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Autism-vaccine study was 'fraud,' journal says

ludahai

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For years, anti-vaccine folks have used this as part of their argument against getting children vaccinated, and MANY people believed it. Now, it is shown to be a compelte fraud. Parents who bought into this and whose children subsequently caught these diseases that the vaccines were meant to prevent should look at a lawsuit...

PARIS (AFP) – A 1998 study that unleashed a major health scare by linking childhood autism to a triple vaccine was "an elaborate fraud," the British Medical Journal (BMJ) charged Thursday.

Blamed for a disastrous boycott of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine in Britain, the study was retracted by The Lancet last year and its senior author disgraced, after the country's longest-running hearing, for conflict of interest and unethical treatment of patients.
 
Is this a bad time to tell you that the guy who did the "research" this was based on retracted his claim a long time ago?
:p

That's funny... the CNN report I just saw had the very guy on saying that he stands by it. The retractees were those who did the research along-side him...
 
That's funny... the CNN report I just saw had the very guy on saying that he stands by it. The retractees were those who did the research along-side him...

Maybe I'm remembering wrong. I don't track complete bull**** very carefully :D
 
The anti-vaccination movement is one that continues to baffle me. There is literally ZERO solid evidence for it to stand on and what evidence there is crumbles under ANY sort of scrutiny...yet people still buy into it.
 
Parents who bought into this and whose children subsequently caught these diseases that the vaccines were meant to prevent should look at a lawsuit...

That's probably their only chance for a lawsuit, since the law prohibits suing the drug companies that make the vaccine that you blindly inject your child with. Besides, if no one around you has polio, why vaccinate for it, everyone else's kids will take the risk while yours take no risk and still don't get the disease. BTW, make sure you get your flu shots, I don't wanna miss any work this winter.
 
Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews.com

LONDON – The first study to link a childhood vaccine to autism was based on doctored information about the children involved, according to a new report on the widely discredited research.
The conclusions of the 1998 paper by Andrew Wakefield and colleagues was renounced by 10 of its 13 authors and later retracted by the medical journal Lancet, where it was published. Still, the suggestion the MMR shot was connected to autism spooked parents worldwide and immunization rates for measles, mumps and rubella have never fully recovered.
A new examination found, by comparing the reported diagnoses in the paper to hospital records, that Wakefield and colleagues altered facts about patients in their study.
The analysis, by British journalist Brian Deer, found that despite the claim in Wakefield's paper that the 12 children studied were normal until they had the MMR shot, five had previously documented developmental problems. Deer also found that all the cases were somehow misrepresented when he compared data from medical records and the children's parents.


Read more: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud - FoxNews.com

Amazing! Peer reviewed science failed us? I wonder what other failures of Peer Review are out there...
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

Amazing! Peer reviewed science failed us? I wonder what other failures of Peer Review are out there...

This is how science is supposed to work: all knowledge is tentative and all conclusions are suspect.

With one stipulation: you have to have informed awareness of the advantages and limitations of any given experiment before you interpose your own judgment. Keep in mind that many scientists have been disavowing this particular study for years, even before this fraud came to light.
 
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Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

This is how science is supposed to work. All knowledge is tentative and all conclusions are suspect.

With one stipulation: you have to have informed awareness of the advantages and limitations of any given experiment before you interpose your own judgment. Keep in mind that many scientists have been disavowing this particular study for years, even before this fraud came to light.

I know, I appreciate that fact, but if you read the article, the cases of avoidable diseases like measles has gone up since this fraud was published.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

Amazing! Peer reviewed science failed us? I wonder what other failures of Peer Review are out there...

You're absolutely right, one medical journal publishing one article 13 years ago is definitely reflective of the scientific community as a whole.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

Oh mah gwadz....a study made with a sample of 12 people was found to be flawed? I guess we don't have to take people who cold weather to disprove GW seriously anymore. ;)
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

I know, I appreciate that fact, but if you read the article, the cases of avoidable diseases like measles has gone up since this fraud was published.

I view it more as a failure of the media than peer-reviewed science. Peer-review has been pretty critical since publishing. The theory received more promotion than it deserved.
 
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Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

Amazing! Peer reviewed science failed us? I wonder what other failures of Peer Review are out there...

And what is the alternative to science and logic? Oh yea religious dogma based on 2000 year old writings when people thought the planet was flat.
 
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Merged threads
 
The anti-vaccination movement is one that continues to baffle me. There is literally ZERO solid evidence for it to stand on and what evidence there is crumbles under ANY sort of scrutiny...yet people still buy into it.

there were charges against Wakefield's study very early on here and the Govt tried to make the case for the MMR vaccine but it's not easy to be rational about what you do or do not put into your child's body when they are so helpless. My ex wife and I read the literature at the time and had our two boys vaccinated - but reading the literature still didn't dispell all fear as the needles went in.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

This is how science is supposed to work: all knowledge is tentative and all conclusions are suspect.

...except for global warming.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

I would just like to say that I got mumps and my sister got ruebella from our vaccine. That is all.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

This is how science is supposed to work: all knowledge is tentative and all conclusions are suspect.

With one stipulation: you have to have informed awareness of the advantages and limitations of any given experiment before you interpose your own judgment. Keep in mind that many scientists have been disavowing this particular study for years, even before this fraud came to light.

Scientists are supposed to lie? That's how it works? Scientists lied about global warming, too. Is that ok by you?

Scientists are probably more dangerous than preachers.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

And what is the alternative to science and logic?

Interesting that you put logic and science together.

Modern science is based on positivism. Positivism says that there is no difference between something that doesn't exist and something that exists and hasn't been observed. So modern science says the extent of our universe is only those things which we observe. This seems illogical to me. I won't even go into the extent at which our science is dominated by the elite that decide what 'knowledge' appears in our text books and scientific journals. Remember positivism, there is no man behind the curtain until you observe him.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

Interesting that you put logic and science together.

Modern science is based on positivism. Positivism says that there is no difference between something that doesn't exist and something that exists and hasn't been observed. So modern science says the extent of our universe is only those things which we observe. This seems illogical to me. I won't even go into the extent at which our science is dominated by the elite that decide what 'knowledge' appears in our text books and scientific journals. Remember positivism, there is no man behind the curtain until you observe him.

All of which circuity means...... zero.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

As the father of a child with Autism, and an active member of multiple support/education groups for families with autistic members, I can tell you that the risk was greater than that caused by skipping vaccinations (some people actually just requested single instead of multiple vaccinations). The biggest crime of this flawed study and its wide spread advocacy was the false hope of a cure that seemed to attach to it.
 
Re: Journal: Study linking vaccine to autism was fraud Read more: http://www.foxnews

As the father of a child with Autism, and an active member of multiple support/education groups for families with autistic members, I can tell you that the risk was greater than that caused by skipping vaccinations (some people actually just requested single instead of multiple vaccinations). The biggest crime of this flawed study and its wide spread advocacy was the false hope of a cure that seemed to attach to it.

What risk? There was no risk. Skipping vaccines = dumb.
 
link

For years, anti-vaccine folks have used this as part of their argument against getting children vaccinated, and MANY people believed it. Now, it is shown to be a compelte fraud. Parents who bought into this and whose children subsequently caught these diseases that the vaccines were meant to prevent should look at a lawsuit...

The anti-vaccine people are certifiable lunatics. They have blood on their hands. Of course, it's not like exposing this fraud is going to change their minds...their opinions are not based on facts or reason in the first place.
 
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