children s health issues
Childhood Vaccination Concerns
Measles Mumps Rubella (MMR) Vaccine: Concerns about Autism
In the 1990s, the public press reported concerns that the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella Vaccine may cause The largest of these studies looked at 537,303 Danish children who were born between 1991 and 1998. Most (82%) of these children had been given the MMR vaccine. Doctors found that The children who had been vaccinated were no more likely to develop autism than those who were not vaccinated. Autism or a related disorder occurred in 608 of 440,655 (0.138%) children who were vaccinated and in 130 of 96,648 (0.135%) of those who were not vaccinated. The percentage of children who became autistic is nearly identical in the group that was vaccinated and the group that was not vaccinated. A follow-up study of all children born in Denmark between 1999 and 2010, a total of 657,461 children, concluded that MMR does not cause autism overall nor does it increase the risk in children who are at high-risk of autism because of their family history. Other similar studies from across the world have reached similar conclusions. In addition, the research in the original widely publicized study linking autism and the MMR vaccine has been found to have serious scientific flaws and has been discredited by the medical and scientific communities. Despite the overwhelming evidence to support the safety of the MMR vaccines, many parents unfortunately remain unconvinced. As a result, in 2019 the United States experienced its largest measles outbreak since 1992. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), most of the infected people were not vaccinated (seeCDC: Measles Cases and Outbreaks). 