Revisiting Excess Diagnoses of Illnesses and Conditions in Children Whose Parents Provided Informed Permission to Vaccinate Them

Abstract

Controversy over a reported increase in office visits specifically scheduled for illnesses and conditions in children has stalled progress in understanding adverse outcomes associated with an increasingly crowded schedule of pediatric vaccines. Studies finding associations between vaccines and adverse conditions have been targeted for retraction. Here, we revisit data from one such study, comparing the increase in office visits for conditions independent of the routine “well-child” visits (hereafter, Health Care Visits; HCVs). The retraction occurred after >1/4 of a million people had read the peer-reviewed study. It was targeted by one anonymous reader who complained he did not believe the published results. His complaint hinged on the supposition — unsupported by any data — that vaccinated children made their scheduled HCVs more regularly than unvaccinated, implying that those unkept appointments led to fewer diagnoses. We show, here, new data from the same practice that the opposite is true. When the data for vaccinated versus unvaccinated children are examined, the critic’s claim is exactly reversed. Relative Risk and Odds Ratios sustain and augment the original report. Additional office visits, beyond scheduled HCVs, are quantified, controlling for variation in kept HCVs and age/days of care. Estimates of Health Care Incidence (HCI) show that visits above regular HCVs increase due to vaccination by 2.56 to 4.98 additional office visits for vaccine-related health issues per unit increase in vaccination per year. Blocking and multiple linear regression analysis of interactions indicate both that the unvaccinated are keeping scheduled HCVs more often than the vaccinated, and that vaccination comes with a net increase in non-routine office visits, i.e., not “well-baby visits” but trips to the doctor for reasons other than vaccination. Taking account of the complexities of healthcare-seeking with measured covariates and outcomes, especially adverse health events, suggests that vaccination may be driving the increased need for non-routine office visits for specific health complaints. Meanwhile, one reader’s unsupported and false criticism of the former study, reflects a pervasive bias leading to systematic removal of many well-designed studies attributing adverse outcomes to vaccines. Hiding such well-designed and faithfully reported, not to mention peer-reviewed and published research, clears the way for marketing programs bought and paid for by vaccine manufacturers and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).