Australian Vaccination Movement steals too

September 1, 2010

Arr! Why didn't any of you skallywags tell me stealing was wrong?

In addition to the charges brought against the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN) by the Health Care Complaints Commission over their constant misinforming of parents about health information and harassment of families criticizing the organization, now the AVN has taking to stealing, or more specifically, to violating copyright law by selling newspaper and medical journal articles online without the authors’ permission.

The Australian Vaccination Network, which was the subject of a public warning issued by the Health Care Complaints Commission last month, withdrew 11 information packs from its website yesterday after complaints from authors.

The packs, which were selling for up to $128, included home-made books filled with articles photocopied from journals around the world, information on drugs taken from MIMS, the medical guide used by doctors and nurses, and copies of brochures inserted in medication boxes by pharmaceutical companies.

What’s that conspiracy theorists always say about following the money? Now you might wonder why the AVN would be interested in spreading real medical information from actual reliable sources, given how prone they are to lying to parents for the specific purpose of tricking them into thinking the real medical professionals are part of an evil conspiracy. Well this should explain that:

“‘That article is at least 15 years old so is not based on current information.”

See, the AVN isn’t anti-science. They love science, so long as it’s old, outdated science.

The network is also under investigation by the Office of Liquor, Gaming and Racing after reports it solicited donations without a fundraising licence. If found guilty, the network will no longer be allowed to operate as a charity.

The president of the network, Meryl Dorey, said she was unaware she had breached copyright but accepted there had been problems with her licence.

”We’ve made mistakes but they’ve been honest mistakes. They’ve been out of ignorance rather than fraudulence,” she said.

You see, Meryl Dorey didn’t mean any harm. How was she to know that being a pirate was illegal? Cause that never comes up in any pirate movie ever. Nor is it explained at the beginning of every DVD and VHC. For she’s been living on the moon for her entire life and never heard of such foreign concepts as intellectual property and copyrights. That’s a plausible defense. It’s like that time I ran over that kid with my car. I didn’t know that was a crime. Honest.

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