Children dying from pentavalent vaccine

Tuesday, February 18, 2014 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: pentavalent vaccines, child deaths, India

(NaturalNews) Opposition is mounting in many developing countries against the use of pentavalent, or five-in-one, vaccines, which are being aggressively pushed by health authorities as a public health requirement. Reports indicate that an increasing number of mostly infants are dying not long after receiving the controversial jab, which is said to trigger an immune response to five different diseases in a single vaccine.

For instance, V.S. Achuthanandan, the Leader of the Opposition in Kerala, India, recently stated publicly that pentavalent vaccines should no longer be included as part of the government's immunization program. Joining a chorus of opposition that recently erupted into a wave of protests, Achuthanandan referenced the many babies who have died following the vaccine as evidence that it should no longer be administered as part of the standard vaccination schedule.

These statements come as India's central government gears up to expand the pentavalent vaccine program to another 11 Indian states, according to Health.India.com. Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, admitting that there has been a noticeable increase in adverse events following administration of the vaccine for diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, hepatitis B and Hib, claims this damage is not a result of the vaccine.

But many others disagree, including Dr. Jacob Puliyel, a pediatrician and member of the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization. He told reporters that, contrary to what the Indian government is claiming, many of the deaths that have occurred following the administration of pentavalent vaccines show clear signs of a causal relationship.

"The deaths associated with this vaccine have been sporadic... and follows the pattern of anaphylaxis reactions," stated Dr. Puliyel. "[I]f a drug is known to have caused this form of fatal reaction, it is not permissible to give it without doing sensitivity testing... which is not carried out in the case of pentavalent.... Trivialising all these deaths as coincidental amounts to obscuring the real picture."

WHO scientists develop tools for tracking adverse events following vaccination

India's Adverse Events Following Immunization committee denies any link between pentavalent vaccines and the infant deaths, but the evidence speaks for itself. Even the World Health Organization (WHO), which heavily promotes the use of vaccines, admits that adverse events do happen, which is why the group is funding research into adverse event assessment tools.

"Serious illnesses or even deaths may rarely occur after childhood vaccinations," reads a study on injuries and deaths associated with vaccines that was published in the journal Vaccine late last summer.

While this study was actually initiated to come up with ways to avert implicating vaccines with vaccine-induced injuries, it does still make the admission that vaccines can and do lead to serious injury or even death in some cases. This definitely appears to be the case with pentavalent vaccine, which health officials time and time again have been unable to rule out as a likely cause of death in some children.

In the fairly recent case of the two babies who died in Kerala, India, following pentavalent vaccination, the post mortem certificate revealed that the vaccine could have been the cause. The certificate clearly rules out natural disease, injury and aspiration pneumonia as the cause of death, which leaves only only other obvious factor.

"Based on the findings in the autopsy, preliminary reports of microbiological and histopathological findings, no definite opinion as to the cause of death can be furnished," reads the certificate, as quoted by Express Pharma Online. "However, death as a result of post vaccination sequelae could not be ruled out."

Sources for this article include:

http://www.thehindu.com

http://health.india.com

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

http://www.omsj.org

http://pharma.financialexpress.com

http://science.naturalnews.com