There has been some friendly dialogue and healthy debate on Facebook recently regarding the very contentious

issue of childhood vaccines; focused mostly on the safety of vaccines. Childhood vaccinations can easily become a very divisive issue which has the potential to damage relationships as each side (pro and anti vax) dig their heals in and become ever more convinced of the veracity of their position (and the patent falsehood of the other position). My personal opinion on childhood vaccinations is that parents need to do their own research and that this research needs to be based on a variety of sources:

1. What public health officials tell us, as well as the medical profession (established guidelines, information on government websites, information from your GP or Pediatrician) 2. Published research in scientific journals that sheds light upon issues of vaccine safety and efficacy 3. Anecdote and personal experience of family, friends as well as from social media

Combining these three sources, an intelligent individual is able to reach some reasonable conclusion about how to proceed on the issue. Three choices face parents based on their research:

1. All vaccines listed on the schedule have a high level of safety and efficacy. All the vaccines target illnesses that are potentially life-threatening/disabling and could not be adequately treated with other means. The vaccine schedule, as set out by public health authorities (e.g. NSW Health), is the one to follow as is (no changes). 2. Some of the vaccines on the schedule have questionable safety and/or efficacy or the diseases they target are low prevalence and/or not life threatening or a child has such a low risk of contracting the disease, that the risks of vaccines adverse effects outweigh the benefits, that they can be reasonably excluded from my childs schedule of shots. Parent proceeds with an alternative schedule, in cooperation with their doctor, omitting certain shots (e.g. MMR, Heb B) and/or changing the spacing of when the shots are given (e.g. avoiding multiple shots in one doctor visit spacing them out more to reduce the chances of and to monitor for adverse effects) 3. The entire schedule is not suitable for my child and the vaccines, as a whole, are probably unsafe and the risk of adverse effects is too high. Parents in this camp may have already had a vaccine injured child or have a history of

autoimmune disorders in their family (read on to see the burgeoning scientific literature on the causal link between certain vaccines and autoimmunity).

What I aim to demonstrate here is not that vaccines are dangerous and should be totally avoided. Rather, I aim to demonstrate that there is more than sufficient scientific evidence to move many parents well away from position number one (total acceptance of what public health authorities state, following the vaccines schedule as is, and a move toward positions two or three). Unfortunately, and this is based on my personal experience, most parents who are entrenched in position number one have honestly not taken the time to access and read the group 2 evidence (published science), and largely rely upon evidences groups 1 and 3 (what public health authorities tell them and anecdote). This creates an atmosphere where healthy debate is exceedingly difficult. Let me now take you through just some of the published science, that I believe would tip any reasonable individual, toward position 2 or 3. I will set out my argument according to the following headings, and back each one with published data. 1. Historical is it true that vaccines were a decisive factor in the eradication or reducing the prevalence of some of our worst communicable diseases? Historical evidence compiled in the recently published book, Dissolving Illusions Disease, Vaccines, and the Forgotten History, by Suzanne Humphries MD, provides compelling evidence that much of what vaccines are credited for doing was actually the result of better hygiene, sanitation and accurate medical diagnosis. The book is filled with documented evidence, fully referenced with archival data. Here is just one example from Dr Humphries meticulously researched book.

Dont be scared away by this busy graph. Each colour represent the death rate for a particular disease. The point illustrated is quite straightforward. For each of these diseases, the death rate had already greatly reduced before the vaccine for the disease was introduced. The measles vaccines, introduced in 1968/1969, came well after the mortality rates from measles had plummeted. You can clearly see that for all these diseases, you had massive mortality rates in the 1800s which then greatly reduces well before each of the vaccines were introduced. If you read Humphries book, you will be shocked at the level of poor hygiene, poor sanitation and people living in filth at this time in Britain as well as America. With no proper sanitation, people living in slums, no access to fresh food, any disease would overwhelm such a weakened immune system. Bottom line mortality rates had significantly dropped well before vaccines were introduced.

2. Documented lack of efficacy of vaccines and lack of long-term protection outbreaks occur in populations with high vaccination rates (as opposed to media scares about measles and whooping cough, that convince parents unvaccinated children are to blame). Scientific references documented outbreaks of disease in populations with very high rates of vaccination for the disease. California whooping cough epidemic in 2010 most children who got the whooping cough were completely vaccinated, as were the adolescents. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22819634 Measles outbreak in highly vaccinated high school population 99% were vaccinated and 95% had antibodies to measles after vaccination http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3821823 And another measles outbreak in a school with 92% vaccination rate almost half the cases of measles were in students who had received two doses of the measles vaccine http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2012/05/23/cid.cis445.full And another http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17609829 And another http://www.jpeds.com/article/S0022-3476(05)80726-7/abstract And another showing vaccines do not confer long-lasting immunity http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8118532 And another, this time in a population who had received THREE doses of the whooping cough vaccine We conclude that pertussis remains a significant health problem in Nova Scotia, despite nearly universal
vaccination

http://www.jpeds.com/article/S0022-3476(89)80643-2/abstract And anothermeasles outbreak in population with 99% vaccination coverageIncomplete vaccination coverage is not a valid explanation for the Quebec City measles outbreak. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1884314

3. Vaccine adjuvants (usually aluminium) can be neurotoxic to the developing brain and have a documented link to triggering autoimmune disorders, including lupus, arthritis and Type 1 diabetes. The Hepatitis B vaccine seems to crop up often in the literature as a documented causal link and this is the vaccine that is first given to all newborns. Links to each study are provided below the title of the study. Aluminium Vaccine adjuvants: Are they Safe? http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ben/cmc/2011/00000018/00000017/art00011
Aluminum is an experimentally demonstrated neurotoxin and the most commonly used vaccine adjuvant. Despite almost 90 years of widespread use of aluminum adjuvants, medical science's understanding about their mechanisms of action is still remarkably poor. There is also a concerning scarcity of data on toxicology and pharmacokinetics of these compounds. In spite of this, the notion that aluminum in vaccines is safe appears to be widely accepted. Experimental research, however, clearly shows that aluminum adjuvants have a potential to induce serious immunological disorders in humans. In particular, aluminum in adjuvant form carries a risk for autoimmunity, longterm brain inflammation and associated neurological complications and may thus have profound and widespread adverse health consequences. In our opinion, the possibility that vaccine benefits may have been overrated and the risk of potential adverse effects underestimated, has not been rigorously evaluated in the medical and scientific community. We hope that the present paper will provide a framework for a much needed and long overdue assessment of this highly contentious medical issue.

Hepatitis B vaccine induces apoptotic death in Hepa1-6 cells http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22249285

Vaccines can have adverse side-effects, and these are predominantly associated with the inclusion of chemical additives such as aluminum hydroxide adjuvant We conclude that exposure of Hepa1-6 cells to a low dose of adjuvanted hepatitis B vaccine leads to loss of mitochondrial integrity, apoptosis induction, and cell death

Vaccinations may induce diabetes-related autoantibodies in one-year-old children. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14679101 The spectrum of ASIA: Autoimmune (Auto-inflammatory) Syndrome induced by Adjuvants http://lup.sagepub.com/content/21/2/118.short Autoimmunity following Hepatitis B vaccine as part of the spectrum of Autoimmune (Auto-inflammatory) Syndrome induced by Adjuvants (ASIA): analysis of 93 cases http://lup.sagepub.com/content/21/2/146.short Rubella Vaccine causal link to chronic joint disease http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/art.1780390913/abstract
The Program and the US Court of Federal Claims have accepted a causal relationship between currently used rubella vaccine in the US and some chronic arthropathy with an onset between 1 week and 6 weeks after vaccine administration.

Hep B vaccine and increased risk of multiple sclerosis

http://www.neurology.org/content/63/5/838.short
These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that immunization with the recombinant hepatitis B vaccine is associated with an increased risk of MS, and challenge the idea that the relation between hepatitis B vaccination and risk of MS is well understood.

Mechanisms of aluminum adjuvant toxicity and autoimmunity in pediatric populations. (Published in the journal Lupus in 2012) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22235057
In summary, research evidence shows that increasing concerns about current vaccination practices may indeed be warranted. Because children may be most at risk of vaccine-induced complications, a rigorous evaluation of the vaccine-related adverse health impacts in the pediatric population is urgently needed.

A case-control study of serious autoimmune adverse events following hepatitis B immunization. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16206512 Aluminum in the central nervous system (CNS): toxicity in humans and animals, vaccine adjuvants, and autoimmunity. Published in Immunological Research, 2013. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23609067
We have examined the neurotoxicity of aluminum in humans and animals under various conditions, following different routes of administration, and provide an overview of the various associated disease states. The literature demonstrates clearly negative impacts of aluminum on the nervous system across the age span. In adults, aluminum exposure can lead to apparently age-related neurological deficits resembling Alzheimer's and has been linked to this disease and to the Guamanian variant, ALS-PDC. Similar outcomes have been found in animal models. In addition, injection of aluminum adjuvants in an attempt to model Gulf War syndrome and associated neurological deficits leads to an ALS phenotype in young male mice. In young children, a highly significant correlation exists between the number of pediatric aluminum-adjuvanted vaccines administered and the rate of autism spectrum disorders. Many of the features of aluminum-induced neurotoxicity may arise, in part, from autoimmune reactions, as part of the ASIA syndrome.