A couple of months ago I sent this e-mail (I have slightly edited and shortened it) to the editors of Medialens, a wonderful internet site published by five disillusioned British journalists. (David Miller, David Edwards, Richard Keeble, Mark Curtis and David Cromwell). Whilst a good deal of the site relates to the Iraq war, and to matters pertaining to the (unholy) "War on Terror", articles and links do appear about other important matters, such as Hurricane Katrina and global warming. It was one such article, or blog, about the melting of the Siberian tundra over an area bigger than France and Germany combined, and ending with the thought "is the world truly insane?" that caused me to write to them. They were kind enough to publish it on their site in the message pages.




Hello, 

I am an experienced GP with about thirty-five years continuously in practice. The other day a lady, Mrs A,  came to see me at my surgery. She came with her thirty-two year old son, who had been concerned about his mother's health. She is fifty-seven years old, and this is what she told me:

"Doctor Monro, can you help me, it's like this.......", and she described these symptoms:



I don't suppose you are a doctor, but I would be reasonably confident, that as an intelligent layman, you would have a pretty good idea what is the matter with this patient.

If I add that her mother and grandfather were diabetic, you would have no doubt at all.  

Now see here. There is no proof that this lady has diabetes, every single symptom could be caused by something else, eg the headache could be tension, or feeling sickly could be an ulcer, or her urinary symptoms might be an infection, the rash eczema, the weight loss thyrotoxicosis,  etc etc. 

But if this woman was your sister, or relative or friend and the doctor were to say.....

"Well, Mrs A, there's no proof you have anything seriously wrong, I think you should go home, take some aspirin for your headaches, this antibiotic for your urinary symptoms, and this tonic for your weight loss"

......you would be horrified, and rightly, I would be no better than a quack and I would be up before the GMC quicker than a knee-jerk. Because you would know, and I would confirm, that there is nothing else that this lady could have than diabetes. I would be completely and utterly negligent to assume anything else. 

The fact that I can confirm the diagnosis of diabetes with a one minute finger-prick blood test has no direct connection with the certainty of the diagnosis of this lady on symptoms and signs alone. We have an overwhelming concatenation of symptoms and signs, and a disease process, lack of insulin and increasing blood sugar, that is easy to comprehend, in fact could be understood by a ten year old, and which fits in exactly with all the symptoms and signs elicited. I could treat this lady even if I didn't have the "proof", because patients don't need "proof" before you take action - they need a diagnosis, that's all. 

NOW take a rather bigger patient and global warming.

Here are some of the symptoms


And some signs:

 

Now see here, there is no "proof" that the world is warming, every single "symptom" described could be caused by something else, local weather changes, sun cycles, heat islands, El Nino, volcanic activity etc etc. But, again, we have an overwhelming concatenation of symptoms and signs, and a "disease" process, burning of fossil fuels and increasing carbon dioxide causing increasing global warming, that is easy to comprehend, in fact could be understood by a ten year old, and which fits in exactly with all the symptoms and signs elicited. There is literally nothing else that could be the matter with the world other than anthropogenic global warming. It is impossible to conceive of any other more likely process or processes. 

What we don't have is the equivalent of  the one minute blood test. But just as the diabetic does not need this test to demonstrate the almost complete certainty of her diagnosis, neither does the world need such a test to demonstrate the almost complete certainty of global warming, nor do we need such a test to initiate the urgent treatment that the "patient" so urgently needs. 

Global warming deniers are no better than the quacks who might misdiagnose my patient, and the sooner we tell these people that this is what they are, the better. Just like quacks, not only do they get the diagnosis wrong, they get the treatment wrong, and they kill the patient. Why should we stand idly aside while these idiots kill the world?

Or look at it this way. The son, apparently so concerned about his mother, doesn't believe that there is such a condition as diabetes. I can't tell you why he doesn't - he seems to have this idée fixe - some deep rooted aversion to accepting this diagnosis. He says to me, "Dr Monro, how do you know my mother has diabetes? I have read that this is a very debatable diagnosis, and almost certainly nothing to do with rising sugar levels. I am sure there is nothing very wrong with my mother, you've said it yourself, each of her symptoms could be something else. Dr Monro, I think you are being highly alarmist, and I am going to take my mother to another doctor for second opinion." . There didn't seem much I could do about this, he was determined. I later heard that he did get a second opinion, and a third, and in fact he went to see a thousand different doctors, who all told him the same thing, that his mother had diabetes. It was only when he went to get the thousand and first opinion did he at last find someone who took him seriously and agreed that there was nothing wrong with his mother other than what a few aspirin would fix. Of course, this thousand and first practitioner was no longer a practicising doctor, he was a homeopathist, but he seemed very nice and knowledgable, and was more than ready to discredit the rising blood sugar theory of diabetes. In fact he had written a book, debunking the consensus on this and many other diseases, called The Sceptical Physician. It was after this poor woman had attended the homeopathist that she collapsed and I hear she is now in intensive care, fighting for her life.

Literally thousands of climate scientists are ringing ever more vigourously the alarm bells, while a few well publicised doubters, who almost without exception are not climate scientists, continue to sow confusion in the general public, to the glee of self-interested politicians and corporations, some of whom fund the doubters precisely to increase that confusion. There should be no confusion. When thousands of experts all agree on the diagnosis, we have to take them seriously, and when the consequences of inaction could well be fatal, we have to do so urgently; to deprecate this "consensus" as if it were some sort of vast conspiracy is an insult to the integrity of these scientists - researchers and scholars of the highest academic integrity- and who number among their rank many Nobel Prize winners.

While the doubters and the sceptics and the cynics hold such sway, it is given to us to keep fighting for the world, to show in any way we can - by science, by pursuasion, by reason, by ridicule - how misguided these people are and how immoral their lack of concern for the future is. They are no better than quacks, who would kill my patient through negligence, and they are no better than my patient's son, who has nearly killed his mother through pigheaded ignorance. This is no less than a war - for our children's sake we have to win, and very soon.

Yours sincerely,

Dr John K Monro

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