The former UK company Wellcome allowed thousands of babies to be inoculated in the 1960s and 1970s with toxic whooping cough vaccines it knew had not passed crucial safety tests, the Observer, a UK newspaper, claimed on July 8.

It said its investigations showed that two batches of the firm's vaccine were more than 14 times more potent than the standard dose and 14 other batches containing thousands of vaccine doses were not put through a crucial toxicity test.

One of the toxic batches was the same batch that led the Irish Supreme Court in 1992 to award £2.7 million (US$3.8 million) in compensation to Kenneth Best, a Cork boy who suffered permanent brain damage. At the time the Irish judge accused Wellcome of negligence and attacked the company's poor quality control at its Kent laboratory.

Now, 9 years after the award, the newspaper said the Irish Department of Health had received details from GlaxoSmithKline about the batch -- numbered 3741 -- and was tracing 296 Irish children who were inoculated with it.

Glaxo Wellcome merged with SmithKline Beecham to form GlaxoSmithKline in late 2000.

The newspaper added that pressure from Denis Naughten, a senior Irish Member of Parliament (MP), has forced other disclosures from the company, including the fact that a second batch of vaccine, numbered 3732, produced by Wellcome around the same time, was even more potent than that used on Best in 1968.

In the 3 years after Wellcome produced the toxic batches, dozens of British parents believed their children suffered brain damage or even died as a result of the whooping cough vaccine. But their views were dismissed by drug companies and health officials.

The report quotes Gordon Stewart, emeritus professor of public health at Glasgow University, as saying the revelations are "scandalous." Stewart, who in 1984 was asked by the government's Chief Scientific Officer to investigate a link between brain damage and the vaccine, said he advised the Department of Health about these potential toxic batches in 1989 but they did not act.

His report, which was never published by the government but has been seen by The Observer, is highly critical of the whooping cough vaccine used at this time, which he believes was toxic.

Ian Stewart, Labor MP and chair of the all-party Commons committee on the vaccine issue, said he would be holding an emergency meeting of the committee this week and tabling a series of parliamentary questions.

He said, "The families need to know the truth."

"If it can be shown that Glaxo Wellcome were negligent in allowing toxic vaccines to be used, then the company must face up to its responsibilities."

The families of vaccine-injured children receive £100,000 compensation from a government fund financed by the taxpayer. Stewart believes if the firm is at fault, then they should pay compensation, which would be significantly more.

UK Observer July 8, 2001

Dr. Mercola's Comments:

Probably the largest valid criticism of the current vaccines, which no one with a shred of logic could argue effectively against, is that vaccines have never received adequate safety testing. I am delighted to see the legal system being used to address this issue in England. Unfortunately, this is not possible in the US due to manipulation of the legal system by the drug companies which makes it difficult, if not impossible, to sue them for any damages. They abrogated themselves of any responsibility for their actions and parents of damaged children are required to petition the US government for compensation. From Dr. Buttram's excellent review (link below): It should be pointed out that today's children receive 22 or more vaccines before school age, whereas today's senior citizens received only one vaccine in their youth, the smallpox vaccine. Some of these vaccines contain mercury. Although the impact of this potentially toxic metal remains unknown as concerns the vaccines. With growing public concerns about potential adverse reactions of these heavy burdens of foreign immunologic materials on the immature immune systems of children, it is reasonable to ask ourselves what is known about these reactions. A small but growing minority of physicians and scientists are becoming aware that safety testing for the various vaccines has been woefully inadequate. As one of many examples, a 1994 special committee of the National Academy of Sciences published a comprehensive review of the safety of the hepatitis B vaccine. When the committee, which carried the responsibility for determining the safety of vaccines by congressional mandate, investigated five possible and plausible adverse effects, they were unable to come to a conclusion for four of them because they found that relevant research had not been done. The clear implication of this and other revelations concerning a general deficiency of safety testing in the vaccine field, especially as concerns possible long-term side effects, is that adverse reactions may be taking place on a large scale without being recognized as to their true nature. Related Articles: Vaccine Scene 2000 - Review and Update