"Wakefield's article linking MMR vaccine and autism was fraudulent."

Wow. If the allegations referred to in this British Medical Journal editorial are true -- that scientist Andrew Wakefield, who was being paid by law firms who wanted to sue vaccine companies, deliberately manufactured data linking vaccines to autism  -- then Wakefield has blood on his hands.

Count me in among the mothers who (back in 2000 when my first child was born) chose to vaccinate on a delayed and modified schedule in part because of the doubts engendered by reports like Wakefield's 1998 paper in the respected British journal Lancet. 

It has been suggested for a long time that the preponderance of the evidence since Wakefield's report tended to refute the alleged vaccine-autism connection, and I had come  to believe that it was in error -- one of those common dead-end pathways in scientific research.  Eventually, the paper was even retracted, as does happen sometimes when there prove to be mistakes.   I no longer had a concern about vaccines and autism specifically.  I hadn't been following the story closely since then, and so I wasn't expecting a finding of fraud.

Full disclosure:  I'm still unhappy with vaccines that have a fetal-tissue connection.  I still prefer to give kids one vaccine at a time the first time they get one, so that the cause of any reaction can be known.   I'm supportive of religious- and philosophical-exemption laws.  And I am aware of the concerns about vaccine reactions of other kinds, and am understanding of the nervousness with which many parents approach them, as well as being generally sympathetic with a low-medical-intervention and individual- rather than population-focused medicine.  

But this?  Outright falsification of medical data that affected vaccination decisions (and possibly disease outbreaks) in several countries, as well as influencing the direction of autism research?  

I can't figure out whether I'm outraged more as a mother or as a scientist.

(Knowing me, probably as a scientist.)

Mainstream-type folks often like to characterize alternative-type folks as crackpots.  Homeschoolers know this.  Home-birth mamas know this.  Mothers who practice extended breastfeeding know this.  Consumers of alternative medicine of all kinds know this.  People who source some of their food outside the mainstream production/processing industry know this.  Hey, religious people know this.  It's annoying to see experts whose knowledgeable advice you rely on, referred to as crackpots, or evil.

It's even more annoying when some of the  "experts" DO turn out to be  crackpots, or evil, or both.

Chemistry blogger Derek Lowe weighs in:

The 1998 paper that linked MMR vaccination with autism has had a long way to fall. It made, of course, a huge media sensation, and energized the whole vaccination/autism controversy that still (in spite of evidence) goes on. But it didn't look very robust from the start, scientifically. And over the years it's gone from "Really needs shoring up" to "hasn't been reproduced" to "looks like there's something wrong with it" to "main conclusions retracted" to the final, lowest level: outright fraud.

Here's a good history of the whole affair in the BMJ. And here's the first part of a series of articles by Brian Deer, the journalist who dug into the study and found how fraudulent it really was. Not one of the 12 cases in Wakefield's original study hold up; the data were manipulated in every single one to make it fit his hypothesis. His hypothesis that he was getting grant money for. His hypothesis that he was already planning lawsuits around, before the study even started.

His hypothesis, I might add, that has led to completely unnecessary suffering among the unvaccinated children this scare has produced over the years, and has diverted enormous amounts of time, energy, and money away from useful study of autism. This sort of deliberate action is really hard to contemplate, as a reasonable human being - it's like some sort of massive campaign to persuade people to throw bricks through the windows of ambulances.

In a better world, we'd be getting expressions of sorrow and contrition from all the celebrities and others who've profited from this business. But that's not going to happen, is it?

Don't hold your breath.

Comments

[LeeAnn Balbirona]

Wow, fraud on this scale, that led to so much waste and worry; might it actually lead to prison time for this guy? He certainly should be stripped of whatever credentials that remain.

[Delores]

Have you ever read "Unraveling the Mystery of Autism and Pervasive Developmental Disorder" by Karyn Serousi? As a scientist, you might cringe at some of it, but it is very well written and her husband is a scientist. The book is sort of a combo between personal story/experience and science to understand and back it up. If nothing else, it is just a good and interesting book.

I think in general that vaccines are good and have done a great deal of good in this world. I have serious "issues" with the fetal-tissue connection. And I think it is very unrealistic to think that vaccines will never have adverse affects on people -- despite the infinite combos of DNA. To me, denying potential for different reactions is like saying that since some people are not affected adversely by eating bread then no one is adversely affected.

I think a "slow and steady" route is the best way. There is no rush. And besides -- the effect of the vaccines can wear off. From what I understand, the vaccine for chicken pox (can't recall the technical name) is only effective for about 10 years. Whereas once a child gets it, the immunities are there for life. I would never presume to say that is the case for all illnesses, or that this is the best solution. I just can't stand it when people assume one "way" is the right "way" when it comes to vaccines.

I'll get off my soapbox now. :)

[Barbara C.]

I kind of had my doubts about this particular issue anyway...most things I've read point to a genetic connection for autism.

But I don't think that babies need quite as many vaccinations in the first year as they are scheduled to receive. I think the schedule is based on the fear that parents won't bring the kids back for vaccinations at later ages, so they overload them as babies.

[bearing]

"I think the schedule is based on the fear that parents won't bring the kids back for vaccinations at later ages, so they overload them as babies."

Agreed on that last bit. That's the kind of thing I mean when I say I prefer individual- rather than population-focused medicine. Tailoring the vaccination schedule to what's best for the child in his family - individual. Recommending a schedule based on what statistically will lead to the most kids receiving the most vaccinations - population based. I understand the motives, but my responsibility is first to my child and secondarily to the rest of the population.

[Tabitha]

"I think the schedule is based on the fear that parents won't bring the kids back for vaccinations at later ages, so they overload them as babies."

I think it's also geared towards babies that are in daycare and that are, therefore, exposed to many more things at a very young age. I know I'm incredibly blessed to be able to stay home with my children, and that one of the extra benefits of this is less exposure in the first 2 years of life to all kinds of nasties.

[SE]

Some of the vaccines they schedule early really do protect against diseases to which young infants are very vulnerable--pertussis, for instance, and rotavirus. But I don't buy at all that babies born to Hep-B-negative mothers need to be getting the Hep B vaccine at birth; that is clearly a decision calculated to benefit other babies, not mine. And I, too, am troubled by the use of cell lines derived from aborted fetuses and the way the measles vaccine, which I would really like to be able to give my child with a clear conscience, is offered ONLY in combination with a fetal-cell-line-origin vaccine (rubella).

Thanks for this post--your blog is one of my favorites!

[Morgan D.]

I would encourage you to read/listen to these bits of information before coming to a conclusion on whether or not it was indeed a fraud:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHrgYxqcU0w

http://www.whale.to/a/dr_andrew_wakefield.html

http://childhealthsafety.wordpress.com/2011/01/08/the-big-lie-brian-deer-dr-wakefield-the-british-medical-journal/

[bearing]

I looked. I saw nothing that refutes the claims that the children's health histories were cherrypicked and altered for inclusion in the paper. I also saw nothing that gives a sufficient explanation for why Dr. Wakefield's disastrous ethical conflicts of interest were not disclosed from the beginning. These are serious problems, and my judgment is that it was correct to retract the paper and now it is correct to ignore the research as it is irredeemably tainted.

Whether the fraud was deliberate is not within my ability to judge. It looks bad.

[Lee]

The role of the lawyers in helping should not be ignored here.Their actions deserve to be called into question. Read the article...

http://marketsandculture.blogspot.com/2011/01/mmr-vaccine-autism-andrew-wakefield-and.html

..it is astonishing how many millions of public money were wasted by their actions.

[bearing]

Yeah, people in the UK ought to be up in arms about it.

I suppose that many of the parents who skipped the MMR vaccine were predisposed to vaccinate less anyway, but surely there were a lot of people on the margins who were tipped away from vaccination because of the apparent evidence -- people who, *had the later-retracted paper not existed,* would have made a different choice. All of these people are justifiably angry, because it's not a choice without consequence.

I mean, Dr. Sears cited Wakefield (not without reservation, but still) in his book _The Vaccine Book._ Sears is on the crunchy end of mainstream parenting, but mainstream he is.