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ONE
third of the members of a government committee that has advised that the
MMR vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella is safe have financial
interests in drug companies that make the treatment, writes Rosie Waterhouse.
Twelve of the 36
members of the Committee on Safety of Medicines have financial links with
the MMR manufacturers, whose products they have given the all-clear on the
basis of published research. Most members are academics or medical experts
who specialise in pharmacology.
Five of them hold
shares in the drug companies, or are paid consultants, while another seven
have received grants or sponsorship from them to fund academic studies or
clinical trials.
All members declare
their financial interests in a register and before meetings. The chairman
then decides whether they can participate in discussions.
Campaigners against the
MMR vaccine, who fear it causes autism or bowel disease in children, claim
the financial links between drug watchdogs and the pharmaceutical industry
could lead to a conflict of interest.
One lobby group, Jabs,
is to write to Alan Milburn, the health secretary, asking for an
investigation into the potential conflict of interest.Last week Mary
Robinson, from Hayle, Cornwall, said she would take legal action after
claiming that five of her six children had developed autism after their MMR
injections.
While the government
and most of the medical establishment argue that the vaccine is safe,
research by Dr Andrew Wakefield, of the Royal Free hospital, London,
claimed the trials leading to the MMR vaccine's adoption in Britain were
too brief to detect the feared complications.
In an interview in The
Sunday Times today, Liam Donaldson, the government's chief medical officer,
defends the government's refusal to endorse separate injections in place of
the MMR vaccine.
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