Farshid Jalalvand: Why Distrust of the Measles Vaccine Persists

A previously healthy eight-year-old boy arrived at a pediatric emergency department with neurological symptoms. He seemed absent and had spasms in his legs. Doctors suspected epilepsy, but treatment did not help.

The boy had contracted measles at age two and had no documented vaccination. A lumbar puncture confirmed subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, or SSPE, caused by measles virus remaining in his body six years after the infection. The disease gradually destroys the brain. By the time it is diagnosed, there is no treatment that can stop it. The boy soon lost his ability to speak, became incontinent and developed severe intellectual disability.

The case was reported in France earlier this year. SSPE is a rare but devastating complication of measles and has virtually disappeared in countries with high vaccination coverage. The writer says recent measles outbreaks in the United States and Europe, including one linked to the Urkult festival in Näsåker, could put more children at risk.

The commentary traces persistent vaccine distrust to Andrew Wakefield, now portrayed as a heroic figure by the international anti-vaccine movement. Investigative journalist Brian Deer’s 2020 book, “The Doctor Who Fooled the World,” describes how Wakefield became an anti-vaccine prophet. Wakefield first claimed, without evidence, that measles virus caused Crohn’s disease. He later shifted his theory to the weakened live virus in the MMR vaccine, then claimed the vaccine damaged the intestine and allowed toxins to reach the brain and cause autism.

In 1998, The Lancet published Wakefield’s paper, which reported a correlation between MMR vaccination, intestinal damage and autism diagnoses in 12 children. The paper itself did not claim causation, but Wakefield went to the media and warned about the alleged risks. The commentary argues that the claim continues to have consequences for children despite the study’s manipulation and the persistence of measles outbreaks.