Gates: Vaccine-autism link is 'an absolute lie'

Just over a month after the British Medical Journal's lambasting of Andrew Wakefield and his vaccine-autism link research, philanthropist Bill Gates sat down with CNN's Sanjay Gupta and discussed his own views of Wakefield's studies.

"So it's an absolute lie that has killed thousands of kids," Gates told Gupta. "Because the mothers who heard that lie, many of them didn't have their kids take either pertussis or measles vaccine, and their children are dead today. And so the people who go and engage in those anti-vaccine efforts--you know, they, they kill children. It's a very sad thing, because these vaccines are important."

As a contributor to vaccine development and distribution throughout the world, Gates believes that his most recent $10 million contribution could help halve the number of children who die from vaccine-preventable diseases. "We have to do three things in parallel," Gates said. "Eradicate the few that fit that profile--ringworm and polio; get the coverage up for the vaccines we have; and then invent the vaccines--and we only need about six or seven more--and then you would have all the tools to reduce childhood death, reduce population growth and everything--the stability, the environment--benefits from that." 

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