“No name in contemporary English medicine is greeted with such polarized reactions as that of Dr. Andrew Wakefield”

*read: L’affaire Wakefield: Shades of Dreyfus & BMJ’s Descent into Tabloid Science

Andrew Wakefield, MD, an academic gastroenterologist, trained at St. Mary’s Hospital Medical School, the fourth generation of his family to do so. He practiced medicine as a gastrointestinal surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital in the U.K. prior to his “notoriety,” which was generated by a relentless series of sensationalist articles in Rupert Murdoch’s Sunday Times (2004 – 2010) and re-ignited in 2011 by the editor in chief of the British Medical Journal (BMJ).

Dr. Wakefield has authored (or co-authored) more than 140 published peer reviewed scientific papers. Beginning in the 1990s, several of his articles focused on persistent measles virus infection of the intestine. One such article, “Is measles vaccine a risk factor for inflammatory bowel disease?” was published in The Lancet in 1995. None of these earlier papers aroused any controversy. (They are listed in Pub Med here)

Following the publication of a case series about twelve children in The Lancet (1998), Dr. Wakefield reported the findings of that study at a press conference where he disclosed that the study shows an association between children’s severe gastrointestinal disease and developmental regression – i.e. autism. Furthermore, he indicated that according to parents’ testimony, the symptoms of both debilitating conditions manifested soon after children’s vaccination with the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine.

The parents of the children in the Lancet study sought Dr. Wakefield’s help for their children, based on his previous publications. They indicated that their description of their children’s severe gastrointestinal distress had been dismissed by doctors who seemed to regard these children as “damaged goods,” not worthy of further medical investigation. [This is a recurring complaint made by parents whose children suffer from autism and other developmental or mental disabilities.]

“Parents were speaking about this situation years before Dr. Wakefield came on the scene and our government also knew about these concerns years before the Lancet study yet they did nothing to investigate, leaving hundreds of other children at risk of side effects. Our government did not listen to parents but accused them of making the symptoms up and threatening to take their children away if they did not stop making a connection with MMR vaccine.” (Statement by Isabella Thomas, the mother of two children involved in the Lancet study)

Indeed, Wakefield’s Lancet case report was criticized by Dr. Fiona Godlee, editor in chief of the BMJ specifically for taking parents’ testimony seriously:

“More open to criticism [of the Lancet] is the fact that the study itself was so poorly designed — relying on parental recall — especially considering that this is such an important topic for public health. It is this that should have kept it out of a high profile journal.”

Her statement encapsulates the elitism of medical academics who so easily disqualify the eyewitness testimony of parents.

It is no longer radical to point out that medical practice guidelines — whether disseminated in “high profile” scientific journals or the mass media – are tainted by the corrupting influence of the pharmaceutical industry, sometimes in cahoots with government; in general, practice guidelines are not in patients’ best interest. (See work by John Abramson MD, Marcia Angell MD, David Egilman MD, Peter Gøtzsche MD, Richard Horton MD, John Ioannides MD, Jerome Kassirer MD, Meryl Nass, MD, Richard Smith MD, Roy Poses, MD, to name but a few.)

However, it seems there is zero tolerance for anyone who utters similar criticism about a vaccine or criticizes the ever- expanding childhood vaccine schedule. which is a guideline recommended by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) or the National Health Service in the UK. These guidelines are designed on the basis of an erroneous assumption: that one size fits all – disregarding underlying individual sensitivities that put some children at risk from exposure to the ingredients of a vaccine – especially a multi-virus vaccine. As Jane Bryant, who covered the UK General Medical Council (GMC) proceedings against Dr. Andrew Wakefield for The One Click Group reported:

“It is becoming increasingly difficult for the general public to place much trust in so many of the products so lucratively marketed by the pharmaceutical industry and promoted by doctors that far from benefiting our health, so often maim and kill. With investigations currently being conducted into Avandia, Abilify, Singulair, Vytorin, Seroquel, Zyprexa, Zetia, Champix, Prozac, Paxil, Seroxat and Pristiq and a whole host of other drugs besides, vaccines included, it requires an extraordinary placement of blind stupid faith to imagine that vaccines are the holy medical grail entirely untainted by profit and malfeasance.” (April 7, 2008)

The sanctity of vaccines has become a religious mantra and anyone who questions the safety and/or efficacy of government recommended vaccines or the safety of a particular vaccine, deviates from acceptable vaccine orthodoxy. If they are parents of autistic children and lay critics, they risk being ridiculed as “anti-vaccine cranks and quacks.” Journalists are dissuaded from balanced reporting about scientific evidence that contradicts CDC’s vaccine mantra. Case in point, Sharyl Attkisson. (Read Efforts to Shut Down Journalism on Vaccines )

What the Lancet article stated & did not state:
Contrary to Dr. Godlee’s editorial pronouncement –“Wakefield’s article linking MMR vaccine and autism was fraudulent“ –– there was no evidence of fraud — the article did not link the MMR vaccine and autism. The article was not a randomized clinical trial but rather an observational report of twelve children that suggested a link between the children’s enterocolitis and developmental regression. The thirteen co-authors of the case report were members of the Royal Free Hospital’s Inflammatory Bowel Disease Study Group. The report cited several previous reports in the scientific literature that recognized “disintegrative psychosis” as a sequel to measles encephalitis.

“In some cases the onset and course of behavioural regression was precipitous, with children losing all communication skills over a few weeks to months. This regression is consistent with a disintegrative psychosis (Heller’s disease), which typically occurs when normally developing children show striking behavior changes and developmental regression, commonly in association with some loss of coordination and bowel or bladder function.”

The Lancet report explicitly stated that the study did not prove a link between the MMR vaccine and autism; it called for further research:

“We did not prove an association between measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine and the syndrome described. Virological studies are underway that may help to resolve this issue…We have identified a chronic enterocolitis in children that may be related to neuropsychiatric dysfunction. In most cases, onset of symptoms was after measles, mumps, and rubella immunization. Further investigations are needed to examine this syndrome and its possible relation to this vaccine.”

How did Andrew Wakefield become “one of the most reviled doctors of his generation”? Andrew Wakefield listened to parents’ observations; then he organized a team of medical experts, both pediatric and adult gastroenterologists and pathologists who performed a battery of physiological medical diagnostic tests to provide guidance for the children’s treatment. The tests validated parents’ testimony about their children’s severe physiological distress. The findings were published in the Lancet (1998) as a case series report. At a press conference following publication  of the report, Dr. Wakefield expressed concerns about the safety of the MMR vaccine and its possible relation to autism. As a safety measure he recommended separating the 3-in-1 MMR into three single virus vaccines.

His public statements propelled him and the Lancet report into the spotlight, and opened a public debate that has raised legitimate questions; including questions about the nature and validity of the evidence backing the claims made by public health officials and vaccine “authorities” who have assured doctors and the public that vaccines are perfectly safe. Therein lies Dr. Wakefield’s “crime.” By raising safety issues about the MMR vaccine publicly he posed a serious threat to very powerful vested interests for whom any suggestion that a vaccine is unsafe, could result in a reduction in vaccination rates.

This could increase the number of infectious disease cases, but also translates into validating the lack of trust in the UK following the introduction of the MMR vaccine in 1988, followed by the controversy over a measles-rubella (MR) re-vaccination campaign, promoted by the government in 1994. Reduction in vaccination rates translates to loss of considerable  profits to the pharmaceutical industry, whose profits currently are guaranteed by government mandates.

To put the financial threat that Dr. Wakefield poses in perspective:
Current (2015) estimates of worldwide  vaccine-generated revenues are between $24 — $33.1 billion U.S. dollars.
By 2019 they are estimated to reach — between $58 to $61 billion. The U.S comprises 42% of the vaccine market, and Europe, 36%.  (Vaccine Reaction) In 2015, Former Merck employee and whistleblower Brandy Vaughan spoke out against the state of California’s vaccination mandate bill SB277 and said:

“The U.S. gives more vaccines than any other country in the world. Our childhood schedule for under the age of one has twice as many vaccines as other developed countries. What else do we have? The highest infant mortality rate of any developed nation. Finland has the lowest. They only give 11 [vaccines] by age six. Mississippi has the highest rate of vaccination in the U.S.–highest infant mortality rate. These numbers do not lie. But you will not hear that on the media…

What we have with vaccines is the highest profit margin pharmaceutical drug on the market. Drug companies make more money off vaccines than they do any other pharmaceutical drug, in terms of profit margin. There is a lack of rigorous safety studies. And they don’t have the incentive to do them because they have no liability.,. in the U.S.” (Global Research, 2016)

The vaccine industry has implemented a fear-based marketing plan reinforced by medical “key opinion leaders” and the CDC, the nation’s most powerful promoter of vaccination. To protect its profit margins, the channels that disseminate news and information about vaccines are tightly controlled to reinforce a single point of view, lest controversy is stirred up. The belief that vaccines are safe and effective must be reinforced in unison. The case against Andrew Wakefield is driven by corporations whose financial interests collide with independent medical investigations that identify troublesome safety issues.

A culture of intimidation
Unless one has an appreciation of the culture in which the pharmaceutical industry operates, and the tactics it uses to enforce its interest, one cannot comprehend the vitriolic onslaught that Dr. Wakefield has been subjected to. The most reliable, documented evidence emerges during the discovery process of litigation. For example, during an Australian Vioxx class action lawsuit against Merck, especially revealing internal emails were presented. They exposed the sinister tactics of intimidation that Merck used when dealing with researchers and clinicians who expressed disagreement with its disavowing the serious cardio risks of Vioxx.

One email contained a “Merck Hit List of Doctors” instructing Merck employees to “neutralize” and “discredit” those doctors. The court heard written testimony from a professor of medicine at Stanford University who had complained to Merck in writing about interference with academic appointments and intimidation of “at least eight clinical investigators.” In one email a Merck employee stated: “We may need to seek them out and destroy them where they live.” (Merck Drew Up Doctor Hit List, The Australian, April, 2009)

Any medical professional who dares question vaccine safety or discusses disturbing research findings publicly risks being marginalized, “discredited,” vilified, and branded a heretic. Fear of garnering similar abuse — explains why so few physicians raise their own concerns about vaccine safety publicly. Andrew Wakefield has been vilified and subjected to false accusations orchestrated by the interconnected shadows who control the dissemination of medical information. They were determined to destroy his reputation, his credibility, his professional integrity and his career for the crime of suggesting publicly that the combined MMR vaccine may not be safe; and agreeing to serve as an expert witness for families in a MMR lawsuit. (Read: Why is the CDC Petrified of the Film Vaxxed? 2016)

In an interview with PLoS, Dr. Fiona Godlee proudly credited the BMJ for being “at the forefront of investigating the MMR scare” while criticizing those in the media who took a “balanced” approach –i.e., the “fairness in journalism” standard. She criticized a reporter (Melanie Phillips of the Daily Mail) for “setting Wakefield and the scientific consensus against each other as if there was equal weight on both sides.” Godlee went on to say, “This is traditional legalistic approach but doesn’t work well for some stories…” (PLoS, 2011)

Is it science when gatekeepers tolerate only one point of view about vaccine safety?

Peer reviewed, published reports by independent researches who confirmed disturbing findings about vaccines have simply not been reported or mentioned by either high impact journals or the mainstream media. These reports are ignored in order to prevent public controversy, which risks undermining trust in vaccination policy.

Read our compilation of Scientific reports validate “controversial” findings reported in The Lancet

Monumental vaccine research fraud protected by a wall of silence
When evidence of research fraud is uncovered – significant fraud that effectively disqualifies the underlying evidence base of vaccine safety and efficacy – the same wall of silence is maintained.

A series of highly significant revelations of research fraud by CDC – which in very palpable ways affect public health – not to speak of the harm done to individual children – were unreported and unexamined in the pages of high profile medical journals. Apparently the gatekeepers of “evidence based medicine” deemed evidence of research fraud committed by those who formulate and enforce public health policy – untouchable.

Thomas Verstraeten MD was the lead author of the first large-scale CDC epidemiological study that assessed the risk of thimerosal, the mercury preservative in vaccines, to autism. The study utilized a large U.S. database, and examined the medical records of 400,000 infants born 1991-1997. This major study provided scientific evidence documenting that exposure to thimerosal during the first month of life increased the relative risk of autism by 7.6%. The data revealed additional risks: a 1.8x increased relative risk for neurodevelopmental disorder; a 2.1x risk for speech disorder; and a 5.0x relative risk for nonorganic sleep disorder. Dr. Verstraeten reported that ALL these relative risks were statistically significant. In June, 2000, he presented the evidence at a high level invitation-only secretly convened CDC conference at Simpsonwood Center, Ga. (original Abstract (1999), released in 2016)

Instead of directing manufacturers to eliminate thimerosal from vaccines, CDC concealed the scientific findings of its own scientist, and CDC officials embarked on sponsoring dubious multi-million dollar epidemiological studies that were designed to counteract Dr. Verstraeten’s evidence documenting a thimerosal-autism risk. CDC continues to disseminate false reassurances claiming: “The evidence is clear: thimerosal is not a toxin in vaccines… there is no relationship between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism in children.” (CDC “Science Summary Fact Sheet”)

In an email addressed to Harvard professor, Dr. Philippe Grandjean, an expert in heavy metals toxicity (with copies sent to six CDC scientists) Dr. Verstraeten expresses concern about scientific dishonesty:

“many experts looking at this thimerosal issue, do not seem bothered to compare apples to pears… I do not wish to be the advocate of the anti-vaccine lobby and sound like being convinced that thimerosal is or was harmful, but at least I feel we should use sound scientific argumentation and not let our standards be dictated by our desire to disprove an unpleasant theory.” (July 14, 2000)

Despite Dr. Verstraeten’s objection about scientific incompatibility (“apples to pears”) CDC chose Denmark as a comparator, and selected a Danish network of scientists who were either employed by the Danish vaccine manufacturer, Statens Serum Institut (SSI), or worked at institutions closely connected to SSI. CDC worked hand in glove with Dr. Poul Thorsen (a Danish psychiatrist) who co-authored several seminal reports that laid the foundation for CDC’s claim that thimerosal was safe and vaccines did not cause autism.

• Those Danish reports were not scientifically sound; they were crafted and manipulated to provide CDC with what it sought: “strong evidence against the hypothesis that MMR vaccination cases autism.” These reports laid the foundation for CDC’s “authoritative” assertions that thimerosal was safe and vaccines did not pose a risk for autism. Four of these studies were published in the influential journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Others were published in The New England Journal of Medicine, 2002; the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA, 2003).

These influential reports have been repudiated in peer reviewed analyses which showed them to be fraudulent; yet, they have not been retracted; nor has their repudiation by scientists been published or discussed in the medical journals which have the greatest impact on medical practice.

A series of highly significant revelations of fraud by CDC’s prime thimerosal apologist, Dr. Poul Thorsen, should have brought CDC’s house of cards down. In 2011, Dr. Thorsen was indicted by a US federal grand jury on 22 counts of forgery, money laundering, and embezzlement. He fled to Denmark to avoid prosecution while he continues to be listed on the Department of Health Inspector General’s list of IG most wanted fugitives.

2011 was a year of major research and journalistic scandals
How is one to explain that in 2011, at the very time that the editor of the BMJ embarked on a smear campaign calculated to cause the greatest damage to Dr. Wakefield, the BMJ ignored entirely, the fraud committed by Dr. Poul Thorsen and Dr. Kreesten Madsen in collaboration with CDC scientists and officials?

Their documented research fraud derailed children’s lives, potentially causing hundreds of thousands of children life-long disability. This fraud of major proportions was not reported or discussed in the medical journals, nor the media. The fraudulent research was covered only by alternative health information channels –most notably by Age of Autism and its roster of international contributing authors.

Instead, the medical journals and the media continue to vent their furry by attacking Dr. Wakefield – who harmed no child. They denigrate the parents of autistic children, while turning a blind eye to the preventable catastrophic harm that victimizes hundreds of thousands of children and their families. During this entire period, CDC has defiantly refused to share vaccine safety data with independent scientists.

In 2013, Dr. William Thompson, senior epidemiologist at the CDC stepped forward and blew the whistle. He confessed that the pivotal study by the CDC, published in the journal of the American Association of Pediatrics (2004) was manipulated; the data were fabricated to conceal a fourfold increased rate of autism in black baby boys who were vaccinated with the MMR vaccine prior to age three. Furthermore, he testified that to cover-up the evidence, the original study documents were destroyed. The claimed findings reported in Pediatrics were, therefore, fraudulent.
Read further Monumental betrayal of public trust: Evidence of CDC malfeasance & research fraud

How is one to explain that the gatekeepers of medical science completely disregard evidence of monumental vaccine research fraud –even when it occurs at the very epicenter where vaccination policy is set?  The stated objective of the BMJ editor was to “close the door on this damaging vaccine scare.” Is that the objective of one and all?

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has compared corrupt vaccine science to corrupt tobacco science.  Here is how we believe they are comparable

Both industries’ criteria for research discourages studies that might document risks;
Both industries suppressed research results that detected serious health risks;
Both industries hired biased researchers who corrupted the evidence;
Both industries blatantly lied to the public
But only the vaccine industry has the backing of the CDC

(“Vaccinations: Deadly Immunity” Rolling Stone; Salon*, 2005; Tobacco Science and the Thimerosal Scandal,” 2004).
Salon pulled the article

So, what were the crimes Andrew Wakefield was accused of? What crimes did he commit?

“I was accused of performing colonoscopies on these children, doing lumbar punctures — I never investigated these children. I was responsible for bringing this team together and conducting the investigation of these children. I was not responsible for their clinical care — that was performed by an outstanding group of gastroenterologists who confirmed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that these children have an inflammatory bowel disease and that has now been replicated around the world.” Dr. Andrew Wakefield

The GMC investigation / hearings were  were the longest protracted hearings in its history: from 2004 to 2010. Read: The GMC kangaroo court charges, etc.

The purpose of GMC protracted proceeding
The purpose was twofold: to intimidate others from touching the third rail i.e., might vaccines be a causal factor in autism?); and to vilify Dr. Wakefield because the parents of autistic children hailed him as a hero. He was castigated as an irresponsible doctor who showed “callous disregard for the distress and pain the children might suffer.” (GMC  verdict, BBC) He was also branded as posing a great danger to public health for raising alarms about the safety of the MMR vaccine. Inasmuch as the number of children who suffer with autism continues to increase at an alarming rate – in the U.S. the prevalence rate increased from 1 in 10,000 in 1980; to 1 in 250 in 2002; to 1 in 45 in 2014 – the alarms about the MMR vaccine will continue to reverberate. (Latest CDC data here)

Brian Deer’s relentless attacks – paid for by the Sunday Times, a component of Murdoch’s News syndicate – were calculated to divert public attention from vaccine safety issues and the necessity of conducting an honest examination of the MMR vaccine safety evidence by scientists who have no ties to the vaccine industry. The vitriolic crusade against Andrew Wakefield is to ensure that no scientist will even consider any “further investigation…[of] this syndrome and its possible relation to this vaccine.” Read: How the case against Andrew Wakefield was concocted

On January 5, 2011, the editor in chief of the BMJ joined forces with Brian Deer.

Deer was hired to write a special series of hit pieces about Wakefield’s work for the BMJ. The editor, Dr. Fiona Godlee, shed the restraints usually adhered to by an academic journal, and adopted the Rupert Murdoch/ Brian Deer flame-throwing style of irresponsible journalism. Dr. Godlee penned her name (and reputation) on a defamatory editorial that accused Dr. Wakefield of “fraud”– the  word “fraud” was repeated 9 times in the editorial. The charge of fraud had never been made by the GMC or the Lancet. The BMJ amplified the charge with the opening statement: “Clear evidence of falsification of data should now close the door on this damaging vaccine scare.” The accusation came after Dr. Wakefield’s professional reputation had already suffered irreparable damage.

After the BMJ launched its “special series” by Brian Deer and a scathing editorial penned by Dr. Fiona Godlee, “Wakefield’s Article Linking MMR Vaccine And Autism Was Fraudulent” (January 5, 2011), Dr. Richard Deth, Professor of Pharmacology at Northeastern University, whose research interests are focused on the role of oxidative stress and impaired methylation reactions in neurodevelopmental, neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. Dr. Deth made the following statement:

“Wakefield’s identification of gastrointestinal inflammation in autism will remain an important scientific contribution. The magnitude of
the effort to discredit him betrays a strong fear that his suggestion of a link to vaccination may be correct. It amounts to a public pillorying that frightens others from investigating this controversial but important issue.” (Read Northeastern News, Chilling Impact on Vaccine-Autism Research)

The BMJ editorial was crafted to undermine the integrity of the medical findings in the Lancet. BMJ editor Godlee claimed:
“Wakefield altered numerous facts about the patients’ medical histories in order to support his claim to have identified a new syndrome” In an email response to questions raised about her editorial by the parent group, Age of Autism, Dr. Godlee defended her charge of fraud by referring to “the very many charges proven against [Dr. Wakefield] by the fitness to practice [GMC] panel.” She misspoke.

On March 7, 2012, the British High Court, overturned the GMC panel’s verdict
The High Court completely exonerated Professor John Walker-Smith, who had appealed the GMC’s action. British High Court Justice John Mitting severely criticized the entire GMC disciplinary process:

“there was distortion of evidence, inadequate analysis, inadequate and superficial reasoning and explanation, inappropriate rejection of evidence, ‘flawed’ and ‘wrong’ reasoning, and ‘numerous and significant universal inadequacies’…. [Thes are] fundamental errors…[that]  go to the heart of the case. They are not curable. The panel’s determination cannot stand. I therefore quash it.” (March 2012)

The GMC panel was driven by corporate business interests and government health bureaucrats who have high stakes in protecting the sanctity of vaccines. By dismissing Professor Walker-Smith’s testimony, the panel demonstrated that it was unfit to make fair and reasoned judgments. (Read Martin Walker, “An Interest in Conflict?” Read further: Significant shadowy financial conflicts of interest behind the persecution of Wakefield)

Justice Mitting noted that:

“the medical records provide an equivocal answer to most of the questions which the panel had to decide. The panel had no alternative but to decide whether Professor Walker-Smith had told the truth to it and to his colleagues, contemporaneously. The GMC’s approach to the fundamental issues in the case led it to believe that that was not necessary – an error from which many of the subsequent weaknesses in the panel’s determination flowed.”

The twelve Lancet children’s medical history and condition had been independently evaluated and documented by a team of medical experts led by Professor Walker-Smith, the lead clinician at the Royal Free Hospital and by senior pathologist Dr. Amar Dhillon –not Dr. Wakefield.

“By the time the paper was accepted for publication, as mentioned in an appendix to the Lancet paper, up to January 28, 1998, a further 40 children had been so investigated, 39 with the syndrome reported in the paper. The children were all investigated specifically and exclusively by clinical need to determine whether bowel inflammation was present that could then be appropriately treated.” (Statement by Professor John Walker-Smith)

The appeal in the High Court was the only time the case was heard before a proper judicial venue.

The High Court decision, not only exonerated Professor Walker-Smith. The insightful decision was reached after carefully considering the documented evidence — including the children’s medical records; the clinical diagnostic procedures used; their reasoned clinical justification; and the convincing testimony of Professor Walker-Smith, who was the lead clinician making clinical decisions and most senior co-authored the Lancet article. By invalidating the GMC process, judgment and verdict, the High Court invalidated the charge of fraud against Dr. Wakefield. There was no fraud in the Lancet study.

As early as 1996, Professor Walker-Smith made a presentation at the Medical School entitled, “Entero-colitis and Disintegrative Disorder Following MMR – A Review of the First Seven Cases,” at which he shared his findings: “preliminary details concerning seven children, all boys, who appear to have entero-colitis and disintegrative disorder, probably autism, following MMR.” These seven children later became part of the Lancet group of 12. Inasmuch as Professor Walker-Smith made the clinical judgment for all 12 children described in the Lancet, not Dr. Wakefield, there was no possibility for Dr. Wakefield to have “falsified” the medical records. Furthermore, no charges of falsification of records were ever brought against Dr. Wakefield until Brian Deer concocted them for the Sunday Times. The BMJ editor amplified the fabricated claim of fraud.

Following his exoneration by the High Court, Professor Walker-Smith described the Kafkaesque GMC prosecution in his Enduring Memories (2012) in which he poignantly reflects,

“The central issue for me over all the years from the time of the first complaint had been made to the GMC by the journalist, was the following. Who or what was behind the decision ab initio to take his complaint against me so very, very seriously? I pondered the central mystery of the Hearing for me. Was there another influence behind the GMC, an invisible Deus ex machina?”

The BMJ accusation of “fraud” was itself a fabrication
Throughout 2011, Dr. Godlee penned her name to mudslinging accusations of fraud that would never stand up in a court of law. There is no evidence of falsification by either Wakefield or his co-authors, much less “clear evidence of falsification” as Dr. Godlee proclaimed. As is so often the case, the accuser is guilty of that which he /she accuses another.

Dr. Godlee has claimed that she was “unaware of any peer reviewed paper replicating Andrew Wakefield’s research or confirming his claims to have identified a new syndrome of regressive autism and inflammatory bowel disease associated with MMR vaccination.” That claim that no one else ever replicated the Wakefield et al. findings,  though trumpeted repeatedly, is demonstrably false. Even in a cursory search on PubMed elicits dozens of reports by genuine scientists. This false claim is repeatedly broadcast by the medical establishment and the media to reassure the public about the safety of vaccines and to reinforce that Wakefield is untrustworthy; his claims aberrant and without merit.

Perhaps someone might bring our (admittedly) incomplete peer-reviewed compilation Scientific reports validate “controversial” findings reported in The Lancet to Dr. Godlee’s attention.

It has become ever more apparent that as Dr. Wakefield’s research findings were replicated and amplified in numerous (some larger) studies the world over, the attacks on his professional reputation have intensified and broadened to become a sustained effort to delegitimize the scientific search for a possible link between autoimmune illness and adverse reactions to a vaccine or an ingredient in a vaccine.

Indeed, the BMJ editorials, penned by its editor in chief Dr. Godlee, criticized Dr. Richard Horton, the editor of the Lancet, for having retracted the Wakefield article “for far narrower misconduct.” [Dr. Horton’s only reservation, when he retracted the article, was the possibility of a conflict of interest]

And Dr. Godlee even lamented the fact that the GMC didn’t go far enough; their findings, she stated, left “the door open for those who want to continue to believe that the science, flawed though it always was, still stands.” So, her objection is to the statement in the Lancet indicating: “Further investigations are needed to examine this syndrome and its possible relation to this vaccine.”

Surely it is shocking that the editor in chief of a major medical journal has embarked on an ignoble campaign to “close the door” on scientific inquiry that touches on a forbidden, but critically important subject. Indeed the failure to encourage this avenue of research with adequate resources has resulted in the current a preventable catastrophe. CDC’s latest data indicates that 1 in 48 children in the US is condemned to suffer with autism.

From the moment that he stepped on the untouchable third rail in medicine, Dr. Wakefield risked condemnation by the powerful vaccine stakeholders who unleashed a barrage of accusations that destroyed his career in the UK. Dr. Wakefield’s “crimes”:

• Lending legitimacy to parents’ observations about the close proximity of the children’s severely symptoms to their MMR inoculation;
• By validating parents’ observations Dr. Wakefield was undermining a profit-driven vaccination policy.
• Suggesting that further research is required to investigate whether those symptoms were related to the time of vaccination with the MMR;
• Agreeing to be an expert witness in a class action lawsuit on behalf of parents, against MMR manufacturers;

We agree with Professor Richard Deth’s incisive observation:
“The magnitude of the effort to discredit him betrays a strong fear that his suggestion of a link to vaccination may be correct.”

Even a cursory examination of the scientific reports validating Dr. Wakefield’s controversial findings, convinces us of the scientific integrity of the much disparaged article. We have, therefore, concluded that Dr. Andrew Wakefield is indeed a hero for his courageous stand and determination to validate the parents and not to be silenced.

• Read further:
  *Why Andrew Wakefield MD is on our Honors Roll
  *The GMC kangaroo court charges; the Lancet evaluation; the High Court decision
  * Scientific reports validate “controversial” findings reported in The Lancet
  * Medical doctors recognize the safety problems in the 3-in-1 vaccine
  * How the case against Andrew Wakefield was concocted
  * Monumental betrayal of public trust: CDC malfeasance & vaccine research fraud
  * Significant shadowy financial conflicts of interest behind the persecution of Wakefield

While the mainstream medical journals and the media remained silent about the real research fraud by CDC, Andrew Wakefield brought it to public attention with the documentary film, Vaxxed. The response of the powers that be (who prevented the movie from being shown at the Tribecca and Texas film festivals where it was to be launched) was orchestrated to divert attention from the CDC fraud by re-igniting the assault on Wakefield.

A senior scientist from within the CDC provides a “smoking gun” 
In 2013, Dr. William Thompson, senior epidemiologist at the Center for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) stepped forward and confessed that the pivotal study by the Center for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC), published in the journal of the American Association of Pediatrics, Pediatrics (2004), entitled “Age at first measles-mumps-rubella vaccination in children with autism and school-matched control subjects: a population-based study in metropolitan Atlanta,” was manipulated, its claimed findings fraudulent. His documentation served as the catalyst for Dr. Wakefield’s film, Vaxxed: From Cover-up to Controversy. It is his second film. (Read more here and here)