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REGRET: Dad Paul Bullman and son Dominic, who was diagnosed as austistic after having the MMR vaccine

The confusion over the MMR vaccine refuses to subside. Vicki Shaw looks at claims the jab is safe...and why parents are still shunning it.

The vaccination expert....................
CLINICS should be banned from providing single injections for parents concerned about the MMR jab, according to vaccinations expert Dr Martin Schweiger.
Dr Schweiger, who is responsible for co-ordinating vaccination programmes in Leeds, believes single jabs could do more harm than good. And he said parents had a duty not just to their own children but others to have the MMR jab.
He said he believed in freedom of choice, but sometimes people needed to follow rules for the good of communities as a whole.
He said: "Some regulations are there to protect us. We all like the right to chose but on certain issues we have to agree to go down the same route.
"I might like to drive on the right hand side of the road, but I don't because everyone else drives on the left. If I were to ignore the rules it would put me and other people in danger. There are, I'm afraid, occasions when it is right to remove people's choices and I firmly believe the MMR vaccine is one of those instances."
By having single injections parents left their children at risk for longer of contracting measles, mumps or rubella.
He said: "The gaps between giving each of the vaccines means the children are not fully immunised for a considerable amount of time.

The parents........
• Sandra Bramham will never allow her daughter Rachel to have another injection.
Rachel suffered a severe reaction to the first dose of the MMR jab and was left in intensive care for two weeks.
Now Sandra fears her immune system may have been irreparably damaged – even common colds can see the eight-year-old hospitalised.
Sandra, 36, from Pontefract, said: "You follow all the advice and then your child ends up critical in hospital.
"I cannot say how guilty I felt seeing her lying there and thinking it was all my fault."
Rachel had the first dose of the MMR jab at 18 months old. Exactly nine days later she collapsed and fell into an epileptic shock.
She spent four weeks in Leeds General Infirmary.
Sweet maker Sandra added: "We did not let her have the MMR booster and I would never let her have another injection, ever. I'd rather take my chances against the illness."
• Diane and Geoffrey Forth would have more reason than most to fear the MMR jab – but they are convinced it is safe.
Their son Matthew, now 18, is autistic but they are adamant his symptoms were present before he had the injection.
And they have so little doubts that even after Matthew was diagnosed they still chose the MMR jab for younger child Jamie.
Geoffrey, 53, of Pateley Bridge, said: "We feel very strongly that people are just latching on to the MMR vaccine as something to blame.
"The fact is autism develops around the same time as children have the jab, so I suppose it could be a natural assumption.
"But we know that Matthew was developing the signs of autism well before the injection and I suspect many of the children, whose parents claim have been damaged, probably were, too.
Diane added: "Autism is caused by a faulty gene and the fault has to be there in the first place for it to develop. Having a vaccination isn't suddenly going to implant this gene in the body."
• Paul Bullman claims giving his son Dominic the MMR jab was the "biggest regret" of his life.
Dominic, now 15, developed symptoms of autism just weeks after having the injection at 14 months.
Six weeks after the jab a health visitor expressed concern about weakness in Dominic's legs. By the time he was three he had been diagnosed as autistic. Paul firmly believes the vaccine has destroyed his son's hopes of a normal life.
The family is one of around 2,000 mounting a court case against vaccine's manufacturers Smith Kline Beecham and Smith Kline and French. Paul said: "I don't think anything will ever persuade me MMR was not responsible. Dominic was a happy, healthy baby before he had the jab. Now he is severely affected."

The scientists......
MORE research has been carried out into the MMR jab than any other vaccine – and the majority of research claims it is safe.
But with studies being paid for by the Department of Health or pharmaceutical companies, parents remain sceptical.
Scientists though say they are in a no-win situation – they have to get their funding from somewhere and say professional ethics would rule out any bias.
The suggested link between MMR and autism was first reported by Dr Andrew Wakefield of the Royal Free Hospital in London in 1998. But since then several studies, including some by his own colleagues, have discredited his research, which also claimed a connection with Crohn's disease.
With a study seemingly being published every few weeks, parents are understandably confused.
These are just some of the reports in the past 12 months:
l The latest study was published last week by Dr Wakefield's former colleagues at the Royal Free and University College Medical School. Funded by the Department of Health and published in the Archive of Diseases in Childhood, it found no "credible evidence" to link the triple jab with the psychiatric condition. And it said a rise in the number of autism cases was most probably due to better diagnosis and reporting.
• In May, a US study, reported in the International Paediatrics journal, claimed a significantly higher link between autism and MMR than other triple vaccines. The relative risk with MMR was said to be five times higher than the DTP (diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis) jab which is given at three or four months old.
• In April, the Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin said there was no "convincing evidence" of a link.
• In February, the Public Health Laboratory Service found no evidence of immune system damage caused by the MMR vaccine.
• In November, a Danish study looked at more than half-a-million children given the jab and could find no link between MMR and cases of autism.

The GPs............................
SINGLE vaccines should not be provided by the NHS – but nor should there be a Big Brother-style outlaw of private injections, Leeds GP Richard Vautrey believes.
Although he firmly agrees that MMR is the safest possible way of immunising children, he insists parents who want to pay for single jabs should be able to.
"I don't think it would be right for us to tell parents they cannot chose what treatments their children have," he said. "Personally though I could not stress enough how valuable an injection MMR is."
Dr Vautrey, pictured, has two young sons, both of whom have received the jab. "I was the first in the queue because I remember exactly what sort of problems measles, mumps and rubella can cause. Sadly, I think people have forgotten the damage these can do."
He said there were good reasons not to choose the single vaccines over MMR. Firstly children must have six injections instead of two, and remain unprotected between the different jabs. Research also showed that while parents are prepared to attend for the occasional injection, many forgot to return for follow-up jabs.

The High Court judge
Even the High Court has an opinion on the MMR vaccine, it seems.
In June, judge Mr Justice Sumner ordered two mothers to have their children vaccinated with the controversial jab – although they are now appealing against the ruling.
The women had refused to give their daughters, aged five and 10, the combined injection over fears of a link to autism.
But both fathers – who are no longer with the mothers – wanted their children to receive the vaccination.
Mr Justice Sumner decided both children should receive the jab because the benefits outweighed the risks.
Risk
He also ruled that the girls should be immunised against other diseases, including diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, polio, and meningitis.
He rejected the idea of giving the girls separate vaccinations against mumps, measles or rubella, saying the gap between jabs could put them at risk of getting these diseases.
And he said his decision was influenced by evidence given by medical experts.
One of the mothers issued a statement after last month's High Court ruling criticising the decision. She said: "It's outrageous that, in a free society, a judge could make such a decision."

28 July 2003

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