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MMR: miracle cure or dangerous cocktail?
The debate focuses on the MMR vaccine (against mumps, measles and rubella) given to children when they're 12-15 months old, with a pre-school booster before they're five.
Dr Wakefield, of the Royal London Free, seriously doubts the safety of the vaccine. An authority in the field, he has studied 170 cases of autism and bowel disease in children and believes MMR may be the trigger. The government insists there's no problem. They cite a recent Finnish study of 1.8 million children that showed absolutely no link with either autism or bowel disease. Though Wakefield is vilified as a scaremonger by almost the entire medical establishment, 50% of GPs and health professionals now admit they too have reservations. Meanwhile, 2000 UK families are taking legal action, claiming their children developed autism immediately after the MMR jab.
Here's a flavour of the debate on iVillage 'Thinking allowed':
'Trying to make a reasonable decision about whether to vaccinate with MMR or not is really difficult. My son was due to get his the day after the first media scare hit. When I arrived at the GP's surgery I was still unsure, but in the end I went ahead because:
- After looking at all the evidence I could find, I concluded that the chances of adverse affects due to measles were higher than the chances of autism or bowel disorders. This is partly backed up by anecdotal evidence as my sister in law was left with side effects after childhood measles.
- My health visitor said she'd never seen a single case of autism following MMR. From the reports in the media it would appear that Dr Waring would agree that MMR is in the interests of public health, although he wouldn't recommend it to any one individual. He said on the BBC 'I'm not concerned with public health but with my individual patients'. One other point: a lot of people have mentioned single vaccines as an alternative. The government's concern is that deaths from measles have occurred in Ireland when they changed to single vaccines. There's a time lag between doses, which leaves the child exposed.'
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