A life sentence with no appeal; It's the final insult

[Guest guest]

A life sentence with no appeal; It's the final insult. Whileasylum

seekers and prisoners denied second helpings of pudding are givenlegal

aid, these agonised parents who believe MMR caused theirchildren's

autism are refused it.

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The Daily Mail (London, England); 2/24/2004

Byline: MICHAEL SEAMARK

THE battle by 1,000 families to prove the MMR jab ruined their

children's lives was in severe jeopardy last night following a decision

to cut off their legal aid.

Their multimillion-pound claim against the makers of the vaccine faces

collapse after the Legal Services Commission - which had spent [pounds

sterling]15million on the action - refused to approve a further [pounds

sterling]10million.

An appeal for a judicial review into that decision has been heard and

the result is expected in the next two weeks. But without further public

funding these cases are unlikely to go forward, devastating the families

fighting to win justice for their sons and daughters.

They are bitter that, despite legal aid being handed out to a host of

dubious causes, their fight is being dismissed.

Campaigner Jackie Fletcher is the national co-ordinator of the Jabs

parent support organisation and her 12-year-old son is one of

those children involved. She said yesterday: 'Without legal aid the

families of the damaged children face losing their day in court - which

we hoped would give answers to all worried parents.' The decision last

October to stop any further legal aid was condemned as 'illogical and

perverse' by parents. It came only six months before the cases were due

to be heard of the children, who suffer from a range of disabilities

including autism, bowel problems, epilepsy and other learning

difficulties.

The LSC said it recognised that the children suffered from a series of

serious medical conditions, and that the matter was of sufficient public

interest to justify the money so far invested in the case.

But the failure of any medical body to prove a concrete link between the

triple jab and these health problems meant the case had little chance of

success, it said.

AMONG the families who spend their life constantly caring for their

damaged children, there is little doubt of the link between the MMR jab

and their suffering.

The Government, led by Tony Blair and chief medical officer Liam

son, continues to insist that the measles, mumps and rubella

vaccine is perfectly safe.

Below are some of the tragic stories that the courts are yet to hear -

Fletcher, now 12

HE appeared to be a perfectly healthy baby until he had his MMR jab at

13 months.

Ten days later, his parents say, he became drowsy and listless, then

suffered a febrile convulsion.

When his mother Jackie, 47, from Wigan, told the hospital duty

paediatrician that had just had the injection, she says the

doctor rejected any connection and said it was 'probably an ear

infection'.

Over the next few weeks, started having fits and suffered a

string of infections.

Eventually, he was diagnosed with severe epilepsy and a problem with his

immune system.

has the development of a 14-month-old child. He is

wheelchair-bound, cannot talk, wears nappies and needs 24-hour care.

Mrs Fletcher founded Jabs, a support group for parents who believe their

children were damaged by vaccines.

She has two other sons, aged 21 and 17. Her husband , 51, retired

from his job as a transport engineer to help care for .

'We have to anticipate his every need,' she says. 'Like a lot of the MMR

children, his condition is deteriorating.'

Kessick, now 15

HIS mother Rosemary, a 49-year- old former lecturer and business

analyst, says was a bubbly, jolly baby, 'perfect and bright as a

button'.

But within a couple of weeks of his vaccination, at 15 months, she

Poulter, now 13

FAMILY videos show as a baby smiling for the camera.

His parents say the injection at 15 months heralded the start of his

problems. He began screaming and whining and eventually turning into a

'demonic toddler'.

His mother Rochelle, of Burgess Hill, West Sussex, told the health

visitor at his 18-month check that she felt something was wrong.

'He'd stopped developing,' she says. He was not talking or doing the

things he had done before.

was diagnosed autistic and became socially withdrawn,

uncoordinated and aggressive.

Today, he is a day pupil at a special school in Lewes and has learned to

deal with his aggression but remains socially inadequate.

'He still gets things extremely wrong,' says Mrs Poulter, 44, whose

husband Graham, 48, is a gas engineer-He's an adolescent and there are

different problems now.'

Oliver Loch, now seven

HIS older siblings, and , had both received the triple

jab and were fit and well.

But their mother says that within weeks of Oliver being immunised

at 14 months, he developed bowel problems and his behaviour changed

dramatically.

'Before the vaccine, he was a happy, cheerful, sociable little boy,'

said the part-time pharmacist, who lives near Cardiff.

'People would comment on his big smile.' She says the little boy started

to have tantrums over the next few weeks. He would also scream and did

not want to be held.

He was diagnosed as autistic shortly before his third birthday.

He also suffers from epilepsy.

There is no doubt in Mrs Loch's mind that her son's problems are linked

to MMR.

'He's regressed,' she says. 'You are on a knife edge all the time.'

Terry and , now nine and 11

' THERE are times I wish my boys had never survived because they are in

so much pain,' says their mother Isabella, 45, from Brighton.

had his MMR jab when he was 14 months old and his mother says

that within hours the normally happy, calm and smiling baby started to

fidget.

'His eyes were wide open, as if he had seen a monster. There was a high

pitched screaming.' Terry, pictured above, was a bright, very

intelligent child until, aged 21 months, he had the jab.

Mrs says the following day he suffered a huge fit.

The two boys have different forms of autism. is very aggressive

and his condition is deteriorating. Terry is very quiet.

Their brothers Ian, 25, and Nigel, 23, were not immunised and are

unaffected. Their mother says this rules out a genetic cause.

She helps to run the campaign group Jabs and her husband, Ian, runs a

distribution company.

Oliver Thrower, now 16

AS a toddler, Oliver was talking and had reached all his developmental

milestones.

'The health visitor was delighted with him,' says his 53-year- old

father , a former public transport planner and now Oliver's

fulltime carer.

'Ask him to point out a car or a tree on the frieze in his bedroom and

he would get them all right.' But after he had a single measles

vaccination at 15 months, his parents, from Warrington, Cheshire, say

they noticed a decline.

Then, at four, Oliver had the MMR jab and all his skills 'dissolved'.

He screamed, became destructive and attacked his parents and other

children.

The autistic teenager has no speech and cannot dress himself.

Mr Thrower says: 'He is severely

brain-damaged. Relatives ask how Oliver is, and I say he's the same.

'He was brain- damaged for life.

Oliver is as he was when he was four years old. We don't expect him to

get any better.'

Coote, now 16

A LIVELY, happy child with a good vocabulary, , from Bolton,

received the MMR vaccine at 19 months.

Two days after the jab, her parents say, she had a raging temperature,

refused to eat or drink and let out distressing high-pitch screams.

When her mother Ann, 46, called a doctor, she says he told her many

children suffered these reactions.

Nine days after the injection, fell asleep and stopped

breathing.

She was revived, but it was a year and many hospital visits later that

doctors finally discovered she had a form of epilepsy. At its worst, she

endured 40 fits a day.

The little girl's development went backwards, she stopped speaking, went

back to nappies and would wake in the night screaming.

Her father , a self-employed countryside warden, says she has a

mental age of six. 's condition has improved and the worst fits

are now under control.

Hewitt, now ten

BRIGHT, intelligent and sociable as a baby, had the MMR jab at 13

months.

Three weeks later his mother Ann, from Wood Green, North London, took

him to a children's bonfire party, where he spent the whole night

screaming.

She says after that he started banging his head, and when they went to

the mother and toddler group instead of playing with the other children

all he wanted to do was play with the door.

Today, the youngster is unable to take part in any social occasion.

'He never gets any invitations,' says Mrs Hewitt, 55, a placement

officer in a London social services department. Her husband is a

social policy manager.

is autistic. He is unable to eat most foods and has a constant

bowel disorder. He also suffers from one of the worst forms of epilepsy.

'We look into his eyes and know there is something more in there,' says

his mother.

Eighteen months ago, was one of two autistic children who handed

a petition in to 10 Downing Street calling for urgent research into

possible links between autism and MMR.

BUT THESE ALL GOT LEGAL AID...

HERE is a selection of cases which have been deemed worthy of

substantial legal aid.

A LITHUANIAN family of asylum seekers are awarded [pounds

sterling]100,000 in legal aid after claiming a three-bedroom maisonette

they have been given is too small.

The claim for damages is thrown out in 2002 after the court hears the

family were offered an alternative home which they rejected because the

bathroom wasn't big enough.

BRENDAN Fearon, 33, wins [pounds sterling]5,000 legal aid to claim

compensation from Tony for injuries sustained while burgling the

farmer's Norfolk home.

Fearon, who says he was hurt in the burglary during which 16-yearold

accomplice Fred Barras was shot by , drops his case in 2003 after

he is seen walking and cycling.

FORMER Guinness chairman Ernest Saunders, 55, claims to be penniless and

gets legal aid in 1990 to fight charges of conspiracy, false accounting

and theft.

Saunders is given a five-year jail term after the 113-day trial which

cost [pounds sterling]25million. He escapes paying any costs.

A JAMAICAN illegal immigrant convicted of dealing crack cocaine is

granted legal aid in 2002 to fight deportation because she has Aids.

Althea Matthan, 27, says treatment in Jamaica is ineffective.

A PRISONER is granted legal aid to sue the Home Secretary in 1999

because he couldn't get a second helping of rhubarb crumble in a jail

canteen. Danny Gayle, 42, was punished for hurling his dessert on to the

counter.

TWO Kosovans shot and wounded by British peacekeeping troops claim legal

aid this year to sue the Ministry of Defence for [pounds

sterling]100,000. After the incident Mohamet Bici was flown to Britain

for surgery to reconstruct his jaw and both he and his cousin Skender

were given council homes in Leeds.

A GIRL of 16 from Cleveland is granted [pounds sterling]1,000 legal aid

in 1996 to take her parents to court. They banned her from seeing her

younger brother, sister and dog after she went to live with her

boyfriend.

THIS month Chitralekha Mehta, daughter of the founder of the Patak's

spice business empire, is revealed to be receiving legal aid to bring a

High Court case claiming she and her sister were cheated out of shares.

She is, the court is told, 'a woman of considerable wealth in India'.

MURDERER Duggan gets legal aid in 2002 to sue the prison service

because his savings bring no interest.

Duggan, jailed in 1984 for battering his girlfriend to death with a

scaffolding pole, complained against the zero-interest prison account

meant to pay for phonecards, toiletries and cigarettes.

ELIZABETH Fagan, 39, is awarded [pounds sterling]250,000 of taxpayers'

money in 2001 to sue over the 'trauma' of witnessing a fatal road

accident. Mrs Fagan from Tooting, South London, takes action against the

driver of a vehicle who crashed into a police motorcyclist, killing him

- and leaving her 'mentally scarred and unable to work'.

IN 2000, nine armed Afghan hijackers run up legal bills of [pounds

sterling]4.3million claiming asylum in Britain after threatening to blow

up a passenger jet.

The gang forced the aircraft to fly from Afghanistan at gunpoint and

demanded asylum at Stansted airport.

M25 killer Noye, jailed for life at the Old for the

murder of Cameron, was backed by [pounds sterling]250,000 in

legal aid, it is revealed in 2000.

Noye has a property empire in Cyprus and Tenerife, and had access to

hundreds of thousands of pounds in cash while hiding from British police

in Spain.

A WOMAN who left her wealthy banker husband to marry Princess ' s

lawyer is given legal aid for her divorce case in 1998. Dina Rabinovitch

left her husband for Julius, then estimated to be earning

[pounds sterling]300,000 a year from his legal career.

TWO unemployed men are awarded [pounds sterling]10,000 in 1996 to fight

a bypass in Bristol.

Nicholson, 43, and Barry McNeeney, 50, who live eight miles away,

complain that the road would divert a cycle route.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Solo SyndicationLimited

<http://www.avn.org.au/> your health - your rights - your

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Meryl Dorey

Editor Informed Choice Magazine

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