Tag: autism shot

Are You Too Scared to Vaccinate Your Kids?

These days, if a parent suggests to their pediatrician that they might want to skip or delay their child’s vaccines, it is typically not because they are afraid of any association with autism, or because they have been influenced by Jenny McCarthy or Andrew Wakefield, or even because they have done a lot of research.

It is mostly because they are scared.

Are You Too Scared to Vaccinate Your Kids?

What are they scared of specifically?

“In today’s world, smallpox has been eradicated due to a successful vaccination program and vaccines have effectively controlled many other significant causes of morbidity and mortality. Consequently, fear has shifted from many vaccine-preventable diseases to fear of the vaccines.”

Marian Siddiqui et al on the Epidemiology of vaccine hesitancy in the United States

Surprisingly, there often isn’t anything specific that they are scared of. That’s unfortunate, as it makes it harder to offer reassurance when they don’t have specific questions or concerns.

Still, something is scaring these parents, sometimes to the point that they have panic attacks if they even think about vaccinating their kids.

“…many parents are inundated with horror stories of vaccine dangers, all designed to eat away at them emotionally while the medical and scientific communities have mounted their characteristic response by sharing the facts, the data, and all of the reliable peer-reviewed and well-cited research to show that vaccines are safe and effective.”

Federman on Understanding Vaccines: A Public Imperative

What has them so scared?

Could it be:

Whatever it is, it builds up to the point to where these parents fear the risks of vaccines more than they fear the risks and complications of vaccine-preventable diseases.

As more people are vaccinated and diseases disappear, they forget how bad those diseases are, skip or delay getting their vaccines, and trigger outbreaks.
As more people are vaccinated and diseases disappear, they forget how bad those diseases are, skip or delay getting their vaccines, and trigger outbreaks. Photo by WHO

That’s not surprising.

After all, why fear polio, measles, diphtheria, or tetanus, etc., if you have never had or known anyone that has had one of these now vaccine-preventable diseases? Why fear them, if you have never known anyone who has died with one of these now vaccine-preventable diseases?

And why trust that you should vaccinate your kids when you are likely inundated with messages about vaccines being poison, a Big Pharma conspiracy, or that you can just heal your child with some garlic and essential oils if they get sick?

Reducing Anxiety from Vaccinations

Have any ideas on how to get over your anxiety about vaccinations?

To start, learn that vaccines are safe, necessary, and they work to protect your kids and that all of the messages you are hearing about vaccines that have been scaring you aren’t true. You have probably already realized that on some level, but there are cognitive biases, heuristics, and logical fallacies that work together to change our perception of risk, keep us believing things aren’t true, and in this case, can keep you from vaccinating and protecting your kids.

It can also help to learn to think critically and be more skeptical about the things you see and read about vaccines, especially if you aren’t sure about the source of the information.

“The Internet has been identified as an important source for parents to seek and share vaccine information. There are concerns that parental fears or hesitancy on childhood immunizations are increasing due to the popularity of social media and exposure to online antivaccination sentiment.”

Tustin et al on Internet Exposure Associated With Canadian Parents’ Perception of Risk on Childhood Immunization: Cross-Sectional Study

Don’t let a small, yet vocal anti-vaccine minority scare you into a poor decision about your child’s vaccines.

What to Know About Being Too Scared to Vaccinate Your Kids

Parents who are inundated with anti-vaccine messages and misinformation sometimes get too scared to vaccinate their kids, fearing vaccines more than they fear the diseases they prevent.

More on Being Too Scared to Vaccinate Your Kids

How to End the Epidemic of Bad Books About Autism

Looking for a book about autism?

There are a lot of good ones, including NeuroTribes and the Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism.

Unfortunately, there are an awful lot of bad ones too.

How to End the Epidemic of Bad Books About Autism

Why are there so many bad books about autism?

That’s easy.

JB Handley is the latest to write a book about vaccines and autism, moving the focus to aluminum, now that it has become obvious that removing thimerosal from vaccines didn't affect autism rates.
JB Handley is the latest to write a book about vaccines and autism, moving the focus to aluminum, now that it has become obvious that removing thimerosal from vaccines didn’t affect autism rates.

Just about every anti-vaccine expert out there also thinks that they are an expert on autism. In fact, they think that they have all of the answers and can even help you cure and prevent autism.

That’s why there are books like:

  • The Autism Book: What Every Parent Needs to Know About Early Detection, Treatment, Recovery, and Prevention by Dr. Bob Sears
  • Preventing Autism: What You Can Do to Protect Your Children Before and After Birth by Dr. Jay Gordon
  • Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey in Healing Autism by Jenny McCarthy
  • Callous Disregard: Autism and Vaccines – The Truth Behind a Tragedy by Andrew Wakefield
  • Vaccines, Autism & Chronic Inflammation: The New Epidemic by Barbara Loe Fisher
  • The Age of Autism: Mercury, Medicine, and a Man-Made Epidemic by Dan Olmsted and Mark Blaxill

What do all of these books miss?

“Autism, as I see it, steals the soul from a child…”

Dr. Jerry Kartzinel writing in the introduction to Jenny McCarthy’s first autism book Louder Than Words

Besides the fact that there is no autism epidemic and that vaccines are not associated with autism, they miss that they are actually hurting autistic families.

“Doctors who first worked with children with regressive autism back in the early 1990s found that one of the biggest “wows” came from treating intestinal yeast overgrowth, and this benefit holds true today. Children whose diarrhea doesn’t go away with the GFCF diet usually show resolution with yeast medication.”

Bob Sears, MD on The Autism Book

From restrictive diets and antifungal drugs for yeast infections to bleach enemas and detox therapies, these books often push expensive, often unproven, sometimes disproven, and dangerous  non-evidence based biomedical treatments and cures on hopeful parents of autistic kids.

Don’t help them by buying or promoting their books.

Instead, look for better books by folks who are really helping autistic kids and don’t think they are damaged, or books by someone who is actually autistic.

What to Know About the Epidemic of Bad Autism Books

There are a lot of good books out there with helpful information if you think that your child is autistic, has been  recently diagnosed, or if you simply want to learn more about autism. It’s time to stop the epidemic of bad autism books.

More on the Epidemic of Bad Autism Books

Vaccines and the Latest Autism Prevalence Report

The Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network recently released a report that showed a 15% increase in autism prevalence rates.

What does that have to do with vaccines?

Well, nothing, unless you are an anti-vaccine group that is continually trying to associate vaccines with autism.

Trends in Autism Prevalence

Just about everyone understands that autism prevalence rates have been increasing over the years. It is what makes some folks think that there is a real autism epidemic.

Using ADDM Network numbers, it is easy to see the trend:

  • 1 in 150 children in 2000
  • 1 in 150 children in 2002
  • 1 in 125 children in 2004
  • 1 in 110 children in 2006
  • 1 in 88 children in 2008
  • 1 in 68 children in 2010
  • 1 in 68 children in 2012
  • 1 in 59 children in 2014 (the latest, 2018 report of children born in 2006)

As in previous years, this new report generated headlines from anti-vaccine groups, who continue to think that any increase in autism rates is a new reason to blame vaccines.

Of course, as it is has been shown over and over again, vaccines are not associated with autism.

These CDC reports should even take away any last idea that they are.

Why?

If there was any association with vaccines, then why are autism rates so widely different in the 11 states that are tracked by ADDM?

Are immunization rates different in those states?

Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network

Anyone who has read the latest report on autism rates understands that it “is not a representation of autism in the United States as a whole, but is instead an in-depth look at the 11 communities in the ADDM Network.”

Those communities have changed for each report, but this time they were in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Wisconsin.

key-finding-asd-prevalence
Prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorder Among Children Aged 8 Years — Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network, 11 Sites, United States, 2014 (2018 report)

Even then, the ADDM Network doesn’t look at all of the children in those states. They are mostly looking at children near large institutions that are hosts for the ADDM Network, such as the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, and Rutgers University, etc.

The 325,483 8-year-olds in the latest ADDM Network report were born in 2006 and live in:

  • part of Maricopa County in metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona
  • 75 counties in Arkansas
  • Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas, and Jefferson counties in Colorado
  • Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett counties in Georgia
  • Baltimore County, Maryland
  • parts of two counties (Hennepin and Ramsey) including the large metropolitan cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota
  • Franklin, Jefferson, St. Charles, St. Louis, and St. Louis City counties in Missouri
  • Essex, Hudson, Union, and Ocean counties in New Jersey
  • Alamance, Chatham, Forsyth, Guilford, Orange, and Wake counties in North Carolina
  • Bedford, Cheatham, Davidson, Dickson, Marshall, Maury, Montgomery, Rutherford, Robertson, Williamson, and Wilson counties in Tennessee
  • Dane, Green, Jefferson, Kenosha, Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Racine, Rock, Walworth, and Waukesha counties in Wisconsin

Why is this important?

“Autism prevalence among black and Hispanic children is approaching that of white children,” said Dr. Stuart Shapira, associate director for science at the CDC’s National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities. “The higher number of black and Hispanic children now being identified with autism could be due to more effective outreach in minority communities and increased efforts to have all children screened for autism so they can get the services they need.”

It shows that “there continue to be many children living with ASD who need services and support, now and as they grow into adolescence and adulthood.”

Immunization Rates and the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network

It also helps to dispell any last ideas that vaccines are associated with autism…

Just look at the immunization rates in the ADDM Network counties (4 doses of DTaP, 3 doses of IPV, one dose of MMR, 3 doses of Hib, 3 doses of HepB, 1 dose of Varicella, 4 doses of Prevnar, flu shot, and 1 dose of HepA by age 36 months) and compare them to the autism rates in those same counties.

 

County Autism Rate Immunization Rates
Maricopa (AZ) 1 in 71 DTaP 82%, IPV 91%, MMR 90%, Hib 91%, HepB 93%, Var 88%, Prev 75%, flu 32%, HepA 78%
Boulder (CO) 1 in 72 DTaP 87%, IPV 95%, MMR 93%, Hib 89%, HepB 90%, Var 93%, Prev 80%, flu -%, HepA 65%
Jefferson (CO) 1 in 72 DTaP 86%, IPV 93%, MMR 91%, Hib 90%, HepB 94%, Var 90%, Prev 83%, flu 48%, HepA 69%
Cobb (GA) 1 in 59 DTaP 83%, IPV 94%, MMR 91%, Hib 88%, HepB 93%, Var 91%, Prev 80%, flu 40%, HepA 21%
Baltimore (MD) 1 in 50 DTaP 91%, IPV 95%, MMR 95%, Hib 94%, HepB 95%, Var 93%, Prev 86%, flu 46%, HepA 61%
Hennepin (MN) 1 in 42 DTaP 88%, IPV 93%, MMR 92%, Hib 88%, HepB 93%, Var 90%, Prev 82%, flu 42%, HepA 47%
Ramsey (MN) 1 in 42 DTaP 87%, IPV 96%, MMR 93%, Hib 91%, HepB 94%, Var 93%, Prev 79%, flu 42%, HepA 63%
Jefferson (MO) 1 in 71 DTaP 83%, IPV 95%, MMR 90%, Hib 92%, HepB 95%, Var 87%, Prev 82%, flu -%, HepA 51%
Essex (NJ) 1 in 34 DTaP 81%, IPV 91%, MMR 91%, Hib 93%, HepB 91%, Var 91%, Prev 69%, flu -%, HepA -%
Hudson (NJ) 1 in 34 DTaP 78%, IPV 91%, MMR 91%, Hib 92%, HepB 91%, Var 91%, Prev 70%, flu -%, HepA -%
Ocean (NJ) 1 in 34 DTaP 84%, IPV 91%, MMR 91%, Hib 92%, HepB 91%, Var 83%, Prev 74%, flu -%, HepA -%
Union (NJ) 1 in 34 DTaP 89%, IPV 92%, MMR 92%, Hib 91%, HepB 94%, Var 91%, Prev 79%, flu -%, HepA -%
Davidson (TN) 1 in 64 DTaP 89%, IPV 95%, MMR 95%, Hib 93%, HepB 94%, Var 94%, Prev 84%, flu 50%, HepA 35%
Dane (WI)
 1 in 71 DTaP 87%, IPV 93%, MMR 93%, Hib 88%, HepB 93%, Var 90%, Prev 82%, flu -%, HepA 45%

If vaccines were associated with autism, what should you see? Higher rates of autism in the areas with the highest immunization rates. You don’t see that in any of this data though, do you?

The counties in New Jersey, with the highest rates of autism, have good immunization rates, but they aren’t much different from the immunization rates in Colorado counties or Arizona counties with much lower autism rates.

Some other things we know about vaccines and the latest autism report?

  • in 2006, when those kids were born, New Jersey had one of the lowest rates for getting newborns a hepatitis B shot on their first day, as recommended, at just 23%. Arizona, with a much lower rate of autism, did much better, getting 65% of newborns their birth dose of hepatitis B vaccine on time. In fact, Maricopa County had one of the highest rates, at 71%.
  • fewer than half of their mothers likely received a flu shot during their pregnancy, even though they had been recommended since the 1990s
  • extremely few of their mothers received a Tdap vaccine during their pregnancy, as this didn’t become a routine recommendation until 2011

Does any of this surprise you?

How can vaccines be associated with autism, when counties that have higher immunization rates have lower rates of autism?

What to Know About Vaccines and the Latest Autism Prevalence Report

The latest Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network report on autism prevalence from the CDC shows a rate that has increased to 1 in 59 children. And as county level trends in vaccination coverage show no correlation to those autism prevalence rates, folks will hopefully stop trying to associate vaccines with autism.

More on Vaccines and the Latest Autism Prevalence Report

Which Vaccine Is the Most Dangerous?

In 2002, Dan Rather did a report for 60 Minutes on “The Most Dangerous Vaccine.”

Can you guess which vaccine he was reporting on?

Which Vaccine Is the Most Dangerous?

You are thinking his report was about MMR, the so-called “autism shot,” right?

“And then the nurse gave my son that shot. And I remember going, “Oh, God, no!” And soon thereafter I noticed a change. The soul was gone from his eyes.”

Jenny McCarthy on Oprah

It was around the time that the “media’s MMR hoax” was in high gear.

“Whatever you think about Andrew Wakefield, the real villains of the MMR scandal are the media.”

Ben Goldacre on The MMR story that wasn’t

But 60 Minutes had already done a segment on “The MMR Vaccine” with Andrew Wakefield back in 2000.

The smallpox vaccine was considered the most dangerous as President Bush decided whether or not it was necessary to vaccinate millions against this deadly disease.
The smallpox vaccine was considered the most dangerous as President Bush decided whether or not it was necessary to vaccinate millions against this deadly disease.

No, this story was about the smallpox vaccine.

And if you had to rank vaccines from safest to most dangerous, then yes, you could say that the original smallpox vaccine, the one with the most side effects, is the most dangerous.

Fortunately, that very same smallpox vaccine helped eradicate smallpox and few of us need to even think about getting a smallpox vaccine. It is still given to some folks in the military though and is available if necessary.

The story was about a plan to vaccinate many more people, including hospital workers. At the time, there was a worry about terrorist attacks using smallpox.

“Here’s another way to do it. We can make the vaccine. Make sure we understand who’s going to get it, who’s going to be giving it. Then wait, wait for there to be one case of documented smallpox somewhere on the face of this earth and then we can move into vaccinating people, large numbers of people.”

Paul Offit, MD

Not everyone was on board with the plan though. Dr. Offit, for one, didn’t think that it was a good idea to start vaccinating people for a threat that we didn’t know would appear, especially since the older smallpox vaccine had more side effects than other, more modern vaccines.

Again, that doesn’t mean that the smallpox vaccine is dangerous.

Smallpox is dangerous and deadly. If there is a risk that you could get smallpox, then you would much rather have the smallpox vaccine, even with its side effect profile.

And fortunately, a new attenuated smallpox vaccine, Imvamune, is also available and has less side effects. Two other smallpox vaccines, ACAM2000 and APSV, which are similar to the original DryVax vaccine that was used in the US, are also still being used until Imvamune is formally approved by the FDA.

Vaccine preventable diseases are dangerous.

While they aren’t 100% without risk, vaccines, from rotavirus to HPV, are safe and necessary.

What To Know About the Most Dangerous Vaccine

All vaccines are safe and effective, but if you had to rank them, the original smallpox vaccine would be the most dangerous because it has the most side effects.

More on the Most Dangerous Vaccine