AGE OF AUTISM

UK Department of Health Deliberately Exposes Vulnerable Population to Flu Infection

By John Stone

Is the vaccine program there to prevent harm or to foist commercial products on a captive market at the public expense? The parrot cry of health officials trying to bully citizens into vaccinating is that they are putting other people at risk, but it is very easy to call their bluff when they pursue a contradictory policy over nasal flu vaccine and children, a vaccine which sheds and will put in harm's way immune-compromised people and younger siblings. From September this year in the United Kingdom children above the age of two are to be offered a nasal influenza vaccine ‘Fluenz’ which is the same as  the ‘Flumist’ many American children already get, and this is to be rolled out for all schoolchildren next year. Here is the text of my recent letter to the British Medical Journal, so far unpublished:

It is deeply disturbing that this senseless project ploughs forward regardless. While government seems to have seized the agenda over influenza vaccination by unwarranted claims of (influenza) mortality [1,2] there are definable risks to the use of nasal influenza vaccine. Manufacturer's product information states among other things [3]:

"FLUENZ should not be administered to children and adolescents with severe asthma or active wheezing because these individuals have not been adequately studied in clinical studies.
"Do not administer FLUENZ to infants and toddlers younger than 12 months. In a clinical study, an increase in hospitalisations was observed in infants and toddlers younger than 12 months after vaccination (see section 4.8).

"Vaccine recipients should be informed that FLUENZ is an attenuated live virus vaccine and has the potential for transmission to immunocompromised contacts. Vaccine recipients should attempt to avoid, whenever possible, close association with severely immunocompromised individuals (e.g. bone marrow transplant recipients requiring isolation) for 1-2 weeks following vaccination. Peak incidence of vaccine virus recovery occurred 2-3 days post-vaccination in clinical studies. In circumstances where contact with severely immunocompromised individuals is unavoidable, the potential risk of transmission of the influenza vaccine virus should be weighed against the risk of acquiring and transmitting wild-type influenza virus."

David Aaronovitch Loses Exchange About Wakefield & MMR: Then it is Deleted

Newly appointed Index-on-Censorship chairman David Aaronovitch loses on-line exchange about Wakefield and MMR in the London Times: then  it is deleted.

By John Stone

With British journalists running relays to resuscitate the dead story of the Swansea measles epidemic  the former Communist Party activist, David Aaronovitch – newly appointed chairman of the “human-rights” organisation Index-on-Censorship  -  has come off worse in an exchange with me about Andrew Wakefield and MMR in The Times of London, which was after some hours deleted.

I had written under his article:

It is very unclear that Wakefield cheated bearing in mind the complete exoneration in the High Court last [year] of the senior author and clinician in the Lancet paper Prof John Walker-Smith, who unlike Wakefield was funded to appeal. Walker-Smith was equally responsible for [the] paper and it’s reporting, and more responsible for any clinical decisions regarding the patients in it. The GMC findings, which were based on Brian Deer's allegations, cannot be considered reliable: indeed were highly flawed.

However, an over-riding problem with MMR is that irrespective of Wakefield it is used despite any scientific certainty as to safety. The conclusion in abstract of the Cochrane review of MMR in both 2005 and 2012 is:

"The design and reporting of safety outcomes in MMR vaccine studies, both pre- and post-marketing, are largely inadequate. The evidence of adverse events following immunisation with MMR cannot be separated from its role in preventing the target diseases."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16235361
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22336803

Perhaps by some Orwellian sleight of hand "largely inadequate" for the professional has become "adequate" for the layman, but in my opinion being lulled to sleep by official truths is not being a good journalist.

To which Aaronovitch responded:

@John Stone You have a dog in this fight, John. Brian Deer's "allegations" as you call them concerned Wakefield's methods, his undeclared financial interest in single vaccinations and role as paid expert to anti-vaccination litigation, his doctoring of case histories and the ethics of his research on his subjects. And obscure the facts as much as you will, you cannot come up with credible evidence of an autism link to MMR, either correlative or causal. It would have been much better for those dealing with autism had this whole MMR farrago not distracted from the business of research into causes and help to parents.

For those who want it here is the link to Brian Deer's website…

MMR and the Crumbling Façade of the British State

Dr David Salisbury - Head of UK Immunisation in Victoria Towers Garden by the Palace of Westminster

By John Stone

Truth is a hard game and when people start admitting it you scarcely know where it might end. Today, the BBC and the United Kingdom Department of Health tacitly admitted that a key finding of the GMC hearing against doctors Wakefield, Walker-Smith and Murch was false, to wit that the Wakefield Lancet paper of 1998 was identical to a study commissioned by the Legal Aid Board: with that finding out of the way – dismissed as it was Mr Justice Mitting in the High Court in the appeal of Prof John Walker-Smith – then many of the other accusations against all three doctors crumble to dust.

 

This is the wording of the BBC report:

 Dr Wakefield's study considered whether there was a link between the three-in-one MMR vaccine and autism and bowel disease.

It focused on tests carried out on 12 children who had been referred to hospital for gastrointestinal problems.

Dr Wakefield was also paid to carry out another study at the same time to find out if parents who claimed their children were damaged by the MMR vaccine had a case. Some children were involved in both studies.

However,  this  study was not the abandoned  one that the GMC panel insisted on in its findings:

The Panel has heard that ethical approval had been sought and granted for other trials and it has been specifically suggested that Project 172-96 was never undertaken and that in fact, the Lancet 12 children’s investigations were clinically indicated and the research parts of those clinically justified investigations were covered by Project 162- 95. In the light of all the available evidence, the Panel rejected this proposition.

Obscenely, the GMC panel deliberated for three years over this falsehood and yet such is justice that it has only been over-turned in the case of one of the doctors. However, it really is time that the manufacturers of these official deceits started answering questions. For instance, why - if MMR was safe - were such disgusting perversions necessary to protect its reputation?

 John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

Britain Becomes a Closed Society

By John Stone

On Monday the three main British political parties came to an agreement to create a Royal Charter  for press regulation based on the recommendations of Lord Leveson,  which also hints at draconian powers over the internet which may extend across national borders. Inevitably, at the table in the small an hours of Sunday night was the shadowy lobby organisation Hacked Off, which had pretended to act as public watchdog  at the Leveson Inquiry while representing powerful global interests , meanwhile including as an adviser  the pharmaceutically aligned former Member of Parliament Dr Evan Harris, who collaborated with Brian Deer on his "MMR investigation" .  The implication of the charter in its draft form is that it may even attempt to control what is said about British concerns by British citizens on foreign websites, with the threat of legal retribution. The key clause comes in Schedule 4 (1b) (Page 21) :

“relevant publisher” means a person (other than a broadcaster) who publishes in the United Kingdom:

1. i.    a newspaper or magazine containing news-related material, or
2. ii.   a website containing news-related material (whether or not related to a newspaper or magazine)”

If this happened powers could plausibly be used to limit informed comment on such things as the vaccine programme and the causes of the autism epidemic  according to bureaucratic consensus, as we have already seen effectively happens in the British media for the most part without statutory controls, and as is also now being threatened in Australia.

At the inquiry Lord Leveson refused to allow evidence about the conduct of the Sunday Times MMR investigation but took care to hear evidence from the pharma funded PR guru Fiona Fox of Science Media Centre, and he later denounced Andrew Wakefield in his report, none of which was apparently in his original remit. Fox had chaired a Department of Business committee to determine the future of British scientific journalism which included Paul Nuki, who had hired Brian Deer to find “something big” on “MMR”,  and Martin Moore the boss of Hacked Off. Leveson and lead counsel to the inquiry, Robert Jay, also failed to disclose that they themselves had had an historical role in denying British MMR litigants a hearing.

The Daily Mail reported on Tuesday:

“The Royal Charter also states that it will cover 'news-related material' including current affairs news and information, opinion and 'gossip about celebrities, other public figures and other persons in the news'.

“Kirsty Hughes, the chief executive of Index on Censorship said: 'This will undoubtedly have a chilling effect on everyday people's web use,' she said.

'Bloggers could find themselves subject to exemplary damages, due to the fact that they were not part of a regulator that was not intended for them in the first place.'

Alex Spourdalakis and The Future

Update 3/13: Alex remains in the hospital with his mother.

Update 3/12. Alex's Mom Dorothy Spourdalakis has a care plan meeting scheduled at the hospital - which, if she does not agree fully to the terms, will mean the removal of her son from her care and his being placed in DCFS

Managing Editor's Note: This comment from our John Stone is well worth repeating here on the main site.

I don't think in the history of AoA any story has struck such a chord as this one. Here we see the catastrophic future of our children - created by modern medicine, and well beyond its capacity to deal with. If it hasn't happened to us or them yet it, it assuredly will. This is the future a greedy industry and sychophantic crony government officials have created for us and our children - the complete failure of human institutions. Hell on earth.

Or we can think of those children in Chad, blamed for their reaction to the WHO meningitis vaccine, and shipped off to die in the desert for the greater good...

HMS Brian Deer Holed Beneath the Waterline?

Part II Deer’s hideous revenge

By John Stone

On Friday AoA reported that the journal Nature had been persuaded to remove from its on-line news service derogatory and misleading remarks by Brian Deer about whistleblowing scientist Dr David Lewis. The remarks had stood since 9 November 2011, posted under Eugenie Samuel Reich’s report  of Lewis’s rebuttal of Deer’s allegations against Andrew Wakefield in the British Medical Journal. While BMJ had refused to publish most of Lewis’s article in any form the Reich article contained serious admissions by Deer and BMJ editor Fiona Godlee.

Now Deer has republished the letter on his own website headed ‘Reprint Nature.com’ (with logo)  but fails to mention that the journal itself has removed it. Other title headings which accompany the letter, in the best academic style, are ‘Response to crank attack by David L Lewis’  and  ‘Dr David L Lewis: you couldn’t make it up’ to which , perhaps, the only answer is ‘But you did, Brian, didn’t you?’

This is obviously cutting edge stuff in the brave new world of Oxford and BMJ’s ‘Evidence Based Medicine’ 

Down, down, down…

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

HMS Brian Deer holed beneath the waterline?

John Stone

On the ninth anniversary of the publication Brian Deer’s original allegations against Andrew Wakefield in the Sunday Times (22 February 2004) the journal Nature has been forced to remove derogatory and misleading comments from the web by Deer about whistleblowing scientist Dr David Lewis, which have stood since November 2011. Deer’s insinuations against Lewis were provoked by Lewis’s defence of the research integrity of Wakefield’s controversial paper ‘Ileal-lymphoid-nodular-hyperplasia, non-specific colitis and pervasive development disorder in children’  against the reformulated allegations of Brian Deer against Wakefield in BMJ in January 2011.  While the British MedicalJournal refused to publish Lewis’s report except in a highly censored format, it commenced the unravelling of Deer’s account, first of all with the report of Eugenie Samuel Reich in Nature, and then in 2012 with the High Court exoneration of  Wakefield's colleague Prof John Walker-Smith and the decision of University College London not to investigate the Wakefield affair further on the advice on the United Kingdom Research Integrity Office (UKRIO) . 

The removal follows on a letter – shortly to be published on-line  - from Dr Lewis’s attorney, F Edwin Hallman Jr, to British Medical Journal where a more elaborate version of Deer’s allegations appear. An earlier letter in a similar vein was written on behalf of Dr Lewis to by Stephen Kohn to La Crosse, University of Wisconsin, where Mr Deer was invited to give talks last October.

The question arises how much longer the British establishment can go on supporting Deer’s allegations? It is clear that they began to get cold feet before the General Medical Council hearing againstAndrew Wakefield and colleagues in 2005-6, taking their cue from an article Ben Goldacre in the Guardian newspaper, which was followed by editorials in the Independent, New Scientist, Spiked-online and BMJ calling for the prosecution to be called off , and that bad feeling has existed between Deer and Goldacre since . Now, what the present writer once dubbed “the Boseley problem” looms large:

“The almost unavoidable conclusion is that large sections of the British media have always known that the “Wakefield” prosecution was based on an imposture, and have been holding their silence in contempt of fair reporting and of the public at large, and that these people are much more concerned about their own backs than they are about our children”.

Brian Deer Fantasist: ‘Taking on the Establishment’

By John Stone

Brian Deer's forthcoming presentation at the BMJ/Oxford conference is entitled 'Taking on the establishment - investigative journalism'. In this regard it may be helpful in documenting just how fanciful this claim is to revisit my letter to BMJ published after a two week tussle with them in February 2010. And just to consider the great champion of the ordinary citizen against the over-powerful is still at top table in Oxford in 2013!

........................................

Trisha Greenhalgh's competing interests  

Prof Greenhalgh [1] does not disclose any competing interests. She has, however, contributed a controversial article [2,3] attacking the 1998 paper [4] to journalist Brian Deer's website. Although not disclosed here by Greenhalgh or in the accompanying article by Deer [5], Deer was named as a complainant against Andrew Wakefield in the High Court by Mr Justice Eady, who stated [6]:

"Well before the programme was broadcast [Mr Deer] had made a complaint to the GMC about the Claimant. His communications were made on 25 February, 12 March and 1 July 2004. In due course, on 27 August of the same year, the GMC sent the Claimant a letter notifying him of the information against him."

Since 2003 Greenhalgh has benefitted from more than £1.4m in research grants from the Department of Health [7]. When Deer's original allegations were published in the Sunday Times in February 2004 he was supported by the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, who told ITV [8]:

"There is absolutely no evidence to support this link between MMR and autism. If there was, I can assure you that any government would be looking at it and trying to act on it. I hope, now that people see that the situation is somewhat different to what they were led to believe, they will have the triple jab because it is important to do it."

and by Chief Medical Officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, who told the BBC [8]:

"I don't think that spin and science mix. If they are mixed, it is a very unfavourable position for children's health. Now a darker side of this work has shown through, with the ethical conduct of the research and this is something that has to be looked at."

and Jeremy Laurance reported in the Independent [9]:

"At the Department of Health, which has striven for the past six years to bolster public confidence in the vaccine, joy is unconfined at the discrediting of Andrew Wakefield, as the researcher responsible for the scare."

Meanwhile, Health Secretary John Reid asked the GMC to investigate [10].

I express concern that conflicts that go up to the highest ranks of government are still conflicts, that the government itself is not a disinterested player, and has not behaved like one. At the same time Prof Greenhalgh's research has benefitted hansomely from its largesse. I believe there should be an inquiry.

[1] Trisha Greenhalgh, Why did the Lancet take so long? BMJ 2010; 340: c644

BBC Admits Dark Side to Bill Gates’s Polio Project Ahead of Dimbelby Lecture

BBC forced to admit dark side to Bill Gates’s polio project ahead of lecture. (photo credit Reuters)

By John Stone

Ahead of tonight’s prestigious Dimbleby lecture by Bill Gates the BBC has been forced to acknowledge that there are serious concerns about the safety and usefulness of Gates’s polio  project. In an apparently upbeat article ‘The world can defeat polio’  the BBC’s Medical Correspondent, Fergus Walsh, slips in a reference to the work of Jacob Puliyel quote in AoA last week. The abstract to the paper by Vashisht and Puliyel in the Indian Journal of Medical Ethics states:

It was hoped that following polio eradication, immunisation could be stopped. However the synthesis of polio virus in 2002, made eradication impossible. It is argued that getting poor countries to expend their scarce resources on an impossible dream over the last 10 years was unethical. Furthermore, while India has been polio-free for a year, there has been a huge increase in non-polio acute flaccid paralysis (NPAFP). In 2011, there were an extra 47,500 new cases of NPAFP. Clinically indistinguishable from polio paralysis but twice as deadly, the incidence of NPAFP was directly proportional to doses of oral polio received. Though this data was collected within the polio surveillance system, it was not investigated. The principle of primum-non-nocere was violated. The authors suggest that the huge bill of US$ 8 billion spent on the programme, is a small sum to pay if the world learns to be wary of such vertical programmes in the future.

Clearly, what should occur is an open public debate about these issues rather than just taking the word of the world’s most successful salesperson. Last week Gates told the Daily Telegraph: “The golden rule that all lives have equal value and we should treat people as we would like to be treated.” But the reality is that the golden rule applies neither at the level of open debate (the opposition is shouted down) or the children horrifically injured in pursuit of alleged greater good. There is no indication that he is doing anything but continuing to act high handedly, and his words should be treated with as much suspicion as before.

See also: ‘Bill Gates Buying Immortality In History - By Beating An Already Beaten Disease - And Killing Kids’

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

Hi, Dr. Kalichman.

Doing "God's Work": is Bill Gates's Second Career Ethically Messier than his First?

By John Stone

Next week Bill Gates is to deliver the BBC’s annual Dimbleby lecture. In advance of this event Gates was profiled by a Daily Telegraph feature writer, Neil Tweedie. Unfortunately – like so many modern mainstream journalists – Mr Tweedie seems to have abandoned the task of balanced and informed reporting. He certainly shows no sign of responding to the letter I sent him three days ago. Thus it is Gates seems to be able to rely on a defeated and abject mainstream media to ignore or cover over the tracks of disaster.

Gates’s second career is in many ways very like his first: a matter of global conquest without too much finesse (everyone simply has to have his products) but this time the price in human terms is very high when it goes wrong. Here is my letter to Tweedie:

Dear Mr Tweedie,

You may not have known but on the day your interview with Bill Gates was published he was successfully negotiating for the exclusion of mercury containing paediatic vaccines from a UN global mercury ban, a matter which he omitted to mention and in which he has kept a low profile. Despite what his underlings or the British government say, all mercury is toxic and it is being administered to infants in toxic quantites. The use of these vaccines in the UK was phased out in 2004, either because the British government thought it politically unacceptable or because they tacitly knew they were doing damage. I have also written about it here .

Meanwhile, in regard to polio eradication I draw you attention to a paper by Vashisht and Puliyel in the Indian Journal of Medical Ethics sarcastically titled: "Polio programme: let us declare victory and move on" for which this is the abstract:

It was hoped that following polio eradication, immunisation could be stopped. However the synthesis of polio virus in 2002, made eradication impossible. It is argued that getting poor countries to expend their scarce resources on an impossible dream over the last 10 years was unethical. Furthermore, while India has been polio-free for a year, there has been a huge increase in non-polio acute flaccid paralysis (NPAFP). In 2011, there were an extra 47,500 new cases of NPAFP. Clinically indistinguishable from polio paralysis but twice as deadly, the incidence of NPAFP was directly proportional to doses of oral polio received. Though this data was collected within the polio surveillance system, it was not investigated. The principle of primum-non-nocere was violated. The authors suggest that the huge bill of US$ 8 billion spent on the programme, is a small sum to pay if the world learns to be wary of such vertical programmes in the future.

Also, the schedule which Gates, GAVI, the WHO and governments are implementing takes no account of the adverse synergistic effects of the combined vaccines. I attach  a copy of the paper by Aaby et al 'Vaccine programmes must their effect on general resistance' (BMJ. 2012 Jun 14;344:e3769. doi: 10.1136/bmj.e3769).

Daily Mail Publishes MMR Letter

A slightly edited but not toned-down version of a letter by Bill Welsh, President  of Autism Treatment Trust, Scotland was published in the Daily Mail hard edition on Friday (18 January 2013).  Age of Autism here reproduces the original text for its readers.

Sir,

 A payment of $600,000 in the USA as compensation for MMR vaccine damage leading to autism in a child (Daily Mail 15/1/13) follows a $1 million payout a few days earlier for the same tragic scenario. It is my understanding that up to 100 families in America have now been compensated in recognition of the neurological harm MMR can do, although, as part of the recompense, each family had to sign a 'confidentiality agreement'! There are many more USA cases awaiting a decision.

 Last year a small boy in Rimini was similarly compensated for the autism he developed following MMR. The Italian government did not challenge the court decision. Hundreds more cases are in the pipeline in Italy.

In the UK over 1,500 families entered litigation claiming MMR had led to autism in their child. Legal aid was suspiciously withdrawn and the parents were abandoned with their seriously ill children who had, and still have, known, painful, treatable co-morbid underlying medical conditions.

 What does this tell us of the mindset and morals of the guardians of public health in the UK?

 It tells us that the ancient Carthaginian policy of child sacrifice is alive and well and has full approval in the shadier corridors of  Whitehall. The promotion and protection of a deeply flawed vaccination programme has over-ruled common sense and common decency. To damage perfectly healthy children in a crude experiment is undoubtedly a criminal offence and must be treated as such. It is high time that our politicians realised that they, along with the citizens of the UK, have been misled about the safety of MMR.

Bill Welsh

"Not All Mercury Is Toxic" Desperate Throw in New Scientist to Prevent UN Ban

By John Stone

The remarkable claim that thimerosal is not toxic is found in the headline and text of an article in the New Scientist in a last ditch stand to prevent a UN ban on mercury in paediatric vaccines . The author, Dr Heidi Larson of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine states:

“ In 2006, an expert panel convened by the WHO issued a statement on thiomersal in vaccines, concluding that there was "no evidence of toxicity". It highlighted the fact that while methyl mercury builds up in the body, ethyl mercury is excreted rapidly. The American Academy of Pediatrics has since endorsed the WHO's position.”

She does not mention that her colleague at LSHTM, Prof Stephen Evans was on the World Health Organization committee (Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety)  which issued the statement in July 2006 and he and another LSHTM employee, Dr Punam Mangtani, presently still sit on it . Evans  previously worked for the UK Medicines Control Agency (now the MHRA ) which is an agency of the Department of Health  funded by the pharmaceutical industry. The current chair of GACVS  is Dr Melinda Wharton of the US Centers for Disease Control, National Immunization Program.

Dr Larson fails to mention either the LSHTM conflicts :

“The School has expanded greatly in recent years. Its research funding now exceeds £M60 per annum, much of it from highly competitive national and international sources such as the UK Research Councils, the Wellcome Trust, the UK Department for International Development, the UK Department of Health, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the European Commission.”

Or her personal ones:

“Dr. Larson previously headed Global Communication for Immunization at UNICEF and Chaired the Advocacy Task Force for the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI).”

She also runs from LSHTM the Vaccine Confidence Project which has as its partners: Brighton Collaboration; CDC; Chatham House; Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; GAVI Alliance; Health Map; Imperial College, London; The Inclen Trust; Institute for Child Health, Nigeria; International Pediatric Association; International Vaccine Institute; National Centre for Immunisation, Research Surveillance; National Network for Immunization Information; ProMed Mail; Public Health Foundation of India; Sabin Vaccine Institute; UNICEF; Vaccines for Africa; WHO. It is funded by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Also at LSHTM is the chair of the UK Joint Committee on Vaacination and Immunisation (JCVI),Prof Andrew Hall, which was granted dictatorial powers over the vaccine program by the English Parliament in 2009, although they did remove mercury from the UK vaccine schedule in 2004.

The claim that ethyl mercury is “excreted rapidly” is based on a study published in the Lancet by Pichichero et al   which was disproved by Burbacher et al in 2004  . Pichichero’s article failed to note the following conflicts disclosed in an earlier publication :

"The author has received research grants and/or honoraria from the following pharmaceutical companies: Abbott Laboratories, Inc.; Bristol Myers Squibb Company; Eli Lilly and Company; Merck&Co.; Pasteur Merieux Connaught; Pfizer Labs; Roche Laboratories; Roussel-Uclaf; Schering Corporation; Smith Kline Beecham Pharmaceuticals; Upjohn Company; Wyeth- Lederle."

Utter Froth: Autism Epidemic Caused by the Film Rain Man!

By John Stone

The remarkable claim that the autism epidemic is an artefact of the popularity of the film Rain Man is made by the developmental psychologist and autism expert Prof Uta Frith of University College, London in a recent BBC news item which purports to make fun of scientific myths created by the movies. Frith is known for coining the concept of "theory of mind" in relation to autism in 1985 in collaboration with Simon Baron-Cohen, and also holds a professorship at Aarhus University, home of Poul Thorsen. The film Rain Man, starring Dustin Hoffman, appeared in 1988. This is the relevant extract from the BBC news item:

Interviewer: “The film Rain Man was actually the turning point in the awareness of autism.”

Frith: “If you look at the kind of curves that you see about the prevalence of autism there was an apparent increase in prevalence but of course it is really an increase in awareness.”

1987-8 was indeed the period in which infants in the first wave of the autism epidemic in Britain and the United States were being born, but of course they would not have been diagnosed in 1988, and it seems preposterous that doctors and scientists (presumably including Prof Frith) would have been so influenced by a popular film (they certainly should not have been). In 1988, for instance, Prof Frith was 47 and had completed a PhD on autism twenty years before - where, then, are all the cases that she missed? The film is about a middle-aged man not about young children. I can find no papers on Pubmed discussing, let alone supporting, a Rain Man hypothesis. 

As it is this after dinner tittle-tattle will now be repeated as solemn gospel by people who “heard it on the BBC”. It looks more as if Prof Frith is trying to create myth here than destroy one.  Why would she do that? Perhaps she ought to consult her conscience about all the families desperately battling to obtain services for their children while professionals engage in whimsical and misleading fantasies about their historical predicament.

John Stone is UK Contributing Editor to Age of Autism.

The British Dimension - the WHO Mercury Cover-Up and the CDC

By John Stone

The World Health Organization’s policy on thimerosal and vaccines was confirmed in June 2002 on the basis of known to be false and flawed data in a British study sanctioned by the US Centers for Disease Control, subsequently included in the notorious Institute of Medicine  review of Thimerosal and MMR, and only finally published in PEDIATRICS, the Journal of the Academy of American Pediatrics in September 2004.  But it was known at the CDC before work on the paper began in 2001 that the data was unsuitable for reviewing the WHO program. It is essential to re-examine this matter in the light of the forthcoming UN decision over whether mercury should be retained in vaccines.

In 2001 the UK’s Sunday Times newspaper was taking an interest in the mercury content of vaccines, two years after the issue came to public light in the US. Against this background it reported on 17 June that the WHO would be launching an investigation into the safety of thimerosal (or thiomersal as it is called in the UK) led by epidemiologist  Elizabeth Miller, head of immunization at the UK’s Public Health Laboratory Service (which was subsequently absorbed into the allegedly independent Health Protection Agency). The report stated:

 “She will analyze records of 500 GP practices to check for a link between the use of vaccines that contain the preservative thiomersal — which is almost 50 percent mercury — and a range of neuro-developmental disorders which include autism.”

Responding to the newspaper all of a month later in what seems be a masterpiece of bureaucratic spin Miller wrote:

“Your articles, Autism linked to mercury vaccine' (May 27) and 'Inquiry launched into vaccine ‘link’ with autism' (June 17) implied that there has been increasing use of thiomersal-containing vaccines in the U.K. since 1988. In fact, the thiomersal content of vaccines given in the routine vaccination program has not increased over the past decade. The only vaccines for children used in the routine program that contain thiomersal are DPT (diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis ) and DT. Because of theoretical concerns that the small amount of mercury in thiomersal could be harmful, both European and United Kingdom regulators have recommended that manufacturers phase out its use wherever possible as a precaution.

“As a further precautionary measure, the Public Health Laboratory Service, on behalf of the World Health Organization, will be undertaking research into any negative effects of thiomersal-containing vaccines in the near future…”

On scrutiny this is  less than re-assuring. In the first place Miller lurches casually from “since 1988” to “the past decade”, which is actually “since 1991” (thus evading the accelerated DPT schedule introduced in 1990) and she is only talking about the routine programme, in a period when many parents split the vaccines, unwittingly exposing their children to even more mercury. She states that the only vaccines that contain thimerosal are DPT and DT but that is only in the present, rather than over the previous 13 years. She inaccurately and prejudicially states that the amount of mercury in thimerosal is “small” (actually, as already stated by the Sunday Times, 50% by weight) and the concern theoretical. None of which boded well for a bias free investigation.

Swept Aside: an Un-Published Submission to the Leveson Inquiry about Science Journalism

By  John Stone 

Age of Autism has been highlighting the mis-directed UK media abuse inquiry headed by Lord Justice Leveson. Ostensibly set up after public concerns about intrusive journalism and political cronyism the inquiry somehow concluded a fortnight ago with a further assault on the integrity of Andrew Wakefield – referred to as “a rogue scientist”  - and capitulation before industry lobbyist Fiona Fox of Science Media Centre (who isn’t a scientist at all). Age of Autism’s UK editor, John Stone, who was one of group of parents who initially submitted evidence to Leveson about the Brian Deer/Sunday Times MMR investigation – which Leveson refused to hear – submitted further evidence (published here for the first time) after Leveson chose to give room to Ms Fox last December. Although swiftly submitted this submission was also ignored by the judge, just as he was subsequently to ignore the fact that Wakefield’s colleague Prof John Walker-Smith was fully exonerated in the High Court, knocking on the head a host of the Sunday Times’s allegations.

Various matters are not mentioned in the submission, either for diplomatic reasons, or because at the time they had not come to light.  There is no mention of the fact that both Leveson and the inquiry’s lead attorney, Robert Jay, had already been instrumental in denying MMR litigants a hearing. Nor the fact that Fox had been appointed by the UK’s Department of Business to head a committee to advise on the future of science journalism which included the editor who hired Deer at the Sunday Times, Paul Nuki,  and the boss of Hacked Off, the self-appointed guard-dog organisation to the Leveson Inquiry, Martin Moore. In effect Leveson has endorsed and sanctioned a situation in which scientific issues can be manipulated for the benefit of the powerful against the public interest – and while the position is already dire we are now faced by the possibility of this being enforced by legislation and a newly created arm of government. The danger, however, was pointed out to the judge a year ago, and he ploughed on regardless.

Evidence to the Leveson Inquiry on MMR and the behaviour of the “science” lobby, including journalist Ben Goldacre, former MP Dr Evan Harris and Fiona Fox of Science Media Centre.

John Stone

Dr Goldacre’s ‘Bad Science’ column began in the Guardian in 2003 and he rapidly rose to prominence receiving the Association of British Science Writer’s award for that year for an article on the MMR issue ‘MMR: Never mind the facts’. It may be noted that the ABSW awards were at the time sponsored by MMR manufacturers and defendants GlaxoSmithKline [1]. It was also not disclosed at any time, though Dr Goldacre’s column dealt heavily in issues of epidemiology and public health policy that his father, Michael Goldacre, was a professor public health at Oxford and a leading government epidemiologist [2, 3, 4] whose work had included papers on MMR (notably GSK’s Pluserix vaccine after it was withdrawn by the manufacturers in 1992) [5].  In the case of Pluserix it should also be taken into consideration that the NHS had apparently indemnified the manufacturers for the use of what was known to be a faulty vaccine (already being removed from use in Canada in 1988 and its license revoked there in 1990) [6, 7]. Despite the growing public celebrity of the younger Goldacre, and the professional prominence of the older, no authoritative information for their familial relationship came to light before 2009, although it is the sort of matter that might normally be in the area of public comment.

Prof Steven Salzberg and the Congressional Autism Hearing: Why Can’t He Answer or Correct

By John Stone

One of the few public responses to the Congressional hearing into autism by a vaccine programme advocate was from Steven Salzberg, professor of medicine and biostatistics at Johns Hopkins University Medical School on Forbes.com. While Prof Salzberg’s blog was open to comment he has unfortunately not only ignored serious criticism but most disturbingly - for a senior scientist and academic - correction of basic facts.  Here are a few points, some taken or adapted from my comments.

(1)    Salzberg criticises Congressman Burton:

“Bang bang, two false claims in 10 seconds. First he claims that mercury from vaccines “accumulates in the brain”, a statement with no scientific support at all … Unfortunately, some quack doctors have experimented with chelation therapy on autistic children, despite that fact that it can cause deadly liver and kidney damage, and one of them caused the death of a 5-year-old boy in 2005.”

However, Burton had presumably read the Burbacher paper (NIH funded). Here is and extract:

““There was a much higher proportion of inorganic Hg in the brain of thimerosal monkeys than in the brains of MeHg monkeys (up to 71% vs. 10%). Absolute inorganic Hg concentrations in the brains of the thimerosal-exposed monkeys were approximately twice that of the MeHg monkeys. Interestingly, the inorganic fraction in the kidneys of the same cohort of monkeys was also significantly higher after im thimerosal than after oral MeHg exposure (0.71 ± 0.04 vs. 0.40 ± 0.03). This suggests that the dealkylation of ethylmercury is much more extensive than that of MeHg.”

We really have to ask whether Salzberg can truthfully state that there is “no scientific support at all”. Here, by the way, is a two part list of 90 peer review studies condemning the safety of thimerosal.

Salzberg is also deeply misleading or worse regarding chelation and autism citing a 2005 case and a contemporary report . Subsequent to that report it transpired that the child had been administered with the wrong chelating agent and this was not in any way representative of chelation therapy for autism (and in seven years there are no more cases he can cite). A senior academic ought to know better than to cite an out-of-date and provisional journalistic report, when a later one would have given a different story. He has taken no steps to correct his article in either respect.

(2)

Salzberg then goes on to refer to Andrew Wakefield’s Lancet 1998 paper as “fraudulent” failing to acknowledge that earlier this year an English High Court judge exonerated Wakefield’s senior co-author, Prof John Walker-Smith. Re-examining the GMC finding he could not find evidence of misreporting, no evidence that the investigations were inappropriate (i.e. the children were genuinely sick) or unauthorised, or that the paper had been commissioned by the UK’s Legal Aid Board, and this was uncontested by the GMC. It remains anomalous that charges against Walker-Smith’s colleagues Wakefield and Simon Murch have not been reversed on these matters but then we are dealing with corrupt and politicised institutions.

(3)

UK Leveson Inquiry Authorises Government/Pharmaceutical Power Grab Over MMR

By John Stone

As predicted on Age of Autism Lord Justice Leveson has used the inquiry initiated to investigate press abuse of ordinary citizens to authorise a power grab for government bureaucrats and industry lobbyists over science reporting    – a piece of misdirection if ever there was one. Notably, in his 2000 page report, he has endorsed the concerns of pharmaceutical public relations expert Fiona Fox of Science Media Centre, who was hired by the UK Department of Business to chair a committee to direct the future of science journalism in the UK. SMC is funded by vaccine manufacturers. Present on the Department of Business committee were both  Paul Nuki who was the editor at the Sunday Times that hired journalist Brian Deer to investigate Andrew Wakefield and Martin Moore chair of Hacked Off  , the self-appointed public watchdog to the Leveson Inquiry who blocked vaccine damage families’ concerns about Deer’s investigation, and refused to answer questions about Hacked Off’s advisor, politician Dr Evan Harris, who collaborated in the Deer’s initial investigation   – a matter of public record which Harris preposterously later denied in a public statement through Hacked Off .

Meanwhile, Leveson himself blocked heavily documented complaints from families about the Deer-Sunday Times investigation not disclosing that  both he, Leveson, and the inquiry’s lead attorney, Robert Jay, had taken part in closed hearings to withdraw public funding from the MMR litigation. Leveson had endorsed the decision of Mr Justice Davis (now Lord Justice Davis) who at the time failed to disclose that his brother Crispin was both proprietor of the Lancet and a recently appointed director of defendant MMR manufacturer GSK. Jay had taken part in the Davis hearing (which was also closed) as the representative of the Legal Services Commission, which had withdrawn the funding. Another issue of complaint which Leveson refused to hear was that the Sunday Times re-launched Deer’s attack on Wakefield’s integrity within days of the paper’s boss, James Murdoch, being appointed to the board of GSK with a brief to defend the group’s reputation.

Lord Leveson’s Inquiry: Trashing Ordinary People

The UK’s Leveson Inquiry into media abuse reports on Thursday.

By John Stone

One of my memories of the UK’s Leveson Inquiry, the hearings of which could be viewed on the web, was of the good lord grumbling that people kept on trying to raise issues which had nothing to do with his remit. The inquiry, it will be recalled, was sparked the excesses particularly of Murdoch group newspapers, and involved horrific intrusions into the lives of ordinary people, and political cronyism. It is unclear why Leveson chose to ignore the plight of one set of ordinary families whose lives were invaded by a particular journalist, and who were in a legal battle to get compensation for children damaged by MMR vaccine, although it transpired that Leveson and his lead attorney, Robert Jay, had both taken part in MMR litigation hearings, the substance of which remain secret. Nor is it clear why he chose to hear the evidence of Fiona Fox, of Science Media Centre, which is funded by MMR vaccine manufacturers and has not been the victim of vile invasive journalism. You might think that that had nothing to do with his remit.

The events that led up to the hearing, the trashing of ordinary lives, the political cronyism that extended into the Prime Minister’s household, were the ostensible reasons for the inquiry, not the huge vested interest within industry and the state that would be damaged if the trashing of selected ordinary people was not allowed to continue. Before the inquiry did anyone here the cry of misery from GSK, Merck and Sanofi, Dr David Salisbury or the Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA)? Was this why it was convened?  And yet in the person of Fox and Tony Blair’s public relation’s guru, Alistair Campbell, they had their place at the table – God forbid anyone should be allowed to question the safety of their products, and woe-betide anyone who succeeds! Let nothing interfere in such instances with media lynch party. Tally ho!

The Charade of Hacked Off

By John Stone

Last week the Daily Mail went to town exposing the web of interests surrounding the UK’s Leveson Inquiry into media abuse: a network of interests so tangled that it took seven articles to describe . In particular it highlighted the role of senior advisor to the inquiry Sir David Bell who was also founder of Media Standards Trust, which spawned Hacked Off, the self-appointed public watch-dog to the inquiry. The Mail offensive was ridiculed by the Guardian, on the basis that there was no reason why all these people should not know each other and that for the most part the associations were not hidden. Plainly the Mail is very bothered by the shadow of a government body regulating media, but they ought to have looked harder at the function of Hacked Off.

Age of Autism’s experiences with approaching Hacked Off illustrates the dangers of all these incestuous relationships. Supposedly Hacked Off is there to hold the Leveson Inquiry to account, but what happens – as in our case – if the lobby organisation and the inquiry work together to bury our complaint about Brian Deer and the Sunday Times MMR investigation, which did so much to alter public perceptions of the vaccine. As we showed in our extensive reports both Lord Leveson and the inquiry’s lead attorney, Robert Jay, had previously been involved in denying MMR litigants’ claims. Meanwhile, a prominent adviser to Hacked Off was Evan Harris who had collaborated with Brian Deer on his original allegations against Andrew Wakefield. Harris, under pressure from AoA tried to distance himself from Deer, but the documentary record tells a completely different story.

And then it turned out that the boss of Media Standards Trust and Hacked Off, Martin Moore, sat on Department of Business committee to plot the future of science journalism with the Sunday Times editor who hired Brian Deer to investigate Andrew Wakefield, Paul Nuki who now runs the UK National Health Service’s main website and who was the son of a member Committee on Safety in Medicines when MMR was licensed (including GSK’s Pluserix, which was known at the time to be unsafe, and later was withdrawn in great haste by the manufacturer). Moreover, the chair of the committee was Fiona Fox whose Science Media Centre is funded by vaccine manufacturers, and who gave evidence against early press handling of the MMR affair at the hearing.

One thing that is exceedingly likely to happen is that inquiry will make recommendations about the reporting of vaccine safety concerns which had absolutely nothing to do with its original terms of reference. On the other hand it also looks all too likely that the great British government bureaucracy was on their guard about the MMR cover-up before the inquiry was ever announced, and was working flat out on what to do about it.

It was sickening to read today that Hacked Off was organising a meeting in preparation for the publication of Lord Leveson’s report  before the end of the month between prominent victims of media abuse and party leaders, not of course because they are all undeserving cases but because they are being manipulated by people who most likely have quite different hidden agendas, and possibly do not care about anything much but the next free lunch.  Apparently, when it comes to the vaccine programme it is alright to lie and distort, and to block anyone ever reporting the truth. It is a very interesting question what kind of public policy it is which needs that kind of protection.

UK's Leveson Inquiry

Note: We revisit John Stone's post from last June regarding the Leveson Inquiry in light of the Daily Mail articles this week: 

Leveson Inquiry has momentous implications for free speech. But Mail dossier raises disturbing questions about the influence of 'people who know best and  Disturbing questions over Leveson's key adviser: Special Investigation into a central figure in the McAlpine scandal and judicial inquiry into the press

UK's Leveson Inquiry plays cat and mouse with public interest over the Murdoch press investigation into MMR

By John Stone

When it comes to the MMR affair the UK’s inquiry into the conduct of the press and Rupert Murdoch’s News International media empire seems to have been biased, have hidden historical connections and to be anything but transparent. Four family members of vaccine damaged children who submitted evidence to the Inquiry have found themselves arbitrarily rebuffed at News International’s behest. Their concerns, based on publically available information, were:

-    The obtaining of confidential medical records by Sunday Times hired journalist Brian Deer  

-    Deer’s use of an alias when interviewing parents   and  Brian Deer's Use of an Alias Part 2,  

-    The circumstances in which Deer was hired by the Sunday Times to find something “big” on “MMR”   , Open Letter to Sunday Times Editor 

-    That Deer and the Sunday Times did not make clear in the newspaper that he had personally initiated the prosecution against Wakefield and colleagues with a series of complaints whilst continuing to report the GMC hearing  

-    That Deer received advice from MedicoLegal Investigations, an agency with close connections to the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry  

-    That the Sunday Times/Times launched a new raft of articles  against Wakefield following the announcement of the appointment of News International boss, James Murdoch, to the board of MMR manufacturers and defendants GlaxoSmithKline in February 2009  

Faced with these important issues the Leveson Inquiry has simply chosen to draw a veil over the matter, while happily taking evidence that the press abused its role by reporting concerns about MMR safety in the first place. It is a remarkable and unhappy coincidence, therefore, that Lord Leveson  and lead attorney for the Inquiry, Robert Jay QC ,  were both involved in blocking litigant families’ interests in the MMR proceedings.

Below is the joint statement of the four co-authors of the submission (which cannot be reproduced for reasons of confidentiality):

A key question of the UK Leveson Inquiry into press ethics is how independent will the inquiry be in the face of powerful press corporations such as News International and their media outlets. Set up last summer after revelations of a decade of phone hacking by the press, the Inquiry into the Culture, Practice and Ethics of the Press, chaired by Lord Justice Leveson, has come to be seen as a potential solution to unbridled press powers to intrude into private life. Whether it succeeds in establishing a new system of press regulation and legal rights against intrusion must await the publication of Leveson's report later this year. But our experience as four parents of autistic children who submitted a detailed account of the Sunday Times’ 7-year investigation into the 1998 Lancet paper by Dr Andrew Wakefield et al, demonstrates NI’s continuing power to influence the evidence submitted to the Inquiry and its agenda.

Another Tale of the Corrupt and Bungling BBC

By John Stone

The BBC is convulsed by the fall out of the scandal of Jimmy Savile , the DJ who died last year having been sheltered by the corporation and others for 50 years from serial sex abuse accusations. The Newsnight program which expediently shelved its report on Savile not to interfere with the hagiographic programs about him scheduled for last Christmas, has now blundered with a follow up report which wrongly implicated Conservative Party grandee, Lord MacAlpine, in the age old North Wales children’s home sex abuse case. BBC Director-General George Entwistle  has been forced to resign while the Chairman, Lord Patten (who is himself under threat) remarked “If trust goes it’s over”.  For a long time the BBC has been riddled with agendas while truth has taken a back seat. It is therefore no surprise that they make corrupt decisions or bungle reports, it is just that on this occasion they have been caught out.

Against this background Age of Autism re-publishes John Stone’s review of the BBC Trustees response to his complaint about the ‘Science Betrayed’ radio program last year ‘BBC Trustees Stand By Groundless Insinuations Against Andrew Wakefield in Radio 4 'Science Betrayed ' Programme’. We believe that the program and the response of the BBC hierarchy is demonstrative of the BBC’s arrogant culture and its utter contempt for truth.

The decision of the BBC's Editorial Standards Committee - whose six members are also Corporation trustees - fails to take account of emerging facts, and hides behind Brian Deer's flawed and logically untenable account of events. We publish UK Editor John Stone's final submission to the committee.

I am responding to the document from Part 4... It is important to note that Mr Deer’s claims have unravelled very substantially in the past 5 weeks as the result of a report on Nature News, and further correspondence in BMJ Rapid Responses including statements made by the BBC’s expert advisor on this complaint, Prof Ingvar Bjarnason, by BMJ editor Fiona Godlee, by Brian Deer himself and by Dr Amar P Dhillon, the senior histopathologist co-author of the Lancet paper. These events demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt the original recklessness and unfairness of the programme in March.

Point 1

I note that progress with the University College London Inquiry stalled after the programme, a source of frustration to the editor of the BMJ at least, who complained to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee [1].

The Crumbling British Establishment, the Savile Affair, MMR and Criminal Negligence.

By John Stone

I was recently taken to task by the redoubtable drag artist, often thought to be the alter ego of Brian Deer, Becky Fisher for alluding to the Savile affair in the context of religious exemptions against vaccination. For those who have not heard the story, Jimmy Savile was a BBC disc jockey who became a national institution, raised millions for charity, received a knighthood and last year was accorded a public funeral which was perhaps the grandest since that of the Queen Mother. But all his public acts of goodness were really just a mask for sexually abusing vulnerable people of both sexes: children, the sick, the disabled, the institutionalised, even according to some accounts the dead, while he remained protected and possibly assisted for more than 50 years by the great and the powerful - with no one able to say a word against him. I was making a point about conscientious objection: that ultimately our religions do not call on us to accept everything the state throws at us. It is also a salutary reminder of how easily ordinary people can become the victims of the powerful, and are left without a voice.

But there is another parallel between the Savile affair and MMR. It was under the watch of Secretary of State for Health, Ken Clarke, that in 1988 Savile was given the keys and unlimited access to the criminal mental asylum, Broadmoor  (Clarke, who is still a government minister, and until very recently Justice Secretary). It was also under Clarke’s ministry that indemnities were signed by the National Health Service for GSK’s Pluserix MMR vaccine against advice from Canada that it was already causing harm.

This was not the only bad thing going on in the Department of Health at the time. For instance, there was the Camelford water incident in which the Department of Health has maintained for decades that the population were not injured by water heavily contaminated with aluminium sulphate. In 2005 a Mrs Elizabeth J Sigmund wrote to British Medical Journal:

“In late July 1988 I made contact with a senior toxicologist at the DoH, Dr G K Matthew. We spoke many times: he told me that he had attended committee meetings about the Lowermoor acid water incident and had urged the department to send an expert team to North Cornwall to gather samples of the water and other relevant data, and to make clinical assessments of the health of the people. His words to me were: “I am constantly being overruled”.

Enduring Memories: Prof John Walker-Smith recalls his life and the Wakefield affair.

Note: Enduring Memories, Prof. Walker-Smith's memoir, is now available in the UK at The Village Bookshop.

By John Stone

‘Looking back I am astonished that I was able to study as many as 116 child autopsies during the period 10 October 1967 to 11 August 1969. That so many children should have died in a children’s hospital during this period of one year ten months shows how much we have advanced during the following thirty years. During my last five years at the Royal Free not one child died of a gastroenterological cause.’ [John Walker-Smith, Enduring Memories, 2nd edition 2012,  p. 113]

The corollary of this arresting statement was not only did John Walker-Smith live through those years he was at the very centre of the developments that enabled so many lives to be saved. It is an even more remarkable achievement when you consider that during those last five years Walker-Smith’s department was a place of tertiary referral and that many of the most intractable cases in the country would have been referred on to his department. As we know, in one of the most shameful episodes in modern British history (the nearest comparison being the mysterious death of David Kelly), and with the connivance of the medical and political establishment, within four years of  his retirement the department dismembered, his name publicly tarnished while a journalist with no medical qualifications – and a political agenda   - made accusations in a national newspaper, meanwhile accessing children’s private medical records with state connivance.

Best of AofA: What's Behind Ben Goldacre?

(Reprinted from August, 2010)

By John Stone

After years of secrecy on the matter confirmation has finally come to light that Guardian ‘Bad Science’ journalist Ben Goldacre is the son of Oxford professor of public health  Michael  J Goldacre (HERE). Prof Goldacre has been director since 1986 of the UK Department Health funded Unit of Healthcare Epidemiology (HERE).  The family relationship is mentioned in a review of Goldacre junior’s Bad Science book in the peer-review journal Medicine, Conflict and Survival  (25, p.255-7, 2009)by Dr Ian Fairlie, but there has been a long term lack of candour about the matter. While the reasons for the secrecy remain unknown it is possible that if the relationship, which has never before been mentioned in the mainstream media or scientific publications, had been common knowledge it might have raised questions about the independence of the younger Goldacre’s views.  Goldacre senior was a co-author of a study of the effects of GlaxoSmithKline’s notorious Urabe strain version of MMR, Pluserix, after it was suddenly withdrawn from public use in 1992 (HERE): the Unit has produced several MMR related studies.

Ben Goldacre’s column which started in 2003 has featured his largely epidemiological approach to health issues, most prominently MMR and autism. Coming apparently from nowhere, journalistically speaking, he was promoted to the role of an “opinion leader” from the outset. His early article MMR: Never mind the facts won the accolade of the GlaxoSmithKline sponsored Association of British Science Writers’ award for the best feature article of 2003.
 
The article, however, used flawed epidemiology for which he later offered no defence (HERE), as well as including an anonymous attack on Andrew Wakefield by one of Wakefield’s colleagues. This was just the first of several notable interventions Ben Goldacre in the MMR affair. A stock-in-trade has been his generalised attacks on parents of MMR damaged children. His Bad Science blogsite for a long time offered this intimidatory advice to would-be contributors:

“..personal anecdotes about your MMR tragedy will be deleted for your own safety”
(HERE)

A fundamental of Ben Goldacre’s journalistic method is the ad hominem and he always talks across opponents: he can always depend on the greater prominence of his published views and he never answers the many awkward criticisms.

The Goldacre dynasty seem to be one of several with on-going connections with the MMR affair:

• *Dr Evan Harris, the former MP, who accompanied Brian Deer to make accusations against Andrew Wakefield and colleagues, and led a debate under privilege in the House of Commons making further allegations of unethical practices (HERE) is the son of paediatrician Prof Frank Harris who sat on the Committee on Safety in Medicines and the adverse reactions to vaccine committee ARVI in the early 1990s when Pluserix MMR vaccine had to be withdrawn (HERE) , (HERE) , (HERE).

University College London Pulls out of Holding an Inquiry into the Wakefield Affair

By John Stone

Eighteen months after University College London, the parent institution of the Royal Free Hospital, announced their intention of holding an inquiry into the “Wakefield affair” in a controversial BBC radio documentary they have finally backed down according to a report by Zosia Kmietowicz in British Medical Journal. The decision represents a particular defeat for BMJ and its editor Fiona Godlee, who had been pressing for the inquiry after long delays in setting up. At one point Godlee – in November 2011 - appealed in vain to the UK House of Commons and Science and Technology Committee to take over from UCL, but UCL insisted that a chairperson would be appointed and terms of reference published by the end of the year. This never happened.

Now Kmietowicz reports:

“In a paper on the development of its new framework, UCL said that after taking advice from the UK Research Integrity Office and “a senior legal figure” it concluded that “the net result [from an investigation] would likely be an incomplete set of evidence and an inconclusive process costing a substantial sum of money.”

However, she fails to mention that this follows the complete exoneration of John Walker-Smith, the senior author and clinician in the 1998 Wakefield-Lancet paper, in the English High Court earlier this year. Sir John Mitting threw out all the findings of the General Medical Council against Walker-Smith hearing where he had stood accused with Andrew Wakefield and Simon Murch – while Murch as the more junior clinician had been allowed to resume his career after the three year hearing, Wakefield was not funded as Walker-Smith had been to pursue his appeal, and it presently lies in abeyance. The charges against all three were entirely based on accusations by journalist Brian Deer whom the Sunday Times had originally sent on a fishing expedition against Wakefield.

Harry’s Inquest Book: the Death of Harry Horne-Roberts

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                By John Stone

Readers of Age of Autism have followed this tragic story since Harry’s death two and a half years ago. Now his parents, Jennifer (Jennie) Horne-Robert and Keith Roberts, have published a second e-book documenting his life and tragic death . Frustratingly, the long prepared inquest recorded but failed to acknowledge the terrible consequences of the inappropriately prescribed medication – notably the sixty year-old anti-psychotic drug chlorpromazine - which was administered behind the backs of Keith and Jennie, and which was known to induce weight-gain.

Many issues remain officially unaddressed: the coroner himself chose to highlight the lack of an exercise regime, but did not ask how such a drug came to be prescribed to a young man who already had weight problems, whether it was a remotely appropriate prescription for someone on the autistic spectrum and the failure of professionals to communicate with the parents. It is evident also that given Harry’s weight an exercise regime might in itself have been highly problematic. The book chronicles and documents these appalling events in detail, leaving disturbing questions about the functions of the British state, and the future of our children.

Jennie and Keith’s earlier book ‘Harry’s Story’ can also be read on-line  . See also ‘Remembering Harry: The Life and Pharmaceutical Death of Young Artist’  .

 

UK's Leveson Plays Cat and Mouse with Public Interest Over Murdoch MMR Investigation

UK's Leveson Inquiry plays cat and mouse with public interest over the Murdoch press investigation into MMR

By John Stone

When it comes to the MMR affair the UK’s inquiry into the conduct of the press and Rupert Murdoch’s News International media empire seems to have been biased, have hidden historical connections and to be anything but transparent. Four family members of vaccine damaged children who submitted evidence to the Inquiry have found themselves arbitrarily rebuffed at News International’s behest. Their concerns, based on publically available information, were:

-    The obtaining of confidential medical records by Sunday Times hired journalist Brian Deer  

-    Deer’s use of an alias when interviewing parents   and  Brian Deer's Use of an Alias Part 2,  

-    The circumstances in which Deer was hired by the Sunday Times to find something “big” on “MMR”   , Open Letter to Sunday Times Editor 

-    That Deer and the Sunday Times did not make clear in the newspaper that he had personally initiated the prosecution against Wakefield and colleagues with a series of complaints whilst continuing to report the GMC hearing  

-    That Deer received advice from MedicoLegal Investigations, an agency with close connections to the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry 

-    That the Sunday Times/Times launched a new raft of articles  against Wakefield following the announcement of the appointment of News International boss, James Murdoch, to the board of MMR manufacturers and defendants GlaxoSmithKline in February 2009 

Faced with these important issues the Leveson Inquiry has simply chosen to draw a veil over the matter, while happily taking evidence that the press abused its role by reporting concerns about MMR safety in the first place. It is a remarkable and unhappy coincidence, therefore, that Lord Leveson and lead attorney for the Inquiry, Robert Jay QC , were both involved in blocking litigant families’ interests in the MMR proceedings.

Below is the joint statement of the four co-authors of the submission (which cannot be reproduced for reasons of confidentiality):

A key question of the UK Leveson Inquiry into press ethics is how independent will the inquiry be in the face of powerful press corporations such as News International and their media outlets. Set up last summer after revelations of a decade of phone hacking by the press, the Inquiry into the Culture, Practice and Ethics of the Press, chaired by Lord Justice Leveson, has come to be seen as a potential solution to unbridled press powers to intrude into private life. Whether it succeeds in establishing a new system of press regulation and legal rights against intrusion must await the publication of Leveson's report later this year. But our experience as four parents of autistic children who submitted a detailed account of the Sunday Times’ 7-year investigation into the 1998 Lancet paper by Dr Andrew Wakefield et al, demonstrates NI’s continuing power to influence the evidence submitted to the Inquiry and its agenda.

The UK’s National Autistic Society at 50: What it Must Do Next

By John Stone

On Thursday I had a curious telephone call. A voice I recognised as a fund raiser for the National Autistic Society explained that the society was celebrating its 50^th birthday and they were ringing people who had contributed to the autism community to thank them for everything they have done.  I suppose in my case this was attempting to do everything they were not , although whether this was the reason for the call or more my lapsed subscription is a matter of speculation: at any rate I was not invited to SamCam’s party for the society at No 10. For me this occurrence had a melancholy quality. I do not feel quite the same way about the society as I do about Autism Speaks (which seems to me a completely rapacious organisation). Indeed, these days I feel more sad than angry, though oddly in the years when I felt angry I was still giving them a subscription.

So, I would like to begin by paying tribute to the NAS for its genuine political achievement of the last decade, the Autism Act of 2009 which has done something in the nick of time to protect the many thousands of young adults, including  my own son, who are now pouring out of the school system.  To accommodate this new reality there had apparently to be maintained the official line that autism had always existed in the population at similar levels, and this for the last 12 years – since I started to try and draw attention to the rise in autism - has been the source of a certain bitterness. But it is also evident, as officers of the society have explained to me in so many words at different times, that the society’s advocacy of autism issues is limited by government policy. This perhaps is ‘realpolitik’. There certainly was a time when the big charities in the UK were prepared to stand up against government, but these days they are more like QANGOs, lobby organisations which may press the needs of their communities, but only within a politically safe line.

To my mind there is one honourable thing that the society needs to do to protect the welfare of the autistic community and this is to acknowledge once again that autistic people often need help with gastro-intestinal problems. Prior to the hearing against Wakefield and colleagues the society had the great wisdom to put out a statement (which I am sure was not widely heeded):

“The National Autistic Society (NAS) is keenly aware of the concerns of parents surrounding suggested links between autism and the MMR vaccine. The charity is concerned that the GMC hearing, and surrounding media coverage, will create further confusion and make it even more difficult for parents to access appropriate medical advice for their children.

“It is particularly important that this case is not allowed to increase the lack of sympathy that some parents of children with autism have encountered from health professionals, particularly on suspected gut and bowel problems. Parents have reported to the NAS that in some cases their concerns have been dismissed as hysteria following previous publicity around the MMR vaccine. It is crucial that health professionals listen to parents' concerns and respect their views as the experts on their individual children.

Jon Edwards Video Trailer: A Story of Hope and Autism

By John Stone

Following the exoneration of John Walker-Smith in the High Court in March I wrote to the Lancet’s editor, Richard Horton, pleading with him to re-instate the Wakefield 1998 paper in the interests of children in the UK being denied medical investigation and treatment following the witch-hunt against Wakefield and colleagues both in the Sunday Times, and latterly British Medical Journal. Horton replied lamely:

“Dear Mr Stone - I would be horrified if doctors did not take the symptoms of any child seriously. So I sincerely hope that a child with symptoms of autism would be examined and investigated with care and sensitivity.

“My Best, Richard Horton”

(Email, 15 March 2012, 10.07pm)

To which I fired back:

“That is why you should re-instate the paper. It has become ideologically taboo in this country to accept that there is a real problem. The GMC tried to make out that the cases were fabricated and that gastro symptoms were only superficial, and the judge decided that they only selected the evidence which suited them. But for years members of the medical profession have been terrified to follow in their footsteps, and really based on the words of Mr Deer, Evan Harris, Tony Blair and Liam Donaldson. Two of these people may have been doctors of a sort but none of them had the knowledge, the ethical probity or the kindness of John Walker-Smith.”

And answer came there none: Dr Horton may or may not be “horrified”, but so far he is not prepared to do anything about it. As Martin Hewitt pointed out here last week there is not now the faintest scientific or legal reason not to re-instate the paper. But unfortunately this not only a matter of historical fairness. As the case of Jon Edwards – highlighted in a new film from Autism Team – makes abundantly clear, until our political class and medical establishment address their bad consciences nothing for these children is going to happen in the United Kingdom.

This is the trailer for the film about Jon Edwards ‘Changing Lives’. That's Jon's Mum in the photo above holding up one of the adults sized nappies he wore until.... Watch the trailer.

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism. Dr Horton's email address is richard.horton@lancet.com

BMJ's Godlee Swears She Did Not Know Wakefield Lived in Texas In Face of Documentary Evidence

'On Thursday 12 April 2012 British Medical Journal's appeal against Andrew Wakefield's libel suit being heard in Texas goes before Travis County Court in Austin. John Stone, AoA's UK editor, reports on developments in the case.'  You can donate to the Andrew Wakefield Justice fund HERE.

BMJ editor Fiona Godlee swears that she and her colleagues did not know that Andrew Wakefield lived in Texas, in the face of documentary evidence.

By John Stone

In an attempt by British Medical Journal to wrest Andrew Wakefield’s libel case from the jurisdiction of a Texas court its editor Fiona Godlee has denied ‘under penalty of perjury’ that she and her colleagues were ever aware that Wakefield resided in Texas, despite numerous references in the journal to this fact since 2005. The declaration which was made to the court twice, first on 28 February 2012 and then on 5 April, coincided on the second occasion with the presentation by Wakefield’s lawyers of annotated evidence that the fact had often been reported by the journal. This claim must cast doubt on Godlee’s competence and reliability as a witness. It follows her remarkable claim last year, at a meeting of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, that she did not know that BMJ’s business partners Merck and GSK were manufacturers of MMR vaccine . It also follows the revelation last month that BMJ had not had the article by Brian Deer – on which its claims of fraud against Wakefield were based – externally peer reviewed, as claimed at the time of publication, (See BMJ HERE.)

The wording of Godlee’s twice made declaration is as follows:

‘Indeed, to the best of my recollection, even though I was aware that the Plaintiff had relocated  to the United States, I do not believe that I knew that the Plaintiff was a Texas resident at the time of these publications, and I am not aware of anyone else at BMJ publishing group who knew the Plaintiff was a Texas resident.

‘I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct.’

Meanwhile, an affidavit (paras 28-38) from Wakefield’s lawyers (signed John D Saba)  lists references by the journal going back six and a half years:

Clare Dyer on-line 10 November 2005  ‘High Court judge criticises Andrew Wakefield for trying to silence his critics’ quote:

“Dr Wakefield, who now works in Austin, Texas…”

Owen Dyer on-line 12 July 2007  [print version 17 July] ‘GMC hearing against Wakefield opens’ quote:

“Dr Wakefield, now lives in Austin, Texas…”

Owen Dyer on-line 3 April 2008  [print version 5 April 2008]  ‘Wakefield tells GMC he was motivated by concern for autistic children’ quote:

“Dr Wakefield, now lives in Austin, Texas…”

Clare Dyer on-line 29 January 2010  ‘Wakefield was dishonest and irresponsible over MMR research, says GMC’ quote:

Dr Wakefield…is now executive director of Thoughtful House Center for Children in Austin, Texas..’

Best of AofA: Who Cares that 54% of American Children Suffer from Chronic Illness

Managing Editor's Note: We ran this post last June. Seems little has taken place to put true health on the radar screen.  Children continue to become and remain sick in droves.

By John Stone

An Open Letter to the National Institutes of Health (Dr Marina Volkov answering on behalf of Director Francis Collins): 54% of American Children Suffer from Chronic Health Problems .

Dear Dr Volkov,

I acknowledge receipt of your e-letter of June 20 in response to my letter to Dr Collins (‘An Open Letter to National Institutes of Health's Dr Francis Collins: 54% of American Children Suffer from Chronic Health Problems, 1 in 6 has a developmental disorder’ reproduced below). I have to admit that I am less disappointed that Dr Collins has not answered in person than that you have insultingly not bothered to address any of the issues I raised in my letter, contenting yourself with a recital of NIH expenditure on autism research, some of which may be directed to looking at environmental causes. 

On reflection, it strikes me that you may not be remotely competent to answer, but this does not reflect well on the NIH in any case. With the nation’s health in meltdown the refusal to address the fundamental problems that Dr Collins himself first raised to Congress 5 years ago is astonishing. Let me give a single example – nothing to do with autism  - from Dr Collins’s NIH budget request for 2012 which indicates the inadequacy of the position (HERE) .

Dr Collins writes:

"We face a similar economic threat from diabetes. If current trends continue, by 2050 as many as one in three U.S. adults will be diagnosed with diabetes. Total costs of diabetes, including medical care, disability, and premature death, reached an estimated $174 billion in the United States in 2007...According to analysis from the UnitedHealth Center for Health Reform & Modernization, more than 50 percent of Americans could have diabetes or pre-diabetes by 2020...Furthermore, the center’s analysis predicts diabetes and pre-diabetes will account for an estimated 10 percent of total health care spending by the end of this decade, at an annual cost of almost $500 billion.

"But I can offer some hope. NIH spearheaded a landmark clinical trial on type 2 diabetes prevention that showed that people at high-risk for diabetes can dramatically reduce their risk of developing type 2 diabetes through modest exercise and dietary changes that achieve modest weight loss. Called the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), the clinical trial included 3,234 adults at high risk for developing type 2 diabetes, including those with a family history of diabetes, as well as other risk factors. One-third of these individuals participated in a lifestyle program that included exercise training and dietary change implemented under the guidance of lifestyle coaches. The DPP research team found that this approach lowered risk of diabetes by 58%..."

The UnitedHealth Centre report (HERE) projects 15m US citizens with diabetes by 2020 (>5%) and 52% with diabetes or pre-diabetes, but Dr Collins tells us we can only perhaps avert 58% of this by identifiable life-style changes, leaving some unidentified underlying cause of the phenomenon and still more than 1 in 5 Americans with pre-diabetes or diabetes by 2020, according to these figures.

Autism Media Channel From London in John Walker Smith GMC Appeal Win

Live from London today on the Autism Media Channel.

Prof Walker-Smith Cleared and the Beginning of the End for Allegations Against Andrew Wakefield

By John Stone

The exoneration of John Walker-Smith – a great and good man - is the best news our community has had for years.  For years Prof Walker-Smith, himself, has stayed well clear of the MMR controversy but the truth is that he was drawn with Prof Simon Murch into politically motivated allegations against Andrew Wakefield by journalist Brian Deer and Liberal-Democrat politician Evan Harris under the auspices of the Sunday Times.

Deer, himself, recollected in the British Medical Journal being approached by Sunday Times section editor Paul Nuki to find something “big” on MMR, and was later to come to an exotic arrangement with the General Medical Lawyers not to be named as the complainant against the three doctors while continuing to report on the matter. Nuki was apparently the son of a doctor who sat on Committee on Safety in Medicines when MMR was introduced, and he was eventually to leave the Sunday Times to run the UK National Health Service’s main website, NHS Choices. It was the misconstruction of events by Deer, Harris and the GMC which has led to years of purgatory for not only Walker-Smith, Wakefield and Murch but for thousands of children denied proper medical investigation and treatment as a result of the witch-hunt. It is worth noting that the UK Leveson Inquiry, set up to look into media abuse and particular the affairs of News International has so far refused to look in to any of these matters.

Meanwhile, the BBC in an act of doublethink of which only it could be capable has pronounced the 1998 Lancet paper still “discredited” on the day that along with Prof John Walker-Smith it has been completely exonerated.

There is no doubt that the lies and hypocrisy will continue, and of course now it is not only the Murdoch owned media that is implicated. But it is a huge victory.

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

Quashing of GMC Findings Against Prof Walker-Smith

Cryshame parents welcome with immense relief the end of the eight year ordeal of Prof John Walker-Smith and the quashing of all substantive charges against him in the High Court, and wish him their heartfelt congratulations at finally clearing his name.

In an unflamboyant 70 page judgment Sir John Mitting (see photo) was unable to establish any reasoning behind the GMC's findings, relating either to the ordering of inappropriate investigative procedures on children, or to the claim that the controversial 1998 Wakefield Lancet paper (of which Prof Walker-Smith was senior author) was based a research protocol 172-96 which the GMC further alleged to be funded by the Legal Aid Board rather than an "early report" reviewing the cases of patients seen entirely on the basis of clinical need, as stated. These allegations, which were originally made against Prof Walker-Smith (as well as Dr Andrew Wakefield and Prof Simon Murch) by journalist Brian Deer and Liberal-Democrat politician Evan Harris in the Sunday Times in 2004, have now been shown to be completely unfounded.

The Walker-Smith Appeal, the British Media and the Boseley Problem

By John Stone

Sarah Boseley (centre in the photo) is the senior Guardian newspaper journalist who wrote on the occasion of the UK General Medical Council’s findings against Dr Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues Prof  John Walker-Smith and Prof Simon Murch in January 2010:

"Opinion is divided in the medical establishment on the wisdom of pursuing Wakefield – and particularly his colleagues who played a lesser role in the drama – at the GMC. Some say there was a clear case to answer and that the GMC had no other option but others believe that no good can come of it."

What Boseley omitted to do as a decent journalist and a competent reporter was to tell her readership what the medical establishment was worried about. And what they were worried about may be by now coming back round to haunt both the medical establishment itself and the media, although no doubt damage limitation measures are already being put in a state of readiness.  The spectre came in the form of a UK Press Association report of Prof Walker-Smith’s High Court appeal misleadingly entitled ‘MMR row doctor decision was “fair”’  . However, underneath the headline the story begins to hint at the real matter:

“The decision to strike off an eminent doctor over the MMR jab controversy has been defended at the High Court as "just and fair - not wrong".

“The General Medical Council (GMC) admitted to a judge that "inadequate reasons" may have been given by a disciplinary panel that found Professor John Walker-Smith guilty of serious professional misconduct. Those reasons related to conflicts over expert evidence.

“But Joanna Glynn QC, appearing for the GMC, said: "In spite of inadequate reasons it is quite clear on overwhelming evidence that the charges are made out."

“Professor Walker-Smith is asking Mr Justice Mitting at London's High Court to rule that he was denied a fair hearing. On the fourth day of his challenge, the judge said that the case had been "complex and difficult from the start - it greatly troubles me".”

At stake in the hearing are essentially two issues: whether Prof Walker-Smith acted beyond his brief as a clinician in the care of the 12 children in the much disputed Lancet paper, and whether the paper had anything to do – as alleged – with the protocol (identified with Royal Free Hospital ethical approval 172-96) for a Legal Aid Board funded paper, or was just as the paper itself stated an “early report” on 12 children seen and investigated on the basis of clinical need. This problem has been perpetually hinted at but never clearly explained in the British media – we will call it for convenience “the Boseley problem” though it is very much the problem of other journalists too.

Following the allegations by journalist Brian Deer and doctor MP Evan Harris in 2004 that the Wakefield Lancet paper had been commissioned and paid for by the UK Legal Aid Board the first apparent dissent to appear was in an award winning article by Dr Ben Goldacre ‘Don't Dumb Me Down' , the son of a leading government epidemiologist and Oxford University professor, Michael J. Goldacre.  Goldacre junior wrote in September 2005:

“Now, even though popular belief in the MMR scare is - perhaps - starting to fade, popular understanding of it remains minimal: people periodically come up to me and say, isn't it funny how that Wakefield MMR paper turned out to be Bad Science after all? And I say: no. The paper always was and still remains a perfectly good small case series report, but it was systematically misrepresented as being more than that, by media that are incapable of interpreting and reporting scientific data.”

Open Letter to Sunday Times Editor John Witherow: ‘We wouldn’t do fishing’

By John Stone

Yesterday the editor of The Times of London, James Harding, was forced to issue an apology over evidence he gave to the Leveson Inquiry into media standards in the UK, to a High Court judge, Mr Justice Eady (whose name will be known to regular AoA readers) and to a Mr Richard Horton (a policeman, not to be confused with editor the Lancet). Age of Autism now requests that the editor of The Times’s sister Murdoch newspaper, John Witherow, answer equally pertinent questions about his evidence.

Dear Mr Witherow,

Following the admission of your colleague James Harding that he had given erroneous evidence to the Leveson Inquiry I am writing regarding your statement in your oral evidence to Lord Leveson on 17 January 2012 that ‘We wouldn’t do fishing’. This statement would appear to be contradicted by the Sunday Times hired journalist, Mr Brian Deer, concerning the inception of his investigation of Andrew Wakefield. Deer stated in an article in British Medical Journal :

'For me the story started with a lunch. So many do. “I need something big,” said a Sunday Times section editor. “About what?” I replied. Him: “MMR?”'

The editor in question, Paul Nuki, was apparently the son of Prof George Nuki who sat on the Committee on Safety in Medicines in 1987  when a known-to-be defective version of the MMR vaccine, Pluserix, was being considered for license  . Pluserix was not withdrawn till 1992. The younger Nuki subsequently went on to manage the National Health Service’s main website, NHS Choices .

Equally anomalous was the fact that Deer, with the permission of the newspaper, interviewed two litigant members of the public under a false name, although they were told that he was from the Sunday Times . This may be because of an earlier “investigation” by Mr Deer into Margaret Best, whose son was damaged by DPT vaccine, however it is hard to see why this would have been necessary unless Mr Deer had an agenda which could not be fulfilled by another journalist using their own name. What was at stake, given that this was not an ordinary “under-cover” type investigation?

Hacked Off Boss, Martin Moore, Sat on UK Government Panel with Editor who Hired Brian Deer

By John Stone

Martin Moore (left), the unresponsive boss of the organisation ostensibly set up to support members of the public who have fallen victim of the unethical journalistic practices of the Murdoch media empire in the UK (See Age of Autism "Write to Hacked Off.." HERE), sat on a panel set up by the UK’s Department for Business to plan the future of science journalism in Britain producing a report ‘Science and the Media: Securing a Future’. Moore has repeatedly refused to be drawn on a catalogue of apparent abuses in Deer’s MMR investigation, including Deer’s assertion that a Sunday Times news editor, Paul Nuki (right), had hired him to find “something big” on “MMR” (which sounds suspiciously like a fishing expedition). It now turns out that Nuki and Moore sat on the same government committee in 2009-10 to determine the future of British science journalism under the chairmanship of Fiona Fox. Fox, the head of Science Media Centre, has also recently given evidence regarding the MMR to Leveson Inquiry on ethics in British journalism.

Meanwhile, Moore’s organisation Hacked Off effectively sits as unofficial guard dog to the government appointed Leveson Inquiry, which has now heard a succession of witnesses including Fox condemn as irresponsible earlier media concerns about the safety of MMR, but has so far failed to hear witness statements based any of the submissions about Deer’s investigation.

To date Moore and Hacked Off have ignored documented concerns that:-

Sir Crispin Davis and James Murdoch No Longer on GSK Board

The Wall Street Journal reports that James Murdoch, son of beleaguered media mogul Rupert Murdoch, whose empire is embroiled in scandal, has stepped down  from the GlaxoSmithKline board. See WSJ online HERE.  In addition, Sir Crispin Davis, former Chief Executive of Reed Elsevier, which owns The Lancet, which published the paper that included Dr. Andrew Wakefield's MMR information,  is leaving the board after a nine year tenure.

The heir to Rupert Murdoch’s media empire has quit the board of Britain’s biggest drugs company in the wake of the phone hacking scandal.

James Murdoch joined  GlaxoSmithKline less than two years ago.

He has come under fire from MPs who have questioned him about signing off out-of-court settlements to hacking victims without a full picture of what had gone on at the News of the World.

He was forced to deny misleading Parliament over the extent of his knowledge.

Glaxo said Mr Murdoch’s decision to turn his back on the £98,000 role was entirely his own.

Chairman Chris Gent said: ‘James has taken this decision to focus on his current duties as non-executive chairman of BSkyB and following his decision to re-locate to the United States as chairman and chief executive, international, of News Corporation.’

John Stone has written about both Murdoch and Davis and their proximity to the Dr. Andrew Wakefield MMR Lancet Paper BMJ topic.

James Murdoch Still Supported by GlaxoSmithKline ran last July:

Lancet Boss Failed to Disclose Own Conflicts to Parliament While Denouncing Wakefield

Both posts run in full following the jump:

In Memoriam Paul Foot: Private Eye in an Ethical Tangle Over MMR

By John Stone

The editor of the British satirical journal Private Eye, Ian Hislop, told the UK’s Leveson Inquiry into media ethics on Tuesday concerning the MMR controversy:

"Yes, we got it wrong. I was advised by our MD not to pursue it and I should have listened to him. The story went on too long. Mea Culpa."

Private Eye’s columnist ‘MD’, otherwise known as TV presenter, comedian and doctor, Phil Hammond has close pharmaceutical connections and has campaigned (with ultimate success) through Private Eye and British Medical Journal for the Merck/Sanofi HPV vaccine Gardasil  to be preferred in the UK to GlaxoSmithKline’s Cervarix. Although this may not be known to Private Eye readers Hammond has disclosed in BMJ that he “has been paid to speak at dinners by many drug companies (including GSK and Sanofi Pasteur).” Sanofi are also partners with Merck in Europe: Merck, GSK and Sanofi Pasteur are the three former defendants in the MMR litigation. He also presided over a grand industry award ceremony in 2007, in part sponsored by the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, in which the host journal, Scrip World Pharmaceutical News  - which caters for pharmaceutical industry executives - paid tribute to him in glowing terms:

“Those not up for an Award shared an enjoyable evening with the nominees, one that balanced business and pleasure for all concerned. Host Dr Phil Hammond, a writer, broadcaster and qualified GP, captured the mood with his light-hearted critique of the healthcare sector that the 750 guests enjoyed greatly. Dr Hammond is well known mainly in the UK, yet his often-provocative address successfully struck a chord with the Awards’ international audience. In particular, he sympathised with some of the difficulties facing the industry, especially in this era of reimbursement challenges. "I'm looking forward to the day when I can actually prescribe some of the drugs that win Awards," he told the audience. Julie Walters, CEO of MediaSpeak, and representative for shortlisted company Synosia, spoke for many when she said: “Our guests from the US loved the Awards, especially Dr Phil Hammond. Book that man for next year!””

Private Eye began to retreat from its support for MMR families after the death of its leading investigative reporter, Paul Foot, in 2004 and the no doubt increasing influence of Hammond. However, MD Hammond’s review of the science post GMC verdict in 2010 is less than convincing (Private Eye 5-18 February 2010). He cites four sources – including the notorious Madsen study - which do not tell a clear story either individually or collectively and which he does not appear to understand beyond the spin which has already been put on them.

Harry Horne-Roberts Death Ruled Heart Attack

Managing Editor's Note: For background on Harry Horne-Roberts' death please read Harry Horne-Roberts's Parents Welcome Probe into Death While in Autism Care Home . I was recently at a therapy center and noticed a huge weight gain in two teen boys with autism who are each now grossly obese and have difficulty walking. What of their health?  Again, our condolences to Harry's family.

By Sarah Collins of Ham & High

Harry Horne-Roberts was just 20-years-old when he died two years after moving into Hillgreen Care home in Haringey.

There had been no indication that anything was wrong and just days before his death he went walking with his parents in Epping Forest and was his usual bouncy self.

But on December 16, 2009 at 7am he was found face down on his bedroom floor and pronounced dead at 10.30am.

Coroner Dr Andrew Walker of Barnet Coroner’s Court ruled the 22-stone teenager’s death was due to a heart attack linked to obesity at an inquest on Wednesday last week (January 4).

But Harry’s parents, Jennifer Horne-Roberts and Keith Roberts, claimed strong anti-psychotic drugs he was given without their knowledge were responsible.

They claim his three stone weight gain during 15 months in care was due to the drug chloropromazine and that the boisterous 6t-teen was given the drugs without their knowledge.

Before he moved to the care home, Harry had been exuberant and regularly took part in sports and outings.

His parents took the “heartbreaking” step to put Harry into care to increase his independence, but claimed during the inquest they were instead locked out of his treatment with “catastrophic consequences”.

They only learned that he was on the drug when a carer let the information slip in March 2009 and then wrote four letters to Harry’s psychiatrist without receiving a reply.

During the inquest psychiatrist Dr Sujeet Jaydeokar said: “There was a breakdown of communications.”

He added: “With hindsight it would have been better if we had copied you into the letters. We have now changed our practice and now copy all letters to family members.”

Haringey Mental Health Trust acknowledged its failure to implement a dietician-led weight loss programme.

The trust has now implemented new processes to improve the outcome for obese patients with learning disabilities.  Read the full article in Ham & High.

Evan Harris Distances Himself From Brian Deer But His Position Remains Untenable

By John Stone

“… both Harris and Hacked Off/MST have to do a lot more to clear the air, if by now it is possible. In the first place Hacked Off/MST have accepted a false assurance from Harris, and both have to make clear their views on Brian Deer’s investigation, the ethical deficiencies of which have been thoroughly drawn to their attention. Their present actions pose more questions than they answer, including what exactly they are doing at the Leveson Inquiry”

I earlier today received the following characteristically tight-lipped communication Martin Moore of Media Standards Trust/Hacked Off

'Dear Mr Stone,

'Please see the statement below:

'The Hacked Off campaign have been reassured that Dr Evan Harris has never engaged in breaching patients' confidentiality nor was he involved in Brian Deer's MMR investigation. As such we see no reason to believe Dr Harris’ position as an advisor to the Hacked Off campaign has been compromised and he will continue to work closely with us.

'With best regards,

Martin Moore'

There is no historical doubt that Harris worked with Deer on his investigation, and Harris himself has previously boasted about it. It is hard to see how MST/Hacked Off could have accepted his word. Richard Horton, editor of the Lancet wrote in his book ‘MMR Science and Fiction’ of the presence of Harris with Deer in the Lancet offices when Deer made his initial allegations recalling (p.3):

“The tension in that earlier meeting had been heightened by the shadowy presence of Dr Evan Harris, a Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament.”

Media Standards Trust and Hacked Off Director, Martin Moore, Stonewalls Over Evan Harris and Brian Deer’s Investigation

By John Stone

The director of the UK Media Standards Trust  and its purported public support arm for the Leveson media standards inquiry, Hacked Off, is stonewalling over Brian Deer’s MMR investigation, and former MP Evan Harris’s involvement in it - Dr Harris is also an advisor to Hacked Off. Moore’s last word on the matter after an Age of Autism article two days ago was:

‘To date we have not found evidence that Dr Harris’ previous activities compromise his role as an advisor to the Hacked Off campaign.’

These are the points that have been made to Moore and his colleagues on Hacked Off, Brian Cathcart and Thais Portilho-Shrimpton, about Deer’s investigation and it is not clear what their real role in the matter is  if such practices are acceptable to them:-

Deer published on the web without permission the names of children included in the Wakefield 1998 Lancet paper, only available from confidential medical records. Web pages were provided to Hacked Off dated 29 November 2004, 16 February 2006 and 11 November 2006.

Deer has stated also that he has read confidential legal documents relating to the MMR litigation belonging to families:

'Call me old fashioned, but I think JABS should know better than to invoke poor Ms ….. saying - presumably out of ignorance - that "legal aid was mysteriously taken away". There was no mystery, as Jackie surely knows. It followed the exchange of reports. In fact, having read them, I defy anyone with an IQ greater than their waist measurement to study those documents and not come to the conclusion that the Wakefield case was a bust.'

'Even in 2003, my investigation was very time consuming. I hadn’t then looked into Ms Kessick and I didn’t then know that talking to her amounted to talking to Wakefield. The pair of them were in it together. However, I did get from her a detailed account of what she said happened to her son (which broadly squares with her case in litigation), and it was at total variance with what was recorded in the Lancet.' (HERE)

Hacked off with Hacked Off: UK Citizens’ Support Organisation Features Brian Deer's Accomplice Evan Harris as Advisor

By John Stone 

Write today to Hacked Off asking them to explain the presence of Evan Harris as an advisor to their organisation and asking for their support over Brian Deer’s MMR investigation before the UK’s Leveson Inquiry. Write to Hacked Off founders Martin Moore (martin.moore@mediastandardstrust.org) director of Media Standards Trust and journalist Brian Cathcart (B.Cathcart@kingston.ac.uk) as well as Thais Portilho-Shrimpton the organisation’s employee at the Inquiry (thais@hackinginquiry.org).

‘Hacked Off’, the support organisation formed in the wake of the Murdoch media hacking scandal in the UK has so far failed to come up with explanation of the presence of former MP Evan Harris as an advisor. Dr Harris – who was also a member of the British Medical Association ethics committee at the time - worked closely with Brian Deer who accessed confidential medical and legal information, notoriously publishing the names of participants in the 1998 Wakefield/Lancet paper on the web. Three weeks after I first contacted Hacked Off about this matter they remain tight-lipped, and have made no public attempt to distance themselves from Harris. Nor has Harris made any attempt to distance himself from Deer’s investigation.

Harris wrote an editorial in Murdoch newspaper, the Sunday Times, accompanying Deer’s first allegations against Wakefield on 22 February 2004, led a debate against Wakefield under the cloak of privilege in the House of Commons on 15 March 2004, and took part in a Science and Technology investigation of  Wakefield on 1 March 2004 in which he failed to acknowledge that Wakefield had publicly disclosed his role as an expert in the MMR litigation in a letter published in the Lancet as early as 2 May 1998, although the impression given in media reports at the time was that he had never done so at all. Harris, himself, had a host of potential conflicts in the affair which have only ever been partially acknowledged. He also accompanied Deer to the Lancet offices on 18 February 2004 to ambush Wakefield and colleagues, and to the first day of the GMC hearing against them on 16 July 2004.

This was also agenda journalism. Deer was initially approached in 2003 by a Sunday Times news editor who told Deer he needed “something big” on “MMR”: this editor Paul Nuki, like Harris, apparently had a father who sat on the Committee on Safety in medicines during the Pluserix episode (1987-92), and who was also to leave the paper to run the UK National Health Service’s main information website (NHS Choices) in 2007. A new wave of allegations from Deer was unleashed in the Sunday Times in 2009 immediately following proprietor James Murdoch’s appointment to the board of MMR manufacturer (and former defendants) GSK.

Hacked Off popped up seemingly spontaneously in Summer 2011 to represent the public interest in the media hacking allegations, and is supposed to support members of the public acting as witnesses to the Leveson Inquiry. The position, however, may be a little more complicated as the organisation is an off shoot of the Media Standards Trust which has behind it a roster of powerful international media and science industry sponsors . All this would be fine if they were committed to fair play and did not run for cover the moment anything politically sensitive appeared on the horizon. The manifesto states: :

“Hacked Off was founded to campaign for a public inquiry into illegal information-gathering by the press and into related matters including the conduct of the police, politicians and mobile phone companies. Only a full public inquiry, we argued, could put the truth of the hacking scandal before the public and ensure that necessary lessons were learned.”

It is obviously easy for Hacked Off to lend support in a cases where the invasion of privacy is the only issue but much harder where a journalistic investigation has involved the patronage of the highest echelons of government, including the public endorsement of the Prime Minister and the Chief Medical Officer  and relates to the protection of both government policy and powerful industrial interests. In such a case it is more than ever important for such a body to express concern on behalf of members of the public whose lives have been ransacked. Deer’s investigation included the accessing of private medical and legal records, blagging (the use of a false identity to conduct interviews), and a secret agreement with the GMC not to disclose that he was the complainant against Wakefield and colleagues so that he could continue reporting as a disinterested party.

Best of AofA Scientists and Drug Companies Scheme to Avoid FDA Scrutiny and Exploit US Vaccine Programme Immunity Against the Public Interest

Managing Editor's Note: We ran this post last May. Seemed relevant today.

By John Stone

Just eight days after the Supreme Court of the United States ruling granting vaccine manufacturers virtual immunity over prosecution ( Bruesewitz v. Wyeth) , scientists and company representatives met at a congress in Baltimore to  “Understand the Changes in the National Vaccine Plan to Maximize Government Sponsored Funding and Avoid FDA Scrutiny”.  The “workshop” which took place on 2 March 2011 was the first event in a Vaccine Business Congress  held under the auspices of the Institute for International Research USA . Amongst the many participants  at the congress were representatives of Merck, GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi Pasteur, Roche,  the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation,  the Wellcome Trust, and the National Cancer Institute (NIH) (IIRUSA Welcome, IIRUSA Agenda).

Despite frequent bleating from industry apologists that vaccine manufacturers do not make money the pre publicity for the event showed the industry in rampant mood. The on-line brochure states:

“VACCINES are the continuing success story, earning over $27 billion in 2009 alone, despite difficult economic times for the pharmaceutical industry.  By 2012, vaccines are expected to bring in more than $35 billion in revenue.”

The brochure demonstrates the utter negligence of  the US Congress, administration and courts in leaving its citizenry subjected and exposed to an industry, forced to inject its products by mandate into their children, forced to pay for them through taxation and finally to do so without any sanction against manufacturers should damage occur. Is it any surprise then that instead of regarding the manufacture of safe and effective products as a solemn ethical duty, they just turn round and brazenly discuss how to milk the contemptible system to the uttermost?  Please send this article to your Congressmen and women, and ask them what they intend to do about it.

With thanks to Hilary Butler  and others.

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

 

BBC Trustees Stand By Groundless Insinuations Against Andrew Wakefield in Radio 4 'Science Betrayed ' Programme

By John Stone

The decision of the BBC's Editorial Standards Committee - whose six members are also Corporation trustees - fails to take account of emerging facts, and hides behind Brian Deer's flawed and logically untenable account of events. We publish UK Editor John Stone's final submission to the committee.

I am responding to the document from Part 4... It is important to note that Mr Deer’s claims have unravelled very substantially in the past 5 weeks as the result of a report on Nature News, and further correspondence in BMJ Rapid Responses including statements made by the BBC’s expert advisor on this complaint, Prof Ingvar Bjarnason, by BMJ editor Fiona Godlee, by Brian Deer himself and by Dr Amar P Dhillon, the senior histopathologist co-author of the Lancet paper. These events demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt the original recklessness and unfairness of the programme in March.

Point 1

I note that progress with the University College London Inquiry stalled after the programme, a source of frustration to the editor of the BMJ at least, who complained to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee [1].

The ESC’s attitude to Conflict of Interest is dangerously whimsical: it leaves the BBC free to waive concern about people it likes and crucify people it does not. Unless they decide on objective, citable consistent criteria they will make arbitrary decisions. Anything else is touchy-feely, self-referential nonsense.

I also note that the committee failed to take account of evidence I provided that Andrew Wakefield had embarked in the documentable shape of published papers on “a wider study to replicate findings in the Lancet paper” so it is quite hard to know what Prof Pepys was complaining about. Some people want these papers withdrawn, but they are quite certainly there and their existence factually contradicts Prof Pepys’s claim in its present form.

Point 2

I refer to my previous comment in relation to CoI.

Point 3

Once again this is an arbitrary judgement. It is saying that Mr Deer is such a fine person and dedicated journalist that normal ethical constraints do not apply in his case. But it has already been conceded that his unusual arrangement with the GMC was not explained in the programme (which also reflects on the ethics of the GMC). I note that the Committee now cite his current disclosure in BMJ, which also does not explicitly describe the arrangement, but it is also inconsistent on the part of the ESC because it is argued elsewhere in the document that what may have been said in the BMJ is no direct concern of the BBC. Indeed, it is evidently the BBC’s choice not to disclose this embarrassing matter. There is, nevertheless, a serious inconsistency running throughout the response that one minute the BBC is leaning on BMJ, the next saying that programmes claims stand on their own (though they plainly don’t).

Point 4

A discussion is obviously not fair in the context of a programme which persistently gives more weight to one person than another (and by the way fails to get to the bottom of what is being discussed). I note the ESC’s concluding remarks:

“The committee said that it was clear that it was the reliance of Mr Wakefield (Dr??) on the red books as of evidence of “the child’s prior normality” which Mr Deer was criticising. Accordingly, the Committee did not uphold the complaint on this point.”

This is both a false alternative and an historically unfounded insinuation: as well as the red books Dr Wakefield was reliant on GP correspondence, the medical histories taken by Prof Walker-Smith, and the parent consultations with the neurologist Dr Harvey and the psychiatrist Dr Berelowitz. While this may be Mr Deer’s opinion it shows no respect for factual accuracy. It is not correct and it is not fair comment.

Point 5

I quote:

“The Committee noted for the most part, allegations made in the programme had been challenged in the course of the GMC tribunal”.

This is a false statement. These allegations first saw the light of day in a Sunday Times article by Mr Deer in February 2009, and were repeated in BMJ in January 2011. The defence at the GMC hearing which began in 2007 never had to address these allegations.

“The committee note that the tribunal has the same standing as a court of law: and its findings on fact were entitled to be relied upon by the producers of the programme.”

However, all the findings that were remotely relevant to the programme are still under appeal by Prof Walker-Smith, and this was not said, and the absence of any warning regarding this is surely a serious lapse of procedure on the part of the Corporation.

With regard to the evidence of Susan Davies, it is evident that what she is saying is the results of the biopsies were both consistent with significant inflammation and with normality. I note that after the recent intervention of Dr David Lewis as reported in Nature News Prof Bjarnason, Dr Godlee and even Mr Deer had to retreat substantially [1]:

“But he (Bjarnason) says that the forms don't clearly support charges that Wakefield deliberately misinterpreted the records. "The data are subjective. It's different to say it's deliberate falsification," he says.

“Deer notes that he never accused Wakefield of fraud over his interpretation of pathology records…

“Fiona Godlee, the editor of the BMJ, says that the journal's conclusion of fraud was not based on the pathology but on a number of discrepancies between the children's records and the claims in the Lancet paper…”

Predicament of BBC’s Athens Correspondent: Dumped after Adverse Reaction to Vaccine

By John Stone

 Please sign a petition highlighting the plight of BBC journalist Malcolm Brabant, left dangerously ill since yellow fever vaccination in April.  The story, now reported in the mail on Sunday, has been ignored by his employer and denied by the product manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur, which is also allied with Merck. This is despite the fact that Mr Brabant’s symptoms apparently correspond to known side effect of the vaccine.

According to the Mail report:

‘He had the inoculation in April at the East Attica Vaccination Centre in Athens in preparation for a working trip to the Ivory Coast in West Africa. Within hours of the injection, his temperature rose to 104F.

‘Ms Villemann [Brabant’s wife]  said: ‘Within two or three hours, he was shaking and shivering. The whole bed was rocking backwards and forward. It was awful.’

‘He developed insomnia and grew irritable and anxious. After seven days, he was admitted to a private hospital in Athens, where he began to suffer delusions. ..

‘Mr Brabant has had two further psychotic episodes since April. He recovered and returned to work, but had a relapse in July and was flown to a psychiatric hospital in Britain.

‘The BBC paid his medical bills for his treatment in Athens, but he has been able to record only occasional reports over the past few months…

‘Mr Brabant was taken to hospital again on November 8. In the past two months he has also had several blood clots on his lungs. ‘

Sanofi Pasteur’s denial contrast with information in the product insert, including:

‘Some serious and potentially fatal adverse reactions (including systemic and neurological reactions persisting more than 48 hours, YEL-AVD and YEL-AND) appear to occur at higher frequencies after the age of 60 years. Therefore, the vaccine should only be given to those who have a considerable risk of acquiring yellow fever (see above and section 4.8)…

‘Very rarely, yellow fever vaccine-associated neurotropic disease (YEL-AND) has been reported following vaccination, with sequelae or with fatal outcome in some cases (see section 4.8). Clinical features have appeared within one month of vaccination and include high fever with headache that may progress to include one or more of the following: confusion, encephalitis/encephalopathy, meningitis, focal neurological deficits, or Guillain Barré syndrome. To date, those affected have been primary vaccinees. The risk appears to be higher in those aged over 60 years, although cases have been also reported in younger persons or following transmission from nursing mothers to the infants.

‘Very rarely, yellow fever vaccine-associated viscerotropic disease (YEL-AVD) resembling fulminant infection by wild-type virus has been reported following vaccination (see section 4.8). The clinical presentation may include fever, fatigue, myalgia, headache, hypotension, progressing to one or more of metabolic acidosis, muscle and liver cytolysis, lymphocytopenia and thrombocytopenia, renal failure and respiratory failure. The mortality rate has been around 60%. To date, all cases of YEL-AVD have been in primary vaccinees with onset within 10 days of vaccination. The risk appears to be higher in those aged over 60 years although cases have also been reported in younger persons. Disease of the thymus gland has also been recognised as a potential risk factor (see section 4.3 and section 4.8)…’

Another product insert states :

‘Recently, there have been a small number of reports of multi-organ system failure, which may result in death, following vaccination with STAMARIL® and other yellow fever virus vaccine from the same strain. Symptoms are nonspecific and include fever, muscle aches, and headache leading quickly to liver, kidney and muscle damage, and internal bleeding. The cause of this reaction is not known. People with a thymus disorder are at a higher risk so you must inform your doctor if you have any history of a thymus disorder including thymoma (tumour of thymus) and prior thymectomy (removal of thymus) before receiving yellow fever vaccination. ’

Of course, occurrences will be reported as rare if the manufacturer denies it when it happens.

Brian Deer Lords it at a Pharmaceutical Conference in France

By John Stone

This week journalist Brian Deer has been enjoying celebrity status at the luxury villa of Les Pensières of the Fondation Mérieux on the banks of Lake Annecy in the French alps: The Merieux foundation advertises its financial links to all three MMR manufacturers that were defendants in the UK litigation (GSK, Merck and Sanofi), as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. 

So far Deer has disclosed no pharmaceutical sponsorship or hospitality in his series of British Medical Journal articles attacking Andrew Wakefield and now Wakefield’s colleagues at the Royal Free Hospital, the last published just twelve days before conference began. Nor does he mention this latest engagement in a letter yesterday to the journal  (presumably a dispatch from the conference itself). Meanwhile BMJ have failed to publish a letter pointing out the discrepancy and have once again given the lie to editor Fiona Godlee’s official ‘holier than thou’ stance on Conflict of Interest.

At a conference entitled  ‘See Re-invigorating Immunisation Policy Implementation and Success: From Parent to Partner and from Broadcast to Engagement' Deer was keynote speaker at the introductory evening on Monday with an address ‘Money, media and retrospection. What drove the MMR crisis, and what lessons should we learn for the future?’ but also was listed to chair two sessions on Tuesday afternoon and evening.

This puts in ironic perspective the scathing remarks that Deer made about Dr David Lewis attending a vaccine safety conference in Jamaica in January in both in BMJ and in Nature News , but is also perhaps a gratifying apotheosis for everyone who has watched his remarkable career.

John Stone is Contributing Editor to Age of Autism.

 

Dr Dhillon's Statement - BMJ Allegations Not As Cut & Dried As Editor Suggests

This rapid response from Clifford Miller awaits publication in the BMJ.

Dr Dhillon's Statement - BMJ Allegations Not As Cut & Dried As Editor Suggests

The journal paper Dr Dhillon cites in his personal statement [1] appears to cast light on these matters.  It is entitled “Guidelines for the initial biopsy diagnosis of suspected chronic idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease. The British Society of Gastroenterology Initiative” [2].

It also appears to illustrate why journalists and non-specialist journal editors might find it wise not to stray too far from their appointed roles.  The questions are now begging, why would a journal Editor step so far out of that editorial and publishing role to undertake such high profile campaigning advocacy of the kind seen in this case.

The message from these guidelines repeatedly appears to be that what may seem mild or normal may not be and can be significant.  These British Society of Gastroenterology Guidelines appear to present a contrary view to the views of journalist and commissioned BMJ author Mr Deer.  Mr Deer has a degree in philosophy from Warwick University and no medical or scientific qualifications.

Further, the transcripts of the GMC hearings also reveal interesting information, which calls most seriously into question what now appear to be in comparison somewhat casual allegations of research misconduct.

The sworn testimony of Professor Simon Murch [3] shows there was meeting at the Royal Free, it seems on a Friday lunchtime and at the request of Dr Davies, arranged in the manner of a normal histology meeting in the histology seminar room at the Royal Free Hospital.  It seems the various pathologists who had seen the tissues attended at the same time.

It further seems from this testimony that there were 10 expert medical specialists present at this meeting.  The names recorded in the transcripts as being present are:  Dr Davies,  Professor Walker-Smith, Dr Thomson,  Dr Murch [now Professor]. Dr Andrew Anthony, Dr Dhillon,  Dr Casson, Dr Malik, Dr Wakefield. Drs Heuschkel and Phillips possibly also present [from recollection].

Dramatic Development Further Exonerates Andrew Wakefield and Puts Pressure on British Medical Journal

By John Stone

In the latest dramatic twist in the Wakefield affair the senior histopathologist co-author of the controversial  Lancet paper, Dr Amar Dhillon, has defended  his contribution to the study. His intervention further knocks on the head allegations from journalist Brian Deer and the editor of the British Medical Journal, Fiona Godlee, that Wakefield had manipulated the data. In a statement to the journal has Dr Dhillon has explained his contribution to the study and set it in the context of regular clinical practice. Hidden from British Medical Journal readers the case against Wakefield has been unravelling since last week when in answer to criticism from microbiologist Dr David Lewis one of the experts hired by BMJ to review the data, Prof Ingvar Bjarnason admitted to Nature.com that “the forms don't clearly support charges that Wakefield deliberately misinterpreted the records. "The data are subjective. It's different to say it's deliberate falsification," he says," he says”. Bjarnason’s admission was particularly telling given his public hostility to Wakefield and his research.

Dr Dhillon notes:

“The reappearance (BMJ Nov 2011 online: http://www.bmj.com/highwire/filestream/536428/field_highwire_adjunct_fil... ) of some of my histology grading sheets for the Lancet 1998 study (Wakefield AJ et al. Ileal lymphoid nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis and pervasive developmental disorder in children. Lancet 1998;351:637-41) is interesting. I have not seen the grading sheets since 1997-98 when I gave them to Andy Wakefield. Following the interest shown in the grading sheets in the November 12 2011 BMJ Feature “Pathology reports solve “new bowel disease” riddle” (BMJ 2011;343:bmj.d6823), accompanying articles and editorial it is evident that there are a number of misunderstandings. Many of these are a result of a lack of understanding of the essential difference between the systematic documentation of specific microscopical features in a grading sheet by a “blinded” (ie in the absence of any clinical, or other information) pathologist on the one hand; and on the other hand concluding an overall clinicopathological diagnosis by integration of clinical information with diverse lines of investigation (including information in the grading sheet). The difference between the two activities should be understood better…

He concludes:

“At the time of submission of the Lancet 1998 publication I had the clinical, laboratory, endoscopic and histology information presented to me in summary tabular form, and aggregated descriptive text only.

 -My grading sheets were with Andy Wakefield and my general recollection of my impression of my slide review was that some biopsies were a bit inflamed, and others were not: I did not know which case was represented by which set of slides, and which sets of slides were “normal” controls. As far as I recall, the changes were not severe in any of the slides, but it is not unusual for gut mucosal biopsies to show little abnormality even in clinically well defined cases of gastrointestinal disease, particularly in children

 -My clinical colleagues had collated all of the available information, including my microscopical grading sheet observations in the context of their knowledge of each patient’s condition and concluded a final diagnosis of colitis when this was considered by them to be appropriate

 -Thus, at the time of submission of the Lancet 1998 publication, with the limited supplementary information available to me (which I had been prevented deliberately from knowing during the study); and in the context of a comprehensive clinicopathological review by trusted clinical colleagues, the designated diagnosis of colitis seemed to me to be plausible.”

The statement does not hint at anything resembling research impropriety.

With this in view I have written to Dr Godlee through BMJ Rapid Responses suggesting it is time to call it a day:

‘Dear Dr Godlee,

How can this folly go on? It is now perfectly clear that Andrew Wakefield acted as part of a team and the clinical analysis was conducted with the highest of motives, and expertise.

You have had your answer - please can we now have an apology. It would be appalling if you took any action now but to back down.

Sincerely,

John Stone

Godlee has been calling for a further inquiry into the Wakefield affair – it is almost as if having dug herself a pit, she is calling for someone else to pull her out.

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.

Desperate British Medical Journal Editor Godlee Turns on Wakefield’s Co-authors

By John Stone

Today, British Medical Journal launches a new offensive against Andrew Wakefield and the Lancet paper which did not link MMR with autism and gut disease, with a press release entitled: ‘MMR fraud needs parliamentary inquiry, says BMJ, as new information puts spotlight on Wakefield's co-authors’. Remarkably, there was not a hint of this only two months ago (September 6) when editor Fiona Godlee addressed the US National Institutes of Health and stated :

18.55 "What these articles also say that when those three things didn't come up trumps on the twelve children included, and the subsequent series of children, Andrew Wakefield altered the data to make those three things emerge"

46.06 "we need co-authors to do their job...I think in this case the co-authors did not fulfil their responsibilities... there is no allegation of misconduct against them apart from the other two who were arraigned with Andrew Wakefield, but they didn't fulfil their responsibilities."

But suddenly Godlee’s world appears to be falling apart. The case that Wakefield was somehow supposed to have altered the data under the noses of the 12 senior medical scientists without a single one noticing or commenting for 13 years, and several of them conspicuously standing by the data is beginning to take its toll of BMJ’s credibility.  Notably, BMJ has come under attack from a leading whistleblowing scientist Dr David Lewis, as reported in a report from Nature News. According to Nature’s reporter, Eugenie Samuel Reich, even the scientist Godlee hired to review the Lewis’s assessment, though scarcely well-disposed towards Wakefield, doubts that there is evidence for fraud:

‘Before publishing Lewis's letter, the BMJ asked Ingvar Bjarnason, a gastroenterologist at King's College Hospital, London, to review the materials. Bjarnason says he doesn't believe they are sufficient to support claims in the Lancet paper of a new disease process. He also questions whether "non-specific" on the grading sheets refers to colitis, saying it could refer to any kind of gut changes. But he says that the forms don't clearly support charges that Wakefield deliberately misinterpreted the records. "The data are subjective. It's different to say it's deliberate falsification," he says.’

So, why the vendetta?  The latest thing is that she seems to have started a war with University College London over their failure to hold an inquiry into the affair, but it is becoming increasingly evident to even Wakefield’s enemies that there is nothing whatsoever to investigate.

Perhaps, Godlee’s colleagues ought to start asking questions. This farrago has been going on far too long. And even now she hasn’t published Dr Lewis’s letter.

John Stone is UK Editor for Age of Autism.