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Response
to Peter Jennings | World News Tonight
[October 05,
1998]
Peter
Jennings
Anchor
World News Tonight with Peter Jennings
47 West 66th St., 2nd Floor New York, NY 10023
Dear Mr.
Jennings:
As a
regular viewer of your 6:30pm (Eastern time) World News Tonight, and as a
member of the Board of Hasbro Children's Foundation who participated in
honoring you at a dinner in New York several years ago, I hope this letter
may reach your desk and receive your attention. I am a Duke pediatrician
with 40 years experience in research, development and policy regarding
vaccines. Twice in the past months (most recently on Friday evening 25
September) you have presented stories regarding vaccines and utilized
"authorities" who are not at all qualified. The first episode
regarded the hypothesis that infant immunization provoked juvenile diabetes
mellitus. The "expert" who appeared on your program was Dr. Bart Classen,
an immunologist from Baltimore, Maryland who heads his own private
organization. His theories are not new and have been reviewed at least
three times in the past year by expert groups including diabetologists,
immunologists, vaccinologists, geneticists, epidemiologists and
biostatisticians all of whom have agreed unanimously that Dr. Classen has
totally misinterpreted data that he has extracted from studies in Finland
and elsewhere, and has built a hypothesis for which there is absolutely no
evidence. These reviews have been sponsored by the Johns Hopkins University
Institute for Vaccine Safety, the National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health and the Vaccine
Initiative of the Infectious Diseases Society of American and the Pediatric
Infectious Diseases Society.
The second
individual who has appeared on both these programs is Mrs. Barbara Loe
Fisher who is show with a subtitle "National Vaccine Information
Center." I am confident that 99% of your television audience who view
her with such a heading assume that this is some authoritative federal
agency. Indeed, she represents a small group of unfortunate parents who
feel that their children have been damaged by vaccines and who have
conducted over a period of 20 years campaigns against many of the aspects
of infant and child immunization. With no more explanation of who she is
and whom she represents, your viewers must assume that the National Vaccine
Information Center is a medical agency perhaps associated with the National
Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control or some other
scientific establishment.
Certainly,
you have every right to select those individuals to comment on medical
information whom you judge to be worthy and reliable. However, I cannot
understand how either of these two individuals could possibly qualify in
that respect. It should be made quite clear that Dr. Classen's hypotheses
are solely that, not proven or established facts, and that Barbara Loe
Fisher is an advocate for a particular position regarding vaccines and
childhood immunizations, but not in any way an immunization authority.
In a more
recent presentation on Friday evening 25 September, Mr. John McKenzie
presented information about the new conjugate pneumococcal vaccine and the
successful results of a recent trial in California. Once again Mrs. Fisher
was the "expert" commentator who felt that "this disease
does not qualify" and is not a life threatening or epidemic problem.
Dr. Classen again commented on diabetes mellitus and added asthma as
another consequence of infant immunization. Totally absent from the story
was the serious problem of antibiotic resistance with more than 30% of
pneumococci isolated from patients with blood stream infection, meningitis
or pneumonia resistant not only to penicillin but to most of the other
commonly used antibiotics, so the only effective antibiotic remains
Vancomycin, one which should be reserved ideally for unique situations. The
prevention of pneumococcal disease by a successful vaccine would be an
enormous asset in combating this problem of antibiotic resistance, let
alone its primary value in preventing much of the life threatening illness
which is most common in young infants and the aged population.
In order to
present a logical case to you, I have composed a letter that is probably
too lengthy but I hope you will take the time to read it and would be
willing to discuss these matters further if you have any disagreement.
Currently I chair with Dr. Louis Sullivan, former secretary of HHS, a
program called the Vaccine Initiative. It has been established precisely to
provide to parents, health workers, legislators and the media accurate,
reliable information about vaccines, their benefits and risks, and the
programs for their utilization in this county.
As a
recognized authority in the field of infectious diseases and particularly
of vaccines, I cannot help but wonder who in your organization has singled
out Mrs. Fisher and Dr. Classen as appropriate individuals to comment on
your vaccine stories. I assure you that you and thereby your audience are
badly misled by their comments. I can also assure you that the Vaccine
Initiative would be willing to make expert authorities available to you on
short notice anytime 24 hours a day, 7 days a week if you seek evaluation
of news and stories relating to vaccines and immunizations.
With
apologies again for the length of this letter, but in hopes that it will
reach you and provide you a readily available source of knowledgeable
consultation.
Yours
Sincerely,
Samuel L. Katz, MD, D, Sc
Co-Chair
Vaccine Inititative
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