MMR and autism link was financially motivated

Like thousands of other parents, the idea of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism scares the crap out of us, and has made us wary about giving Little Man the vaccine. Charlie and I discussed it at length, researched what we could, and decided in the end that the risk of Little Man contracting measles or mumps was greater than any possible risk of autism. As it turns out, since Little Man turned 1, he hasn’t been well enough to get the vaccine, what with his recurring creche colds! But as soon as he is well, we definitely plan to get it for him.

So today, when I saw on the news that Dr. Wakefield’s report, the very one that caused the huge panic in the first place, has been proven to be fraudulent, I was horrified. It turns out that he manipulated the data in his report to make it appear as though a link existed. And his motivation? He was being paid by a group that was pursuing a class action lawsuit against the manufacturers of the vaccine. And he had patented a measles vaccine that he intended to replace the MMR. Here’s the full story in The Globe and Mail, if you want to check it out: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health/andre-picard/medical-fraud-revealed-in-discredited-vaccine-autism-study/article1859560/

How many parents decided not to vaccinate their children because of this man’s scaremongering and money-making scheme? And how did it take over a decade to expose this for the scam it was? For all that our media jumped on the story and bombarded us with scary headlines about the initial study, where was the investigative reporting questioning the validity of the study and the motivation of those carrying it out? It goes to show how much we as parents need to question the information that we’re given.