New allegations against Dr Andrew Wakefield made by the UK Times newspaper have recently emerged, further throwing into disrepute his controversial 1998 Lancet publication.
Considering the recent resurgence of this debate, sparked by the ramblings of LBCs 97.3FM’s Jeni Barnett last week, I thought it appropriate to make you aware of the “retraction of interpretation” published in the Lancet in 2004 and written by 10 of the 12 authors of the original paper. This includes Murch and Walker-Smith who, along with Wakefield, are currently being investigated by the General Medical Council of the UK for serious professional misconduct relating to the Lancet publication. Conspicuous by his absence from this retraction is Dr Wakefield. The authors explain that they
“wish to make it clear, that in this paper no causal link was established between the MMR vaccine and autism as the data were insufficient”
The entire retraction is reproduced below, please click on the image to see it in high resolution.
Lancet, 2004 Mar 6;363(9411):750.
I want to emphasise this was published in 2004. Almost FIVE years ago. Yet the anti-vaccers, including the likes of the toxic Jeni Barnett still insist there is a link between MMR and autism. Just to make sure I didn’t get it wrong, here is the important part, enlarged.
This seems pretty clear to me.
So why is this debate still on-going? If the authors have admitted they may have got the interpretation of their own data wrong, why is it the anti-vacc crowd think they know better?
And when will they realise the Wakefield paper was never a definitive finding on MMR and autism?
Especially when you look at the conflict of interest issues also clouding this publication which constitutes part of the reason why Wakefield is currently being investigated for serious professional misconduct.
For the anti-vacc crowd it seems like this might be a case of Saunders’* law in action;
The more bizzare the premise, the more entrenched the belief.
*Richard E. Saunders
You can read the entire 1998 Lancet paper, for free reproduced here on Brian Deer’s blog.
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Comments ( 10 )
[...] of Sceptics’ Book asks: What more do the MMR/anti-vaccers want?. They reproduce a crucial part of the partial retraction of the paper by 10/13 of the original [...]
Brian Deer Discusses Andrew Wakefield in the Sunday Times: Many Updates « Holford Watch: Patrick Holford, nutritionism and bad science added these pithy words on Feb 09 09 at 14:31[...] some of the data been faked but amongst other flaws, the study only involved 12 children and had since been retracted by the the [...]
» A brief report from today’s debate. added these pithy words on May 03 09 at 01:03[...] recall that the Lancet publication which started the whole autism/MMR controversy has since been retracted by the journal, and 10 of the 12 authors also stated unequivocally in a publication in 2004 [...]
» Cherry picking now extends to photographs too. added these pithy words on Nov 22 09 at 13:20[...] ten of the twelve authors on the paper withdrew their names and the Lancet also retracted the paper. “we wish to make it clear that in this paper no [...]
» MMR doctor “unethical, callous and abused trust” added these pithy words on Jan 31 10 at 22:19[...] made a complete retraction of the paper, six years after the majority of the authors had already disassociated themselves from it in 2004. Another paper, accepted and due to be published in NeuroToxicology, showing that [...]
» Wakefield’s paper vindicated “again”? Not likely. added these pithy words on May 12 10 at 23:09[...] ten of the twelve authors on the Lancet paper withdrew their names from the publication stating; “We wish to make it clear that in this paper no causal link established between MMR [...]
» Callous, unethical and dishonest Wakefield finally gets struck off. added these pithy words on May 30 10 at 17:01Sean the Blogonaut added these pithy words on Feb 10 09 at 04:22Don’t you know that it’s a big pharma / government conspiracy
BastardSheep added these pithy words on Feb 13 09 at 10:22Over at washington post via /. today is some good news.
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/12/1851203
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/12/AR2009021201391.htmlA court has ruled that vaccines do not cause autism. So now we have the big three on our sides – science, evidence, and the law!
Clifford G Miller added these pithy words on Feb 26 09 at 07:29That’s funny, so do the other side. Have you taken a look here:-
“MMR/Autism Cases Win In US Vaccine Court”
http://tinyurl.com/ahprxd
bernice l. added these pithy words on Jul 30 09 at 01:54Fellow skeptics, have you read the original Wakefield paper from beginning to end.
To quote:
“We did not prove an association between measles,
mumps, and rubella vaccine and the syndrome described.
Virological studies are underway that may help to resolve
this issue.”and
“We have identified a chronic enterocolitis in children
that may be related to neuropsychiatric dysfunction. In
most cases, onset of symptoms was after measles,
mumps, and rubella immunisation. Further investigations
are needed to examine this syndrome and its possible
relation to this vaccine.”What exactly did they retract? They retracted that which the paper never said in the first place. I can not find any reference in the paper to a finding of causal association between MMR and autism. There was certainly a (parent) reported temporal association between MMR and onset of regression. The skeptic in me says it “it reeks of politics(Peter Garrett)” Are you not sceptical about the real purpose of this retraction. As an aside, Dr Wakefield is pro-vaccine!
