Hello my little microbe loving friends! Welcome to my first ~official~ blog post of the semester! I know you’ve seen the title of this blog and are probably already cringing…I am too, but bare with me and we can get through this together! I want to share with you guys a little more about Andrew Wakefield and the study that made him infamous in the world of medicine and health today.
Okay, let’s start out with his study (that has since been retracted). This study was published in February of 1998 in the Lancet journal. The study was an intense read but the US National Library of Medicine helped me decipher what exactly went on, including what happened behind closed doors. So, basically what happened was he had 12 children in the study—which anyone who has ever taken a statistics class before will tell you is too small of a sample size—and he found this cohort in the pediatric gastroenterology unit because all of them were having signs of gastrointestinal problems as well as some developmental deficits. Wakefield’s study basically stated that the MMR vaccine children get to protect themselves from the highly contagious diseases (measles, mumps, and rubella) caused developmental problems and autism.
At this point you guys are probably thinking “did people actually believe this nonsense?” Well, they did. We do have to go a little easy on the parents right when it came out though. All parents want the best for their children and if a research study and physician are saying the MMR vaccine causes autism then of course you want to make sure that your child doesn’t acquire a developmental disorder that could be prevented. But other independent scientists quickly disproved this study. They condemned the study as being unethical because they didn’t go through the proper channels when researching the kids and they also did not do consecutive sampling, but rather selective. The study was based on information that fit what Wakefield wanted it to say, not on actual correct facts. This means that the researcher uses their own judgement to chose the subjects of their study. The icing on top of this awful cake is the fact that Wakefield had ulterior motives for this study. Wakefield was payed to conduct this study by people that were against vaccines and had lawsuits against vaccine companies. Yup…this Wakefield guy really is not cool.
I know you guys are probably tired of reading due to all the eye rolls you are doing because of Andrew Wakefield, so I will wrap up this blog post by quickly telling you what has happened as a result of the rise of unvaccinated people due to the fear Wakefield and his study has instilled in people. According to the CDC, measles (one of the diseases that can be prevented by the MMR vaccine) has rapidly risen in the number of people it has infected, especially in the past year (2019). Measles is showing up in many different countries and it is highly contagious, so if you don’t have protection against it, you will most likely get it if you are exposed. Vaccines provide that protection and have saved so many people from acquiring the disease. Measles (along with the other diseases) is dangerous. People are getting sick and dying from measles that would still be here if people were vaccinated. This blog has taken a more serious turn, but it is so important to stress the importance of vaccines, you aren’t just protecting yourself, but your neighbors as well.
Thank you for being loyal readers! I will talk to you guys next week so get ready, I don’t know about you, but I’m excited!
P.S. MAKE SURE YOU’RE VACCINATED!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here is a collection of anti-vax memes I found that I died (no pun intended) laughing at ~enjoy~
Microbiology 