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| Science |
| Anti-Vaccine Autism Researcher Falsified Data |
| 2009-02-08 |
| THE doctor who sparked the scare over the safety of the MMR vaccine for children changed and misreported results in his research, creating the appearance of a possible link with autism, a Sunday Times investigation has found. Confidential medical documents and interviews with witnesses have established that Andrew Wakefield manipulated patients' data, which triggered fears that the MMR triple vaccine to protect against measles, mumps and rubella was linked to the condition. The research was published in February 1998 in an article in The Lancet medical journal. It claimed that the families of eight out of 12 children attending a routine clinic at the hospital had blamed MMR for their autism, and said that problems came on within days of the jab. The team also claimed to have discovered a new inflammatory bowel disease underlying the children's conditions. However, our investigation, confirmed by evidence presented to the General Medical Council (GMC), reveals that: In most of the 12 cases, the children's ailments as described in The Lancet were different from their hospital and GP records. Although the research paper claimed that problems came on within days of the jab, in only one case did medical records suggest this was true, and in many of the cases medical concerns had been raised before the children were vaccinated. Hospital pathologists, looking for inflammatory bowel disease, reported in the majority of cases that the gut was normal. This was then reviewed and the Lancet paper showed them as abnormal. Despite involving just a dozen children, the 1998 paper's impact was extraordinary. After its publication, rates of inoculation fell from 92% to below 80%. Populations acquire "herd immunity" from measles when more than 95% of people have been vaccinated. Last week official figures showed that 1,348 confirmed cases of measles in England and Wales were reported last year, compared with 56 in 1998. Two children have died of the disease. Nice work, Dr. Wakefield. With two professors, John Walker-Smith and Simon Murch, Wakefield is defending himself against allegations of serious professional misconduct brought by the GMC. The charges relate to ethical aspects of the project, not its findings. All three men deny any misconduct. Through his lawyers, Wakefield this weekend denied the issues raised by our investigation, but declined to comment further. |
| Posted by:Cornsilk Blondie |
| #14 Wakefield's hypothesis is that MMR vaccine triggers autism via an inflammatory bowl disease. Experts in enterogasteric disorders have pretty much demolished this claim and demonstrated that Wakefield distorted and misrepresented the alleged evidence for such a disease. Relevant papers in the research journal Histopathology are cited here. Professors Tom MacDonald and Paola Domizio from Barts and the London School of Medicine in London were experts for the defense in the UK MMR litigation against the vaccine manufacturers out of which Wakefield trousered one million dollars. MacDonald is a pre-eminent gut immunologist with an international reputation and was recently awarded the President’s Medal of the British Society for Gastroenterology for his scientific achievements. Domizio is an extremely well known gut pathologist and is also a senior figure in the Royal College of Pathologists in the UK. The gist of their article (Histopathology. 2007 50:371-9) was that autistic enterocolitis does not exist. In a forensic dissection of the key paper by Wakefield and colleagues in the American Journal of Gastroenterology in 2000 (Am J Gastroenterol. 2000 95:2285-95), MacDonald and Domizio clearly showed that the so-called enterocolitis was due to Wakefield incorrectly deeming enlarged lymphoid follicles in the gut as pathological abnormalities, and that he had also created new and unsubstantiated pathological abnormalities to give the impression of gut pathology. The image of enterocolitis in an affected child shown in this paper was an extremely highly magnified picture of a small piece of tissue, which may in fact have come from one of the original Lancet 12 (in order to bump up the numbers of patients studied, Wakefield just reported the original Lancet 12 again). This is a familiar Wakefield tactic, his “representative” images are always taken at an extremely high magnification on the microscope, presumably to hide the fact that the rest of the tissue is normal. MacDonald and Domizio also shredded other Wakefield papers of the same ilk in their article. Key to this piece of detective work by Domizio and MacDonald was a table in the Am J Gastro paper where these invented histological abnormalities were shown |
| Posted by: lotp 2009-02-08 20:28 |
| #13 falsified data have been corroborated multiple times? lotp, please clarify. When people ask me whether I believe in the vaccination theory to account for my kids' Asperger's Syndrome, I point out that my dad, who is 84 now, also has Aspergers; and Austism research pioneers Kanner and Asperger did their research before the invention of the MMR. The vaccination theory is a classic case of the post hoc fallacy: after this, therefore because of this. Kanner-type autism symptoms (the more obvious manifestation of autism) begin to appear around age 15 months, which is about the time the MMR series of shots begins. Aspergers is more subtle. We knew something was odd with daughter #3 because she didn't make eye contact from day one, and never slept for more than 90 minutes at a time; but her symptoms were so much different from her older brother's symptoms. We made the connection when we observed that they had the same lopsided gait. |
| Posted by: mom 2009-02-08 20:18 |
| #12 Alas, Dale, the falsified data have been corroborated multiple times now. No matter how tempting, it is fatal when a researcher fakes data to force a study to come out the way s/he wants it. |
| Posted by: lotp 2009-02-08 19:36 |
| #11 The Medical community has fought this for years.I am more inclined to question them as they will profit more. These vaccines are forced on parents and children. I have heard to many times of children that were normal within a short time of injection develop Autism. The AMA is a very powerful group with some good Medical Doctors as well a bad. This is where the you have 4000% markups and even 45% profits for just the delivery of drugs to the drugstores. Health business is still very good at this time. The more I think about it the more this looks like a smear effort. TKY, Dale |
| Posted by: Dale 2009-02-08 19:05 |
| #10 >The idea expands on the “extreme male brain” theory of autism proposed by Dr. Simon Baron-Cohen of Cambridge. Ali-G's Bro' |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles the flatulent 2009-02-08 18:37 |
| #9 djh_usmc, for some reason quite a few Rantburgers have offspring with Asperger's Syndrome.... perhaps because it's tied to high intelligence. ;-) trailing wife, maybe it's just a guy thing. |
| Posted by: tipper 2009-02-08 16:45 |
| #8 After the Lancet article, the manufacturers of MMR had a number of class action lawsuits against them. Subsequently it was discovered that the 'research' was founded by a number of trial lawyers. |
| Posted by: mhw 2009-02-08 16:01 |
| #7 Suspect, PBMcL? We know the global warming data has been cooked. Everything from selective choice of data (the famous hockey stick curve, which starts at the depths of the Little Ice Age, ignoring the much warmer climate at the time Jesus of Nazareth lived) to instrument placement (next to heat outlets and on black tar roofs in cities rather than the middle of a field) to flat-out invention (cf Al Gore's little film). But, as you say, for our own good, and the good of Mr. Gore's bank account. Back on topic, the Lancet really has about as much credibility as the New York Times these days. The researchers ought to be infected with three doses of each of active measles, mumps and rubella cultures, and left to live with the consequences, exactly as the children of those who believed their results did not have their children given the thrice three-fold MMR inoculations. Barring that, which perhaps some might think a bit vindictive, they definitely need to be publicly stripped of their medical licenses, tenure, and all professional accreditations, much as a soldier is stripped of his various patches in front of his regiment. djh_usmc, for some reason quite a few Rantburgers have offspring with Asperger's Syndrome.... perhaps because it's tied to high intelligence. ;-) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-02-08 15:11 |
| #6 Slightly OT, but I suspect that Mountains of "Global Warming" data have been cooked as well. Only for our own good, of course... |
| Posted by: PBMcL 2009-02-08 14:45 |
| #5 Send him to prison |
| Posted by: newc 2009-02-08 14:22 |
| #4 When I lived in the UK this guy was hot news. He singlehandedly prevented thousands of families to forgo mandatory vaccinations for their children. It this turns out to be true then God forgive him if these children end up disastrous medical conditions as a result of not having those vaccinations. |
| Posted by: Jack is Back! 2009-02-08 14:07 |
| #3 Sorry, I meant teens...stupid keyboard. |
| Posted by: djh_usmc 2009-02-08 13:56 |
| #2 Lancet strikes again.... :-( |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2009-02-08 13:55 |
| #1 This is very interesting, I have two tesn with Aspergers, which is a high functioning form of Autism. One of the largest debates in the Autism community is whether or not these vaccines had a hand in causing Autism. If this story about Wakefield holds true, then emphasis can be put into an area that is more likely, genetics. This is extremely good news, again if it holds true. |
| Posted by: djh_usmc 2009-02-08 13:54 |