Vaccine Proponents Not Immunized From Criticism
http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/07/28/vaccine-proponents-not-immunized-from-criticism/?mod=googlenews_wsj
By Alicia Mundy
Many parents, concerned about risks from childhood vaccines, are putting the kibosh on shots for their kids despite advice from government officials, the medical establishment and academics.
Gaps in immunization are starting to show. A lack of vaccination against measles was known or suspected in 63 of 64 U.S. cases of the disease in the first third of the year, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Measles was declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, after decades of vaccination.
Still, consumers’ suspicion of vaccine advocates runs deep. On Friday, the CBS Evening News took a look at the financial ties between advocates of vaccines and makers of the shots. The CBS report came in the wake of the network news’ ongoing stories on vaccines and autism.
The CBS report focused on the American Academy of Pediatrics, the pro-vaccine group Every Child by Two, and Paul Offit, a vaccine researcher and staunch defender of immunization.
Drugmakers have given millions in grants and other kinds of payments to the AAP and helped build its headquarters, CBS reported, noting specific payments of $433,000 from Merck and $342,000 Wyeth.
Another recipient of industry funds is Every Child By Two, a nonprofit organization co-founded by former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, which told CBS that it has doesn’t have any conflicts of interest. CBS said that AAP treasurers have included a former Wyeth executive and a Big Pharma consultant.
Offit, chief of infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, declined to be interviewed by CBS for the piece. But the story pointed out that Offit’s $1.5 million chair is funded by Merck and that he shares a patent with the company for a vaccine against rotavirus, a cause of childhood diarrhea.
All three subjects of the CBS report told the network they are “upfront about the money they receive and that the funding doesn’t sway their opinions.â€Â
Vaccine makers have been worried by the federal vaccine court’s decision in March to compensate Hannah Poling, a child who developed autism, though the court did not specifically link autism to the medicines. At the time, Offit wrote an op-ed in the New York Times saying that the vaccine court had been turning its back on scientific evidence.
Correction: The original version of this post misstated the amounts that CBS reported Merck and Wyeth gave to the American Academy of Pediatrics. The figures should have been $433,000 for Merck and $342,000 for Wyeth—not $433 million and $342 million, respectively.