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Could vaccines cause disease in susceptible individuals?

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September 1999

Could vaccines cause disease in susceptible individuals?'

By Allan Sison from the Medical Tribune News Service

In a new report, Dr. Harold Buttram, a practicing physician in Quakertown, Pa., questioned whether the recent rise in incidence of autism and neurobehavioral disorders in children could be caused by the combination measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine that is routinely given at age 18 months.

In a past study of autistic children, researchers found that 84 percent of the children had antibodies against a certain type of brain tissue,
indicating that the immune system was destroying brain cells. The researchers also found the brain tissue antibody to be very similar to the antibody that's formed against the MMR vaccine.

Additionally, MMR antibody was found in 59 percent of the autistic children compared to 10
percent in normal children.

Buttram also noted that some experts believe that certain childhood illnesses including measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox are a
necessary and helpful step in strengthening the immune system. Because the vaccines are given by injection, the immune response of the mucous
membranes, through which these diseases enter the body, is not challenged and strengthened. Those who support this theory attribute the
use of vaccines to the great increase in cases of asthma and eczema, both of which are diseases of the mucous membranes.

"It is true that there may be situations where extreme measures may be justified, as the lesser of two evils, to preserve life and health," Buttram wrote. "The basic question, therefore, is whether the benefits of current childhood vaccines outweigh the harm, or whether the reverse is true."

The report is published in the March/April issue of the Medical Sentinel.

"A small but growing minority of physicians and scientists are becoming aware that safety testing for the various vaccines has been woefully
inadequate," Buttram wrote. He cited a 1994 National Academy of Sciences review of the safety of the hepatitis B vaccine. The review was done to investigate five possible adverse effects of the vaccine.However, conclusions could not be made about four of the effects due to a lack of enough research.

"There are no data on the triple vaccines," added Bernard Rimland, founder and director of the Autism Research Institute in San Diego, Calif.

The incidence of autism in California increased 273 percent from 1987 to 1998.

When the institute opened in 1967, Rimland noticed that a number of parents had mentioned that the diptheria, pertussin and tetanus (DPT)
vaccine seemed to have an adverse effect on their children. "In the late '70s and early '80s, we began hearing the same thing about MMR," he said.

Rimland pointed out that triple vaccines can put additional stress on the body. A person's immune system usually deals with one virus at a time. Combining the individual measles, mumps and rubella vaccines into one vaccine results in a much more dangerous vaccine, he said.

Rimland noted that doctors can report adverse effects of vaccines through the Vaccine Adverse Effect Reporting System (VAERS), which is
mandated by the Food and Drug Administration. However, the VAERS is a voluntary program. According to the FDA, between 90 and 99 percent of adverse effects resulting from vaccination go unreported.

"The physician has been taught repeatedly that these vaccines are perfectly safe and that any event that is supposedly associated with them is just a coincidence," Rimland remarked. He also cited possible malpractice suits, added paperwork and the lack of a penalty as reasons why doctors do not report these occurrences.

Buttram was quick to point out that measles and other diseases may result in complications that cause brain injury. Therefore, physicians and government officials may be choosing between the lesser of two evils. "When arbitrary decisions in the mandating of vaccines are made by government bureaucracies, which frequently work hand-in-glove with the pharmaceutical industry, with no recourse open to parents, we have all the potential ingredients for a tragedy of historic proportions,"
Buttram concluded.

Source: Medical Sentinel (2000;5:49-52)