Andrew Wakefield

The subject of my post yesterday was childrens’ behaviour and autistic diagnoses, and then last night the BBC broadcast a programme on Andrew Wakefield, the doctor who first criticised the triple MMM vaccine suggesting it could cause problems.   

There wasn't much mention of the triple vaccine but a total crushing of Wakefield. If, as the BBC asserts the health of our society is best protected by completely forgetting Wakefield then why have such a broadcast?

Surely this is an "elephant. in the room" situation?

Telling us all to forget about someone most of us had already forgotten, or never heard about initially will certainly cause a few concerns. Wakefield is being discredited and the focus was on measles, not specifically MMM. His main argument was against multiple vaccines delivered as one dose, and this is a different concern.

At the time he was campaigning here in the UK he wanted the NHS to allow single disease vaccines to be available to everyone. Those who could afford private treatment had their children vaccinated by three separate doses.

Now we know that the NHS links vaccination uptake to income for doctors, and some countries have made vaccination mandatory. The goal is that no child should remain on this planet unvaccinated. As we are almost in that state now we have effectively eliminated any opportunity to test, to research. In order to research side effects of the triple M in a robust and reliable way would require a large group of un-vaccinated children. Only by studying two groups, vaccinated and unvaccinated could any behavioural or other health issues be compared.

But when we only have vaccinated children this cannot be done.

Wakefield states that his aim in life is to find the causes of autism. Rather than crush him maybe we should ask why our public broadcaster is reiterating the negative claims now? Is Wakefield about to reveal something that we must not believe? Maybe we should ask who else is concerned about vaccines?

My previous post on this blog mentioned Dr Judy Mikovitz, who is certainly worried about effects on our immune systems and there are many other scientists worried too. Not just about autism but about the HPV vaccination and what that is doing to young people. What should we think? Is this an issue for parents of young babies only, or does it concern us all? Is it about pharmaceutical companies or something much bigger? If a peer reviewed journal such as The Lancet admits to peddling fake news then who are the public to believe? 

Maybe the bottom line is that it’s all about trust, and it's apparent loss in our society today.