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AAP Will Look for MMR/Autism
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To try to learn if the recommended childhood vaccination for
measles, mumps, and rubella causes autism in some children,
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has made a
one-year, $450,000 grant to the American Academy of Pediatrics
(AAP) to determine if measles vaccine strain gene sequences
are present in the intestinal tissues of children with autism
spectrum disorder and in the intestines of non-autistic
control children. The CDC noted that the potential role of the
MMR vaccine as a cause of autism "has divided segments of the
medical, scientific and public communities and threatens to
adversely effect the MMR immunization program in the United
States as it has in the United Kingdom and Ireland, where the
MMR immunization rates have dropped sharply from above 95
percent to just over 70 percent" as the result of two
published papers alleging a connection. The AAP research is
expected to involve organizations in the U.S. that feel
strongly there either is or is not a link between MMR and
autism, as well as major universities and medical groups in
this country and Ireland. Announcement of the grant appeared
in the Federal Register October 11.
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