Measles outbreak and MMR vaccinations: live webchat with Department of Health director of immunisation Professor David Salisbury, Tuesday 9 April, 2-3pm

[GeraldineMumsnet]

In light of the measles outbreaks in South Wales and higher than average levels of measles in some areas of England, and concerns reflected in MNers' discussions, we've invited Professor David Salisbury, the government's director of immunisation, back to MN to be our webchat guest tomorrow, Tuesday 9 April, at 2pm.

Please post any questions you have about the MMR vaccine for your children, or yourself, to Professor Salisbury.

Thank you.

But surely posting links about a topic on a thread about that topic is part of what MN is all about?

"Pluserix, the study was well large enough with 25 kids to detect the huge rate of measles virus occurrence that Wakefield and colleagues reported. Bustin's explanation on how samples must have been contaminated are very logical (I do speak PCR though) so the easiest explanation (apart from "it was all a lie") is a laboratory contamination. I read the Bustin article just now and it is not as "lay suitable" as his Cedillo testimony but it says the same thing, maybe read either?"

No, the authors themselves did not claim this (passage I quoted), while demonstrating plausibility of the original findings (their findings including the two positive ones replicated across three laboratories), even endorsing them. It is obviously not the case that Wakefield had ever posited that this was sole cause of autism, but there might be a significant sub-group - the Royal Free team were locating many such patients.

I don't think there's much point in touting reputation (Bustin good, Wakefield bad etc.), the issue is just not resolved because it is a political hot potato.

Incidentally, since people go on about Wakefield making money it emerges from the Cedillo transcript that Bustin had received £225,000 in expert fees for the case before he got to the US.

Appalling explanation.

(1) Do you not think the mother of a child who was discussed at the GMC would have valid questions to ask of David Salisbury.
(2) What other issues would you have expected them to discuss on this thread?
(3) Why have you removed posts that did not include links - such as the ones where vaccines explained who she was, and where she described what happened to her children.

I am very close to leaving mumsnet over this tbh Justine.

and this is why people didn't trust the authorities over MMR... a mother of a child included in Wakefield's Lancet paper dares to speak about her own experience, and she is silenced. Again and again this happens - in this case no doubt inadvertently on the part of MN, but there's a pattern here and it does not build public confidence, quite the reverse.

The explanation doesn't even hold together all that well.

In previous cases where posters were deleted for being new joiner, single issue posters, it tends ot be ALL posts by that poster deleted.

One of Vaccines' posts remained, so clearly not a blanket 'delete account' kneejerk reaction.

why did posts containing Vaccines' personal account get deleted? That fact that one post remained suggests the posts were deleted on a case by case basis, not a 'get rid of the lot' joblot deletion. so each post removed had a decision made about it.

The whole thing stinks.

@saintlyjimjams

I am very close to leaving mumsnet over this tbh Justine.

Hey Saintly,

Please don't do that. We will go through all deleted now and reinstate some. As Justine said, it was a totally honest mistake - generally, if someone joins and posts lots of links about one subject, they are removed for spamming. We did have several reports about these posts and we responded in the usual way - we can see, now, that this was not appropriate on this occasion - apologies.

I have been following this thread closely but didn't post on it as doubt I would have remained civil to Salisbury.

Anyway, am posting now to say that I agree with saintly with regards to the bizarre deletions.

I would also like to say that I am very interested in what Vaccines has to say and thank her for coming on and posting. I would feel ashamed of MN if she has been driven away by this - we are a parenting community and if parents can't even be heard here than that is appalling. I suspect that Vaccines is used to being silenced and I for one refuse to participate in the silencing of parents like her. Enough.

Salisbury is invited to come on and post about a single issue (even if his posts were just patronising flannel) but parents are deleted for posting about their family's issues.

I hope HQ manages to reinstate ASAP.

what has PCOS got to do with the vaccines Would?

I am with Saintly and Beachcomber here.

Pluserix - I think you misunderstand that passage from the Hornig paper - they are not endorsing anything in the previous paper.

Totally agree with Edam.

Thank you CatherinaJTV

I don't know what to think tbh wouldbe - hopefully they will be reinstated soon. I am genuinely shocked that someone thought it would be reasonable to delete them.

What a shame you haven't reinstated Vaccine's first post where she identifies herself as a Lancet case mother and comments that she requested to meet David Salisbury years ago but he was too busy. Then goes on to ask her question.

There were no links in that post as far as I can remember. Are you able to clarify why it has remained deleted. In fact you have reinstated posts of her with links, but none that i can see that tell her story.

An extraordinary decision, tbh.

The initial deletions were (allegedly) because Vaccines was 'spamming' with links.

except even a cursory read of her posts would have revealed that she wasn't.

now posts with links are reinstated (thus showing the initial deletion reasoning to be wrong), while posts with no links, but with highly relevant info are left deleted (so why were they deleted in the first place, and why not reinstated?)

this thing continues to stink.

Wow. This entire thread has been a disaster - rigidly bland answers from a guest who refuses to engage with worried and confused parents, and then the most unintelligent action I've ever seen from MNHQ. All a bit sad.

I am glad some posts have come back.

isnt the age that the MMR is given the age where things like autism show themselves?

I am v ignorant of it - I just thought at a year, its a clearer time to see if problems are occurring and that is co incidental with autism?

There are different types of autism Clemetine. It's not one thing. It's probably more accurate to talk about autisms. So some types of autism are present from birth and some types of autism are regressive. It's not particularly controversial to say that various environmental factors may trigger a regression in susceptible children. And there is a lot of work going into looking at potential triggers. There are probably many different ones.

I'm still hoping the posts telling vaccines story come back. I don't think I can stay on here and look fellow autism parents in the eye in they don't come back.

Thanks Saintly, its confusing to someone who doesn't know much about it.

What is paramount though is that information can be shared, and people be able to talk about these things.

Once info is out there people can make up their own minds what to do with it, but it should not be denied.

I for one am glad Vaccine came on here today and I think it was v brave of her. I shall mull over what she and others have said.

Good luck Clementine

CatharinaJTV

"Pluserix - I think you misunderstand that passage from the Hornig paper - they are not endorsing anything in the previous paper."

Anyone can read it for themselves.

Don't just reinstate the deleted posts Justine, mumsnet has a voice, I must have read about 50 cases on here whose parents are utterly convinced the mmr caused something similar to autism, even if they are a tiny minority why have none of them been asked to take part in a study? why do they feel that their gp's dont want to know? mumsnet could commission their own independent study.