Eighteen percent of American believe that vaccines can cause autism, 30 percent remain unsure, and 52 percent of Americans don’t think vaccines can cause autism, according to public opinion polling done after research linking vaccines to the condition was reported as fraudulent.
While 69 percent of respondents said they had heard about an association between vaccination and autism, 47 percent knew that the original Lancet study had been retracted, and that recently the research is reported as being fraudulent.
The poll also found that 86 percent of parents who have doubts about the vaccine said that their children were fully vaccinated, compared to 98 percent of parents who believe vaccines are safe, and that 92 percent of children are fully vaccinated.
The poll was conducted after news reports were published that said Andrew Wakefield, the lead researcher of the research linking autism to the MMR vaccine, had used faked data.
More than 20 studies since Wakefield’s have disputed the association between vaccination and autism.
The online survey of 2,026 adults from Jan. 11 to 13 was done by Harris Interactive and HealthDay. (AP/Fox News, CNN, BMJ, WebMD)
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
The BMJ’s statement this week that the 1998 article by Andrew Wakefield and 12 others “linking MMR vaccine and autism was fraudulent” demonstrates what a difference one journalist can make. Journalist Brian Deer played a key role in uncovering and dismantling the Wakefield story.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper had a segment worth watching, including a new interview Cooper conducted with Wakefield via Skype:
Unfortunately, journalism played a key role in promoting Wakefield’s claims. The “Respectful Insolence” blog referred to one journalist as “CBS’ resident anti-vaccine propagandist.” Around the world there were many other examples of journalists’ unquestioning acceptance of the vaccine scares.
The BMJ reminds us that “the damage to public health continues, fuelled by unbalanced media reporting and an ineffective response from government, researchers, journals, and the medical profession.”
To be blunt up front –- SBM is not apologetic about the pharmaceutical industry. We get zero funding from any company, and have no ties of any kind to “big pharma.” In today’s world I have to spend time making that clear, because despite the reality critics are free to assume and falsely claim that our message is coming straight from the bowels of hell (a.k.a. the pharmaceutical industry).
We promote science-based medicine and criticize pharmaceutical companies along with everyone else when they place other concerns ahead of scientific validity, or promote bad science, for whatever reason.
It has become fashionable, however, to not only criticize the pharmaceutical industry but to demonize them –- and the term “big pharma” has come to represent this demonization. Cynicism is a cheap imitation of skepticism –- it is the assumption of the worst, without careful thought or any hint of fairness. Read more »
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