Free Republic

In 1998, British Doctor Andrew Wakefield published research findings in Britain's famed medical journal The Lancet linking autism to a children’s vaccine (MMR) for measles, mumps and rubella. The doctor’s claims resulted in a panic as they “…triggered a slump in immunization levels, outbreaks of infectious disease and worldwide public worry.” In 2004, London Sunday Times reporter Brian Deer revealed that Dr. Wakefield had literally MADE UP the research which showed autism resulting in a matter of days after children had been vaccinated. Deer found that a group of attorneys was paying Wakefield large sums to discredit the MMR vaccine....

The British Medical Journal on Wednesday accused a disgraced British doctor of committing an "elaborate fraud" by faking data in his studies linking vaccines with autism. Andrew Wakefield's work convinced thousands of parents that vaccines are dangerous. Such fears have not only caused parents to skip vaccinations for their children, which critics say has led to ongoing outbreaks of measles and mumps, but have forced costly reformulations of many vaccines.

A gastroenterologist who persuaded millions of parents worldwide that the vaccine used to prevent measles, mumps and rubella might cause autism has been banned from practicing medicine in his native Britain after the country's top medical group said Monday he conducted his research unethically. Dr. Andrew Wakefield was the first researcher to publish a peer-reviewed study suggesting a connection between autism, inflammatory bowel disease and the MMR vaccine. In February, Britain's leading medical journal, "The Lancet, "retracted Wakefield's controversial 1998 study just days after Wakefield was found guilty by a British panel of acting unethically in his research on autism....

The doctor who first suggested a link between MMR vaccinations and autism is to be struck off the medical register. The General Medical Council found Dr Andrew Wakefield guilty of serious professional misconduct over the way he carried out his controversial research.