Controversy Over Vaccine Research
Related
Media
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTh97pANTxc
Overview
A 2009 television news report on the growing scandal around Andrew Wakefield's 1998 Lancet paper linking the MMR vaccine to autism. By 2009 Brian Deer's reporting in The Sunday Times had shown that the medical records of the twelve children in the study did not match what the paper claimed, and the General Medical Council's fitness-to-practise hearing against Wakefield and two colleagues was under way. The report covers the allegations, the fall in MMR uptake and the return of measles that followed.
Notes
- The useful thing about this clip is the date. The paper had been publicly doubted since 2004, when ten of its thirteen authors withdrew the interpretation; the retraction and the striking-off were still a year away. The damage was done in the interval, which is the usual shape of these things: the claim travels, the correction crawls.
- It is a reminder that the Anti-Vaccine movement did not arise from nowhere. It had a peer-reviewed paper, a press conference and a photogenic doctor, which is why "it was in The Lancet" is not the end of an argument. See Appeal to Authority.
- For the full story, Vaccines and Autism - A Measured Response is the long version and Vaccine Link to Autism Retracted the next instalment.