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US experts
back MMR doctor's findings
(Filed: 23/06/2002)
The man whose research first raised concern over the
vaccine's safety is winning support. Lorraine Fraser reports from an
influential Congressional hearing.
Scientists in America have reported the first
independent corroboration of the research findings of Dr Andrew
Wakefield,
the specialist who has questioned the safety of the childhood MMR
vaccine.
Dr Arthur Krigsman, from New York University School of
Medicine, has observed serious intestinal inflammation in autistic
children identical to that described by the controversial British doctor
and his colleagues in a research paper four years ago.
Dr Krigsman's discovery is significant because it
independently supports Dr Wakefield's conclusion that a previously
unidentified and devastating combination of bowel and brain disease is
afflicting young children - a claim that the Department of Health has
dismissed as "bad science".
Dr Wakefield has seen nearly 200 previously normal
youngsters who apparently developed the combined behaviour and digestive
problems after receiving the three-in-one measles, mumps and rubella jab
- a vaccination given routinely to babies and pre-school children in
Britain and the United States.
Pathologists at Trinity College, Dublin, have since
identified measles virus in bowel tissue samples from 75 of these
children and,
as reported in The Telegraph last week, now claim to have evidence
that the virus comes from MMR.
The Department of Health refuses to accept that such
results cast doubt on MMR's safety. A principal criticism levelled at Dr
Wakefield and his colleagues is that no part of their research has been
replicated by scientists elsewhere.
Last Wednesday, however, Dr Krigsman reported that he
had seen the same pattern of illness in 43 American children.
At a hearing of the Government Reform Committee of the
United States Congress on the safety of MMR and other vaccines, he said
that - like the British children - his patients had all inexplicably
deteriorated, losing language and other skills, at around 12 to 18
months of age.
All the children had a definite diagnosis of autism and
had come to him because they had symptoms of serious digestive problems,
such as pain, constipation and diarrhoea, for which no explanation could
be found.
"Our findings, which are independent of Dr Wakefield's
findings, completely support his explanation and his observations of the
abnormalities in the bowels of these children," he said.
The intestines of the children were "not normal", he
added. One 13-year-old autistic boy, who had become so violent that his
parents had wanted to institutionalise him, had the "worst case" of
inflammation of the colon the doctor had ever seen through a fibre-optic
scope.
Dr Krigsman, an experienced consultant paediatric
gastroenterologist and an assistant professor at the university, told
the committee that he did not know whether his patients' illnesses were
linked to MMR. However, he now plans to have the biopsies he took during
the examinations tested independently to check for evidence of measles
virus infection.
The results will be awaited anxiously by parents and
public health officials in Britain, where
the debate over the safety of MMR began with the report from Dr
Wakefield and other doctors at the Royal Free Hospital in north
London in 1998.
Dr Krigsman's research was among presentations
described as "significant findings" by Dan Burton, an Indiana
congressman chairing the Congressional committee.
Doctors in Britain and America are recognising more
autistic children than ever. The US National Institute of Health
estimates that one American child in 250 is affected, compared with one
in 10,000 a decade ago. A recent survey by the National Autistic Society
in England suggested that one in 86 primary school pupils may have the
condition.
Health officials in both countries insist, however,
that there is no evidence to link this apparent increase with the use of
MMR or any other vaccine, and say there is no reason for parents to
worry. In Britain, the Department of Health has rejected calls to allow
single measles vaccines on the NHS as an alternative, claiming that
numerous statistical studies have concluded that MMR is safe.
The Congressional committee heard evidence from other
specialists suggesting that MMR and the mercury-based preservative,
Thimerosal, may both harm susceptible children, possibly by altering
their immune system. Thimerosal is not used in MMR, but is contained in
other childhood jabs such as DTP - the diphtheria, tetanus and
whooping-cough vaccine.
Dr Jeff Bradstreet, the medical director of the
International Child Development Resource Centre in Florida, disclosed
that tests on his eight-year-old autistic son Matthew - who received
vaccines containing mercury and the MMR jab - have found particles of
measles virus in the fluid that bathes his brain and spine as well as in
his intestines.
Two other boys with autism who, like Matthew, have
recently started to suffer seizures, also have measles virus in their
cerebrospinal fluid.
While the significance of this is not yet clear, Dr
Bradstreet said he was broadening his research in this area.
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