More victims of MMR scare shows importance of checks on scientific publications

9.54.05am UTC (GMT +0000) Fri 30th Mar 2007

As an MRC study finds that the MMR controversy caused parents of children with autism feelings of stress, guilt and frustration, Dr Evan Harris MP, Liberal Democrat science spokesman, said:

"This valuable piece of research shows that the flawed research had more victims than just those who went unvaccinated. It clearly had a bad impact on parents already carrying a significant care burden."

The MMR controversy was sparked in 1998 when Andrew Wakefield and colleagues published an article claiming to have found a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Most of his co-authors subsequently disassociated themselves from this conclusion.

"This gives further reasons why scientists should avoid making sensationalist claims or unfounded conclusions about uncorroborated research findings, and why medical journals need to improve their checks of such work."

MMR: marginalised, misrepresented and rejected? Autism: a focus group study by Shona Hilton, Kate Hunt and Mark Petticrew is published in Archives of Disease in Childhood (BMJ group)