British press getting sued for exposing junk science

http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/cracking-the-spine-of-libel/

‘In Britain, libel laws are censoring the ability of journalists to write stories about bogus science. Simon Singh, a Ph.D. physicist and author of several best-selling popular-science books, is currently being sued by the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) for saying that there is no evidence for claims that visiting a chiropractor has health benefits. A year earlier, writer Ben Goldacre faced a libel suit for an article critical of Matthias Rath, who claimed that vitamin supplements can treat HIV and AIDS in place of conventional drugs like anti-retrovirals. In Britain, libel laws don’t have any presumption of innocence — any statement made is assumed to be false unless you prove it’s true. Journalists are running scared.’

Edit: Credit to slashdot.org for the summary, darn thing submitted before I was done. :stuck_out_tongue:


http://www.senseaboutscience.org.uk/images/sas-libel-2.png