Oct
Can vaccines trigger autism? This is the topic of the film "Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe", directed by Andrew Wakefield and produced by Del Bigtree, an Emmy Award-winning producer of "The Doctors" talk show.
The film became the center of controversy when it was pulled from the Tribeca Film Festival lineup in 2016 by Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal, the two founders of the well-known film festival. According to Rosenthal, other filmmakers had threatened to withdraw their films from the festival if "Vaxxed" was shown.
While De Niro admitted feeling pressured to pull the film, he urged people to see it, saying there are many issues relating to the way the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) evaluates and monitors the safety of vaccines that are not being openly spoken about, and really should be addressed.
- “Vaxxed” is a film investigating claims that vaccines have nothing to do with the autism epidemic
- A 2017 study, which examined health outcomes among 3- to 5-month-old infants following the introduction of DTP and oral polio vaccine in Guinea-Bissau, found that DTP vaccination was associated with five-fold higher mortality from all causes than not being vaccinated
- William Thompson, Ph.D., a (now former) senior scientist at the CDC’s National Center for Immunizations and Respiratory Diseases, confessed that he conspired to cover up links found between the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism
- The original MMR vaccine was found to cause meningitis, and the younger the patient at time of vaccination, the higher the risk of developing meningitis. CDC-funded research suggested there’s a heightened risk for autism in some children when the first MMR dose is given at an earlier age
- CDC whistleblower Thompson stated that a 2004 CDC study was manipulated to erase a link between MMR vaccine and autism in African-American boys who received their first MMR vaccine before the age of 36 months, which resulted in a 3.36 times greater risk of developing autism compared to those who received the vaccine after the age of 36 months
In 2013, biologist Dr. Brian Hooker received a call from a Senior Scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who led the agency’s 2004 study on the Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR) vaccine and its link to autism.
The scientist, Dr. William Thompson, confessed that the CDC had omitted crucial data in their final report that revealed a causal relationship between the MMR vaccine and autism. Over several months, Dr. Hooker records the phone calls made to him by Dr. Thompson who provides the confidential data destroyed by his colleagues at the CDC.
Dr. Hooker enlists the help of Dr. Andrew Wakefield, the British gastroenterologist falsely accused of starting the anti-vax movement when he first reported in 1998 that the MMR vaccine may cause autism. In his ongoing effort to advocate for children’s health, Wakefield directs this documentary examining the evidence behind an appalling cover-up committed by the government agency charged with protecting the health of American citizens.
Interviews with pharmaceutical insiders, doctors, politicians, and parents of vaccine-injured children reveal an alarming deception that has contributed to the skyrocketing increase of autism and potentially the most catastrophic epidemic of our lifetime.
For the last 20 years I have had to watch the suffering of those affected by autism as the problem multiplies year on year. What started with hope for a new understanding, new and effective treatments, and even prevention, turned to despair as special interests exploited their influence over the media to crush the science and the scientists.
And then, two decades and a million damaged children later, one man, Dr. William Thompson – a CDC insider – decided to tell the truth and the embers of that early hope glow once more.
Several years ago I decided that to take on the media you had to become the media. The best medium for this story is film. Our aim with this movie was to take this complex, high-level fraud and to give it context, and weave through it the tragic street-level narratives of ordinary families affected by autism.
This film brings to the public a dark and uncomfortable truth. To ignore it would be most unwise.Andrew Wakefield (Director), March 2016
