I have no idea how this story managed to escape me, I must have my head deep in the sand - Simon Singh, the eminent scientist, is being sued for libel by the British Chiropractic Association.

The case is over a single paragraph in an article that Singh wrote for the Guardian (now removed from the Guardian site, but on-line here). Singh mentions in the third paragraph that the British Chiropractic Association claims its members can "help treat children with colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged crying", even though there is, says Simon, a lack of scienfic evidence. The libel claim argues that the wording Simon used implies that there is no evidence in existence. Singh's defence claims that what they are actually saying is that the BCA:

"is reckless and irresponsible in promoting chiropractic as a treatment for infants and young children with colic or sleeping and feeding problems or frequent ear infections or asthma or prolonged crying because... (a) there is reliable scientific evidence that this would be ineffective in respect of children with asthma, and/or (b) there is no/no reliable scientific evidence supporting the effectiveness of such treatment for each of those conditions/symptoms, and/or... [t]he Claimant promotes such treatments despite knowing that the state of the reliable scientific evidence is as set out at (a) above and that such treatments are to that extent bogus."

Which is absolutely brilliant. Please, PLEASE let me get called up for jury duty! A much more thorougher, and betterer, summary of both sides of the case has been put online by the fantastic Jack of Kent blog, which can be found here for the BCA and here for Simon Singh. I would strongly encourage you to read it, especially in case I've made a mistake!

There's a Facebook group to keep up to date with all the developments, and I urge you to join, or at least to take a look because there's plenty more reading material there. As it says on the front page, "an informed and responsible science writer should be able to write about genuine concerns on an important public health issue (the correct treatment for children) without the threat and expense of High Court libel claims. Even if he was wrong, it would surely be enough for the BCA to simply show their supporting evidence. But they are suing him instead." That's not how science should work, mum. And I should know - I read it on the internet!

As dreadful as this must be for the defence, it is quite thrilling to think about the possibility of the evidence regarding chiropractic being explained and analysed in court. Not that it's a substitute for actual scientific investigation, but anything that makes a practitioner of alternative or complimentary medicine analyse their practice in public and open up their profession to scrutiny is a positive thing indeed.