Do your remember the controversy over the MMR vaccine, how the sceptics who pointed to the number of cases in which children seemed to have developed symptoms of autism or autism related problems shortly after receiving the combined measles, mumps, rubella vaccination? And do you remember how the Government and Big Pharma dissed the doubters, ruining a few careers and producing a lot of very dodgy statistics to convince us that nice Mr. Blair was right when he told parents there was nothing to worry about and the reason he and Cherie were not up for having baby Leo treated with the jab were nothing to do with doubts over its safety.
The MMR scandal resurfaced this week as newly revealed figures showed that since the introduction of MMR the proportion of children affected by autism has risen to one in sixty.
Well the case that MMR vaccine did not contribute to autism was never convincingly made, we were fobbed off with “well you can’t actually PROVE beyond doubt that it is harmful” rather than the more ethical but less cost effective “we can’t prove beyond doubts it isn’t harmful so we will stop using it until we are certain.” Imagine the furore from the anti – smoking lobby if that kind of logic had been used to block the smoking ban. The fact is nobody can prove for certain smoking does cause lung cancer because many people particularly in France and the Mediterranean countries smoke all their lives and live beyond average age. There are very serious grounds to think smoking is harmful though and there are equal grounds for suspecting the MMR vaccine is not as safe as something being used on young children who cannot make their own choices ought to be.
Even those subversive lefties at The Guardian were taken in by the pro MMR spin, their correspondent Ben (Bung-boy) Goldacre using a weekly column to browbeat poor Gillian McKieth for her whacky but harmless theories. Ben must have become very rich on the backhanders he received from Big Pharma for using Bad Science of his own to discredit the Bad Science of the alternative health industry but his strongest venom has been reseved for those who question the efficacy of the MMR vaccine.
Now I cannot say the MMR vaccine causes autism, though its promoters will claim that is exactly what I am suggesting, but there is enough evidence to warrant an independent judicial enquiry. The statistics can be manipulated to support the government and Big Pharma case, but as long as children keep developing symptoms soon after the treatment we must keep asking the difficult questions.