MJA
MJA

MMR, Wakefield and The Lancet: what can we learn?

Julie Leask, Robert Booy and Peter B McIntyre
Med J Aust 2010; 193 (1): . || doi: 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2010.tb03730.x
Published online: 5 July 2010

Vaccine scares are inevitable and we need to plan accordingly

Twelve years after The Lancet published the study by Wakefield and colleagues1 that suggested a link between measles–mumps–rubella (MMR) vaccination, inflammatory bowel disease and autism, the journal has fully retracted the article. The retraction followed the findings of the Fitness to Practise Panel of the UK General Medical Council, released 28 January 2010, that certain statements in the article were false — namely, that children were “consecutively referred” and that investigations were “approved” by the local ethics committee.2

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