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About effing time.
Lancet Fully Retracts MMR Autism Link
It?s always been tenuous at best, but the link between autism and vaccines has been dealt a final and devastating blow this week. The medical journal that printed the controversial study in the late nineties has fully retracted it.
In the wake of a medical panel?s announcement that the autism/MMR study?s author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, acted unethically in building the ?evidence? that?s been used to support an entire crowd of anti-vaxers, the Lancet issued its announcement today.
Published in 1998 in The Lancet, the study claimed eight out of twelve children vaccinated with the MMR innoculation began showing symptoms that fall somewhere on the autism spectrum within days of getting the shot.
The support for Wakefield?s ?findings? has been circling the drain since this time last year, when an in-depth investigation from by British newspaper The Times purported that Wakefield fabricated much of his research.Previous studies had already disproven his theories, but the attacks on Wakefield?s methods have been particularly damaging - prompting the medical panel?s look and ultimate declaration of unethical practices just last week.
In a press release issued by the Lancet today, its editors note, ?Following the judgment of the UK General Medical Council?s Fitness to Practise Panel on Jan 28, 2010, it has become clear that several elements of the 1998 paper by Wakefield et al are incorrect, contrary to the findings of an earlier investigation. In particular, the claims in the original paper that children were ?consecutively referred? and that investigations were
?approved? by the local ethics committee have been proven to be false. Therefore we fully retract this paper from the published record.?
Considering there are children who have died as a result of non-vax policies, is this too little, too late?
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Via Strollerderby
Re: About effing time.
Don't forget all those studies funded by the diet industry.
Y'know, if I weren't a born cynic, I would have converted by now. But I find it's always best not to ever believe anyone at first - I always do follow-up research.
i'm waiting for my SIL to spout off a link between her son's autism and vaccination.
but i'm glad this has been retracted.
This kind of highlights an issue I've had with publishing. The data are usually not published with the articles, so I can't see if I think the analysis is appropriate or if the data may have been fudged. The best you get is an honor system that you are not fudging data, cherry-picking results, or straight making-up data.
Having known many researchers, the vast majority are honest, dedicated people who want publish accurate and appropriate results. Everyone has blinders and some are too ambitious for their own good, but most really want to do something good.
Problems may be more pronounced in higher profile research (like climate change). Fish research is pretty uninteresting to the general public.
Fishgirl, I agree with you.
There's also the problem of the media and the public-at-large being scientifically illiterate, and the media reporting generally only a dumbed-down abstract of a study - or worse, the researchers' (or their bankrollers') press-release, so that the actual data are never seen by the people charged with disseminating it to the rest of the world.
Claim that the medical community is engaging in a conspiracy to cover up the vaccination-autism link.
And one more thing, I would like to flog this guy and every other scientist who falsifies data. It increases the public distrust in all science of every kind and makes the whole situation that much more difficult.