Ethics question
over Wakefield research asks how
investigations help patients
This page
is material from the award-winning investigation by Brian Deer for The Sunday Times of London, the
UKs Channel 4 TV network and BMJ, the British
Medical Journal, which exposed vaccine
research fraudster Andrew Wakefield |
Investigation
summary
Even as research on autistic
children admitted to the Royal Free
hospital had already started for a legal contract awarded to Wakefield, the hospital's ethics
committee was concerned about the
extensive nature of the tests - including
colonoscopies, lumbar punctures and MRI
scans - planned to be performed on
children with developmental disorders.
The issue even reached the hospital's chief executive. Here is a form
returned to the committee by one member -
Andrew Stevens - then a senior manager at
the hospital
|