4. The UK Families Taking Legal Action

• Estimated 850 families taking legal action in the UK under Consumer Protection Act against MMR manufacturers Aventis Pasteur MSD, Merck and Company, SmithKline Beecham and SmithKline & French Laboratories
• Families convinced that MMR vaccination was trigger for child’s degeneration into autism or other serious condition, including deaths.
• Despite research pointing to original failure to properly conduct safety tests on MMR, and emerging research linking MMR with autism (autistic enterocolitis syndrome) and/or inflammatory bowel disease, UK Department of Health and other medical institutions continue to claim that MMR is safe
• This claim based upon advice of UK Committee on Safety of Medicines and Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation - both of which would suffer a catastrophic loss of public confidence, should such a link emerge - and a number of studies, all of which have severe weaknesses or inconclusive outcomes. Details in text.

5. The Parents Have Seen What They’ve Seen

• Vaccines have saved millions of lives. Parents not anti-vaccination in principle. Parents all took children to be vaccinated. All recognise need to protect children from diseases.
•  But saving lives from diseases doesn’t justify ruining significant numbers of lives from unrecognised and unmonitored vaccine damage.
• Also felt by many parents that argument that "the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risks" has become increasingly skewed by overstating dangers of diseases (by citing experience from poor and underdeveloped countries, or UK experience from half a century ago), or grossly underplaying risks from vaccination. Latter aided by extremely poor monitoring of adverse outcomes, or by authorities refusing to accept that an adverse outcome was result of vaccine (= "cooking the numbers").
• All affected parents are in privileged position of having watched child degenerate. Powerful experience. Other parents report same experience.
• Usually gradual degeneration over many weeks and months, not acute event. More like eg onset of cancer than the rare acute reactions to vaccines seen in the past.
• Onset of gut/bowel problems and hyperactivity have accompanied onset of autism. Clearly these are connected with each other. Wakefield investigated bowel problems - and found autism. Concept of a link is therefore obvious, even without detailed research.
• An anecdote is an anecdote. A pattern is much more powerful. What we have a consistent detailed pattern of reports from parents. UK Department of Health (DoH) doesn’t appear to recognise difference.
• Likely that very few of the medical establishment spokespersons, commentators etc. have examined even single example of affected children, talked to the parents, or checked child’s records. Doubtful if most have even read any of the research available (as opposed to the DoH’s press releases and other second-hand material)

6. The Financial Costs - Autism Is Costing Billions

Quite apart from the immense social costs of autism, there are the huge financial costs. Autism effects every UK taxpayer. The costs comprise:

• Health costs - specialist hospital visits, GP visits, prescriptions, exclusion diet costs
• Education costs - special schools, extra teachers, extra teaching assistants, extra training
• Transport costs - taxis plus drivers and escorts, plus local authority management costs
• Social Services costs - respite care costs, transport, management, inspection, reviews
• Loss of earnings of parents acting as carers
• Social Security costs - carers allowances, disability living allowances
• Inland Revenue costs - loss of earnings of parent, loss of revenues from child when he/she reaches earning age
• Wider economic costs - loss of GDP