IOM panel to focus on safety of vaccines

The task is to explore concerns like the alleged link between the MMR vaccine and autism to maintain public confidence in immunization policies.

By Stephanie Stapleton, amednews staff. March 26, 2001.

Washington -- Many parents of children with autism tell a similar story. Sometimes hours, sometimes days after receiving the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, the child experienced violent symptoms -- a startling illness, a serious rash, a high fever. Then the previously developmentally typical child began regressing.

This association has caught the attention of many parent-advocates, as well as some clinicians and researchers. To them, it offers a possible explanation for the sudden onset of this mysterious developmental disorder. However, the hard science backing it up has yet to emerge. Moreover, many public health experts worry that the concern will accelerate an erosion of confidence regarding immunization and lead to a society vulnerable to diseases that have now been battled into submission.

In an effort to inform the debate, the Institute of Medicine held the first in a series of meetings of its Immunization Safety Review panel March 8. The panel is charged with exploring the existing body of science related to this possible causal link and focusing on the gaps of information that must be filled before concrete findings and recommendations can be offered.

"I hope as clinicians and researchers that we don't get put into a position that by requesting investigation we are saying that the parent is wrong," said Kathryn Carbone, MD, chief of the laboratory of pediatric and respiratory viral diseases at the Food and Drug Administration's Vaccines Research and Review Office. "Clinical associations are very important. But associations can be harmful as well as helpful. They must be studied objectively." Dr. Carbone was a presenter at the March IOM meeting. [...]

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