Posted on 07/01/2014 7:29:27 AM PDT by ConservingFreedom
Serious complications related to vaccines are very rare, and there is no evidence that immunizations cause autism, according to an analysis of 67 research studies.
The analysis comes as many vaccine-preventable diseases are making a comeback, often in communities with low vaccination rates. At least 539 people across 20 states have been infected with measles this year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"This report should give parents some reassurance," says pediatrician Courtney Gidengil of Rand and Boston Children's Hospital, co-author of the study out today in Pediatrics.
The report says there is "strong evidence" that the measles vaccine is not associated with an increased risk of autism. That myth gained popularity in 1998 because of a medical study that has been retracted. Still, the myth persists.
"There is a lot of misinformation out there about vaccines," says co-author Margaret Maglione, also a researcher with Rand. "With the rise of the Internet and the decline of print journalism, anyone can put anything on the Internet."
Like all drugs, vaccines can cause serious side effects. But those complications are "extremely rare" and should be weighed against vaccination's enormous benefits, Maglione says.
In an April report, the CDC noted that vaccines given to infants and young children over the past two decades will prevent 322 million illnesses, 21 million hospitalizations and 732,000 deaths over the course of their lifetimes.
The new report notes that some vaccines, including flu shots and the combined vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella, are associated with an increased risk of fever-related seizures in small children. Although these seizures can be frightening for parents, they're typically benign and cause no long-term problems.
According to the analysis, vaccines against rotavirus – a common cause of severe diarrhea and dehydration in children – increase the risk of a serious type of intestinal blockage called intussusception, in which part of the intestine telescopes into itself. The vaccines against it, RotaTeq and Rotarix, can cause an additional one to five cases of intussusception for every 100,000 doses given, the analysis says.
It's important to remember that rotavirus infection also causes intussusception, says pediatrician Paul Offit, chief of infectious disease at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and a developer of the RotaTeq vaccine. He notes that rates of this complication are actually down slightly since the introduction of the vaccines.
The new analysis may not convince parents who are strongly anti-vaccine. University of Utah pediatrician Carrie Byington says she hopes it will persuade doctors to promote vaccines to their patients.
In an accompanying editorial, Byington notes that recent medical school graduates are more skeptical about the effectiveness of vaccines than older doctors, who have been around long enough to have treated children for measles and meningitis. In Washington state, a study found that more than half of medical providers were willing to consider untested, alternative immunization schedules that skip or space out vaccines.
Doctors say it's important to put risks into perspective.
Nearly 38,000 children under age 4 were injured in car accidents in 2012, and 523 died, according to the CDC.
"The most dangerous aspect of giving your child vaccines is driving to the office to get them," Offit says.
The problem is, the antivax people won’t be swayed by studies. They are emotional thinkers, not rational ones.
Thanks CDC! If you can’t trust Big Gov, who can you trust? I’m sure all those Big Pharm campaign donations were to advance the plights of women, children, and minorities, and not to get drugs fast-tracked through the FDA. Say, don’t CONgress critters invest heavily in Big Pharm?
The other problem is, that the provax people won’t be swayed by the concept of parental authority.
They are using the “public health” as a bludgeon to enforce compliance their diktats.
Sorry, I don’t have a problem with vaccination per se but it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I let them stick my daughters with Gardasil or crap like that.
I did not get a small pox vaccine until I joined the military. This was due to my doctor’s recommendation AGAINST getting the shot. There are medical reasons why people refuse vaccines.
Children’s Hospital kidnapped Justina Pelletier with Gestapo like tactics. They held her hostage for over 18 months in cooperation with the MA DCF.
expect us to believe ANY research that comes out of THAT concentration camp?
Hm. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but let's frame these same numbers from the CDC another way:
In 93% of these 322m cases, the infants and children would not have been hospitalized by these illnesses.
In 99.8% of these 322m cases, the infants and children would not have died from these illnesses.
Now of course you want to err on the side of caution. But does this not seem a *tad* strange that we are vaccinating all these infants and children, the vast majority of whom will have no serious complications? Especially since giving the vaccines themselves have known risks associated with them?
Would it not be smarter and more cost-effective to target the vaccinations better so that, say, an infant who may have a high probability of contracting HepB be given the vaccines but the vast majority are not?
Oh but I forgot. The vaccine companies and the health industry make money with every administration, and the consumer is paying for it via a pool of insureds rather than his own pocket.
Treatment of patients has nothing to do with ability to conduct meta-studies. But believe what you will.
Some people - many others just have flakes for parents.
I don't think any child should be forcibly vaccinated against his parents' wishes. But if a school or other institution wants to protect its charges from exposure infectious-disease-susceptible, that's likewise their business.
They are using the “public health” as a bludgeon to enforce compliance their diktats.
Sorry, I don’t have a problem with vaccination per se but it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I let them stick my daughters with Gardasil or crap like that.
If anyone has pushed Gardasil as "public health", that's an abuse of the concept - only casual-contact-transmittable diseases are properly a matter of public health.
Well said.
Well you know how libs think.
“Your daughters are *obviously* going to be sexually active so we need to protect them from getting HPV and spreading it to everyone else who is sexually active.”
They’ve been quite successful to date at folding their various degeneracies into the concept of “health”.
Perhaps, but do you believe all the "studies" put out by the Federal Government and their lackeys? Globull warming is just the tip of the iceberg and for every "study" that says something, you can find one that refutes it.
For quite sometime I've become more and more skeptical about ANYTHING the government says, and since the Ayatollah Hussein 0bama began usurping power, I would check if they said that water was wet.
7% hospitalization is not a small number.
Especially since giving the vaccines themselves have known risks associated with them?
Although all the needed data is not in this article, it appears that the risks of vaccination are far outweighed by the risks of not vaccinating.
Would it not be smarter and more cost-effective to target the vaccinations better so that, say, an infant who may have a high probability of contracting HepB be given the vaccines but the vast majority are not?
That would be a terrific medical advance, no question.
Oh but I forgot. The vaccine companies and the health industry make money with every administration, and the consumer is paying for it via a pool of insureds rather than his own pocket.
The insurance companies, who have skin in the game, think it's cheaper to pay for preventative vaccinations than to pay to treat the disease. Hm.
I don't think it'll take a medical advance necessarily, just a mmore judicious application of resources and (the kicker) a less litigious society.
I'm sure, for example, the varicella vaccine figures into the CDC's figures. We could probably take just about every kid off that vaccine and not suffer greatly for it health wise--they only selectively vaccinate for it in the UK.
Everything's a cost benefit analysis.
And yes, the CDC can talk about general risks, but that may not apply well to your specific kid. Individuals may have risk factors that tip the scales so, like you said, parents have to be able to make those determinations.
Thanks for proving my point.
“The other problem is, that the provax people won’t be swayed by the concept of parental authority.
They are using the “public health” as a bludgeon to enforce compliance their diktats.”
For most of the vaccines, there is a legitimate public health issue. Now, I’m not averse to allowing people to “opt out” if they want, but only if they bear legal liability for all the people who get infected when they or their children contract some completely avoidable infectious disease.
So what you’re trying to tell me is that the science is settled?
“Perhaps, but do you believe all the “studies” put out by the Federal Government and their lackeys?”
No, but we are not talking about just government studies. Every study, private or public, has found just about the same thing as this study. If the antivaxxers could produce even one study that showed otherwise, there might be an issue that the government studies were biased, but they cannot.
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