Study Shows No Benefit for Babies of Flu-Vaccinated Mothers: JAMA Report

This study will be used to back up the current push to give pregnant women influenza vaccines—but it actually shows why they shouldn't accept the jab.

by Heidi Stevenson

3 October 2010

Babies whose mothers were vaccinated suffer from influenza-like illnesses (ILIs) at the same rate as those born to unvaccinated mothers. The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) will publish the study entitled, "Maternal Influenza Vaccination and Effect on Influenza Virus Infection in Young Infants" on Tuesday, 4 October. The study's conclusion states something quite different, but a close reading shows that the results tell a different story.

The study's conclusion reads:

Maternal influenza vaccination was significantly associated with reduced risk of influenza virus infection and hospitalization for an ILI up to 6 months of age and increased influenza antibody titers in infants through 2 to 3 months of age.

So what's the truth? As is so often the case when vested interests fund studies and when the researchers take money from Big Pharma, the stated conclusions do not match the results, which frequently come from tortured methodologies and statistics. This one is a prime example of this technique.

Statistics

When a study's results do not clearly show the distinction between the two areas being compared, it's a strong sign that there's something very wrong with the results. As William W. Watt wrote:

Do not put your faith in what statistics say until you have carefully considered what they do not say.

The significant issue should be a comparison between how much influenza-like illness (ILI) was suffered by babies born of vaccinated versus non-vaccinated mothers. That is precisely what the study does not address! If a baby suffers just as much influenza-like illness, what difference if it's labeled as "influenza" or something else?

Gregg Easterbrook said, "Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything." Des McHale evidenced the truth of that with, "The average human has one breast and one testicle." This study demonstrates the sense behind these quotes. It gives an impression of benefit for babies whose mothers receive flu vaccines during pregnancy, but there's little reality behind the twisted numbers.

Funding and Conflicts of Interest

It's always wise to find out who paid for research and whether the authors have taken money from those sources. Every single source of funding for this study is either an agency that actively promotes vaccinations or a pharmaceutical firm that stands to gain from its results.

Study Funders

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the National Vaccine Program Office (NVPO), the Office of Minority Women's Health (OMWH), and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) provided funding for the study:

• HHS has rolled out the United States' vaccination program, and has contracted with Big Pharma to stockpile vaccines.
• NVPO is part of HHS. It is tasked with pushing vaccinations in the US. The agency is not tasked with determining whether vaccines are safe or effective, but rather, with pushing them and, according to their website, "...encourag[ing] the availability of an adequate supply of safe and effective vaccination products in the States."⁽¹⁾
• OMWH is a subsidiary of the Office on Women's Health, which is a division of HHS, which contracts with Big Pharma to stockpile vaccines.
• The CDC is infamous for its ties with vaccine makers and its shameless fear mongering during the faked swine flu "pandemic" last season.⁽²⁾

  

Big Pharma companies, Aventis-Pasteur and Evans-Powderject, are the other two study financers. Their interest in the results are obvious.

Researchers' Conflicts of Interest

Researcher Katherine L. O'Brien, MD, MPH, has received research grants from MedImmune and Pfizer, and has served as an advisory expert on pneumococcal vaccines for Sanofi-Pasteur. All of these companies manufacture influenza vaccines. O'Brien was involved in all key aspects of the study, including its design, analysis and interpretation of data, and writing the article manuscript.

Every aspect of this study was under the influence of companies and agencies that have strong vested interests in the outcome.

The Study

This is 2010, yet the study uses data from the 2002-03, 2003-04, and 2004-05 influenza seasons. That's a rather long time ago for a study of this sort to be published.

Participants and Study Design

The source of data is not from typical Americans of average means and health. Instead, the sample was taken from a poverty-stricken and notoriously unhealthy group of people, members of the Navajo and Apache reservations, people who have extremely high rates of obesity and diabetes. That alone should indicate that the study should not be treated as having any value for average Americans.

This was not a blinded or placebo-controlled study. It was epidemiological in nature, though the sample size was relatively small for such a study. 1160 mother-infant pairs were enrolled. Of these, 573 (49%) of mothers received influenza vaccines during pregnancy. There were few differences between vaccinated and unvaccinated mothers, but the differences were significant, as they were indicative of health status—a fact that the study completely ignored.

The vaccinated mothers were more likely to have wood or coal burning stoves, which would indicate a healthier and warmer home, and they were more likely to breastfeed, which would provide better health and disease-resistance to their babies. Further, the unvaccinated mothers were more likely to be smokers, so it would be reasonable to assume that their babies would be more likely to suffer health problems.

Thus, the babies of vaccinated mothers held a health advantage over those whose mothers were unvaccinated. So, if the outcomes were similar, then it would follow that babies of vaccinated mothers were harmed by the vaccines, since their health would have benefitted from warm, smoke-free homes and breastfeeding. The babies of vaccinated mothers should have had fewer incidents of ILI—but they didn't.

Results

An ILI was defined as a medical visit with at least one of these symptoms: fever of 38.0°C (100.4°F) or higher, diarrhea, or respiratory symptoms, including cough, runny nose, or difficulty breathing.

Of the 1160 infants, there were 908 cases of ILI. The average (mean) age of onset of first ILI was the same for both vaccinated and unvaccinated: 47 days.

Interestingly, the study does not report how many babies from each group suffered from ILIs. Instead, they report it in terms of person days. Since there were no deaths reported and it appears that all babies in the study were enrolled for the same length of time, this sort of statistic is rather strange. Why not simply state how many vaccinated vs unvaccinated babies were diagnosed with ILI?

The study reports that there were 7.2 cases of ILI per 1000 person-days in the unvaccinated group, and 6.7/1000 person-days in the vaccinated group. That is, there were 0.72% cases of ILI in vaccinated and 0.67% cases in unvaccinated per 1000 person-days, a difference of 0.05% difference between the two groups—a figure that is insignificant, less than the difference of one child between the two groups: 1160 children X .0005 = .58 of one child.

There was no difference in the percentage of cases between the vaccinated and unvaccinated group, so the authors resorted to statistical games to give the impression that there was.

The study purports to show that the infants of unvaccinated mothers required more medical treatment. However, by eliminating information regarding whether the homes were well heated, and the mothers breastfed or smoked, we have no way of knowing the real cause. One must ask whether this information was eliminated from the study because it's the real reason behind the higher rate of medical intervention.

More Cases of Influenza?

In fact, the study did tell the truth that there were more influenza cases among the babies of unvaccinated mothers, and that does sound important—but it doesn't mean that there was less illness. In fact, the vast majority of influenza-like illnesses are not influenza.

The authors pulled another statistical sleight of hand. They point out that 605 (52%) of the babies had ILI. Note that they earlier reported 908 cases of ILI, not 605. Obviously, some babies came down with ILI more than once. They then pointed out that 83 were cases of influenza, and that the 83 cases were 14% of the total. That is absolutely dishonest. Here's why:

The total number of ILI cases was 908. 83 would be 9.1% of the total.

The number of children who came down with ILI was 605. 83 would be 13.7% - which rounds to 14%, the figure quoted.

So, only 9.1% of the ILI cases were influenza, not 14%. Given the complexity of stats used in this study, it begs credulity to believe that this was a simple mistake on the part of the authors.

The study goes on to discuss, in minute and confusing detail, comparisons between the influenza rates of the vaccinated and unvaccinated groups—but this is meaningless. In the face of obviously dishonest numbers, as just demonstrated, these figures cannot be taken at face value.

Then, there's the fact that there were no more illnesses among the unvaccinated than the vaccinated. What difference does it make if you were one of 9.1% whose illness was diagnoses as influenza, when the nature of the illness is indistinguishable from ILI? In other words, this study seems to show that getting an influenza vaccine does not prevent illness. Instead, it makes you more likely to come down with a different variety of the same type of disease.

When you consider the risks associated with influenza vaccines, such as miscarriages and thimerosol-related neurological disorders—none of which were addressed by this study—there is no benefit to be had from influenza vaccinations. Even with the worst sort of data mangling exemplified by this study, no decrease in the number of influenza-like illness was found in babies of vaccinated mothers.

Isn't it time to refuse these vectors of illness? Jabbing our children—or ourselves—with poisonous substances that have never been shown to prevent disease, but have been shown to cause immense and lifelong harm, need to be stopped.

Truly, if you love your children, you will not allow them to have influenza vaccinations, and if you're pregnant, you must consider that such vaccinations expose your child to potentially devastating poisons, like mercury and aluminum, for little or no benefit.

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