Study linking vaccines with autism branded fraud but author stands by truth!

LONDON, England - January 6, 2011 - A 1998 study that linked childhood autism to a vaccine was branded an "elaborate fraud" by the British Medical Journal (BMJ) Thursday, but its lead author said he is the victim of a smear campaign by drug manufacturers.

In an interview late Wednesday with CNN, Andrew Wakefield denied inventing data and blasted a reporter who apparently uncovered the falsifications as a "hit man" doing the bidding of the powerful pharmaceutical industry.

"It's a ruthless pragmatic attempt to crush any investigation into valid vaccine safety concerns," said Wakefield.
He insisted the truth was in his book about the scandal: "The book is not a lie, the study is not a lie... I did not make up the diagnoses of autism."

Blamed for a disastrous boycott of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine in Britain, the study was retracted by The Lancet last year and Wakefield was disgraced on the grounds of conflict of financial interest and unethical treatment of some children involved in the research.

Wakefield, then a consultant in experimental gastroenterology at London's Royal Free Hospital, and his team suggested they had found a "new syndrome" of autism and bowel disease among 12 children.

They linked it to the MMR vaccine, which they said had been administered to eight of the youngsters shortly before the symptoms emerged.

But other scientists swiftly cautioned the study was only among a tiny group, without a comparative control sample, and the dating of when symptoms surfaced was based on parental recall, which is notoriously unreliable.

Experts said the study's results have never been replicated.