fred:

Until there is proof that she is wrong, this is an open issue.

The notion that any individual can claim causality by bringing up a coincidental association, then force the scientific community to go beyond reasonable lengths to "prove" a negative causality (something which is at best impractical, and often impossible in biological systems) before that claim is no longer "an open issue" is completely unscientific.

Here is how science is really done: Someone makes a conjecture of a relationship between two events based on an observation. Then studies are performed to bear out at least a temporal association between the two events. Then studies are performed to identify the actual causality of one event on the other.

Those claiming an association between MMR and autism need to get past the conjecture stage. Cloaking one's arguments in scientific jargon does not make your argument scientific. Insisting on proof of a negative association beyond an unreasonable doubt is not just unscientific, it is inherently anti-scientific.

Many of us in the medical community feel that all this energy spent on promoting the claims of association between vaccines and autism could instead be better directed towards working with the medical community to help find the real cause of, as well as help develop effective treatments for, autism.