The Next Chapter in the Wakefield Kufuffle

Chapter 2, Return of the Parents:

Media Advisory - News Conference

What:

1) On Wednesday 6th May 2009 a formal complaint will be filed with the General Medical Council of the UK against four senior doctors, all highly regarded members of the UK medical establishment. It is alleged, and supported by documentary evidence, that Dr. Richard Horton, Editor of The Lancet, Dr. David Salisbury of the Dept. of Health, Professor Arie Zuckerman, former Dean of the Medical School, Royal Free Hospital, and Dr. Michael Pegg, Chair of the Ethics Committee of the Royal Free gave false testimony on oath in the GMC hearings involving Dr. Andrew Wakefield, Professor John Walker-Smith, and Professor Simon Murch.

2) At the same time parents of 4 children involved in the original Lancet study, on which the major allegations have been based, will make public statements regarding the GMC hearings.

When: Wednesday May 6, 2009
Time: 11:30am – 12:30pm
Where: The Kingsway Hall Hotel, 66 Great Queen Street, London, WC2B 5BX,
www.kingswayhall.co.uk
Who: U.S. attorney James Moody, director of U.S. charities Safe Minds and the National Autistic Association, acting on behalf of 13 American and British autism organisations, states:

“Dr. Richard Horton, Editor of The Lancet, Dr. David Salisbury of the Dept. of Health, Professor Arie Zuckerman, former Dean of the Medical School at the Royal Free Hospital, and Dr. Michael Pegg, Chair of the Ethics Committee of the Royal Free, should be investigated for supplying false testimony. Furthermore, the current GMC hearing against Drs. Wakefield. Murch and Walker-Smith should be terminated. This unwarranted attack on scientists and doctors who came to the aid of desperately ill children has deterred others from helping similarly affected children, and distracted attention from the public health crisis caused by the substantial rise in autism diagnoses.”

Three families representing four of the 12 children included in the original Lancet publication will speak out publicly for the first time about the GMC hearings to clarify the details of their childrens’ involvement in the case series, and express their families’ support of the doctors they consider to be wrongly under investigation by the GMC. A letter from the families to the GMC expressing support of the doctors being investigated will be read by those who are able to be present.

Contact: James Moody - autismandvax@aol.com; tel: 001 202-298-4766.

Andrew Wakefield Gains a Well Known Supporter

Apple Mark reports that Max Clifford, apparent the most well known PR guy in England, showed up at the GMC yesterday and will be offering Wakefield services pro-bono.

The dramatic change in the climate here is not being experienced in the UK. Is that about to change?

UPDATE: Cry Shame has a complete take on the day and the struggling prosecution.

Andrew Wakefield on Autism One Radio Today

Monday, April 14th - Autism One Radio

SPECIAL
12:00 noon ET
Polly Tommey presents: Autism Issues Around the World
The MMR & Autism: Dr. Andrew Wakefield's GMC Hearing
- An Update from London

Guests: Dr. Carol Stott and Jim Moody, Esquire
Following Polly Tommey's program from outside the GMC inquiry in London last month, she returns to provide an update on the progress of the hearing as the defense case approaches its conclusion. Polly will be attending and listening to the proceedings and then talking to those following the inquiry closely, including Dr. Carol Stott, psychiatrist and colleague of Dr Wakefield, and Jim Moody, leading US medical lawyer.

www.autismone.org

Wakefield and Colleagues Should Be Knighted, Not Persecuted

This press released issued by pretty much everyone in the biomedical community.

I say here, here.

U.K. Medical Inquiry Threatens Scientific Inquiry & Progress in Autism

The National Autism Association (NAA), SafeMinds, Unlocking Autism, Generation Rescue, Autism One and Talk About Curing Autism (TACA) wish to express support for Dr. Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues who are unjustly facing a fitness to practice hearing by the General Medical Council (GMC) of the United Kingdom. Dr. Wakefield, a pioneer in autism research and treatment, begins his historic testimony today. The undersigned organizations, along with other U.S. families affected by autism, join in spirit with the U.K. families who are demonstrating today at the GMC offices in London.

The GMC prosecution is a frontal attack on the health and well-being of those around the world who have an autism spectrum disorder. Scientific and medical progress in this field will only be made through open minded thinking on how best to treat and prevent the disabling conditions that accompany this complex diagnosis. The GMC's actions have a chilling effect on the practice of medicine and suppress honest and open scientific inquiry.

Dr. Wakefield and his team of elite researchers at the Royal Free Hospital in London did exactly as they were called to do by their professional curiosity and ethics - find out why so many children have autism and whether gastrointestinal problems play a role in the disorder. Their seminal 1998 paper published in The Lancet reported a series of observations whose common features had coalesced as a new syndrome, autistic enterocolitis. The parents of many patients noted a link between the onset of symptoms and receipt of the measles-mumps-rubella combination vaccine (MMR), but out of an abundance of caution the Lancet paper claimed that the study did not prove an association between MMR and autism. Rather, it prudently called for further research.

The underlying goal of the GMC hearing is to take Dr. Wakefield and colleagues to task for daring to even hint at a vaccine-autism link. The "official" reason is to determine if the scientists profited from their research, but in fact the inquiry is a desperate tactic by vaccination proponents to quiet those who raise questions about the safety of current vaccination practices such as combining three live viruses into the single MMR injection. Recent developments in the U.S. have vindicated Dr. Wakefield's hypotheses. Gastrointestinal problems are now known to be present in many autistic children and gastroenterology has become a standard discipline for autism medical care. The U.S. court for vaccine injury compensation has found that vaccination against multiple diseases on one day led to a case of regression into autism in a child who was developing normally.

Dr. Wakefield should be knighted for his cutting-edge creativity, not persecuted. He made his hypotheses a decade ago, and the rest of science is just now catching up. The public health bureaucrats and their agents - in the U.K. and the U.S. - are more interested in covering up their own misdeeds, poor judgment, or inaction. These include a refusal to make the single monovalent measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines broadly available in response to legitimate concerns over the safety of the triple MMR injection, a refusal to conduct a valid study comparing the rate of autism and other health outcomes in vaccinated and unvaccinated groups, and a refusal to reexamine infant immunization schedules to increase safety. Autism spectrum disorder rates in the U.K. may be as high as 1 in 66 and in the U.S. they are said to be 1 in 150 children, but the public health establishment refuses to declare autism a health emergency, refuses to apply the resources to understanding the disorder, and refuses to conduct the type of unbiased research required.

The U.K. medical establishment has driven Dr. Wakefield from his home, but his loss is America's gain. We are blessed to have Dr. Wakefield as Director of the Thoughtful House Center for Children in Austin, Texas. In a few short years, this has become an international mecca for research, education, and treatment for children with autism. We look forward to a fair GMC hearing and to further ground-breaking research from Dr. Wakefield and his team.

For more information about autism and the undersigned organizations, visit www.autism.org. Details about today's rally in London are available at http://www.cryshame.com/.

National Autism Association
SafeMinds
Unlocking Autism
Generation Rescue
Autism One
Talk About Curing Autism (TACA)

UK: GMC Advises UK Docs To Commit Fraud over MMR

The GMC is Britain's medical ethics council that is currently trying Andrew Wakefield over alleged ethics violations in regards to his research on the MMR.

Apparently they are encouraging doctors to remove children who refuse the MMR from their list of patients to fraudulently raise the MMR uptake statistics.

The docs can then get payments for seeming to have met the governments MMR uptake goals.

So the GMC, whose job it is to maintain ethical medical practices, is apparently giving the nod for docs to commit fraud to prop up vaccine uptake stats and to get cash payments.

I am sure that Wakefield will get a fair hearing.

From UK Lawyer, Clifford Miller:

GMC Advises UK Docs To Commit Fraud over MMR

Is medicine institutionally corrupt? Here you will see the UK's General Medical Council advising UK medical doctors how to commit fraud on the UK's National Health Service for personal financial gain.

The GMC's role is to protect, promote and maintain the health and safety of the public by ensuring proper standards in the practice of medicine by medical doctors. This includes prosecuting UK medical doctors when their behaviour may bring the medical profession into disrepute. Dishonesty, financial impropriety and fraud fall within its purview. This link [1] provides an example of a decided case from its website.

The GMC is a statutory body independent (allegedly) of the NHS and of Government, with responsibility for maintaining the medical register for the United Kingdom. The GMC has statutory powers under the Medical Act 1983 to take action where there are concerns about the fitness to practise of a registered medical practitioner. Where the GMC finds that a doctor is not fit to practise, it has powers to erase that doctor's name from the medical register, to suspend the doctor from the register or to place conditions on the doctor's practice. These restrictions apply to practice in any sector of employment in any part of the UK. [2]

In the UK if doctors meet target levels for numbers of MMR and other vaccinations administered they can claim bonus payments for doing so. If they fail, they cannot claim those payments. One way of claiming the payments is to make a false return.

So how can it be that the GMC advises doctors on how to commit fraud? The GMC pose the question "Can GPs remove some children from their lists, temporarily, for the purpose of calculating the MMR target payment?" Here you will see that its currently available advice is to the effect that "it's OK provided you have patient consent" [3], [4]. It seems it also happens to be OK if it helps to increase the MMR uptake figures. The advice does not appear to be offered for other vaccinations.

And notice how they fail to make any mention of the financial and moral impropriety of doing so when they answer the question they pose like this:-

"This must not be done without the parents' agreement. Parents must be given a full explanation of what was proposed and why, their child's rights as an NHS patient, and the implications for their child's future care. Doctors working within the NHS must treat all patients entitled to NHS services on an equal footing. So temporarily removing a child from a GPs list must not adversely affect their care, for example in accessing secondary care and out-of-hours services, or in providing relevant information to ensure continuity of care and allow effective working with other agencies. Doctors must act honestly in their financial dealings. So GPs must ensure that any arrangement to remove a child from their list and re-register them for ‘immediately necessary treatment', or on some other basis, would be in line with their contractual obligations to the NHS."

Notice that provided the doctor does what the GMC advises and ensures "that any arrangement ... would be in line with their contractual obligations to the NHS" it is fine as "Doctors must act honestly in their financial dealings". Am I missing something or is this starting to look like we need the "men in white coats" to take away the men in white coats?

Not only that but the GMC advice is that if the evidence is available this is not contrary to GMC guidance on good medical practice:-

"Are temporary removals from a GPs list acceptable to the GMC? In the absence of evidence that ‘temporary removals' satisfy the concerns outlined at Q5, we cannot give any reassurance that such arrangements would be seen as consistent with our guidance on good practice."

GMC advice to UK doctors is that doctors "must not ask for or accept any inducement, gift or hospitality which may affect or be seen to affect the way you prescribe for, treat or refer patients." [7] But it seems the GMC do not mind when it comes to MMR, even where the inducement is so strong it encourages fraud on the NHS. But then, the GMC does not seem to mind about that either.

So now you know. If it concerns getting MMR uptake up, fraud is fine. But you had better make sure you implicate the parents and what better way to do that than to pressure them into agreeing their children become temporary patients possibly for emergency treatment only or else be dumped from the patient roster completely. Naturally, I am not saying that is happening nor am I saying the GMC advice is taken to suggest that be done - as it does not, but it could encourage that kind of behaviour. As a lawyer advising pro bono I have direct experience of patients being removed from an NHS doctor's roster after objections to childhood vaccinations.

The GMC has an agreement on cooperating and coordinating with the NHS Counter Fraud service [5]. And "GMC Today" newsletter carried a story ironically titled "Is the NHS immune to fraud?" about reducing and reporting fraud in the National Health Service [6]. The story gives a number to call the confidential NHS Fraud and Corruption Reporting Line and an email address too. It reports:-

"If you have a concern about a fraud taking place within the NHS, please call the confidential NHS Fraud and Corruption Reporting Line on 0800 028 40 60. All calls will be dealt with by trained staff and professionally investigated. Lines are open Monday to Friday 8 am–6 pm. You can also email us at nhsfraud@cfsms.nhs.uk at any time."

I haven't got the heart to tell 'em. Have you?


[1] http://www.gmc-uk.org/concerns/hearings_and_decisions/ftp/ftp_panel_islam_20061013.asp

[2] http://www.gmc-uk.org/about/partners/national_health_service_counter_fraud_service.asp

[3] http://www.gmc-uk.org/guidance/current/library/targeting_preventative_measures.asp

[4] http://www.gmc-uk.org/guidance/archive/Target_payments_for_preventative_health_measures_2003.pdf

[5] Memorandum of Understanding between the General Medical Council (GMC) and the National Health Service Counter Fraud Service (NHS CFS)

[6] Is the NHS immune to fraud? - GMC Today - Oct 2005

[6] Paragraph 74 Good Medical Practice

Wakefield's Hearing Begins

Today began the Wakefield Trial, I don't know if there will be reporting on it, but I will post it if I come across it.

His supporters have two efforts underway:

This Petition

and

CryShame.co.uk

NAA's press release today:

Parents and advocacy groups call inquiry against Dr. Andrew Wakefield a “witch hunt”

National Autism Association Tells England’s GMC to Instead Ask: Why Are So Many Kids Sick?

Washington, DC - Parents and advocacy groups around the globe are asking England’s General Medical Council (GMC) to cancel the “fitness to practice” inquiry that begins today against Dr. Andy Wakefield, and Professors Walker-Smith and Murch. Advocates say the GMC should instead be asking why so many kids are sick, especially in light of an apparently suppressed analysis showing that autism rates in England are as high as 1 in 58. The medical establishment is being criticized for doing little to find the cause, treat the kids, or prevent new cases.

“The list of charges reveal the utter lack of any case against Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues, who are at risk of losing their licenses,” according to National Autism Association (NAA) board member and parent Scott Bono. The charges, only made known last week, relate primarily to a peer-reviewed case report published in 1998 in the “Early Reports” section of The Lancet, one of England’s leading medical journals: Ileal-lymphoid-nodular-hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive disability disorder in children. This first report of a new syndrome, never refuted or retracted, has since been repeatedly reported and studied by other researchers. Vaccine-strain measles virus has been found and sequenced from gut biopsies and cerebral spinal fluid in autistic children.

The charges originated from internet blogger Brian Deer, who many parents have suggested may be linked to the pharmaceutical industry. “This is nothing more than a witch hunt brought against scientists willing to undertake ground-breaking research challenging the assumption that autism is an inherited untreatable psychiatric disorder that cannot be prevented. Implicating the safety of vaccines such as MMR isn’t acceptable to drug companies or government officials who want to protect the vaccine program itself at the cost of the health of children,” said Mr. Bono.

The evidence will demonstrate that questioned diagnostic studies used by Dr. Wakefield, such as colonoscopies and lumbar punctures, were not only approved by ethics review but were clinically indicated. These have now been accepted as the standard of care by a group of leading pediatric gastroenterologists in the United States.

Other charges concern incomplete disclosures of what the advocacy groups consider irrelevant material that could appear to be a conflict of interest only to vaccine makers and government agencies shielding vaccines from legitimate and appropriate criticism. Dr. Wakefield had consulted with lawyers and families receiving government funding from the Legal Aid Board on an entirely separate study to determine whether measles virus could be identified in the diseased gut tissue, providing vital evidence for a possible class action. The legal aid board subsequently determined that this explanation for autism was more probable than not, but under government pressure dropped funding for the suit.

In the first of 5000 cases to be heard in a special vaccine court in the US last month, evidence presented demonstrated that 12-year old Michelle Cedillo began regressing into autism just a week after her MMR vaccination at 15 months. The plausible cause was a persistent measles infection which took hold through an immune system weakened by mercury in vaccines administered prior to the MMR.

Many have cited the major theme of the Government’s defense in vaccine court was that those who have the temerity to question vaccine safety must be censored and their research stopped rather than risk impairing public confidence in vaccines. According to a growing number of parents, the actual threats involved are:

* companies making vaccines without appropriate safety considerations because they no longer need fear accountability through litigation
* government denials of the autism epidemic that allow an avoidance of funding research into cause and treatment
* a sclerotic medical establishment with its head in the sand as a tsunami of sick children rages overhead.

“The search for truth in autism must be guided by sound science and not be led astray by fear, censorship, and the greed of the pharma-government complex,” commented NAA president Wendy Fournier. “Perhaps the greatest damage done by this GMC hearing, other than a complete waste of time and resources, is the chill wind blown over parents and scientists who dare to ask the hard questions against this and any other medical orthodoxy: why are so many of our kids sick and what can, indeed what must, we do to help them?”

No parents will testify against Wakefield and his colleagues at the GMC hearing. Instead, they have organized a protest coinciding with the start of the hearing. “NAA stands shoulder to shoulder with our British friends in their search for truth, justice, and treatments for their kids,” said Ms. Fournier. “We urge the GMC to stop this persecution and take urgent action in view of a true national health emergency to care for the children afflicted with autism.”

For more information on autism, visit www.nationalautism.org.