What happened to Andrew Wakefield?

Answer 1

He was found to have faked much of the data in his article linking the MMR vaccine to autism. He claimed to have found a novel form of enterocolitis triggered by the MMR vaccine and associated with autism. No other researches were able to replicate his findings.

The Lancet, a highly regarded British medical journal which printed the original article, has since retracted it, describing it as "fatally flawed." An investigation concluded Dr. Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study -- and that there was "no doubt" Wakefield was responsible. He was also shown to have accepted 400,000 pounds from a legal firm representing the parents of autism victims who were suing the manufacturers of MMR vaccine.

On 28 January 2010, a five-member statutory tribunal of the GMC found three dozen charges proved, including four counts of dishonesty and 12 counts involving the abuse of developmentally challenged children. The panel ruled that Wakefield had "failed in his duties as a responsible consultant", acted both against the interests of his patients, and "dishonestly and irresponsibly" in his published research.

Three months following The Lancet's retraction, Wakefield was struck off the UK medical register, with a statement identifying deliberate falsification in the research published in The Lancet and was barred from practicing medicine in the UK. Obviously he no longer practices medicine in the UK. He left that country to run an autism treatment center in Austin, Texas.

After the publication of Wakefield's study, the rate of immunization for measles in England and Wales fell below 80%, and confirmed cases of measles have risen from 56 in 1998 to 1348 in 2008, with two child fatalities, as well as others seriously ill on ventilators.