Researchers who suggested there may be a link between the MMR vaccine and autism and gut disorders will face the General Medical Council on 16 July on charges relating to their 1998 study.
Dr Andrew Wakefield, formerly a gastroenterologist at the Royal FreeHospital in London, Professor John Walker-Smith and Professor SimonMurch are charged with serious professional misconduct. The hearingcoincides with findings from a new, as yet unpublished, study showingthe number of children in Britain with autism as high as one in 58, afigure well above the existing estimate of one in 100.
