Hear the Silence

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Hear the Silence
Written by Timothy Prager
Directed by Tim Fywell
Starring Hugh Bonneville
Juliet Stevenson
Country of origin United Kingdom
Production
CinematographyIvan Strasburg
Running time90 minutes
Budget£1 million
Original release
Network Five
Release15 December 2003 (2003-12-15)

Hear the Silence is a 2003 semi-fictional TV drama based around the discredited idea of a potential link between the MMR vaccine and autism. [1] By then, a contentious issue, the supposed connection originated in a paper by Andrew Wakefield published in 1998. [2] The film debuted on 15 December 2003 at 9 pm on the British network Five. Produced on a budget of £1 million, it stars Hugh Bonneville as Wakefield and Juliet Stevenson as Christine Shields, a fictional mother who discovers the possible MMR-autism link when her son is diagnosed as autistic. [3]

Contents

Synopsis

Christine Shields (Stevenson), who works in a senior capacity for a bank, begins informing a series of doctors that her son appeared to develop autism soon after he received the MMR vaccine, but she receives no sympathy from them, her boss, or even her husband. However, this all changes when she meets Wakefield (Bonneville), who shares her opinion of the MMR vaccine causing her son's autism. Shields is highly relieved at finding someone who believes her. [4] [5]

At the press conference at which Wakefield announces his research findings, mysterious figures are shown already plotting. [4] Fictional government officials want to achieve Wakefield's "demise", which they intend to bring about by portraying his research as flawed. Although never demonstrated as being based on fact, the film depicts Wakefield being targeted by the government: his phone is tapped and his files are stolen. [6]

Cast

(in credits order)

Reception

Hear the Silence, according to unofficial overnight figures, attracted 1.2 million viewers on its first screening with a 6 per cent audience share; Channel Five's films debuting at 9 pm often gained audiences of more than 2 million viewers at the time. [7] Mark Lawson in The Guardian wrote that Tim Fywell's direction "ensures that the piece, from its shivery beginnings onwards, has a flu-like hold on the viewer" and is "a fine piece of drama". [8] The Times science writer Anjana Ahuja believed there were reasons to praise the drama as it contained a "powerful portrayal of autism, parental frustration and marital strains", despite its serious flaws. [4] It was "deceitful, unbalanced and irresponsible", according to Mark Henderson in The Times, but also "slick, gripping and professional" and Juliet Stevenson gave an "outstanding" performance. [9]

Otherwise the film was received negatively, with critics arguing that it portrayed the purported MMR-autism link in a mistakenly sympathetic light as scientific evidence supporting the connection was lacking. It was said to idealize Wakefield and vilify the physicians who dismissed the vaccine-autism link by depicting them as "blatant caricatures" ( British Medical Journal ). [5] [8] Jon Joseph in The Times wrote "there are definitely no shades of grey" with Wakefield's assertions treated as if they are "a law of nature, like gravity". [10] Of the supposed plot presumed to originate with the drug companies as a means to discredit Wakefield,Ben Goldacre wrote in The Guardian of its utter implausibility as the patent on the MMR vaccine had lapsed, it was now generic and no longer highly profitable. [2]

Goldacre wrote that while the film was "moving and convincing" as a drama, it was factually inaccurate: "The only things that the writers of Hear the Silence get wrong, to be fair, are the science and the story." [2] In addition, David Aaronovitch wrote that while the film begins by saying that it is a "dramatised account of the work of Dr Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues at the Royal Free Hospital in the late 1990s," the statement is not accurate. Aaronovitch commented: "Wakefield's own history is distorted, as are the opinions of his colleagues. No scientist is permitted to put a contrary case to that of the hero, though the vast majority of them believe he is wrong". [6] Many years later, after Wakefield's paper had been discredited Aaronovitch described the drama as being "a piece of the purest propaganda". [1]

An open letter from 11 leading British doctors working in paediatrics condemned the film, calling it "distorted" and "entirely unbalanced." [11] One of the letter's signatories, Great Ormond Street Hospital paediatrician David Elliman, also called the film "overly sentimental" and "potentially dangerous". [12]

Aftermath

The discussion programme about the MMR-autism link following the film was a requirement of the broadcasting regulator's impartiality rules. [13] Multiple doctors opposing Wakefield were invited to participate, but boycotted it on the grounds that they considered the film misleading. [14] One of these doctors (David Salisbury, director of the British National Immunization Program) justified his decision to do so by saying that if he and his public health colleagues had appeared as the broadcasters had requested, "We felt we'd be giving respectability to a program that was not respectable." [15] David Henderson in The Times thought the eventual discussion was "unreasonably weighted in Wakefield’s favour" and "no antidote to the two hours of emotional blackmail that preceded it". [9] One of the participants in the programme, Anjana Ahuja, felt those questioning his research were in the minority and she regretted the decision of those doctors who had declined to appear. [16] Ahuja described the discussion, hosted by Kirsty Young, as being "ill-tempered". [4] [13]

In 2008, responding to the criticism she had received at the time of the broadcast, Stevenson commented in a Daily Telegraph interview: "Perhaps it was naive of me to think you could put out a film like that" and "I thought it was generating an interesting debate and that it gave a voice to those who needed a voice - parents who were told they didn't know anything." [17]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MMR vaccine</span> Any of several combined vaccines against measles, mumps, and rubella

The MMR vaccine is a vaccine against measles, mumps, and rubella, abbreviated as MMR. The first dose is generally given to children around 9 months to 15 months of age, with a second dose at 15 months to 6 years of age, with at least four weeks between the doses. After two doses, 97% of people are protected against measles, 88% against mumps, and at least 97% against rubella. The vaccine is also recommended for those who do not have evidence of immunity, those with well-controlled HIV/AIDS, and within 72 hours of exposure to measles among those who are incompletely immunized. It is given by injection.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brian Deer</span> British investigative journalist

Brian Laurence Deer is a British investigative journalist, best known for inquiries into the drug industry, medicine and social issues for The Sunday Times. Deer's investigative nonfiction book The Doctor Who Fooled the World, an exposé on disgraced former doctor Andrew Wakefield and the 1998 Lancet MMR autism fraud, was published in September 2020 by Johns Hopkins University Press.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Juliet Stevenson</span> English actress (born 1956)

Juliet Anne Virginia Stevenson, is an English actress of stage and screen. She is known for her role in the film Truly, Madly, Deeply (1991), for which she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Her other film appearances include Emma (1996), Bend It Like Beckham (2002), Mona Lisa Smile (2003), Being Julia (2004) and Infamous (2006).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vaccine hesitancy</span> Reluctance or refusal to be vaccinated or have ones children vaccinated

Vaccine hesitancy is a delay in acceptance, or refusal, of vaccines despite the availability of vaccine services and supporting evidence. The term covers refusals to vaccinate, delaying vaccines, accepting vaccines but remaining uncertain about their use, or using certain vaccines but not others. The scientific consensus that vaccines are generally safe and effective is overwhelming. Vaccine hesitancy often results in disease outbreaks and deaths from vaccine-preventable diseases. Therefore, the World Health Organization characterizes vaccine hesitancy as one of the top ten global health threats.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Goldacre</span> British physician, academic and science writer (born 1974)

Ben Michael Goldacre is a British physician, academic and science writer. He is the first Bennett Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine and director of the Bennett Institute for Applied Data Science at the University of Oxford. He is a founder of the AllTrials campaign and OpenTrials to require open science practices in clinical trials.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bernard Rimland</span> American psychologist (1928–2006)

Bernard Rimland was an American research psychologist, writer, lecturer, and influential person in the field of developmental disorders. Rimland's first book, Infantile Autism, sparked by the birth of a son who had autism, was instrumental in changing attitudes toward the disorder. Rimland founded and directed two advocacy groups: the Autism Society of America (ASA) and the Autism Research Institute. He promoted several since disproven theories about the causes and treatment of autism, including vaccine denial, facilitated communication, chelation therapy, and false claims of a link between secretin and autism. He also supported the ethically controversial practice of using aversives on autistic children.

Generation Rescue is a nonprofit organization that advocates the scientifically disproven view that autism and related disorders are primarily caused by environmental factors, particularly vaccines. The organization was established in 2005 by Lisa and J.B. Handley. Today, Generation Rescue is known as a platform for Jenny McCarthy's autism related anti-vaccine advocacy.

Patrick Holford is a British author and entrepreneur who endorses a range of controversial vitamin tablets. As an advocate of alternative nutrition and diet methods, he appears regularly on television and radio in the UK and abroad. He has 36 books in print in 29 languages. His business career promotes a wide variety of alternative medical approaches such as orthomolecular medicine, many of which are considered pseudoscientific by mainstream science and medicine.

<i>Dispatches</i> (TV programme) British current affairs documentary TV programme

Dispatches is a British current affairs documentary programme on Channel 4, first broadcast on 30 October 1987. The programme covers issues about British society, politics, health, religion, international current affairs and the environment, and often features a mole inside organisations under journalistic investigation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jenny McCarthy</span> American actress and model (born 1972)

Jennifer Ann McCarthy-Wahlberg is an American actress, model, and television personality. She began her career in 1993 as a nude model for Playboy magazine and was later named their Playmate of the Year. McCarthy then had a television and film acting career, beginning as a co-host on the MTV game show Singled Out (1995–1997) and afterwards starring in the eponymous sitcom Jenny (1997–1998), as well as films including BASEketball (1998), Scream 3 (2000), Dirty Love (2005), John Tucker Must Die (2006), and Santa Baby (2006). In 2013, she hosted her own television talk show The Jenny McCarthy Show, and became a co-host of the ABC talk show The View, appearing on the program until 2014. Since 2019, McCarthy has been a judge on the Fox musical competition show The Masked Singer.

Claims of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism have been extensively investigated and found to be false. The link was first suggested in the early 1990s and came to public notice largely as a result of the 1998 Lancet MMR autism fraud, characterised as "perhaps the most damaging medical hoax of the last 100 years". The fraudulent research paper, authored by discredited former doctor Andrew Wakefield and published in The Lancet, falsely claimed the vaccine was linked to colitis and autism spectrum disorders. The paper was retracted in 2010 but is still cited by anti-vaccine activists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andrew Wakefield</span> Discredited British former doctor (born 1956)

Andrew Jeremy Wakefield is a British fraudster, discredited academic, anti-vaccine activist, and former physician.

Timothy "Tim" Prager, is a British television and film writer.

Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) or autism spectrum conditions (ASCs) describe a range of conditions classified as neurodevelopmental disorders in the DSM-5, used by the American Psychiatric Association. As with many neurodivergent people and conditions, the popular image of autistic people and autism itself is often based on inaccurate media representations. Additionally, media about autism may promote pseudoscience such as vaccine denial or facilitated communication.

<i>Cedillo v. Secretary of Health and Human Services</i> Legal case in US Court of Federal Claims, decided in 2009

Michelle Cedillo v. Secretary of Health and Human Services, also known as Cedillo, was a court case involving the family of Michelle Cedillo, an autistic girl whose parents sued the United States government because they believed that her autism was caused by her receipt of both the measles-mumps-and-rubella vaccine and thimerosal-containing vaccines. The case was a part of the Omnibus Autism Proceeding, where petitioners were required to present three test cases for each proposed mechanism by which vaccines had, according to them, caused their children's autism; Cedillo was the first such case for the MMR-and-thimerosal hypothesis.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Walker-Smith</span>

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<i>Vaxxed</i> 2016 anti-vaccination documentary film

Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe is a 2016 American pseudoscience propaganda film alleging a cover-up by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of a purported link between the MMR vaccine and autism. According to Variety, the film "purports to investigate the claims of a senior scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who revealed that the CDC had allegedly manipulated and destroyed data on an important study about autism and the MMR vaccine"; critics derided Vaxxed as an anti-vaccine propaganda film.

The Lancet MMR autism fraud centered on the publication in February 1998 of a fraudulent research paper titled "Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children" in The Lancet. The paper, authored by now discredited and deregistered Andrew Wakefield, and twelve coauthors, falsely claimed causative links between the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and colitis and between colitis and autism. The fraud was exposed in a lengthy Sunday Times investigation by reporter Brian Deer, resulting in the paper's retraction in February 2010 and Wakefield being struck off the UK medical register three months later. Wakefield reportedly stood to earn up to US$43 million per year selling diagnostic kits for a non-existent syndrome he claimed to have discovered. He also held a patent to a rival vaccine at the time, and he had been employed by a lawyer representing parents in lawsuits against vaccine producers.

Extensive investigation into vaccines and autism has shown that there is no relationship between the two, causal or otherwise, and that vaccine ingredients do not cause autism. Vaccinologist Peter Hotez researched the growth of the false claim and concluded that its spread originated with Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent 1998 paper, with no prior paper supporting a link.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Del Bigtree</span> American television producer and anti-vaccination activist

Del Matthew Bigtree is an American television and film producer who is the CEO of the anti-vaccination group Informed Consent Action Network. He produced the film Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe, based on the discredited opinions of Andrew Wakefield and alleges an unsubstantiated connection between vaccines and autism.

References

  1. 1 2 Aaronovitch, David (4 September 2020). "The Doctor Who Fooled the World by Brian Deer review — the father of anti-vaxxer lies". The Times. Retrieved 13 September 2020.(subscription required)
  2. 1 2 3 Goldacre, Ben (11 December 2003). "Never mind the facts". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  3. ↑ Wells, Matt (23 May 2003). "Five plans autism drama". The Guardian . Retrieved 30 April 2014.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Ahuja, Anjana (13 December 2003). "Suffer little children?". The Times. Retrieved 6 September 2020.(subscription required)
  5. 1 2 Elliman, David (December 2003). "Hear the Silence". BMJ. 327 (7428): 1411. doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7428.1411-a. PMC   293044 .
  6. 1 2 Aaronovitch, David (14 December 2003). "A travesty of truth". The Observer. Retrieved 1 May 2014.
  7. ↑ Deans, Jason (16 December 2003). "MMR row fails to stir audiences". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 May 2014.
  8. 1 2 Lawson, Mark (8 December 2003). "Saint Mum, Saint Doctor and the evil MMR". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  9. 1 2 Henderson, Mark (20 December 2003). "Junk medicine: TV coverage of MMR". The Times. Retrieved 6 September 2020.(subscription required)
  10. ↑ Joseph, Jon (16 December 2003). "TV Review". The Times. Retrieved 6 September 2020.(subscription required)
  11. ↑ "Medics slam 'distorted' MMR drama". BBC News . 15 December 2003. Retrieved 1 May 2014.
  12. ↑ Martin, Nicole (13 December 2003). "TV drama on MMR 'could cost lives'". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 3 May 2014.
  13. 1 2 Wells, Matt; Boseley, Sarah (3 December 2003). "Calls to axe TV drama on MMR". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  14. ↑ Boseley, Sarah (4 December 2003). "Boycott of Five's MMR drama". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  15. ↑ Frankel, Glenn (11 July 2004). "Charismatic Doctor at Vortex of Vaccine Dispute". The Washington Post . p. 3. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
  16. ↑ Ahuja, Anjana (15 December 2003). "A missed chance to jab the MMR doctor where it hurts". The Times. Retrieved 6 September 2020.(subscription required)
  17. ↑ "Juliet Stevenson: 'I would love a completely different life?'". The Daily Telegraph . 18 February 2008. Retrieved 6 September 2020.
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