Brian Deer earns new award as squandered energy and hope sours into bitterness

This page is research from an investigation by Brian Deer for the UK's Channel 4 Television and The Sunday Times of London into a campaign linking the MMR children's vaccine with autism. | Go to part I: The Lancet scandal | Go to part II: The Wakefield factor

With the collapse of Andrew Wakefield's campaign against the MMR vaccine, thousands of parents - many litigants - were stripped of baseless hopes that they could pin their child's autism on supposedly sinister, corrupt forces, and perhaps even win a large sum of money. In some cases, years of energy were wasted that, but for Wakefield's false claims, might have been productively channelled