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Finnish study confirms safety of MMR vaccine

BMJ 2001; 322 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.322.7279.130/b (Published 20 January 2001) Cite this as: BMJ 2001;322:130

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Re: I am amazed

Editor

I would disagree with the suggestion that only way to solve the issue
is to study MMR against measles vaccines; the way to solve the issue is to
do long term prospective studies using cohorts of MMR-vaccinated against
unvaccinated children, for which a cohort must now be available due to
poor MMR uptake in recent years.

In fact I persued this with the head of my local (Leeds) CDCC, Dr.
Martin Schweiger, about two years ago after he responded to a letter of
mine suggesting this in the Yorkshire Evening Post; he said he would 'like
to take up the challenge'; we entered into brief discussion and he told me
some of the difficulties he saw ahead, I do not think he has embarked on
such a study yet.

His team had recently performed a 10 year retrospective study of
almost 100,000 children from Leeds area in which they calculated how many
children suffered serious ADRs from wild bugs as compared to those
vaccinated against them (1986 to 1996); he provided me a draft for perusal
and response; I responded with about 10 criticisms and I do not think the
study was published. In fact my criticisms were similar to those I would
offer for the Fin Study, and the data was derived from medical notes of
GPs and hospital physicians; not only does this involve locating,
interpretating and transcribing large amounts of variable standard of
information from medical notes (probably by clerics as opposed to the
originators of those notes) but also total reliance on an ADR reporting
system which is widely accepted as being abysmal. There was, I believe, a
relatively small advantage shown by 'vaccination' over 'wild bug' in this
study, which could have been reversed considerably were corrections made
for ADR system failures alone.

Comparing measles vaccine against MMR is not a reasonable option for
parents who wish to decide the worth of vaccine against being
unvaccinated, the choice of so many parents for their children.

The Guinea Bissau research was declared by the authors and others,
including Government, to require further study; certainly measles
vaccination appears to have improved against mortality for the first five
years of a Guinea Bissau childs life, children devastated by many diseases
and health problems for which the vaccine may hold unexplained benefits;
for our children apparently one cannot safely extrapolate those results.
For example, a vaccinated child is believed to be more in touch with the
health systems in Africa therefore may come from a more affluent and
settled background, whereas non-vaccinated are either out of touch with
health systems or are easily lost to follow up due to nomadic or unsettled
lifestyles, less of a problem in the UK. Interestingly, the Guinea Bissau
study looked at children to 5 years of age, well before autism is usually
diagnosed (if at all in many cases) so one wonders whether the apparent
'improved mortality' rates degenerate into significant increases in
autism, inflammatory bowel, speech and communication disorders in those
African children?

As I suggested to our CDCC persons, a prospective study is essential
using the current increase in unvaccinated children from which to randomly
select a sizeable cohort against which to compare a cohort of vaccinated
children. EASY, EFFICIENT and WILL ANSWER MANY QUESTIONS.

Then why has it not been done?

I further suggest follow up for most of those childrens' lives, as
has been done with many other studies. If we ask ALL children to accept
vaccines we should check that our request does not pose lifetime dangers
to those children. We should begin to see valuable results within the
first 6 months, as many alleged serious ADRs occur within that period,
many within the first 6 weeks. Children could be flagged within the health
system for 6 month follow-up or at any period of 'occurrence' of any
problem for which a physician is required. Notes can be computerised,
significant, and physicians must be ready to acknowledge suspected ADRs as
they occur; parental input must be part of that system in case a physician
is found wanting. MORIDE et al suggsested that physicians are
underreprting ADRs by 24,500 times, this potential must be minimised in
the study by some means (eg. reasonable payment for ADR reporting has been
shown to improve this in several USA studies).

Political will is required as it is highly probable, witness
widespread public experience, that vaccination is causing a huge amount of
unreported illness in our children which must be addressed sooner than
later.

Any team formed should be independent of political, industrial and
commercial links, experienced, and their study design should be open to
public and peer review prior to initiation to avoid later criticism; it
must be publicly funded.

Regards

John H.

Competing interests: No competing interests

25 January 2001
John P Heptonstall
Director of the Morley Acupuncture Clinic and Complementary Therapy Centre
West Yorkshire