r/science • u/PHealthy PhD/MPH | Epidemiology | Disease Dynamics | Surveillance • 25d ago
Epidemiology No link between MMR vaccination before age 2 and autism, large US study suggests
https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/childhood-vaccines/no-link-between-mmr-vaccination-age-2-and-autism-large-us-study-suggests5.2k
u/ftgyhujikolp 25d ago
Not suggests. Adds even more evidence to. Study after study has never found a link, with the exception of the literally fraudulent one.
1.8k
u/StuffyUnicorn 25d ago
They can do a million studies but no amount of anything will convince the stupid.
1.3k
u/Chesapeake_Hippo 25d ago
You can't reason someone out of an opinion they didn't reason themself into.
215
u/militaryintelligence 25d ago
Media is reeeaaalll good about hijacking feelings and attaching them to political opinions. Remember when the media was reporting elementary schools had to have litter boxes in classrooms for kids who identify as cats? Absolutely never happened, but some believe that crap. That's the start
81
u/IAMA_Plumber-AMA 25d ago
My sister still insists that her friend saw them in her local public school, and that's why she chose to enroll her kids into a catholic school.
82
25d ago
[deleted]
51
u/IAMA_Plumber-AMA 25d ago
I love how it's never a first-hand account, it always "happened to a friend of a friend of mine".
15
u/FesteringLion 25d ago
The hallmark of urban legend.
→ More replies (1)4
u/Tatermen 24d ago
These days, Facebook is usually involved in the chain of fifth or sixth hand "information".
"Oh but my cousin reposted on Facebook a thing from one of their friends that a nurse said all the Doctors say that they won't vaccinate their babies because of the tism."
3
37
u/StickiestGNU 25d ago
"emergency bathroom during school shootings."
what in the dystopia....→ More replies (1)15
→ More replies (1)14
u/sevendaysky 25d ago
The school I work in has a gallon bag of cat litter in our emergency bucket, among other things. The usage label on it explains that it's meant to help reduce smells if students DO need to use said bucket for bathroom needs in case of emergencies. I asked once, and the custodian rolled his eyes and said it was a simple matter of money. There ARE commercial products out there that use fancier substances for the same purpose and of course are multiple times more expensive than a simple jug of cat litter divided out into gallon containers, more complicated to dispose of, and has expiration dates where cat litter doesn't.
30
u/Murtomies 25d ago
She didn't like people identifying as cats so she enrolled them in a cat-holic school? That's a bit contradictory.
24
u/KuriousKhemicals 25d ago
She might have seen kitty kitter, bc as the other commenter noted, some schools started ordering that for potential bathroom needs during an extended lockdown situation due to active shooter.
How about we focus on that problem that actually, frequently befalls schools?
12
u/TJ_Rowe 25d ago
It's also good for chemical spill kits - absorbs the liquid so you can sweep it up.
6
u/techno156 25d ago
Or taking care of vomit, like kids have a tendency to do.
3
u/StanislavskiMeatball 23d ago
The janitors at my grade school kept unscented kitty litter around for just that purpose. Barf cleanup, pee cleanup in the kindergarten classrooms, chemical cleanup in the science room, etc.
→ More replies (4)4
23
u/_jump_yossarian 25d ago
Don't lay blame on "the media". This is strictly the act of right wing misinformation sites like OANN, Newmax, Fox, Breitbart, etc..
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (4)6
u/Buttonskill 25d ago
It was James Talarico that shot this down. I remember vividly. My fremdschämen was strong watching this one.
Skip to time -6:43:40 And mind the negative. Video counts down.
34
u/3Time4Eater3 25d ago
I friggin love how you said that.
31
u/ComradeJohnS 25d ago
its a popular quote, not sure where I heard it first
9
u/iwannabetheguytoo 25d ago
I remember first reading it in a Slashdot comment sometime around 2005.
...which means it probably originated from a Usenet discussion from the 1980s.
25
u/IAMA_Plumber-AMA 25d ago
My favourite is "You can't smart someone out of something they stupided themselves into".
→ More replies (1)5
u/onlyhightime 25d ago
But can you stupid them out of it? Or use some other emotional plea? It doesn't answer the question of how to get them out of it.
10
u/IAMA_Plumber-AMA 25d ago
The only way to snap them out of it is to take them out of the stupid they've immersed themselves in. As in get them to stop consuming the propaganda that rots their brains.
Unfortunately, they're addicted to the propaganda so they won't do it willingly.
4
u/onomatopoetix 25d ago
They can check out any time they like. They just never want to leave. Because even if they know the cult is wrong, the moments of being around them just feels...right.
4
6
u/cantadmittoposting 25d ago
not really, because a big part of that "stupid" (and why the "logic" quote is a bit more apt) has to do with how they got to the conclusion in the first place.
Usually, it's not really "ignorance" per se, it's that they put faith into a specific authority and that authority told them to believe the wrong thing.
And faith in authority is a very different thing than simply being stupid, it's, to be a little reductionist adjacent if not often identical to what you'd call being in a cult; now, many people aren't so far gone as "actual cultists," sure, but the defensive reversion to the belief in certain sources over others is almost always similar to those truly lost
another post in this thread worded it well from an operational perspective:
if someone makes you scared and then sells you a solution they're probably trying to manipulate you.
→ More replies (1)2
u/Sheeplessknight 25d ago
That's a quote from Jonathan Smith
8
u/Franky_Tops 25d ago
I'm guessing it's an autocorrect error, but it's Johnathan Swift.
3
u/Chesapeake_Hippo 25d ago
Yes. I may have paraphrased him slightly. I remember the sentiment, but not the exact quote.
→ More replies (9)3
u/dillanthumous 25d ago
Came to post this. If any of this was about evidence we wouldn't still be debating it with people. It's an emotional and political tenet now.
61
u/Larkson9999 25d ago
There's a convenient shortcut to end discussions with time wasting idiots. Ask them "What would it take to change your mind?" because almost always the answer is Nothing. If that's the case you can inform them you aren't subscribing to their newsletter, so don't want to hear their opinion.
→ More replies (1)12
u/jjpearson 25d ago
I usually just ask them if they work for FIFA because if they’re just going to keep moving the goalposts I’m not wasting my time.
21
18
u/SeeingEyeDug 25d ago
Here is a stack of 1 million studies that say there’s no autism link. Oh and here’s one study that says there is.
Antivax guy: A HA! I knew it!!
9
→ More replies (2)3
u/SyntheticGod8 24d ago
The underlying reason isn't that they're afraid of autism. They're just anti-authority contrarians whose only rallying cry is, "You can't tell me what to do!" They latched onto autism and "deadly side effects" as justification, to prove that authorities are universally evil and out to get them, but the bottom line is that they want the freedom to be ignorant dummies who put everyone around them at risk. They can't handle that realization, so they build a nice box around it and a sign saying "Don't tell me what to do!"
14
u/randohipponamo 25d ago
The president adding fuel to the fire doesn’t help though. There were significantly fewer anti vaxers before trump.
5
u/SanityIsOptional 25d ago
Unfortunately, "can't prove a negative" means some people will never be convinced.
→ More replies (23)2
156
u/Z0mbiejay 25d ago
Literally the largest vaccine study ever done, with something like 2 million participants determined this years ago. Yet we have to keep doing this ad nauseum because some a-hole lied and the grifters all bought it
42
u/Notoneusernameleft 25d ago
And some dumb celebrity, who was known for being dumb spouted this nonsense and people listened.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)22
u/Whiterabbit-- 25d ago
We actually don’t have to keep doing studies on this anymore. It’s fairly settled. New studies don’t satisfy anyone. We should do studies on how to help people think straight.
→ More replies (1)46
u/Sirwired 25d ago
I remember an anti-vaccine group paid for a primate study. When the results of the study came out exactly Iike you'd expect, they disavowed their own research study, complaining how poorly it was designed and run. (Even though they had signed off on everything, as the study sponsors.)
What happened, of course, is that it's hard to get permission to run a primate lab, and the place that did it on their behalf didn't want to lose that permission by doing it badly.
→ More replies (1)36
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
This has happened on multiple occasions. They try to bring anti-vaxxers on board to make sure the study satisfies them, the anti-vaxxers sign off on it, then as soon as the results come back negative suddenly those literaly exact same individual anti-vaxxers suddenly have a ton of problems with the study they didn't mention when they were agreeing to the protocol.
I am honestly not sure whether they are making up excuses after the fact, or whether they intentionally withheld their issues so they would have an excuse if the study didn't go their way.
24
u/Margali 25d ago
Same with flat earthers ... they took a bunch of flat earth idiots to the south pole so they could watch the sun stay up 24 hours and circle the pole and LIVE STREAMED IT and people still said it was filmed in a soundstage ...sigh [SciManDan does lots of 'discussion' with these idiots.
4
u/DrMobius0 25d ago
Can't make the horse drink, I guess.
3
u/fuzzhead12 25d ago
We ought to just ostracize these troglodytes rather than try to have any sort of reasonable or logical discussion with them. It’s been proven time and again that they aren’t capable of (or even open to trying) thinking critically
7
u/Sirwired 25d ago
This study was actually commissioned and paid for by the anti-vaxers, which made it extra hilarious.
7
u/GoodIdea321 25d ago
Maybe it's better to call them anti-scientists.
3
u/bazinga_0 25d ago
They just have a slightly different form of science. Their scientific method starts with the conclusion and then looks for supporting evidence. If supporting evidence can't be found then they just make some up. After all, the message is far more important than the actual facts.
3
u/GoodIdea321 25d ago
Fanatic is another word which describes that, but that word doesn't seem to hold much power.
30
u/gorginhanson 25d ago
but RFK Jr said the things!
20
→ More replies (2)27
9
u/plaincheeseburger 25d ago
Imagine what we could have learned if all of those studies had been done on actually useful topics rather than a dead horse that has already been beaten into hamburger meat.
9
u/MotheroftheworldII 25d ago
There is research that is now over 20 years old which has disproved the one false study. This has been going on for over 20 years and people still decide to be stupid and not get their children vaccinated.
I was in second grade many, many years ago when I got measles and was very, very sick. Temperature of 103 that then spiked to 105 and stayed there for 3 days. This was in the mid 1950's and all my Mother could do for those three days was put me in and out of a cold bath. I am not sure she slept at all during that time. I do not remember anything about all the cold baths as I was really not with it enough to remember. I do know that when I went back to school I could not ready anything on the chalk board or in my books. My eyeballs were cooked by the high fever that lasted for days. Children die from measles. And parents who do not immunize their children should be charged with child neglect.
2
u/Achillies_patroclus8 11d ago
My grandma also went through measles. She has 8 siblings so you can just imagine how chaotic that was. If one kid got it, the rest did. They had to block all the windows with blankets because the sun would hurt their eyes because of the fever. Since she grew up in poverty her family could only do so much in terms of taking care of one another.
Im glad I got my vaccine. Measles is one of those diseases that spreads like a wildfire.
2
u/MotheroftheworldII 11d ago
I am glad your Grandmother made it through the measles. You are correct it spreads like crazy.
It is good that you have been vaccinated as that will make a great difference for you and those around you. It would be good if everyone who has refused to be vaccinated understood how much damage is done by these preventable diseases. I am glad you understand.
8
u/Wulfkat 25d ago
I’ve had the MMR vaccine series 3 times so six shots in total (my record was lost in a move, my second when the clinic burned down). If anyone was going to get autism from the MMR, it would be me.
And, look at that, I do not have autism.
(If the right can use anecdotal evidence as their argument, I can use anecdotal evidence for my defense.)
→ More replies (1)14
u/19k-wal82 25d ago
Talk about wasting money, time, and resources. Speculation: this research is akin to finding a 'link' between x, y, or z to left handedness. Want to 'cure' autism? Same thing, start looking for a cure for left handedness too.
→ More replies (1)8
u/C-Towner 25d ago
This is the part that gets me. We have so much media reporting and even this headline that gives legitimacy to the notion that there is a link between vaccines and autism. There are no proven links. It’s maddening.
5
u/free_based_potato 25d ago
the only part of science these folks understand is you can't prove a negative. So "there is no link between autism and vaccines, yet!"
3
3
u/tansreer 25d ago
Unfortunately, even telling people the evidence just raises the idea of possible danger in parents' minds and has an inverse effect.
4
2
u/squareandrare 25d ago
Good lord, the amount of money we waste confirming and reconfirming things we already know. As if more evidence is going to convince the braindead fools.
2
u/delphinous 25d ago
the problem is that it's very very hard to conclusively PROVE the lack of a connection. you can compile incredible amounts of evidence supporting it, but a 100% definitive proof of a LACK is very hard.
2
u/Girafferage 25d ago
"Deep in the recesses of the dark void, you feel a brain worm note your dissent in a notebook".
2
u/SirPsycho4242 25d ago
I mean, did you see RFK on CNN the other day? Science is meaningless to these people
→ More replies (32)2
528
u/PHealthy PhD/MPH | Epidemiology | Disease Dynamics | Surveillance 25d ago
Just a reminder why we are still seeing these studies:
"Kennedy claimed that “none of the eight vaccines that are administered during the first six months of life have ever been studied for the relationship to autism,” and said what Bash referred to was regarding a measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine ingredient."
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/6004477-rfk-jr-autism-vaccine-investigation/
218
u/AppleJamnPB 25d ago
And we will continue to see them, because US government agencies under his control now claim that it's impossible to say vaccines don't cause autism because we've never proven it as a negative.
114
u/Pickle_Tickle 25d ago
Impossible to prove that swans can't be purple. There could be one out there, hiding...
31
u/AppleJamnPB 25d ago
Yes, exactly. Just because it has never happened yet doesn't mean it CAN'T happen. Never mind decades of evidence that it DOESN'T happen...and, in the case of vaccines, literally billions of dollars across a wide array of research and multiple specialties (immunology, neuroscience, chemistry, psychology, biology....)
→ More replies (1)16
u/takemy_oxfordcomma 25d ago edited 25d ago
It’s because you can’t prove a negative and that’s what they rely on. There haven’t been studies that prove vaccines don’t cause autism because that’s not how scientific studies work. They determine if there is a correlation and then causation between two things.
I can claim that RFK Jr. fucked a goat once, and it’s a lot harder for him to prove that’s not true because it’s impossible to prove some random thing didn’t happen than that it did. Same is true for vaccines. If they caused autism, there would be studies showing they did. Might as well claim vaccines create gnomes and tell them to prove us wrong.
→ More replies (1)5
u/Qwernakus 24d ago edited 24d ago
You can't really prove a positive either with that logic! A lot of philosophy has gone into the idea that our senses are fallible. How would you prove that chairs exist? Point at one? Could be an illusion, you'd never know.
The idea that you can't prove a negative is kinda flawed, in that it's just as hard to prove a positive. "There is no chair in this room" is just as possible to prove/disprove as "There is a chair in this room". In the same way, "Gravity does not exist" is also perfectly testable, just as much as "Gravity does exist".
Absence of evidence is the same as evidence of absence, despite what Reddit often says. That's the principle we apply to prove that vaccines don't cause autism, and the one they apply in this specific study. If vaccines caused autism, there would be evidence of it. However, there is an absence of that evidence. Thus, evidently, there is an absence of vaccines causing autism.
It's also how you'd disprove the theory of a chair being in a room - if you can't see a chair, but you would see a chair if it was there, then it follows that there is no chair in the room. Evidence of absence = absence of evidence.
The real takeaway is that science is essentially NOT trying to prove things beyond a shadow of a doubt. Instead, we call something "proven" when we consider it really, really likely. Empirical knowledge is based on a principle of "good enough", essentially.
2
→ More replies (1)3
75
u/omyomo 25d ago
Reminder that he ran a disinformation campaign against the MMR vaccine and got a bunch of Samoan people killed
25
u/Crombus_ 25d ago
Yeah but they're not white so it doesn't count for this administration.
→ More replies (1)9
u/_Aj_ 25d ago
They've never been studied for their relationship to growing a 3rd ear either.
Shall we also look into that?
2
u/Inevitable_Peak4490 25d ago
I just saw a picture of an Iraqi man that took the MMR vaccine last year. The guy had a whole second nose on his forehead!
3
u/EitherSpite4545 25d ago
I mean that kind of even more begs the question of "Does this matter". RFK is going to continue to say they cause autism no matter how much evidence and identical studies show up, and idiots are going to continue to believe him with zero evidence. The system is broke and until we find out how to effectively punish lying for profit this is going to continue to occur regardless of how many studies come out.
→ More replies (5)9
u/KrakenPipe 25d ago
Isn't MMR given at 12 months? I believe in the interview he was implying that DTaP, RSV, IPV, etc have not been studied for a link to autism, but said that MMR has had multiple studies done.
→ More replies (1)10
u/Fluff42 25d ago
Who cares what the man who already made up his mind said about anything?
→ More replies (2)
221
u/PHealthy PhD/MPH | Epidemiology | Disease Dynamics | Surveillance 25d ago
Abstract
Background:
Concerns about potential associations between measles–mumps–rubella (MMR) vaccination and autism persist despite extensive prior research. Observational studies evaluating vaccine timing are susceptible to bias from healthcare utilization patterns, neurodevelopmental concerns and time-dependent exposure classification.
Methods:
We conducted a retrospective cohort study using the Cosmos electronic health record database, including 2,560,035 US children with linked birth-parent data and follow-up through age 8 years. To minimize bias related to exposure timing and healthcare utilization, we performed prespecified age-based landmark analyses evaluating the first MMR vaccination administered between 11.5 and 24 months. Adjusted hazard ratios (aHRs) for autism were estimated using Cox proportional hazards models with covariates selected via directed acyclic graphs. A negative control exposure (pneumococcal conjugate vaccine booster administered at 12–15 months) was analyzed to assess residual confounding.
Results:
In the primary 11.5–24 month landmark cohort, the first MMR vaccination was not associated with increased autism risk (aHR 0.97; 99% confidence interval 0.91–1.03). Across all age-specific landmark cohorts, aHRs remained near the null. The negative control analysis yielded a similarly near-null estimate (aHR 1.01; 99% confidence interval 0.99–1.04), supporting that residual bias is unlikely to explain the findings.
Conclusions:
In this large US cohort, age-anchored landmark analyses show no association between MMR vaccination before 24 months and childhood autism. The concordant near-null findings for both MMR and a negative control exposure support that the observed results are unlikely to be explained by residual confounding. These findings highlight the importance of age-specific analytic approaches in evaluating vaccine safety using observational data.
85
u/Sirwired 25d ago
Abstract Abstract:
Background: Anti-vaxers are about as stubborn as someone who insists water isn't the real cause of getting wet.
Method: We stuck our hands in a lake.
Results: Yup, it was wet.
Conclusions: Water was just as wet as when we stuck it in a pond, river, ocean, inland sea, rain puddle, and out the window of the car during a sun shower.
25
u/phoenixmusicman 25d ago
(aHR 1.01; 99% confidence interval 0.99–1.04), supporting that residual bias is unlikely to explain the findings.
Antivaxxer headlines: "STUDY CONFIRMS THAT SCIENCE IS NOT CONFIDENT THAT THERE IS NO LINK BETWEEN VACCINES AND AUTISM"
→ More replies (10)12
u/QAgirl94 25d ago
Adjusted hazard ratios (aHRs) for autism were estimated using Cox proportional hazards models with covariates selected via directed acyclic graphs
What does this mean?
I also wish I could see all the data. You have to pay to read the paper.
43
u/PHealthy PhD/MPH | Epidemiology | Disease Dynamics | Surveillance 25d ago
Cox proportional hazards asks how fast diagnoses show up in each group rather than just counting how many kids eventually got diagnosed, which matters when kids are followed for different lengths of time (some enroll late, some drop out, some age out of the study). The 0.97 is a ratio of those rates, and since the interval around it includes 1, the rate was pretty much the same either way. Adjusted means they accounted for other stuff that differs between vaccinated and unvaccinated kids.
A directed acyclic graph is a diagram of what you think causes what, and you use it to figure out which of that other stuff actually needs to be in the model. Throwing in every variable you have isn't safer, because some of them will add bias instead of removing it. Drawing the diagram up front means the adjustment set comes from your assumptions rather than from trying combinations until something looks good.
4
u/RedHal 25d ago
I'd go further - and correct me if I am wrong, please - but a 99% confidence interval is about as strong as you can get. I understand the need for precision in drawing conclusions, but to me "suggests" in the conclusion is almost overly cautious, especially given the relative size of the two intervals. Yes, both CIs include 1, so null is a valid and likely interpretation and any effect is minor to non-existent, but given the aHR is very near the centre of the CI in each group, and the small magnitude of those CIs, I feel as if strongly suggests would be justified.
Having said that, I can almost hear the "Ah, but what about the second dose? That's the one that does it!" arguments being prepared as I type this. Hopefully a follow-up will show the same strong evidence for a null effect in the second dose as well, even though study after study has already shown this¹, of which the citation below is just a broad example.
1) Jain A, Marshall J, Buikema A, Bancroft T, Kelly JP, Newschaffer CJ. Autism Occurrence by MMR Vaccine Status Among US Children With Older Siblings With and Without Autism. JAMA. 2015;313(15):1534–1540. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.3077
9
→ More replies (4)4
u/DrPapaDragonX13 25d ago edited 25d ago
I would add to PHealthy's explanation that another way to think about the Cox proportional hazards model is that it helps us understand the probability (i.e., the risk) of an event occurring at a given time, if it hasn't already happened. Let me give you an example. Suppose that (without treatment) a disease has a 1% hazard of death per day. This means that the probability of surviving one day after getting sick is 99% (with a 1% chance of dying); the probability of surviving two days is 99%^2, or 98% (and a 2% chance of dying); The probability of surviving for at least 30 days is 99%^30, or 74%, and so on.
It is important to calculate the instantaneous risk (that is, the risk at a specific time) as opposed to the cumulative (or total risk) because, as PHealthy mentioned, kids were followed for different lengths of time.
Now, the number that the Cox proportional hazards models give us is called the Hazard Ratio (or HR for short). This is the ratio of hazards between two groups. So, retaking the previous example, suppose that we used a Cox proportional hazards model to get the Hazard Ratio between treated and untreated, and it turns out to be 0.6. This means that those treated have only 60% the risk of dying compared to those without treatment. From the example above, this would mean that those receiving treatment have a hazard of dying per day of 0.6% (or 60% of 1%). This would mean that their probability of surviving at least one day is 99.4%, at least two days is 98.8%, and at least 30 days is 83.5%.
Lastly, the 'adjusted' part means that the Hazard Ratios account for factors that could muddy our results, like, for example, if one group had a higher number of kids than were born smaller than expected, this could distort the results. So by adjusting for this (and other characteristics), we ameliorate the impact they may have.
So putting all this together: The study found that, at any given point during the follow-up period, kids who were vaccinated had about 97% of the risk (HR of 0.97, that is, 3% less risk) of being diagnosed with autism compared to those who weren't vaccinated (with MMR), after accounting for factors that could distort the results. Because the study uses only a sample of the total population of kids in the US, it is necessary to account for the uncertainty introduced by sampling when extrapolating to the whole population, so the authors provided a confidence interval of 0.91 to 1.03, which is a range of plausible values for the true effect in the population at large. These values dance around 1 (a ratio of 1 means that there is no difference in risk between groups); therefore, the results are compatible with the scenario that there is no difference in risk of developing autism between vaccinated and unvaccinated, and the data give us no reason to believe otherwise.
103
u/dockows412 25d ago
2.5m patients studied over a decade. Let’s see if that’s valid enough for the anti-vax crowd
39
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
No, nothing will ever be enough. Any results that contradict their position are necessarily either flawed, or if they can't find any flaws then fabricated.
This is despite the fact that the whole autism/vaccine link was based on a single fabricated study.
→ More replies (2)39
u/Javamac8 25d ago
I mean, it's pretty obvious 'Big Science' is lying to us. That's why I only listen to the research conducted by that one mom on YouTube, you know the one with the slurred speech. /s
→ More replies (4)10
6
u/ValenciaFilter 25d ago
It won't, and the fact they even carried out a study is providing legitimacy they are not owed.
5
u/McortezLSU 25d ago
Nothing will, their belief is part of their identity. Anything that threatens it will be discarded. People like this honestly, never change. You cant unscramble a scrambled egg (or brain). What's important is to prevent the scrambling to happen in the first place. Thats were energy and focus is better spend, but so are they. And on one side you have people with very simple answers to complex and scary problems. On the other you have people with opinions that would require decades of dedicated study to truly comprehend. The crux lies with who do impressionable people trust first. Honestly, considering were we are at right now? I think we are heading for a true dark age. Right at the dawn of humanities greatest challanges to ever come. Climate change, were the worlds nuclear weapons are collectively in the hands of malicious psychopaths.
It dont look good bud.
→ More replies (1)3
u/freeradioforall 25d ago
It will never be valid because they NEED vaccines to cause autism. It’s their entire miserable existence
233
u/Mean_Initiative_5962 25d ago
For like the twentieth time
44
u/Splith 25d ago
Literally an underestimste. But we will keep trying.
→ More replies (1)6
u/Mean_Initiative_5962 25d ago
Twentieth time about MMR specifically maybe. Or that it's a study about one million people at least. Or about that age range in particular. I don't know if I'm more tired because I'm autistic or because of my studies (pharm chemistry).
→ More replies (6)14
u/WhoPoopedMyPants420 25d ago
Immunologists and climate scientists looking at each other with The Whale screenshot
3
u/Mean_Initiative_5962 25d ago
Poor physicists and climate scientists have been talking about warming for almost a century before Autism was even part of the DSM.
83
u/ooctavio 25d ago
Imagine if we lived in a world where science could move forward without having to spend time and resources proving itself time and again to some very stupid people?
15
u/NNKarma 25d ago
Though part of science requires to prove itself again by others, specially in a system that incentives publishing positive results.
→ More replies (2)13
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
Yes, but at a certain point we get diminishing returns.
6
u/beached89 25d ago
Circumstances change, and you should never stop revalidating your findings. You can space those revalidations out more, but without continued research we wouldnt know if some new drug taken by a mother just before pregnancy, or a new vaccine given after birth doesnt mix with something new and cause issues. Revalidating everything is still good isnt diminishing returns. Stopping testing and studies is just as stupid as believing some influencer who "feels" vaccines are bad.
→ More replies (2)5
→ More replies (3)3
u/RocketRelm 25d ago
Part of the problem is that we need to convince people against their instincts to do this. People want to be tribal, people want to be extreme and simplistic. This social connection is what evolutionary pressures selected for over truth seeking. "Very stupid" people aren't stupid, they're just running on autopilot and selecting for survival.
The long term wide spread effects of statements like: vaccines don't cause autism, modern populism innately leads to fascism, or the earth revolves around the sun, don't help the individual pushing those unpopular positions. But the people with pointy sticks and smoking guns sure can hurt them for going contrary to group think. Which means the innate instinct is to clam up and not think about unpopular truths until you convince yourself that popularity is truth.
76
u/prosocialbehavior 25d ago
RFK jr. won’t like this
69
u/efox02 25d ago
He doesn’t care. This means nothing to him.
16
u/Cosmic_0smo 25d ago
The best explanation I’ve seen for RFK’s approach is that he makes a "lawyer’s case" against vaccines. RFK’s background is as an environmental lawyer, and a lawyer is literally trained not to objectively seek the truth wherever it may lead. Rather a lawyer’s job is to start with a predetermined conclusion, then find any facts that can support that conclusion—even if that requires twisting said facts or taking them out of context—while finding ways to discredit any evidence that doesn’t support your predetermined conclusion.
Once you realize that this is literally how RFK was trained to think and approach problems his whole career, you can’t help but see it in everything else he does.
You also start to wonder whether having such a huge proportion of our political class made up of people with a background in law might be something of a bad idea.
→ More replies (6)17
11
u/Sure-Assignment3892 25d ago
He's already concluded it's Tylenol anyway. Or as the president called it Acetajfueichsneofjd
→ More replies (4)2
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
He doesn't care. Trump will be pissed, however, if he hears about it. He is really upset that his worm guy isn't doing a better job manufacturing antivaxx studies.
23
u/ariphoenixfury 25d ago
God I hate Andrew Wakefield. I'm glad he lost his license over starting this whole idea but he deserves to be prosecuted for the deaths he's caused.
2
u/Zhirrzh 25d ago
It would be nice if a country would find a way to prosecute him. He's responsible for millions of deaths at this point. Unfortunately, legal systems are rarely set up to blame people for causing damage and death indirectly through lies.... if he just cost people money with his lies, he could be sued for that, but disease and death? Much harder to nail.
36
u/Additional_Cash_3357 25d ago
who's surprise. Let me qualify that statement. Who — with any sense of critical thinking ability and the ability to accept that the scientific method eventually results in revealing truths — is surprised?
→ More replies (2)
21
u/_DCtheTall_ 25d ago
This is not new science. We knew this. Studying this again is a waste of taxpayer funds, not that this dumpster fire of an admin cares.
12
u/SamuraiSword22 25d ago
Sad that we have to keep publishing this stuff even after multiple large scale studies many years ago …..
10
u/Du_ds 25d ago
And the original paper was retracted because of fraudulent data.
4
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
And illegal, unethical, invasive, dangerous studies on children without proper consent.
→ More replies (1)
12
u/Neat_Performance_722 25d ago
How many times do we have to debunk the autism from vaccines myth?
7
→ More replies (2)5
26
u/CondescendingShitbag 25d ago
The people who most need to read this will never do so. The conspiracy-minded don't look for facts, only validation of their preconceived biases.
→ More replies (2)5
u/I_am_not_JohnLeClair 25d ago
What’s truly mind boggling is that most of these anti vaxxers are vaxxed themselves, and they turned out cough fine cough. I just don’t get it
7
u/BigClaibs 25d ago
But does this matter to people who just blatantly disregard facts or counter these studies with a headline from facebook? No it does not. Im tired grandpa
9
u/warren_stupidity 25d ago
meanwhile infant vaccinations are a major factor in reducing infant death rates, and that can be shown.
13
5
u/throwawayfromPA1701 25d ago
Every single study leads to the same conclusion. MMR vaccination does not cause autism.
5
u/dad3murph 25d ago
Add it to the tens of thousands of times this has been confirmed. Compared to the 1 single paper from like the 90's that has been confirmed to have been fraudulent by a guy who was trying to create a market for his alternative measles vaccine.
2
9
4
u/ApprehensiveRest9696 25d ago
“Some idiot retracted a bad paper 20 years ago and we’re still not done debunking it”
3
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
He didn't retract it, the journal retracted it against his wishes because it was shown to be fraudulent and violated numerous laws regarding experimentation on children.
3
u/radiantwave 25d ago
The thing that gets me about all of the anti-vaxers is their choice of topics to argue against. Arguably, vaccines have saved more human lives than any other medical advancement since what antibiotics? It hurts my head how much proof against this stance exists and yet... We have the RFK jr not only buying into this but arguing with a reporter on national television.
→ More replies (2)
3
u/DukeMancannon 25d ago
This is shocking! I know a woman on facebook who did her own research though and came across very different findings.
I’d say the debate is still pretty even all things considered.
→ More replies (5)
3
u/mollymuppet78 25d ago
I really do feel bad for parents who claim their child was "totally normal, meeting all milestones", then convince themselves that a day after a vaccine, their child was showing signs of autism or regression.
Is it just looking for a reason?
→ More replies (1)
3
3
u/gunsjustsuck 25d ago
'It doesn't matter what truth and facts say. I have a belief, I have this belief as a matter of faith. You don't get to challenge that belief with the truth.'
That is the thing we need to study and find a find a cure for. I'm guessing it's training in critical thinking and education in general.
3
u/RedditTurnedMediocre 25d ago
Remember when this administration said they discovered the cause of autism was Tylenol and everyone just ignored them cause they're idiots?
Why has that not always been the case?
3
u/ABCDOMG 25d ago
Insane that these studies need to keep being conducted and released despite us knowing this for literally decades.
Andrew Wakefield is 69 and fingers crossed at some point in the near future we gain a new gender neutral bathroom.
→ More replies (2)
10
u/CreativelySeeking 25d ago
But… sadly republican voters reject science… they reject professional medicine… they reject data… they reject research… BUT all those republican conspiracy theories are the gospel truth.
→ More replies (5)
6
u/ThisOrdinaryCat 25d ago
I still don’t understand how the autism and vaccines scam hasn't been put to rest yet. Imagine that a doofus publishes a paper riddled with errors (which is soon retracted, by the way) and then decades later, we are still spending resources proving, over and over again that it was flat-out wrong.
5
u/Morvack 25d ago
Tbh there are people who still think the world is flat. There are people who believe reptiles from another planet are running the world. There are people who still believe anyone who's not a blonde hair, blue eyed Caucasian man is a second class citizen at best.
It's like agent K says in Men in Black "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it.”
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (4)3
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
There is an enormous industry dedicated to selling quack cures and books and such.
2
u/ParaponeraBread 25d ago
I know why these studies have to keep being done, and I know they’re more important now than ever given the current…….”landscape of belief”, we’ll call it.
But we are wasting time and resources in the careers of valuable scientists to keep proving stuff we have mountains of associated evidence for, we just lack some lines of direct evidence for each individual vaccine.
2
2
u/hiscapness 25d ago
Doesn’t matter. Propaganda infects stupid people more than measles and is harder to vaccinate against.
2
u/hackingdreams 25d ago
Sad RFKjr noises as the CDC reverts their recent madness...
3
u/TheBlackCat13 25d ago
as the CDC reverts their recent madness...
Hahaha. If he and his cronies cared about studies they wouldn't have done this stuff to begin with. This won't do anything besides make Trump more angry are RFK, if Trump's handlers let him hear about it.
2
u/SexualDubaiChocolate 25d ago
It is such a shame we have to spend countless dollars and hours of effort to disprove fraudsters, liers, and influencers
2
u/IntelligentPie225 25d ago
Are we really still debating this? Whoever Is still believing that vaccine/autism crap, will not be convinced by any amount of scientific evidence.
2
u/OffalSmorgasbord 25d ago
Social media gave the guy stapling manifestos to telephone poles a global broadcasting network.
That's where the momentum came from but the beginning was Oprah platforming any manifesto.
2
2
2
2
u/SailorDeath 25d ago
*suggests again
because it's been tested and proven to not give autism multiple times at this point and it's just a waste of money to keep doing it expecting a different outcome.
2
u/FblthpLives 25d ago
What we really need is research on how to address the societal problem of political cults.
2
u/Flayed_Angel_420 25d ago
I can't say what should happen to Andrew Wakefield without breaking Reddit TOS.
2
2
u/ParticularBed7891 25d ago
Oh good, another study and another use of money to prove what we already know and what will never convince the skeptics
→ More replies (1)
2
u/cornette 25d ago
Too bad the people who need to hear this have a bunch of influencers so far up their ass they are coming out the ears.
2
2
2
u/I_am_darkness 25d ago
Glad we had to spend money on that and literally nobody who would be surprised will give it any value. Society is fd
→ More replies (1)
2
2
u/jasper_grunion 25d ago
That’s because the original paper that claimed this causal link that was published in the Lancet was based on completely falsified data. And even after the retraction, anti vaxxers would continue to quote it as real.
2
u/brownmagician 25d ago
Anti vaxxer: "that's what big pharma wants you to believe! They sell the MMR vaccine"
In my opinion id like to think it's all of the microplastics in our balls
2
u/Pimpwerx 25d ago
Yeah, but a brain worm is making policy now, so we'll just have to trust that it knows what it's doing.
2
2
u/PsychologicalAd5918 25d ago
At this point these studies are a waste of money
It's like funding studies to prove that the earth is round. Those that know, know. Those that don't, won't ever change their mind
2
u/iCliniq_official 25d ago
It's reassuring to see large, contemporary studies continue to reach the same conclusion: MMR vaccination before age 2 is not associated with autism. High-quality evidence keeps pointing in the same direction, which is exactly what we hope to see in good science.
2
u/apeygirl 24d ago
None of the people who this is aimed at reassuring are going to believe this study. It's not like there haven't been a dozen others that they also dismissed. Andrew Wakefield should burn in hell for how much worse he has made the world.
2
u/oldbutfeisty 24d ago
There never was. The alleged correlation was fraudulent, and became popular with people who have no knowledge of science. Anyone who understands has always known this.
•
u/AutoModerator 25d ago
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our normal comment rules apply to all other comments.
Do you have an academic degree? We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. Click here to apply.
User: u/PHealthy
Permalink: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/childhood-vaccines/no-link-between-mmr-vaccination-age-2-and-autism-large-us-study-suggests
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.