15 Mar – A recently published study that assessed the effectiveness and adverse effects associated with the MMR vaccine in children up to 15 years of age has found that the design and safety reporting of MMR vaccine studies is “largely inadequate” and that the adverse events following MMR vaccine immunization “cannot be separated from its role in preventing the target diseases.” 

The exhaustive study, conducted by researchers Vittorio Demicheli, Alessandro Rivetti, Maria Grazia Debalini and Carlo Di Pietrantonj, used the results from five randomized controlled trials (RCTs), one controlled clinical trial (CCT), 27 cohort studies, 17 case-control studies, five time-series trials, one case cross-over trial, two ecological studies and six self-controlled case series studies that involved nearly 15 million children. 

Although the researchers concluded that they could not assess a “significant association between MMR immunization and… autism, asthma, leukemia, hay fever, type 1 diabetes, gait disturbance, Crohn’s disease, demyelinating diseases, or bacterial or viral infections,” it was unclear whether the inadequacies of previous studies had more to do with their inability to find connections than whether they actually exist. 

Unfortunately, drug companies have been reluctant to approve such studies.