Lancet Retraction Sparks Continuing Controversy

In a stunningly controversial move, well-renowned British medical journal, The Lancet, has retracted a paper on a study by Dr. Andrew Wakefield in 1998 regarding the relationship between autism and the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine.

Earlier this month, Food Consumer reported on the retraction, stating that the original paper that Dr. Wakefield submitted was in regards to a specific study involving 12 children with severe bowel disease associated with autism, as well as well as the symptoms of behavioral problems among eight of the children.

MMR and Autism:   Cause and Effect?

Activists (specifically those who support further investigation into the complex issues surrounding the issue of autism and the MMR vaccine) are asserting that the purpose of the retraction is to strike any inference by the paper that might link the two into a direct cause and effect relationship.

However, Dr. Wakefield himself wrote a response on the retraction, stating that the 1998 Lancet paper did NOT make any judgments regarding a causal relationship in the first place.

New Century, New Study

If the original paper made no judgments regarding causal outcomes, then why the sudden retraction?  The catalyst behind such a move, the advocates say, was another study examining autism and the Hepatitis B (HB) vaccine that is going to be widely published and may rock the world of vaccine makers across the globe.  Actors Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey have published a paper criticizing what they refer to as a campaign to discredit Dr. Wakefield.

The current study that is coming under scrutiny is one involving animal studies – in particular, primates.  For the research the primates were put on the same vaccination schedule endorsed by the United States and the American Medical Association.

In examining certain neurological outcomes of newborn monkeys given the equivalent of the vaccine that is given to human infants, Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues DID, indeed, imply that a causal relationship may exist.
 
In summarizing the Hepatitis B (HB) study, Dr. Wakefield/colleagues make the following assertion:  "This primate model provides a possible means of assessing adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes from neonatal Th-containing HB vaccine exposure, particularly in infants of lower GA or low birth weight. The mechanism of these effects and the requirements for Th is not known and requires further study."

By Rachel Stockton