Vaccination Editorial in the Washington Post

[Guest guest]

This one makes me and probably a lot of people here furious!

Sharon Howell

Baton Rouge, LA

http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/opinion/A23560-2001May14.h

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Endangering Public Health

Monday, May 14, 2001; Page A20

VACCINATION AGAINST deadly childhood diseases needs to be

near-universal and widely accepted, or it will cease to be truly

protective. Such wide acceptance is threatened by hearings

being held on vaccine safety by Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.). Mr.

Burton has asserted, based on no reliable scientific evidence,

that vaccines are harming some children. He has said that he

believes his grandson, who is autistic, developed that condition

as a result of receiving a routine childhood immunization for

measles, mumps and rubella. That vaccine has eliminated

untold suffering, but the idea that it can trigger autism has taken

hold among a small number of parents, who proselytize

energetically against vaccinating.

If there were any credible evidence of a risk, one could not blame

parents for fearing to vaccinate or Mr. Burton for using his

position to highlight the risk. But repeated large-scale studies

have failed to find any link between the vaccine and autism. Most

recently, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of

Sciences, at Mr. Burton's request, reviewed previous findings,

and its panel found no grounds for changing the vaccination

schedule, although it urged continued monitoring of that and

other vaccine safety questions. Now Mr. Burton wants the

National Institutes of Health to study the issue again.

Autism, a tragic neurological disorder that can render children

unable to communicate or relate normally to others, appears to

be on the rise. A small percentage of cases is attributed to

genetics or to prenatal damage, but most cases are

unexplained. Symptoms generally surface at about the age

childhood immunizations are given. But the autism rate has not

grown in tandem with immunization rates, and it is rising in

places where rates of immunizations are holding steady.

Despite this, the link hypothesis has developed a sturdy life,

especially on the Internet, to the point at which public health

authorities fear holes could open in the immunization safety net.

In Britain, where the vaccine hypothesis has had more press,

experts are seeing a slight but worrying erosion in vaccination

rates.

A loss of confidence in vaccines would be catastrophic for a

society that has almost forgotten the horror of the many

infectious diseases they have nearly eradicated -- not just

mumps, measles and rubella, but polio, diphtheria, whooping

cough and others. Responsible government oversight of vaccine

safety is essential; these hearings don't fit in that category.

© 2001 The Washington Post Company