Court defers judgment on MMR appeal

The High Court has reserved judgment on whether the decision to strike off an eminent doctor over the MMR jab controversy is lawful.

A judge said the complex case of Professor John Walker-Smith, who was found guilty of serious professional misconduct, had "greatly troubled" him.

In May 2010, the professor lost his licence to practise along with Dr Andrew Wakefield, the doctor who triggered a global scare about the MMR vaccine. The striking-off order was made subject to appeal, and over the last five days lawyers for the professor have argued at London's High Court that he did not receive a fair hearing.

A GMC fitness to practise panel found that he had subjected children to investigation as part of a research project related to autism and the MMR vaccine without seeking approval from the Ethics Committee. If the professor wins his appeal it will mean he has cleared his name as the GMC indicated it would not ask for the case to be remitted for a fresh hearing.

Stephen Miller QC, appearing for the professor, told the court the disciplinary findings were seriously flawed and must be quashed. He said investigations, including lumbar punctures and colonoscopies, were carried out because they were clinically indicated and were necessary for the purposes of diagnosis and treatment - not for a research project.

Mr Miller said: "His main reason for doing so was not to test hypotheses but to benefit individual patients. We suggest all the evidence backs him up - all the evidence which, unfortunately (the panel) ignored".

In court the GMC admitted that "inadequate reasons" may have been given by the disciplinary panel when explaining its findings on disputed expert evidence. But Joanna Glynn QC, appearing for the GMC, said: "In spite of inadequate reasons it is quite clear on overwhelming evidence that the charges are made out."

She told the judge the case was of considerable public interest as it concerned "the effective regulation of research" in the context "of vulnerable patients, desperate families and invasive procedures which inevitably carry some risk".

The professor's appeal is being supported by the parents of many children with autism and bowel disease seen by him at the Royal Free Hospital, north London, up to his retirement in 2001. They say one consequence of the GMC's decision is that families now face serious difficulties in finding NHS treatment for autistic children with bowel disease.

The panel's verdict followed 217 days of deliberation, making it the longest disciplinary case in the GMC's 152-year history. It came 12 years after a 1998 paper in the Lancet suggested a link between the vaccine, bowel disease and autism - resulting in a plunge in the number of children having the vaccination. In 2004, the Lancet announced a partial retraction, and 10 of the 13 authors disowned it.