Secrets of the MMR scare:
How the case against the MMR vaccine was fixed

February 28, 1998, there was a paper published in the Lancet which would go on to create a worldwide MMR vaccine scare.

Authored by Andrew Wakefield, John Walker-Smith, and 11 others from the Royal Free medical school, London.

12 developmentally challenged children were reported on. 11 boys, 1 girl; ages 3-9

They made claims which they adopted as facts __Behavioral symptoms reported by parents in 8 of the 12 children. __Average interval from exposure to 1st behavioral symptoms was 6.3 days (range 1-14). __9 children diagnosed with regressive autism. __ Autistic enterocolitis (unproven bowel disease)

November 2000, Wakefield grants an interview to CBS’s 60 minutes; epidemic of autism .
He campaigned for boycott of the MMR vaccine in favor of single shots.

Concerns for Thimerosal in vaccine also occurring at this time

What Got Deer Started:

Around the time the Lancet paper was published, a woman in Ireland was compensated for vaccine injury caused to her son.

2003 begins to take a closer look at Wakefield’s claims.

Deer’s Findings: The research alleging link between MMR and Autism had been funded from the onset by a group of lawyers.

Wakefield was on their payroll for two years prior to the paper being published and before the research began.

Wakefield and his cohorts created “the problem”

Children enrolled in the study were members of JAB as well as clients and contacts of the lawyers.

1996-97 these parents went to the Royal Free with onset of behavioral problems following MMR vaccination.

Wakefield had arranged for specific named children to be brought to that hospital.

Wakefield was not in clinical care, he was a lab doctor; made calls to the families of the children asking if the child had bowel issues.

To file suite they tried to establish that there was a relationship; bowel disease—then regressive autism. Went through each child’s case note and altered crucial history.

What followed is:

i. Feb. 2004 Deer cries foul in the Sunday Times; Calls Wakefield a fraud. ii. Wakefield files libel suit in British high court; his lawyers scurry to stop litigation. iii. Discovery materials taken away from Deer; no plausible cause in any of the children. iv. Feb. 2010, U.K G.M.C revoke Wakefield’s License; 4 counts o dishonesty, 12 count of abuse of developmentally challenged children. v. The Lancet retracted the paper calling it an elaborate fraud
How the link was fixed
The Lancet paper was a case series of 12 child patients; it reported a proposed “new syndrome” of enterocolitis and regressive autism and associated this with MMR as an “apparent precipitating event.” But in fact: * Three of nine children reported with regressive autism did not have autism diagnosed at all. Only one child clearly had regressive autism * Despite the paper claiming that all 12 children were “previously normal,” five had documented pre-existing developmental concerns * Some children were reported to have experienced first behavioural symptoms within days of MMR, but the records documented these as starting some months after vaccination * In nine cases, unremarkable colonic histopathology results—noting no or minimal fluctuations in inflammatory cell populations—were changed after a medical school “research review” to “non-specific colitis” * The parents of eight children were reported as blaming MMR, but 11 families made this allegation at the hospital. The exclusion of three allegations—all giving times to onset of problems in months—helped to create the appearance of a 14 day temporal link * Patients were recruited through anti-MMR campaigners, and the study was commissioned and funded for planned litigation