Claim: Increasing numbers of vaccines are associated with increasing rates of autism.
Verdict: REFUTES

Retrieved passages:
title: Epidemiology of autism
text: increased. These include certain foods, infectious disease, pesticides. There is overwhelming scientific evidence against the MMR hypothesis and no convincing evidence for the thiomersal (or Thimerosal) hypothesis, so these types of risk factors have to be ruled out. Although it is unknown whether autism's frequency has increased, any such increase would suggest directing more attention and funding toward changing environmental factors instead of continuing to focus on genetics. The prevalence of autism in Africa is unknown. The rate of autism diagnoses in Canada was 1 in 450 in 2003. However, preliminary results of an epidemiological study conducted at Montreal Children's

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: Hospital in the 200–2004 school year found a prevalence rate of 0.68% (or 1 per 147). A 2001 review of the medical research conducted by the Public Health Agency of Canada concluded that there was no link between MMR vaccine and either inflammatory bowel disease or autism. The review noted, "An increase in cases of autism was noted by year of birth from 1979 to 1992; however, no incremental increase in cases was observed after the introduction of MMR vaccination." After the introduction of MMR, "A time trend analysis found no correlation between prevalence of MMR vaccination and the incidence

title: Max Wiznitzer
text: that the rise in autism rates is due not to a real increase in the disorder's prevalence, but rather due to broadening of the diagnostic criteria, decreasing age at diagnosis, and other non-environmental factors. He has also stated that autistic children often show improvement over time, saying, "Over 3 to 5 years, you see an improvement in communication skills." Wiznitzer also considers autism to have a strong genetic basis, arguing that autism is genetic in about 10 to 15 percent of cases, and is of the firm opinion that vaccines do not cause autism as postulated by Andrew Wakefield in

title: Thiomersal controversy
text: search for an explanation for the apparent rise in diagnoses, including considering possible environmental factors. The dramatic increase in reported cases of autism during the 1990s and early 2000s is largely attributable to changes in diagnostic practices, referral patterns, availability of services, age at diagnosis, and public awareness, and it is unknown whether autism's true prevalence increased during the period. Nevertheless, some parents believed that there was a growing "autism epidemic" and connected these three factors to conclude that the increase in number of vaccines, and specifically the mercury in thiomersal in those vaccines, was causing a dramatic increase in

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: and rates of autism are not increasing. Attention has been focused on whether the prevalence of autism is increasing with time. Earlier prevalence estimates were lower, centering at about 0.5 per 1,000 for autism during the 1960s and 1970s and about 1 per 1,000 in the 1980s, as opposed to today's 1–2 per 1000. The number of reported cases of autism increased dramatically in the 1990s and early 2000s, prompting investigations into several potential reasons: The reported increase is largely attributable to changes in diagnostic practices, referral patterns, availability of services, age at diagnosis, and public awareness. A widely cited

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: Israeli children with a diagnosis of ASD receiving disability benefits rose from zero in 1982–1984 to 190 per million in 2004. It was not known whether these figures reflected true increases or other factors such as changes in diagnostic measures. Studies of autism frequency have been particularly rare in the Middle East. One rough estimate is that the prevalence of autism in Saudi Arabia is 18 per 10,000, slightly higher than the 13 per 10,000 reported in developed countries. In 1992, thiomersal-containing vaccines were removed in Denmark. A study at Aarhus University indicated that the rates of autism had stabilized

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: non-response, suggesting that methodological factors explain large variances in prevalence rates in different studies. The incidence and changes in incidence with time are unclear in the United Kingdom. The reported autism incidence in the UK rose starting before the first introduction of the MMR vaccine in 1989. However, a perceived link between the two arising from the results of a fraudulent scientific study has caused considerable controversy, despite being subsequently disproved. A 2004 study found that the reported incidence of pervasive developmental disorders in a general practice research database in England and Wales grew steadily during 1988–2001 from 0.11 to

title: MMR vaccine controversy
text: and 2001, which had concluded, "ADEM can be caused by natural measles, mumps, and rubella infections, as well as by measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines." In other cases, attorneys did not claim that vaccines caused autism; they sought compensation for encephalopathy, encephalitis, or seizure disorders. The number of reported cases of autism increased dramatically in the 1990s and early 2000s. This increase is largely attributable to changes in diagnostic practices; it is not known how much, if any, growth came from real changes in autism's prevalence, and no causal connection to the MMR vaccine has been demonstrated. In 2004, a

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: population of about 300,000 reported a cumulative incidence to age 7 years of 48 cases of ASD per 10,000 children in 1989, and 86 in 1990. After the vaccination rate of the triple MMR vaccine dropped to near zero and was replaced with MR and M vaccine, the incidence rate grew to 97 and 161 cases per 10,000 children born in 1993 and 1994, respectively, indicating that the combined MMR vaccine did not cause autism. A 2004 Japanese autism association reported that about 360.000 people have typical kanner type autism. A 2009 study reported that the annual incidence rate of

title: Folk epidemiology of autism
text: that the MMR vaccine causes autism led to a sharp drop in rates of vaccination in the UK and Ireland after 1998, creating a major public health risk. Lower vaccination rates were followed by increases in the incidence of measles and mumps, and the resulting cases of permanent disability and death. Public fears about vaccination have consumed resources that might otherwise have advanced research into the real causes of autism. There have been thirteen studies that properly followed the scientific method and contained large numbers of participants that failed to connect autism to the MMR vaccine. There have been seven

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: rose 7- to 8-fold from the early 1990s to 2007, and that changes in diagnostic criteria, inclusion of milder cases, and earlier age of diagnosis probably explain only a 4.25-fold increase; the study did not quantify the effects of wider awareness of autism, increased funding, and expanding treatment options resulting in parents' greater motivation to seek services. Another 2009 California study found that the reported increases are unlikely to be explained by changes in how qualifying condition codes for autism were recorded. Several environmental risk factors have been proposed to support the hypothesis that the actual frequency of autism has

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: 2002 pilot study concluded that the observed increase in autism in California cannot be explained by changes in diagnostic criteria, but a 2006 analysis found that special education data poorly measured prevalence because so many cases were undiagnosed, and that the 1994–2003 U.S. increase was associated with declines in other diagnostic categories, indicating that diagnostic substitution had occurred. A 2007 study that modeled autism incidence found that broadened diagnostic criteria, diagnosis at a younger age, and improved efficiency of case ascertainment, can produce an increase in the frequency of autism ranging up to 29-fold depending on the frequency measure, suggesting

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: as childhood vaccines, are controversial and the vaccine hypotheses lack any convincing scientific evidence. Andrew Wakefield published a small study in 1998 in the United Kingdom suggesting a causal link between autism and the trivalent MMR vaccine. After data included in the report was shown to be deliberately falsified, the paper was retracted, and Wakefield's medical license revoked. Although incidence rates measure autism risk directly, most epidemiological studies report other frequency measures, typically point or period prevalence, or sometimes cumulative incidence. Attention is focused mostly on whether prevalence is increasing with time. Epidemiology defines several measures of the frequency of

title: Folk epidemiology of autism
text: even when their original sources of information are shown to be wrong. The scientific consensus is the MMR vaccine has no link to the development of autism, and that the vaccine's benefits greatly outweigh its risks. Folk beliefs that the MMR vaccine causes autism led to a sharp drop in rates of vaccination in the UK and Ireland after 1998 and corresponding increases in the incidence of vaccine-preventable childhood illnesses, disability, and death. In 1998 Andrew Wakefield published a fraudulent article in a "The Lancet", a prominent British medical journal, claiming that the MMR vaccines caused autism. Although the article

title: Controversies in autism
text: author was found to be on the payroll of litigants against vaccine manufacturers. Most recent reviews of epidemiology estimate a prevalence of one to two cases per 1,000 people for autism, and about six per 1,000 for ASD; because of inadequate data, these numbers may underestimate the true prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). ASD averages a 4.3:1 male-to-female ratio. The number of children on the autism spectrum has increased dramatically since the 1980s, at least partly due to changes in diagnostic practice; it is unclear whether prevalence has actually increased; and as-yet-unidentified environmental risk factors cannot be ruled out.

title: Autism spectrum
text: that autism results from brain damage caused either by (1) the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine itself, or by (2) thimerosal, a vaccine preservative. No convincing scientific evidence supports these claims, and further evidence continues to refute them, including the observation that the rate of autism continues to climb despite elimination of thimerosal from routine childhood vaccines. A 2014 meta-analysis examined ten major studies on autism and vaccines involving 1.25 million children worldwide; it concluded that neither the MMR vaccine, which has never contained thimerosal, nor the vaccine components thimerosal or mercury, lead to the development of ASDs. In general,

title: Epidemiology of autism
text: and may be in decline after the removal of thiomersal from all vaccines. One co-author of the study stated "the incidence and prevalence are still decreasing in 2001". In 2003 Pediatrics magazine claimed that same study indicated that the cumulative incidence of autism in Denmark was stable until 1990, but then began to increase after the removal of thiomersal containing vaccines in 1992. The other doctor (Dr. Poul Thorsen) involved in the study omitted the 2001 data indicating dropping rates of autism. Thorsen was later charged with fraud and embezzlement while working with Aarhus University. France made autism the national

title: Vaccine controversies
text: decades, improvements in vaccine design have reduced the immunologic load from vaccines; the total number of immunological components in the 14 vaccines administered to US children in 2009 is less than 10% of what it was in the 7 vaccines given in 1980. A study published in 2013 found no correlation between autism and the antigen number in the vaccines the children were administered up to the age of two. Of the 1,008 children in the study, one quarter of those diagnosed with autism were born between 1994 and 1999, when the routine vaccine schedule could contain more than 3,000

title: Autism
text: smoking, illicit drugs, vaccines, and prenatal stress. Some such as the MMR vaccine have been completely disproven. Parents may first become aware of autistic symptoms in their child around the time of a routine vaccination. This has led to unsupported theories blaming vaccine "overload", a vaccine preservative, or the MMR vaccine for causing autism. The latter theory was supported by a litigation-funded study that has since been shown to have been "an elaborate fraud". Although these theories lack convincing scientific evidence and are biologically implausible, parental concern about a potential vaccine link with autism has led to lower rates of

title: Thiomersal
text: autism as well as increasing number of vaccines in the childhood vaccination schedule—as indicating that the preservative was the cause of autism. The scientific consensus is that there is no good evidence supporting these claims, and the rate of autism continues to climb despite elimination of thiomersal from routine childhood vaccines. Major scientific and medical bodies such as the Institute of Medicine and World Health Organization, as well as governmental agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration and the CDC reject any role for thiomersal in autism or other neurodevelopmental disorders. This controversy has caused harm due to parents