Are unvaccinated kids healthier than those who get their vaccines, as some folks propose?
No.
As expected, they are just at more risk for vaccine-preventable diseases.
Vaccinated vs. Unvaccinated Studies
What about the folks who report that there are studies that prove that without a doubt that unvaccinated children are healthier than their peers?
They are talking about a 1992 survey, not a research study, from the Immunization Awareness Society, an anti-vaccine group who surveyed their own members.
On the other hand, a large study, “Vaccination Status and Health in Children and Adolescents Findings of the German Health Interview and Examination Survey for Children and Adolescents (KiGGS),” which looked at “whether unvaccinated children and adolescents differ from those vaccinated in terms of health,” found that:
- …vaccinated children and unvaccinated children differed substantially only in terms of the lifetime prevalence of vaccine preventable diseases; as is to be expected the risk of such diseases is notably lower in vaccinated subjects.
- In the largest study in children and adolescents so far none of the often anticipated health differences—such as allergies and the number of infections—were observed in vaccinated and unvaccinated subjects aged 1–17 years.
So they didn’t find more cases of “obstructive bronchitis, pneumonia and otitis media, heart disease, anemia, epilepsy, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD” among the vaccinated kids.
The unvaccinated kids just had more measles, mumps, rubella, and pertussis.
More on Vaccinated vs. Unvaccinated Studies
- Do More Vaccinated or Unvaccinated Kids Get Sick in Outbreaks?
- Vaccinated vs Unvaccinated – Measles Outbreak Edition
- Vaccinated vs Unvaccinated – Smallpox Edition
- Do Vaccinated Kids Who Get Sick Have Milder Disease?
- If It’s Vaccines, Then Why Are There Autistic Kids Who Are Unvaccinated?
- The perils and pitfalls of doing a “vaccinated versus unvaccinated” study
- Health of Vaccinated vs Unvaccinated
- A vaccinated vs. unvaccinated study and, guess what, vaccinated kids do better on tests
- Vaccinated vs. Unvaccinated
- A survey administered by a German anti-vaccine homeopath backfires spectacularly
- Generation Rescue’s Vaccinated/Unvaccinated Study
- And yet another vaccinated/unvaccinated comparison study, this time funded by SafeMinds
Thanks for the piece! There are a couple more studies on the topic too (another German study, a Philippine study, tiny African study, and many large flu-shot comparison studies).
“to put it shortly: vaccinated people are as healthy or healthier in all aspects compared to the unvaccinated. The vaccinated populations studied have fewer vaccine preventable diseases (may seem obvious, but nevertheless needs to be mentioned), fewer cases of asthma, fewer heart attacks, better birth outcomes, and higher cognitive scores than their unvaccinated counterparts.”
https://thoughtscapism.com/2015/04/10/myth-no-studies-compare-the-health-of-unvaccinated-and-vaccinated-people/