01-05-2011, 12:21 PM
Cnn.com is reporting that a study linking vaccines to autism was a fraud:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/01/05/aut...tml?hpt=T1
From the article:
"An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study's author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study -- and that there was "no doubt" Wakefield was responsible.
"It's one thing to have a bad study, a study full of error, and for the authors then to admit that they made errors," Fiona Godlee, BMJ's editor-in-chief, told CNN. "But in this case, we have a very different picture of what seems to be a deliberate attempt to create an impression that there was a link by falsifying the data."
"Britain stripped Wakefield of his medical license in May. "Meanwhile, the damage to public health continues, fueled by unbalanced media reporting and an ineffective response from government, researchers, journals and the medical profession," BMJ states in an editorial accompanying the work.
"Most of his co-authors withdrew their names from the study in 2004 after learning he had had been paid by a law firm that intended to sue vaccine manufacturers -- a serious conflict of interest he failed to disclose. After years on controversy, the Lancet, the prestigious journal that originally published the research, retracted Wakefield's paper last February."
The article goes on to say that vaccinations dropped sharply in both Britain and the U.S. after the study's publication and that outbreaks of measles are way up.
Sure adds some perspective to the resolution that the County Council passed on a 7-1 vote. Of course, the resolution focussed on a non-issue – mandatory vaccinations – but that is not how many people viewed it. Who knows how many people eventually put the health of themselves or their children at risk because of what has now been confirmed to be fraud science?
Hopefully in the future the council will put their faith in doctors and scientists instead of conspiracy freaks and such.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/01/05/aut...tml?hpt=T1
From the article:
"An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study's author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study -- and that there was "no doubt" Wakefield was responsible.
"It's one thing to have a bad study, a study full of error, and for the authors then to admit that they made errors," Fiona Godlee, BMJ's editor-in-chief, told CNN. "But in this case, we have a very different picture of what seems to be a deliberate attempt to create an impression that there was a link by falsifying the data."
"Britain stripped Wakefield of his medical license in May. "Meanwhile, the damage to public health continues, fueled by unbalanced media reporting and an ineffective response from government, researchers, journals and the medical profession," BMJ states in an editorial accompanying the work.
"Most of his co-authors withdrew their names from the study in 2004 after learning he had had been paid by a law firm that intended to sue vaccine manufacturers -- a serious conflict of interest he failed to disclose. After years on controversy, the Lancet, the prestigious journal that originally published the research, retracted Wakefield's paper last February."
The article goes on to say that vaccinations dropped sharply in both Britain and the U.S. after the study's publication and that outbreaks of measles are way up.
Sure adds some perspective to the resolution that the County Council passed on a 7-1 vote. Of course, the resolution focussed on a non-issue – mandatory vaccinations – but that is not how many people viewed it. Who knows how many people eventually put the health of themselves or their children at risk because of what has now been confirmed to be fraud science?
Hopefully in the future the council will put their faith in doctors and scientists instead of conspiracy freaks and such.