A children’s cancer hospital named after queen Máxima has distanced itself from a study which suggested that vaccines contributed to excess deaths in developing countries during the coronavirus pandemic.

The study, published by the British Medical Journal, was authored by four Dutch researchers, one of whom, Gertjan Kaspers, was honoured by king Willem-Alexander two years ago for his work in paediatric oncology.

The hospital said it was investigating the circumstances of the publication and would withdraw the article from BMJ Public Health if it found that the researchers had not been thorough.

“The Princess Máxima Centrum deeply regrets the fact that this publication can create the impression that there are doubts about the significance of vaccinations,” a statement by the hospital said.

The hospital said the published article did not reflect the original purpose of the study, which was to investigate the effect of pandemic control measures on the survival chances of children with cancer in developing countries.

It admitted it had failed to supervise the progress of the article or intervene when the focus of the study shifted towards the impact of vaccines. “We are not experts in the field of epidemiology and do not want to give that impression,” the statement said.

Strong supporters

“As Princess Máxima Centrum we want to emphasise that we are strong supporters of vaccination and that this publication should certainly not be read as an argument against vaccination.”

The article was widely criticised in the scientific community after international newspapers including the New York Post and the Daily Telegraph reported on its findings, with the Telegraph running the headline “Covid vaccines may have helped fuel rise in excess deaths“.

Some compared the publication to the 1998 paper in The Lancet by former doctor Andrew Wakefield that claimed vaccines were a possible cause of autism in children. The paper was withdrawn 12 years later after a BMJ investigation found Wakefield guilty of dishonesty and fraud.

Stuart McDonald, an expert in demographics and longevity at consultancy firm Lane, Clark & Peacock, said the Dutch study into vaccines should “not have been published in its current form”.

Ariel Karlinsky, a researcher whose work on global mortality was used as a basis for the study, accused the Dutch team of publishing a “really bad paper with a misleading title” and “blatant copy-pasting”.

The onus here is on BMJ Public Health which published a really bad paper with a misleading title (nothing to do with OWID) and copies some of our work in WMD almost verbatim and misleadingly.

The researchers who wrote it then talked with Telegraph and this is the result.

— Ariel Karlinsky (@ArielKarlinsky) June 5, 2024

Ruben van Gaalen, researcher in excess deaths with the Dutch statistics agency CBS, told the Volkskrant there was “no empirical evidence that vaccination substantially contributes to excess deaths”.

“I am very surprised that there is no reference to the abundance of literature that states this,” he said.