When the anti-vaccination movement began to boom in the early 2000's, many people were corrupted into believing the MMR vaccine caused autism. As the years pressed on and the research for this belief was debunked, I never thought that I would be subjected to hearing my peers — students in universities of higher learning — spouting that vaccines cause autism. Families across the United States are not vaccinating their children, and even celebrities have endorsed this idea that if you get your child vaccinated, they are at risk for autism. If you are someone who believes this, I beg you to continue reading as I will present several facts that I hope will change your mind.

Have you heard of Andrew Wakefield? He was a gastroenterologist who published a paper in 1998 claiming that the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine causes autism. Up until this point, there had been no major standing causes of autism. People around the world clung to this idea, and thus the "anti-vax" movement began. However, doctors and scientists quickly realized that there were many issues involving Wakefield's study.

First, Wakefield did not use any control group in his studies, and therefore no determination could be made if autism was a coincidence or actually caused by the vaccine. Second, Wakefield claimed that the vaccine caused children to have gastrointestinal problems which led to certain compounds entering the bloodstream and eventually affecting the brain, resulting in autism (please read this study for a more detailed explanation).

However, these symptoms did not predate autism in several of the children (not to mention only 8 children were tested for his study). Third, a recent study has found that the MMR vaccines do not cause these gastrointestinal problems that Wakefield claims is the root cause of autism. Finally, many studies have concluded that although there has been an increase in the diagnosis of autism overtime, there has been no increase in that rate since the implementation of the MMR vaccine in 1989.

The evidence was so overwhelming against him that in 2010, the study was retracted by the paper it was was published in. If all this wasn't evidence enough, Wakefield even admitted to fabricating details of the study!

Still, many people and groups stand by this attack on vaccinations, and it is causing deaths across the United States. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, there have been over 9000 deaths in the U.S. alone resulting from illnesses that could have been prevented by vaccines.

It is important to understand that not getting your child vaccinated does not only put your child at risk, but many others. Even if a child is vaccinated, if an unvaccinated child contracts the disease, they can still affect vaccinated children around them. This is why vaccinations only work when everyone receives them, and can be a serious risk if even one child does not.

If you are someone who believes in this anti-vaccination movement, I urge you to please do more research on vaccines and get your children vaccinated. If you are someone who does get their children vaccinated, don't let the false information in the "anti-vax" movement propagate by informing as many people as you can to the truth. Let's put an end to the myth that vaccines cause autism, once and for all.