Vaccination And Autism

By Author: Henry Ford
Total Articles: 189
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Autism is a disorder of the brain which results from a combination of several disorders combined. Vaccinations have been greatly discussed to be one of its causes. Normally vaccination is administered at an early stage of life to children to prevent them from disease. This reason of vaccinating children then and the researches undertaken, make me strongly oppose the fact that vaccination is the cause of autism.

Vaccinations are not the cause for children acquiring autism

According to American Academy of Pediatrics, 2008, many claims have been brought forth by parents claiming that their children suffering from autism was as a result of the vaccines they were given. What then is autism and is it associated with vaccination? Autism is a collection of several disorders associated to the development of the brain and is not one disease. This collection is referred to as ‘autism spectrum disorders’. It is usually characterized by such problems as communication, or lack of social interaction among others. It is reported that its prevalence has gone up recently. One of the reasons attributed to this is the fact that ...
... several disorders nowadays are categorized in the same category as compared to what it used to be in the past. The doctors and the society in general have contributed to the recognition of this disorder frequently unlike before. From reports given by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1 in 150 children have this disorder. Many reasons have been given out concerning the causes of this disorder though its cause so far has not been established. It is shown that it has genetic origin and that at the moment; about 10 percent of the reported cases have genetic attributes for example fragile x. Rumors all over have been circulated that vaccination is one of the causes of autism. An example of the vaccines feared is MMR. Physicians, scientific research and the fact that vaccines have antigens to prevent disease are the reasons which support the fact that vaccines have nothing to do with autism (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2008).

Physicians have been trained to report any serious effects of the vaccines they administer to children to Vaccine Adverse Event yet any case of vaccines as the cause of autism has not been reported so far. This is usually done so that immediate action can be taken. One of the notable examples is that of Rotavirus vaccine which was found out to cause intestinal problems, intussusceptions and this led to its removal from the market. There is no reports which have been taken to this body by any doctor with the same complain. The doctors now believe that the increased rate of autism is as a result of new ways of defining autism. Other disorders which have been treated to be autism include such disorders as, Asperger syndrome which resembles autism though unlike autism, a child has a normal language development. Childhood disintegrated disorder is one of the rare ones and it is associated with a child’s ability to learn various skills though he or she losses them at the age of 10 (New York Times, 2009).

In addition, scientific research has revealed that there is no prove to link autism and vaccine. The American Academy of Pediatrics, CDC, Institute of Medicine and American Medical Association do not support the linkage between autism and vaccine. For instance a study which was carried out and published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood showed that there was no relationship between vaccine and autism. David Brown, the doctor who researched confirmed this (Kahn, 2008). It was reported that measles were on the rise because of people’s failure to vaccinate their children just because of the fear of autism. In the study, 100 children suffering from autism disorders, 52 with learning disorders and 90 with normal development were considered. Their blood samples did not reveal any abnormality as a result of antigens in the body. It is also reported that current research by Immunization Review Committee to find out if MMR vaccine could have been one of the causes of autism reports that there is no connection between autism and MMR vaccine.

Combination of vaccines which has been of great fear to many parents is also reported to have no harm. Vaccines are antigens which are meant to protect the body against any harm and therefore, it can not be a cause of autism. Serious studies have been carried out on such vaccines as MMR which normally protect children against measles, mumps and rubella. CDC, 2009, shows that vaccines have been able to reduce the number of deaths a great deal for those which are associated with vaccinations. There are different ways in which people react to different forms of drugs and so none of them is 10% safe. Two reasons are given by those who fear that MMR which is a vaccine handling more than one disease could be a cause of autism. One, they say that since it is a cause of intestinal disorder then it can lead to autism later and secondly they say that thimerosal a mercury preservative found in it could be its cause. Immunization Review Committee shows no effects of such kind from its reports.

Research by American Academy of Pediatrics, 2008, also shows that vaccines contain antigens to protect children from various diseases vaccinated for. It is very vital for parents to keep on relying on immunization to protect their children from any illness that might strike on them later. Most of these diseases if children are not immunized from it can lead to adverse effects and probably irreversible conditions in the future. Some of these diseases include brain damage, blindness and some are even fatal. Other threats to children include chickenpox, meningitis among others and this shows the importance of preventing them. For instance, currently in the United States of America, 20 percent of individuals in hospitals are infected with measles related diseases yet if they were not vaccinated it is estimated that there would be almost 2.7 million cases of deaths related to measles in the world. The diseases that children are mostly vaccinated against are infectious and therefore failure to do so will not only affect the country but will easily reach out to the neighboring countries. Research also reveals that in order to be safe an estimation of 85 to 95 percent of the population has to be immunized failure to which peoples’ lives will be at steak. Delay in vaccination leads to a child’s vulnerability to various diseases therefore parents should follow the guidelines put in place by CDC and other medical bodies.

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