I just overheard this morning on my way to work a mom autism advocate speaking about a benefit coming up this weekend for Autism Speaks. She spoke of her child's disability and the frequency of autism prevalence in our communities. Then she spoke a bit of her personal story and her child. I was sitting there just fearing the inevitible... Here it comes... Yep. Another child who developed the speech regression of autism around 15 months after having had MMR vaccine. Of course I sat there thinking, yea, my kid too, as my seven year old is an autistic child as well.

But of course being also a scientist and a pediatrician, I know the global science of the matter which is that there is no causal association between MMR and autism. The notion of which has been refuted by the global scientific community over and over after Wakefield's small, fraudulant study over ten years ago.

We feel for these moms, and I feel for my autistic son like any other mom. But there is a larger threat to our community, the threat of vaccine preventable illness namely measles encephalitis and pertussis. Take a look at my site and the knowledge center page as you consider vaccine safety for your family, I have some links to some great children's hospital vaccine education centers, as well as Children's Hospital of Philadelphia's site.

Measles, hope not to see you this year in Western Kentucky, but I know you are out there just waiting for your chance. Please comment and forward this post to those you love, particularly mom's with yong children who may be wrestling with this decision!

Natalie Hodge MD FAAP