Childhood vaccines cause autism.
A persistent claim, originating from a 1998 Lancet paper that has since been retracted, asserts that the MMR vaccine and other childhood immunizations are linked to autism spectrum disorder.
The evidence
The original 1998 study by Andrew Wakefield was retracted by The Lancet in 2010 after an investigation found the data had been falsified and the research was conducted unethically. Wakefield was struck off the UK medical register.
In the years since, dozens of large-scale studies covering millions of children across multiple countries have found no link between vaccines and autism. A landmark 2019 Danish study of more than 650,000 children found no increased risk of autism in vaccinated children.
The scientific consensus, supported by the WHO, CDC, and every major medical organization, is unambiguous: vaccines do not cause autism.
By the numbers
A non-exhaustive count of major peer-reviewed studies by year of publication.
Sources
- Measles, Mumps, Rubella Vaccination and Autism: A Nationwide Cohort Study — Annals of Internal Medicine
“MMR vaccination does not increase the risk for autism, does not trigger autism in susceptible children, and is not associated with clustering of autism cases after vaccination.”
- Retraction—Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia — The Lancet