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Immunization Registries Briefing ECBT Supports Continued Use of MMR Vaccine Additional News Stories and Press Releases National Infant Immunization Week Gates Foundation Awards $18 Million Grant to Sabin Vaccine Institute |
Additional
News Stories and Press Releases
American Academy of Pediatrics Says Evidence Confirms No Link Between Autism and Vaccines WASHINGTON, April 6 In response to a U.S. House Government Reform Committee hearing today, the American Academy of Pediatrics wants to reassure parents that vaccines are the safest way to protect children against potentially devastating infectious diseases. "What a tragedy it would be
for any
child to suffer the consequences If parents refuse to
immunize their
children, this country will see a The congressional hearing
is focusing
on autism, including an unsubstantiated link to vaccines such as MMR
(measles,
mumps and Autism manifests itself in
the first
three years of life, which is the The American Academy of Pediatrics supports aggressive research into the causes, treatment and prevention of autism as many questions remain. The perceived increase in autism cases could be attributed to a number of factors, and additional study is needed. Vaccines are developed through rigorous research designed to ensure safe and effective products. These products are then subjected to another level of intense scrutiny in order to assure that recommendations about immunization practices and procedures reflect the best available science. Once approved for use, there is a robust system of checks and balances that monitors the safety and efficacy of vaccines. A child's chance of being harmed by an infectious disease like measles or mumps is far greater than any risk of being harmed by the vaccine. These diseases have not been eliminated, only kept at bay through widespread childhood immunization. Measles, for example, can lead to pneumonia or an infection of the brain and can cause death. Mumps can cause an infection in the lining of the brain and death. To help inform parents
about the
benefits and risks of vaccines, the American Public Health Association (regarding April 6 Burton hearing). Vaccines are Integral Component of Good Public Health In response to today's U.S. House Government Reform Committee hearing on autism and infant vaccines, the American Public Health Association (APHA) expresses its strong and continued support for universal immunization against vaccine-preventable diseases. "We strongly recommend that health care providers and parents continue to immunize their children, since the health of all children could be seriously jeopardized by a drop in immunization rates," said Mohammad N. Akhter, MD, MPH, executive director of APHA. "Furthermore, APHA advocates that efforts be made to ensure the highest safety standards in vaccine development, manufacture, and distribution, in order to limit adverse effects. These efforts must include research directed to the elimination of the rare unfavorable reactions to immunizations." In spite of the most
exhaustive scientific
research, a small number of The American Public Health
Association,
the largest and oldest Date
April 06,
2000 Tom Brokaw, anchor:
Tonight, sorting out troubling questions about a heartbreaking disease for children and their families: autism. A hearing in Washington today to address fears that routine childhood vaccinations might somehow be to blame. Here's NBC's Robert Hager. Robert Hager reporting:
Gina Smith (Mother): He will never play on a sports' team. He will never be able to go to an amusement park. He does--he won't be able to go to birthday parties. The stimulation is more then he can handle. Hager: Autism is a severe developmental disorder. Victims seem isolated from the world around them and for unknown reasons the number of cases reported among children is growing fast, now more than fifty thousand. Today, parents appealed to Congress for help. Gina Smith came from Louisiana to tell how Jacob's problem seemed to come on suddenly at sixteen months. Smith: (Clip from video of congressional testimony) The light behind his eyes was replaced with a blank, lost, bewildered stare. Hager: Kenneth Curtis came from Maryland to tell about his son. Kenneth Curtis (Father): (Clip from video of congressional testimony) I know there are things that my son wants to say to me, and as he gets older I can--I can look into his eyes and I can see the frustration and the confusion. Hager: The hearing chaired by Congressman Dan Burton who has a personal reason for finding answers: an autistic grandson. And Burton believes it might have been triggered by the routine immunization shots all children get for measles, mumps, rubella and more. A controversial theory, but some feel it needs investigation. (Visual of a bottle of Measles, Mumps, Rubella virus serum). Bernard Rimland (Autism Research Institute): I don't necessarily believe that children should not be vaccinated. I think that much more research needs to be done on the safety of the vaccines. I think much more judgment needs to be exercised in the using of vaccines. Hager: But the government's two pre-eminent health agencies, the Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes for Health, told Congress today there's no evidence at all to link autism and vaccinations. Said autism seems to be inherited and seems to develop before birth, even when it doesn't appear until months after birth. Dr. Paul Offit (University of Pennsylvania): The scientific study that has been done has shown us clearly that vaccines don't cause autism. Hager: But doctors admit they are a long way from knowing what does cause the disorder. Not only that but there is no known cure, even as government spending to find out more has quadrupled in recent years. A long way from answers for Congressman Burton, for parents like Gina Smith, her son Jacob, and tens of thousands more with this baffling disorder. Robert Hager, NBC News,
Washington. "After
Disputes, House Panel Asks for Study of a Vaccine" Leaders of the House
Government Reform
and Oversight Committee have agreed to ask the Department of Health and
Human Services to study the possible link between vaccination and
autism.
Several witnesses spoke at Thursday's hearing, which was called by the
committee's chairman, Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), whose granddaughter has
autism. Current research has not shown any connection between the
onset of autism and the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine, but many
parents
describe their children suddenly exhibiting symptoms of the disorder
after
vaccination. Autism is characterized by a failure to speak,
withdrawal
from social behavior, and repetitive motions. Rep. Henry Waxman
(D-Calif.)
warned that it is important not to scare Press release: By Parents of Kids with Infectious Diseases. National Parent Organization Underscores Commitment to Helping Children Live Stronger and Healthier Lives WASHINGTON, April 6 /PRNewswire/ -- The national parent advocacy organization, PKIDs (Parents of Kids with Infectious Diseases), is committed to protecting our nation's children against diseases that have life-long effects on their health and development. In response to a U.S. House Government Reform Committee hearing on autism (Thursday, April 6), PKIDs voices its support for more resources for autism research and stresses that there is no scientific evidence linking autism to immunization. "There is a long way to go
in understanding
autism. As a nation, we "Autism affects more than
400,000
families and costs the nation over Although autism is
currently the
third most common developmental In hopes of improving the
quality
of children's health across the NO SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE LINKING IMMUNIZATION TO AUTISM While PKIDs advocates for additional resources for autism research, it does not condone the spread of false and misleading information linking autism to childhood vaccination. PKIDs strongly encourages parents to continue immunizing their children with scientifically proven safe and effective vaccines. "Today's high immunization
rates
are what is protecting us from Over the past 50 years,
vaccines
have gained control over or virtually eliminated diseases that
used
to be very common in the U.S., including measles, diphtheria, polio,
smallpox,
rubella, Hib meningitis and mumps. But, other diseases such as
hepatitis
B, varicella and pneumococcal meningitis are still common, resulting in
serious illness for many families. In fact, even in the U.S.,
where
immunization rates are the highest, approximately 1 million pre-school
children are not adequately protected against potentially For more information,
please call
877-55-PKIDS or log onto Los Angeles Times Copyright 2000 Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times April 7, 2000, Friday, Home
Edition Autism-Vaccine Link Raised in Hearing; Medicine: Psychologist Tells House Panel that Steep Rise in Disorder may Stem from Immunization Campaign, a Theory Hotly Contested by Other Experts. Byline: Sunny Kaplan, Times Staff Writer Declaring that autism has
reached
"epidemic" proportions, the head Bernard Rimland, a research
psychologist
who has studied the symptoms and possible causes of autism for 35
years,
joined other The hypothesis that the
disease may
be linked to vaccines is of particular controversy, and many public
health
officials argue that it is "To date there has been no convincing scientific evidence that links any vaccine to autism or any other kind of behavioral disorder," said Dr. Thomas R. Reardon, president of the American Medical Assn., in testimony submitted to the House Committee of Government Reform, which called the hearing. But Rick Rollins, a co-founder of an autism research center at UC Davis and the father of an autistic 9-year-old son, said a California state study released last spring that showed a 273% increase in autism over an 11-year period is a strong argument for further research into a possible vaccine-autism connection. "There is not one single thing here that may be the cause. This is a complicated disease," said Rollins, a former secretary of the California Assembly. "But we need to really accelerate good scientific research and funding." Autism is a developmental
disorder
marked by social isolation, Candace Pert, a research professor in the department of physiology at Georgetown University School of Medicine in Washington, said that, while recent research has shown a genetic contribution to autism, the findings suggest that no more than 20% of autism cases are genetic. Some proponents of the theory that vaccines may cause autism say the sheer number of vaccines that children receive--at least two dozen doses before they enter first grade--may overload a young child's immune system. Some parents of autistic children point anecdotally to the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine as the most likely culprit, saying that their children were "normal" until they received that vaccine, which is typically administered from age 12 months to 15 months. Rimland's findings mirror that hypothesis. "Autism starting at 18 months rose very sharply in the mid-1980s, when the MMR vaccine came into wide use," he said. Dr. Michael Goldberg, a Los
Angeles
pediatrician and director of the Neuro Immune Dysfunction Syndrome
Research
Institute, Goldberg said that the
measles-mumps-rubella
vaccine can serve as a common trigger for autism because it is highly
"immunogenic," Yet another hypothesis is
that mercury,
which is often used as a Environmental toxins may
also be
a contributing factor, as is pointed out in a study recently finished,
but yet to be released, conducted by the federal Agency for Toxic
Substances
and Disease Registry on Brick Township, N.J., a community north of
Atlantic
City where the Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.),
who chairs
the committee that called the hearing, has a 3-year-old grandson whose
autism he attributes to In a news conference preceding the hearing, Burton said that the rise in the disease is not just an "aberration." The federal Department of
Health
and Human Services "says there is no correlation between shots and the
dramatic rise in autism. I am Rep. Henry A. Waxman of Los Angeles, the committee's ranking Democrat, agreed that vaccines "shouldn't be off the table" as a theory for the increase but said "we must not get ahead of science or raise a false alarm." Waxman also criticized the
proceedings
as skewed toward proponents of the theory that vaccines cause autism.
The
Philadelphia Inquirer Parents tell congressional committee that vaccine sickened their children BYLINE: By Huntly Collins Distraught parents told a
congressional
committee Thursday But various experts, including officials from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said there was no scientific evidence to support the alleged link between autism and the so-called MMR vaccine. They warned that such false information could lower immunization rates and leave the nation vulnerable to a measles epidemic like the one that killed 123 children, including nine in Philadelphia, in 1990-91. "If, as a result of reading
about
this hearing, some parents choose to The debate came during a
daylong
hearing in Washington before the House Committee on Government Reform,
chaired by Rep. Dan Burton, who also has been holding hearings on the military's controversial anthrax vaccine, said his grandson, Christian, became autistic after getting the MMR vaccine. "I can't believe that's
just a coincidence,"
he said, adding that Burton came under fire from Rep. Henry Waxman, D., Calif., the committee's ranking minority member, for using the committee hearing as a bully pulpit to promote an unproven _ and potentially dangerous _ notion. "This hearing was called to
establish
a point of view _ a point of view The MMR vaccine, developed by Merck & Co., has become the cornerstone of pediatric health in the United States. It involves one shot that protects children against three diseases that used to be among the leading causes of death and disability. Typically, babies are vaccinated at 12 months and given a booster when they turn 4. Two developments have prompted the notion that the MMR vaccine may cause autism. One is an apparent rise in the prevalence of autism, from about 5 cases per 10,000 births to 12 cases per 10,000 births between 1966 and 1985, according to federal officials. But Coleen Boyle, head of
the CDC's
disabilities branch, told the committee that the apparent rise in the
autism
rate may be due to Another factor fueling the debate is a controversial small study by Andrew Wakefield, a British gastroenterologist, who found that 8 of 12 children developed autism soon after getting the MMR vaccine. Wakefield defended his work before the committee Thursday, but his findings were rebutted by Dr. Brent Taylor, another British physician, who studied 498 children with autism in North London and found no connection with the MMR vaccine. He said Wakefield's work had had "a major effect" on public confidence in the vaccine, with immunization rates in England dropping from about 90 percent in 1995 to 75 percent last year. "The same thing could happen in the United States," Taylor said. Autism is a brain-based developmental disorder in which children typically engage in repetitive behaviors such as rocking; speak little or not at all, and make little eye contact, seemingly immersed in their own private world. The cause of the disorder is not clear, but numerous genes have been implicated. During the hearing, Burton
assailed
Offit's credibility, suggesting that But Dr. Benjamin Schwartz, a CDC vaccine official, said the 12-member board required scientists to disclose any financial ties that might give the appearance of a conflict. He said the agency sought out experts like Offit because they are the most knowledgeable about infectious disease and the vaccines to prevent them. Coverage of the hearing from the Philadelphia Inquirer (c) 2000, The Philadelphia
Inquirer. Visit Philadelphia Online,
the Inquirer's
World Wide Web site, at |