A new study confirms that the rotavirus vaccine does indeed increase the risk of intussusception, a rare form of intestinal blockage.
The vaccine was pulled from the market in 1999, after nine reports of intussusception occurred within the first 7 months of vaccine use, more than double the cases reported in the previous seven years.
Intussusception occurs when the intestine telescopes into itself, causing an obstruction of the bowel that is repaired surgically. During the studies to support licensing of the rotavirus vaccine, only 5 cases of intussusception were reported among more than 10,000 infants who received the vaccine.
Rotavirus is the number one cause of severe diarrhea in infants and is responsible for countless visits to the doctor's office and, sometimes, the emergency department.
An investigation of vaccinated infants confirms that the vaccine was indeed the cause of the complication.
Seventy-four infants out of a total of 426 infants with intussusception had received the rotavirus vaccine, the report indicates, and most of these infants had intussusception shortly after their vaccination.
Within the first 14 days after vaccination, the risk of intussusception was 10 times higher than normal, the authors report, and within the first 7 days after vaccination, the risk was 14 times higher than normal.
If the national rotavirus vaccination program were to continue, the investigators estimate that the intussusception rate would increase by 28% to 57%, or an additional 361 to 732 cases per year.
The New England Journal of Medicine February 22nd 2001; 344: 564-572
This is one of the MAJOR problems with vaccines in this country. The safety studies are done AFTER the vaccines are introduced. In the case of rotavirus only 5 cases were reported in the pre approval studies and 74 were documented after it was released.
Intussusception is a relatively simple physical complication to document and link to vaccines. The more pervasive immune and neurological devastation produced by most all vaccines is less easy to identify and this is a large part of the reason for the delay in the final recognition of the link between the vaccines to the neurological complications that they are producing.
Let us also not forget that Prevnar is made by the same people who made the Rotavirus vaccine, Wyeth labs.
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