Guest Post: Whyser

You know, I wish provaxxers looked critically at their own studies that they believe to prove their own point.

For example, the idea that vaccines are not associated to [insert your favorite adverse reaction here], is currently not strongly supported by any of available science that I’ve seen.

Let’s take the most popular one of all, that ‘vaccines are not associated to autism’.

If you were to try to support that with studies, you’ll likely be linking study after study that shows:

• MMR is not associated to autism
• Thimerosal is not associated to autism

Like this one: “Vaccines are not associated with autism: An evidence-based meta-analysis of case-control and cohort studies”, by Luke E. Taylor, published 2014]

Here’s the problem with those studies in terms of design: you’re comparing a vaccinated population vs. a vaccinated population, but using the MMR as a variable.

As an exaggeration, let’s assume the following vaccination histories of the case and control group:

Case Group
Hep B x 3
DTaP x 4
Hib x 3
Pneumococcal x 3
Polio x 3
Influenza x 1
Varicella x 1
Hep A x 1
MMR x 1

Control Group
Hep B x 3
DTaP x 4
Hib x 3
Pneumococcal x 3
Polio x 3
Influenza x 1
Varicella x 1
Hep A x 1

The only difference being that the case group has been vaccinated for MMR and the control group has not.

When you find that the autism rate between both groups is statistically insignificant, you then conclude that MMR is not associated to autism.

Fair enough, so as long as the PROPER CONTEXT of this conclusion is established, that is, if you’re going to be vaccinating anyways, then the MMR isn’t going to pose any more significant risk.

But for the life of me, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND how people use these studies designed in this manner to conclude that VACCINES are not associated to autism.

You want to attack Exley and Shaw, fine. But if you’re going to do that, you should be just as upset with the multitude of studies that don’t even come CLOSE to answering the question, are vaccines (as a whole) associated to [adverse reaction]?

The vast majority of vaccine safety science is designed similarly to this, so to say that you have science on your side when there are no real studies to support that conclusion shows to me who really believes in pseudoscience.

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Here is the 2014 meta-analysis: “Vaccines are not associated with autism: An evidence-based meta-analysis of case-control and cohort studies”.

The header image is from that study. This study is supposed to reassure parents. It’s supposed to be the nail in the coffin–‘no stone unturned’, vaccines have been exhaustively and objectively investigated for a relationship to vaccines. And lo and behold, it proves over and over that we have simply failed to do the research.

Here are the tables of studies included in that study that they use to “prove” that “vaccines” do not cause autism. Yet, each and every study only ever looks at MMR or Thimerosal (Hg). How can that be used to explain that ALL VACCINES or ANY VACCINES do not contribute to autism? It doesn’t.

OK, so someone, please tell me how we can draw any conclusions about ALL VACCINES, or ANY vaccines, when we are only looking at ONE vaccine or one ingredient (thimerosal)?

Here’s another study: “Vaccines and Autism: Evidence Does Not Support a Causal Association”  by CDC epidemiologist Frank DeStefano.

The title of the paper uses the word “vaccines”, however the paper only investigates the MMR vaccine and thimerosal, the mercury containing preservative that was used in some vaccines. The conclusion specifically says:

The current scientific evidence does not support a causal association between MMR vaccine or TCVs and autism.

Notice how he doesn’t conclude…”all vaccines,” because it’s literally never been studied.

Vaccine studies routinely lack zero exposed control groups