Vaccine industry fights back
The vaccine industry fought back against its critics on Wednesday by warning that epidemics of serious diseases could return if children were not immunised in sufficient numbers.
Its warning followed a recent outbreak of measles in Ireland - where two children died - and the Netherlands, because of the reluctance of some parents to immunise their children. Diseases such as diphtheria have returned with a vengeance when immunisation campaigns have stopped, as happened recently in the countries of the former Soviet Union.
Stephen Lockhart, a director of Wyeth, the vaccine arm of American Home Products, said that diseases could rebound if immunisation levels dropped below 90 per cent. In some areas of Britain levels of MMR vaccine have dropped below that threshold.
Although immunisation levels are high in the UK, the safety of some vaccines has been questioned by groups worried about occasional side-effects.
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