Feb 04 2010
Vaccine-Autism Study Retracted
The Lancet has retracted Andrew Wakefield’s study that linked autism to the MMR vaccine. Not only subsequent research been unable to replicate Wakefield’s findings, but now the General Medical Council of the UK has said that Wakefield’s conduct during the study was “unethical, contrary to the clinical interests of some of the children included in the research“.
This is good news, but in the general atmosphere of woo-acceptance, I’m afraid it’s too late. By about 12 years.
There is no evidence that vaccines cause autism in otherwise healthy children. None. Zero.
Orac, author of Respectful Insolence, has been faithfully battling autism and anti-vaccine quackery and other forms of unscientific, frankly silly, woo for several years now.
Tonight I battled woo on a personal level. I love my husband, but he’s so susceptible to believing “medical” advice… EXCEPT what his doctors tell him.
If I stop eating tomatoes and potatoes, my arthritis won’t go away. If my husband starts taking alpha lipoic acid, his type II diabetes won’t be cured. Homeopathic remedies and the people who sell them are worthless.
If it were just my husband, I wouldn’t worry much. But it’s not. It’s seemingly everywhere I turn recently. And so much of the misinformation calls itself science, that one really has to be careful not to be misled.
arrggghh… I know this post doesn’t entirely make sense, but I’m not entirely free to explain all the run-ins I’ve had over the past several months with fads of woo.
