To think that anti-vaxers may actually being onto something?

[viiz]

I don't have children myself yet but I don't know what I would chose when the time comes. Most of pro vax/anti vax threads turns nasty with people not even willing to try and look at things with others side perspective. Not willing to even consider points of view different than their own and that's a very silly approach. People believed a lot of things that turned out to be false over the years and centuries. Why not to doubt a little?

I was born in early '80s and not in UK. Myself, my siblings and friends were all vaccinated at the time. I don't even remember what I was vaccinated against but had to be pretty basic. Just a few jabs throughout my whole childhood/teen years and nothing 3in1 or 10in1 or whatever they'll bring next.

Now to the point. Reading through hundreds of threads it jumps at me how many children have neurological, behavioural or emotional disorders. No one else sees it really?? I don't know even one person from my childhood including friends, extended family , neighbours etc who would have ADS or ADHD or any other issues like that. I see their children to have it though.

AIBU to consider there could be a link here??

Please be gentle. I hope to have a discussion here. I don't disrespect anyone's views and I only ask to try and ask yourself 'what if'.

What about the possible link between vaccinations and severe food allergies? Not saying I believe there is one, but there is a study being conducted in Australia at the moment looking into it.

HoppingPavlova great post.
I am a similar age and I agree with HP's post but I do think there is something going on. I was born in 1963 and whilst I agree that a lot of kids would have been 'hidden', I still think the incidence of ADHD and other non NT behaviours are higher. It could be a combination of factors rather than one thing though.

Yes, YABU

A link has been looked for, no link has been found.

On the other hand, we are far more aware of and able to diagnose conditions in children that as recently as 30 years ago were put down to 'naughtyness' or 'bad parenting'.

It is also likely that those things start to become identifiable at around 3/4 years of age, which is also around the time children finish having the majority of their vaccinations.

No one, anywhere, ever, has said that vaccinations are 100% effective or 100% safe - but we do know what the risks are, they are well documented, and sufficiently low as to be considered worth it.

But lets just say, for the sake of argument, that there WAS evidence that vaccination was linked to autism.

Is autism worse than debilitating physical disability (polio) or death (polio and lots of other things)? I really don't think so.

Funnily enough now we are getting better at recognising autism and related disorders in children, we are also getting better at diagnosing them in adults... which kinda goes to show that it isn't new at all!

As far as conspiracies go, I have this Malthusian niggle that this anti-vaccine movement is designed to let a good old fashioned disease wipe out a few million. I mean if Spanish flu hasn’t wiped out 20million in 1919, our population and environmental crises would be so much worse. Between the success of industrial farming, the lack of a world war and the invention of the flu jab and other fixing of preventable diseases, we are getting really good at not dying.

• ps I don’t actually believe there is a conspiracy. But it’s an interesting thought re natural future population control...

Uhhhmm, yes. That’s why no one would ever claim them to be 100% safe for every individual. Just like no one claims it is 100% safe for every individual to cross a road, travel in a car, train, bus, plane etc.

Are you sure that nobody ever claims them to be 100% safe? As the OP says, plenty of people will instantly slap down anybody who even raises the question, call them stupid and insist that they're categorically wrong.

The terrorist in the cafe analogy is an interesting one, but I don't think you can use it as an equivalent as the cafe is just the chosen location for the terrorist to perpetrate evil and not the cause. If it hadn't been chosen, the act could still have been carried out in a shop/street/theatre/library or wherever.

IF there are any causes for doubting the infallibility of vaccines, then the case would be suggested against the vaccines themselves - there would be no suggestion of danger in entering the hospital or GP's surgery where they were administered without actually going on to have the vaccine.

I think we're getting better at recognising things, largely because of the internet.

One of my children show traits of autism and another adhd. Both happy children who are doing well and tbh it's only a few symptoms but they do impact their lives. If it weren't for the internet I wouldn't have readily come across the information to make me draw this conclusion (largely parenting forums have given me the initial wondering and then I've been able to research). It's too early to diagnose in both cases and they may not have it, but thanks to the internet I have ample information at my fingertips - resources, research and other people's experiences. If signs do point in that direction the internet will help guide me through it. If my children were born 30 years ago it never even would have occurred to me because they're both functioning and I would accept them as hard work at times or quirky. DD has dyspraxia - I think it was her teacher who said that once upon a time it would have been known as clumsiness. She's probably right. Our standards are much higher these days.

I've no issue with antivaxers, as long as long as they refuse any other medical help throughout their, and their childrens, lives.

If their happy to go to the doctors or hospital for any other issue then they're hypocritical bastards who don't deserve to have a family.

I never understood what anti-vaxers think the government gets out of widespread poisoning of its population? Why would the gov want to make people autistic and why do it in this hugely expensive way? It costs the nhs loads to do vaccinations (but less than caring for millions with diseases and the after effects).

They're*

The huge rise in children with DIAGNOSED ADHD, ASD and other disorders also corresponds with the way classrooms are set out.

Children used to sit in rows facing the teacher, walls were plain with the odd display. The days usually followed a set pattern with the same or similar things happening each day.

Then in the late 1980s classrooms changed, they became bright with displays on every wall, Children were put on tables in groups facing each other.

Children who would have gone to special schools were then moved into mainstream and then to top it off we forced primary children into uniforms.

Someone with high functioning ASD would have slipped under the radar in an old fashioned classroom.

Hi op, this is really interesting to me as it's been on my mind this last week, not that vaccines cause autism but the fact that there seem to be so many cases of it.

Let me explain my experience if I may.
I have 2 younger brothers. Between us we have 8 children.
I have 2, the oldest brother has 4 and the youngest brother has 2. 5 boys and 3 girls.
Of those 8 children, 4 are diagnosed with ASD ( 3 boys and 1 girl ) and of the remaining 4, 3 of them are likely to be on the spectrum ( 2 boys and 1 girl ) which to me suggests that there must be a genetic link somehow.

My ds is one of the boys who are diagnosed with ASD and my dd is one of the 3/4 who I suspect. Our family lives and breathes autism.
The children who have been diagnosed are in various places on the spectrum.
My ds is very high functioning but his 2 boy cousins are not.

Last week we had an appointment with ds's paediatrician at Alder Hey.
He is turning 16 soon and will likely be discharged from AH as it's a children's hospital and this doctor was new to us both.

After chatting for 10 minutes or so he asked me if I had a diagnosis myself! he had asked about dates re diagnosis and I could recall
lots of random dates and details. This alone doesn't suggest anything of course but when he started questioning myself and ds
further he suggested I speak to my GP.

I have long suspected that I too am on the spectrum and looking back from a young age it all makes sense. It just shocked me that this autism specialist clearly saw something in me so easily.

So I have never ever believed that vaccines cause autism and my ds was the only one in the family who was diagnosed for a long time, his cousins are much younger.

There are several older members of the family who would probably fit the criteria for a diagnosis too and it simply wasn't a thing back in the day.

I once remember one of ds's doctors saying ( paraphrasing here ) that if you look back
on your school days, there was probably
someone in every class who was that little
bit odd/quirky/insert other stereotype of autism and he's right in my experience.

I think it's crazy to even consider a child not having their vaccinations when you consider the alternatives. My ds is due to go to a very prestigious college this year after GCSE's, he is very bright, lives a full life and has a great future ahead of him.
Autism is not a death sentence.

There is no medical evidence of any link and lots of research has been done

I would query that. There has been no research comparing unvaccinated children to vaccinated children and there has been no research that I know of on vaccinating pregnant women.

*No one else sees it really??

...

AIBU to consider there could be a link here??

...

I only ask to try and ask yourself 'what if'.*

This is the crux of it. What makes you think your uneducated (in this field) and unscientific musings are in any way relevant or valuable?

I agree with ssash about the layout of classrooms. I also think that in life in general there is far busier with things such as screens making it harder to concentrate. This can be overwhelming for many children. When I was younger we were pretty much free to roam, this provided an outlet missing today.

Coyoacan due to ethical issues we can't do proper blind studies, however, studies are done regularly looking at outcomes between vaccinated and non vaccinated groups.

I do wonder how many anti vaxxers will retain their convictions when we have a full blown measles epidemic and children start dying in this country. Unfortunately it's now generally considered a matter of when and where rather than if we have an epidemic .

1982

AIBU to consider there could be a link here??

In a word... yes. I blame the increase in consumption of organic foods. CLEARLY there's a link there.

(Obviously I am not, please look up the many many examples of causation vs correlation)

Gosh, this was a hot-middle-of-night thread. Every other kid on MN seems to have something, true. I struggle to think of any kids IRL what have these conditions. Conclusion = MN community is not like real life. And people with ASD kids have a lot to talk about.

I know heaps (& heaps) of men age 55+ who have ASD or describe selves as on spectrum (& nobody thinks it's a daft joke). I quip that the rest of us have to fake ASD to fit in.

I work in universities, but my uncle recently deceased & his son now age 55 are among the pool of men I'm thinking about, too.

This is a fave.

HoppingPavlova My viewpoint is similar. I was born in 1960 and there was one girl in my class who looking back clearly had learning disabilities. She was just called a ‘mongy ‘ and was bullied horribly. So tragic. There were no other children in my neighbourhood with conditions such as Downs, cerebral palsy etc because they were in institutions and therefore not living in their community.

My oldest DB born in the 50s clearly had/has Aspergers and ADHD but as a child he was just labelled a very ‘naughty and strange’little boy. No one knew about ASD.

We are far better at picking up on conditions and any increases in their prevalence could be down to so many factors we haven’t yet identified and researched.

I'm not on either side right now. Im just concerned and afraid. Im at a stage in life when I'm trying to have a baby and I want to make right choices for that future child.

I was trying to be careful enough to not say that vaccinations cause autism because this is too simplified. I'm just saying that something might be causing a lot of issues in our children (not just autism) and I'm suspicious of vaccines. Of course it makes sense that there will be more contributing factors that just vaccines.

Pharmaceutical companies are powerful enough to make public believe in what is the most profitable to them. They are powerful enough to discredit whatever is not.

It all started for me when I came across an interview with prof. Maria Dorota Majewska who in 2006 received a grant from EU to research role of vaccinations in neurological disorders. The interview is in Polish but I'll try to translate few of the most important or interesting points. I hope to find something in English later.
Between 1975 and 2012 in USA at least 10 new vaccines were added to vaccination calendar for newborns. In 1975 1 in 500 children were diagnosed with autism and in 2012 1 in 50 (1 in 30 in boys). 100x more! (We could say a lot of children went undiagnosed before but 100x is massive!).
Researchers claim that autism does not occur in non vaccinated communities and use Amish as an example. ( I don't know anyone coming from Amish or any other community of this sort but maybe someone here have some experience?)
'Herd immunity' theory from XX century is incorrect in claiming that vaccinations are the reason for eliminating diseases. Apparently numbers were dropping since the beginning of the century thanks to better hygiene and lifestyle, clean water access, canalisation, better diet, education and antibiotics. (I can agree here that people's life's changed immensely in 100 years. We don't fully know the impact it had on diseases but it sounds very rational)
Statistics from countries with high vaccinating countries like USA (2-3 times more vaccinations than Germany, Holland for example) show that number of infant mortality is twice as high as in countries with low vac.
They conducted clinical research with use of thimerosal (preservative used in vaccines) in rat babies that caused a spectrum of different neurological anomalies in them and changed similar to autistic children. Apparently rats are much less affected by toxins that humans so damage to children would be much more severe.
She's a huge critic of pharmaceutical companies. Talks about not only lies and falsified research about vaccines but also other meds. I'm sure there is a lot of info about this online if we want to research.
She also mentions dr Andrew Wakefield ( I'm guessing it's his research that was discredit that everyone seems to know of). Apparently his publication caused people connecting vaccines with autism and pharmaceutical revenues started dropping. He lost his job, licence and had to live the country after his work got discredited. Now the interesting part. His colleague and coauthor of the publication prof J.A. Walker-Smith sued General Medical Council and won proving that all the evidence against his work was falsified to discredit the link between autism and vaccinations! (Does anyone know anything about it??)

That was long

@Montagu90 I get your point 😄

The thing I will never, ever understand about anti-vaxxers is why they would rather their children have deadly, contagious diseases that could put their child’s life at risk - along with the lives of other children, pregnant mums, the elderly, etc - than have a child with autism. The mind actually boggles!

My son had differences from birth.

I prefer my child to have autism than be dead. If you feel differently that is your choice.

My son has sn , back in the day he wouldn't have had an education and would have been known has backward / simple . I don't think there is a rose in autism just diagnosis , again there was always a 'weirdo ' at my school or two .
If a child has a genetic condition it's there from conception , I jab cannot change their dna .. !