In 2012, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released a comprehensive evidence review entitled “Adverse Effects of Vaccines: Evidence and Causality”.
They looked at 8 different vaccines and 76 different adverse events. One of these adverse events was autism.
- For 1 vaccine (MMR), the IOM favored rejection of a causal relationship.
- For 1 vaccine (DTaP), the IOM declared the evidence inadequate to accept or reject a causal relationship.
- For the other 6 vaccines in the review, the IOM did not look for any evidence regarding a causal relationship.
Clearly then, the correct conclusion of this evidence is NOT that “vaccines do not cause autism”. There is not enough evidence to make that conclusion.
Even if a causal relationship between MMR and autism is rejected, it does not follow that “vaccine do not cause autism” because MMR is only one of 8 or more vaccines, and the evidence is inadequate to accept or reject a causal relationship for them. There have also been no studies looking for associations between cumulative vaccinations, or different timings, or different combinations of vaccines, and autism.
The CDC cites this IOM report for its claim that “vaccines do not cause autism” and yet this report does not support this claim.