Anti-vaxxers will have to find a new excuse to put people in danger of contracting vintage diseases because a new, huge scientific study has officially debunked the connection between autism and the MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccine. Again. Even for children who are deemed to be at a higher risk for having autism, there is nothing connecting it with the MMR vaccine. Definitively. So, everyone can knock it the hell off and vaccinate their children.
This study looked into the insurance claims of nearly 96,000 children from 2001 to 2012 to see if there was a connection between kids getting vaccinated and then developing symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Not only that, but the study included data on the older siblings of those children in case there was a possibility of a genetic predisposition towards ASD. Two percent of the children studied had older siblings with ASD, and the study says that the younger children may or may not develop ASD themselves, but it had nothing to do with them getting vaccinated. So, there’s a big “nope.”
In fact, of the kids who were considered to be at a high risk for developing ASD, 8.6 percent of kids who weren’t vaccinated developed ASD, while 3.8 percent of high-risk children who were vaccinated developed it. If you’re keeping track, a higher percentage of un-vaccinated kids developed ASD.
As for the kids who weren’t at a higher risk, 0.7 percent of un-vaccinated kids developed ASD; 0.5 percent of vaccinated kids (who received two doses of the MMR vaccine) developed ASD. Again: more un-vaccinated kids than vaccinated kids developed ASD. Only slightly, but these numbers were enough for the researchers to say that it doesn’t make a difference whether kids are vaccinated or not. The lead author of the study, Dr. Anjali Jain said, “We don’t know what [causes ASD] unfortunately, but it’s not the MMR vaccine.”
So, vaccinate your freaking kids.
Source: Business Insider