” No, not if you dismiss it as “anecdotal”.
Comment by C. Ian Keay, Attorney at Law on 10/22/2010 at 5:20 pm
To: The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment
From: C. Ian Keay, Attorney at Law, Peterborough, Ontario
Date: 10/22/10
Regarding: Your “Myth: Wind turbines are bad for your health”
From my perspective, the absence of science proving Wind Turbine Syndrome is nothing to get excited about. Why this became a topic worthy of announcement, I don’t fully understand. Until a study is done, of course the reports of adverse health effects due to close proximity to industrial wind turbines are anecdotal. Obviously! Or dare I say it: Duh!
The fact that your organization has issued this announcement is surprising. It would be similar to me issuing a press release from the middle of a busy intersection to announce: “Reports of a car accident are merely anecdotal. There is no car accident here!” as the tow trucks pulled away, the ambulances left the scene and the police officers kept their notepads firmly tucked away and scratched their heads looking for injured people & smashed up cars. Well, of course it would be anecdotal! The right people aren’t looking in the right places!
If people are reporting adverse health affects due to their proximity to wind turbines, doesn’t it follow that someone, say, a doctor … or better yet, an organization whose membership consists of many doctors … performs a study of the matter to establish/refute a causal relationship? My main concern here is not that the right people aren’t looking in the right places, but that the right people aren’t looking for anything at all.
My great concern is that with announcements/positions like this one that CAPE is propagating, the absence of evidence will lead to illogical conclusions: there is no problem. Which will lead to further illogical conclusions down the slippery slope: no point studying this since there is no evidence, other than mere anecdotes, that there is a problem; therefore no studies ever get done and all reports of Wind Turbine Syndrome remain “anecdotal” forever after.
Juxtaposing “anecdotal” evidence of Wind Turbine Syndrome with the problems facing coal is also unhelpful. No one is suggesting that coal is the answer. In fact, wind turbines are terrific (if not mostly ineffectual and certainly not the answer to our energy problems; I believe an optimistic forecast is that wind energy will amount to less than 2% of all energy on the grid, but the costs associated with production are staggering). To repeat, the problem is the wind turbines and the proximity of those turbines to residential areas. I live in Canada. Last time I checked, there is no shortage of land here.
So why install massive turbines near where people live when there is anecdotal evidence of adverse health effects due to close proximity that warrants further study?
I’d appreciate CAPE’s official response/position with respect to my enquiry.
Regards,
C. Ian Keay, B.A., LL.B.
347 Charlotte Street
P.O. Box 1718
Peterborough, ON K9J 7X6
Canada
Tel: 705.748.2241 ext. 257
Fax: 705.748.9125
e: ian@mcgillenlaw.com
Web: http://www.mcgillenkeay.com
Comment by Ron Tedwater on 11/13/2010 at 6:09 am
Really nice post, thank you.