The measles vaccines have been some of the most scrutinized vaccines concerning safety and adverse events in recent years.
Now a 12-year study of two types of measles-containing vaccines, published Monday in Pediatrics, found that seven main adverse outcomes were unlikely after either vaccine, while confirming that both vaccine formulations are associated with fever and febrile seizure 7 to 10 days after vaccination in one-year-old children.
The study, conducted by the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center, included children aged 12 to 23 months from January 2000 through June 2012 who received measles-mumps-rubella-varicella (MMRV) or separately administered, same-day measles-mumps-rubella and varicella (MMR + V) vaccines. A total of 123,200 MMRV doses and 584,987 MMR + V doses were evaluated.
Comparing MMRV with MMR + V, no increased risk of seven main neurological, blood or immune system disorders (immune thrombocytopenia purpura, anaphylaxis, ataxia, arthritis, meningitis/encephalitis, acute disseminated encephalomyelitis, and Kawasaki disease) was detected. No new safety concerns were identified after either vaccine, and most outcomes studied were unlikely after either vaccine.
“This study did not identify any new safety concerns comparing MMRV with MMR + V or after either the MMRV or the MMR + V vaccine,” said lead author Nicola P. Klein, MD, PhD, co-director of the Vaccine Study Center. “In fact, there were few or zero events for several outcomes following vaccination. These findings indicate that even if an increased risk for these outcomes exists, the risk is low and rare. This should reassure parents that these outcomes are unlikely after either vaccine.”
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The study alsoconfirmed the findings from previous studies that MMRV and MMR + V are associated with fever and febrile seizure 7 to 10 days after vaccination among 1 year old children, and that MMRV versus MMR + V is associated with an increased risk of seizures during that interval. While febrile seizures are the most common neurologic adverse events following immunization with measles-containing vaccines, the risk is small — less than one febrile seizure per 1,000 injections. Other previous studies have not found any increased risk for fever or febrile seizures following either vaccine among 4-6 year old children.
“This level of safety monitoring for vaccines can give the public confidence that vaccine surveillance is ongoing and that if a safety problem existed, it would be detected,” said Klein. “Our findings offer reassurance that adverse outcomes of measles-containing vaccines are extremely rare and unlikely, and that parents of one-year-old children can choose MMR + V instead of MMRV vaccines to reduce the low risk of fever and febrile seizures.”
Anti-vaccine website pushes the limits of absurdity suggesting vaccine-homosexuality link
what a joke! this study is comparing mmrv vs. mmr+v this is not proving safety it is just saying that neither is appreciably safer than the other. now had they compared both of these to a saline injection it might be considered a true safety study..if both are unsafe then we can’t call it safety study.
Comparing MMRV vs MMR+V vs Saline wouldnt give us any new information about the safety of MMRV. The same (minimal) dangers would show up in both studies… comparing those dangers to saline wouldnt tell us anything new.
What you are suggesting is a study which compares the dangers of one thing to a completely unrelated thing. Thats like having a study where we look at people who drive every day and what dangers come out and compare that to a group who dont drive at all… of course the driving group will have more dangers because there are inherent dangers in driving. The conclusion would be that you are 100% more likely to get in a car accident if you are driving than if you never drove at all… cool story.
Under your tests, doing anything that has some (no matter how minimal) dangers is worse than doing nothing which is stupid. Sure, the vaccines may have higher incidences of febrile seizures but doing nothing would show that significantly more of them contracted measles or Varicella… although there are risks involved with vax, those risks are minimal compared to the risks of no vax. Also not to mention… these studies have already been done. Many times.
A bunch of kids have died from poisoned apples. Now I’m going to do a safety study and compare kids who are given poisoned apples vs. poisoned pears. Oh- look at that! The same amount of kids who died from eating the poisoned apples died from eating the poisoned pears! That is to say – NO MORE kids died from eating the apples than they did the pears. Poisoned pears and poisoned apples are COMPLETELY different, therefore, poisoned apples are completely safe! Not only can you eat them – you’re a bad person if you don’t eat them! You should have your kids taken away!
That is the basic logic of this study.
That is the proof you greedy, profiteering jerks are holding up to parents like me and telling me to put our trust in so we’ll poison our kids. I’ve got news – it isn’t working.
Right…. except that part of the anti-vaxxer argument is that giving several vaccines at one time increases the risk for complications including autism.
This compared a multi-vaccine to giving the vaccines individually and showed no difference. Thus, the anti-vaxxer theory that combined vaccinations is more dangerous has been shown to not be true. The study concludes that combo-vaccines (at least MMRV) are no more dangerous than individual vaccines.
Im guessing you’ve never read a scientific article in your life…
The stupidity of Bitchplease and Dawns comment makes me cringe. On the other hand, this is evolution at work. Thanks for being part of the solution.
(Though, I’m sorry for your kids.)