WHO: No link between vaccines and autism spectrum disorders

GENEVA, Dec 11 (KUNA) -- Director-General of the World Health Organization Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced that new findings issued by experts of the WHO confirm unequivocally that there is no causal link between vaccines and autism spectrum disorders.
Speaking at a press conference held in Geneva on Thursday, Ghebreyesus said that the Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety had reviewed 31 studies conducted over 15 years in several countries all confirming WHO's previous conclusions that childhood vaccines and vaccines administered during pregnancy including those containing aluminum or thimerosal do not cause autism.
Stressing the importance of vaccines, he said that over the past 25 years under-five mortality has dropped by more than half from 11 million deaths a year to 4.8 million and vaccines are the major reason for that.
He reaffirmed that vaccines remain essential especially for people at high risk of influenza complications and COVID-19 that continues to spread causing severe disease and death in high-risk groups and long COVID.
He said that last week WHO designated a new variant under monitoring (BA.3.2) and published a new risk evaluation and published also a new strategic plan for coronavirus disease threats including COVID-19, MERS and potential new coronavirus diseases.
He stressed that this is the first unified plan for coronavirus disease threats marking a turning point in the transition from the COVID-19 emergency response to sustained long-term and integrated management. (end) imk.gb