In the mid-90's in the UK, there was a big scare about the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine and a link to autism. A lot of the scare centred around a paper published in the Lancet by Dr Andrew Wakefield. As a result, there was a decline in vaccination rates.

In February this year Lancet (in referring to Wakefield's paper) said that they "fully retract this paper from the published record.

Today in London the General Medical Council struck Dr Wakefield from the medical register because of professional misconduct.

The GMC said he acted in a way that was dishonest, misleading and irresponsible while carrying out research into a possible link between the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine, bowel disease and autism.

Terence Stephenson, president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, said: "Measles, mumps and rubella vaccines have all been shown to be safe and UK families are fortunate to have free access to these which is not true of many parts of the world. The false suggestion of a link between autism and the MMR vaccine has done untold damage to the UK vaccination programme."

Good to see that justice caught up with Wakefield for putting so many children at risk.