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Lancet fully retracts MMR paper

February 4, 2010 by danni kirwan

Andrew Wakefield and colleagues' 1998 paper that claimed to link the MMR vaccine with gastrointestinal disease and regressive autism has been fully retracted from the published record.  In this week's edition of the Lancet, its Editors write that "several elements of the 1998 paper by Wakefield et al are incorrect", in particular that "the claims in the original paper that children were 'consecutively referred' and that investigations were 'approved' by the local ethics committee have been proven to be false". 
 
This comes in contrast to a 2004 statement from the Royal Free and University College Medical School and The Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust (also published in the Lancet) that defended the paper's ethical validity, asserting that it had been subjected to "appropriate and rigorous ethical scrutiny" by an independent committee.
 
The controversial research paper led to an international debate regarding the safety of the triple MMR vaccine, which resulted in a decline in uptake of the vaccine.  This was followed by an increase in cases of and deaths from measles.  No subsequent studies have been able to replicate the authors' findings; rather, many studies including a 2005 Cochrane review have failed to find any credible evidence of an involvement of MMR with either autism or Crohn's disease, whilst the impact of mass immunisation on the elimination of the diseases has been demonstrated worldwide.  Meanwhile, Sunday Times writer Brian Deer launched an investigation and was able to obtain access to the children's medical records, finding and reporting distortions of data and conflicts of interest. 
 
The retraction by the Lancet follows the judgment of the UK General Medical Council's Fitness to Practise Panel on January 28th that the actions of Wakefield plus two senior co-authors, Professors Walker-Smith and Murch, "would not be insufficient to support a finding of serious professional misconduct".  This was the longest session yet heard by the Panel, with evidence and submissions from 36 witnesses heard for 148 days over a period of two and a half years.  A session commencing in April will determine whether the facts do amount to serious professional misconduct, and if so, what sanction, if any, should be imposed on their registrations.
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