Be careful what you read in Public Citizen's various health publications -- including their Worst Pills, Best Pills newsletter, their Questionable Doctors report, and other publications of the once-trustworthy champion of consumer health advocacy. Why? Because at least when it comes to thyroid disease, Public Citizen is utterly misinformed, relying on old, outdated information, or sometimes failing to reseach their opinions at all!

Back in May of 2003, the Ralph Nader-founded group Public Citizen's "Worst Pills, Best Pills" newsletter -- published by Public Citizen's Health Research Group -- issued a poorly researched condemnation of Armour Thyroid, claiming that the drug should be on the publication's "Do Not Prescribe" list due to a variety of perceived concerns.

Their article, which was heavy on accusations and short on any fact, was a poorly researched opinion piece masquerading as medical facts, and rehashed the same tired old arguments and mythology about Armour Thyroid. All of a sudden, Public Citizen was, for thyroid patients, becoming a public menace!

At the time, I really wondered what had gone wrong with the usually up-front consumer rights advocate, and sent them a letter and wrote an article, outlining my concerns with their article, and the potentially damaging impact it could have on hundreds of thousands of patients.

Surprisingly, for a public advocacy group, Public Citizen failed to respond to me. Some thyroid patients, however, did receive emails and letters responding to their concerns. Unfortunately, Public Citizen was now defending their position by spreading even more misinformation. Their latest? Insisting that Armour was a "non-prescription herbal supplement available over-the-counter!"

I wrote another lengthy letter to Sidney Wolfe, MD of Public Citizen/Worst Pills, Best Pills, regarding their misguided and error-filled condemnation of Armour Thyroid, and asking that information be corrected and that they attempt to repair some of the damage done.

A week later, I received a partial response from Sidney Wolfe, which basically reiterated the same information from the May 2003 article. The response failed, however, still failed to address the issue of all the misinformation Public Citizen was disseminating.

Weeks later, their volunteer who was answering emails and letters, Betty Blount, who is identified as being a nurse, sent out retraction emails that corrected only one of Public Citizen's many errors. Public Citizen had decided to finally admit that they were wrong, and that Armour Thyroid was and is in fact a prescription drug.

I wrote them again on September 25th, recapping the many inaccuracies in their original newsletter article, in Wolfe's letters, and in the materials sent out by Betty Blount.

To date, however, Public Citizen has still failed to respond to me in any way, or to a number of consumer and practitioner letters that have pointed out numerous errors in their condemnation of Armour Thyroid. I have very little confidence that they plan to respond in any meaningful way.

Public Citizen has apparently decided that no response is the best response -- after all, otherwise, they would have to explain the rationale, motivation, or behind-the-scenes politics and forces that are driving their hasty decision to condemn a drug being used for more than 100 years. They will have to provide scientific evidence to support their shoddy assertions. They will have to assemble actual experts to actually research the subject, instead of putting their own personal opinions in a piece, and stamping it science.

The key message for thyroid patients? Consider whether or not it's worth spending your money on any health information products put out by Public Citizen in the future. I certainly don't plan to purchase any more of their materials, because I now know how totally unreliable they can be.

And -- look closely and carefully at everything health and medically-oriented that is disseminated by Public Citizen, their Worst Pills, Best Pills newsletter, and their "Questionable Doctors" reports. Since they appear to be more interested in selling newsletters and getting their names in the news for filing petitions, rather than disseminating accurate, consumer-oriented information, it's critical that you protect yourself from their potential misinformation.

We know from their Armour article, their subsequent assertions that Armour is a non-prescription supplement, and their refusal to respond and correct major inaccuracies, that at least some of what they are writing and publicly defending is poorly-researched health information. They are also willing to make and defend decisions that rely on no research, or decades-old, out-of-date information. And when called on to explain the errors they are disseminating to the public and practitioners, the group hunkers down and ignores the questions, inquiries and concerns of the citizens they are supposedly so interested in representing.

This is not my idea of a fair approach from a group that, as they say at their website, "promotes research-based, system-wide changes in health care policy and provides oversight concerning drugs, medical devices, doctors and hospitals and occupational health." If this is Public Citizen's idea of oversight, let me say -- I don't need it! Do you?

Express Your Dissatisfaction with Public Citizen's Poorly-Researched Position on Armour Thyroid, and Their Non-Response to the Thyroid Community

If you want to express your concern and disappointment to Public Citizen, call Dr. Sidney Wolfe at 202-588-1000, or write:

Sidney Wolfe, MD
Public Citizen
Health Research Group
1600 20th St. NW
Washington, DC. 20009

Or email Sidney Wolfe at: swolfe@citizen.org and send a copy to Public Citizen's Health Research Group, at hrg1@citizen.org.

And to follow the whole story, see the Public Citizen Thyroid Drug Debacle recap page.