New study confirms measles virus in bowels of autistic children

A study due to be presented June 1st-3rd at the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR), in Montreal, Canada, has confirmed the finding of a link between the measles virus in MMR vaccine with childhood autism.

What has this study found?

• This study has confirmed the original UK/Irish findings of measles virus in the inflamed intestinal tissues of children with autism.
• This study confirms that in the examined cases, MMR vaccine is the source of the measles virus.

• The study is a collaboration between Dr. Arthur Krigsman MD (now with Thoughtful House), a pediatric gastroenterologist specializing in bowel disease in children with developmental disorders such as autism, Dr. Steve Walker, a scientist and expert in molecular biology at Wake Forest University Medical Center, and Dr. Karin Hepner, a Molecular Biologist from California. Dr. Krigsman¹ took biopsy samples from the inflamed intestines of affected children attending his clinic in New York and sent them for independent analysis to Dr. Walker in North Carolina. Dr. Hepner consulted on the technical design of the virus detection methods and conducted independent analysis of some samples.

What is the significance of the finding?

• This study confirms the link proposed earlier in the UK between MMR vaccine and autism in a subset of children who regressed or whose development was arrested in the second year of life.
• This study strongly supports the validity of a scientific paper reporting the detection of measles-virus genetic material in similarly affected children from the UK and Ireland. This study was performed by Professor O’Leary, Professor of Pathology at St James’ Hospital and Trinity College, Dublin, in collaboration with Dr. Wakefield, and was published in 2002.²
• The findings of this study are not consistent with the expected response of children to measles-vaccine virus. The vaccine strain of measles virus is not expected to remain in the body after vaccination. Vaccine experts expect that it should be cleared from the body within 30 days. The continued presence of measles-vaccine virus in the diseased intestinal tissue of sick children cannot be considered innocuous, given the parental stories of regression into autism following MMR exposure.

The results of the study should be viewed in light of:

• Parental history suggestive of injury to the intestine and brain following MMR.
• The published evidence for an abnormal immune response to measles virus in autistic children compared with developmentally normal children.³
• The consistency of these findings in independent and geographically-distinct populations of children.
• The lack of convincing safety data on MMR vaccine.

What are the limitations of the study?

• The frequency with which measles virus material is found in developmentally normal children undergoing similar intestinal investigations is not reported. This was reported in the UK/Irish study, and was highly significantly lower in developmentally normal children compared with autistic children. The current study by Dr. Walker cannot be certain, therefore, that their findings are specific for autistic children.
• The analysis was not blinded, that is, Dr. Walker was aware that the samples were from autistic children. It is our understanding that confirmatory analysis on a small number of samples was, however, performed by Dr. Hepner, who obtained the same results as Dr. Walker.
• These limitations should not influence the necessary precautionary response of regulatory authorities in acting in the interest of children’s safety.

Safety of MMR vaccine

• Authoritative independent reviews of the safety studies of measles vaccines have come to the following conclusions:
  • "The design and reporting of safety outcomes in MMR vaccine studies, both pre- and post-marketing, are largely inadequate."⁴ This means that proper safety trials were not carried out either before or after the introduction of the MMR vaccine.
• A more recent review⁵ from the same organization (The Cochrane Collaboration) identified the fact that the safety studies on the single measles vaccine were better than those conducted on MMR.
  • "We found only limited evidence of safety of MMR compared to the single component vaccines that had a low risk of bias." Once again, the authors were highly critical of the safety studies of the MMR, which "need to be improved." They mentioned a specific concern that safety studies followed up children for no more than three weeks, except for one study which lasted six weeks.
• Perhaps the greatest indictment of the safety of this vaccine was contained in the final conclusion:
  • "The safety record of MMR is probably best attested by its almost universal use." In other words, the scientific evidence of its safety is so poor that its widespread use is the best evidence of safety that we have.

Background

• Autism is a complex disorder of learning and behavior, starting early in childhood. The number of children diagnosed with autism and related disorders on the autistic spectrum has increased dramatically in many countries over the last 15 years.
• The possible association between MMR vaccine, autistic regression, and intestinal symptoms was first reported by parents to Dr. Wakefield, a UK gastroenterologist, in 1995. The first group of children presenting in this way to Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues at the Royal Free Hospital in London were reported in the Lancet as a clinical case series in 1998.
• All of the clinical findings – everything described in this Lancet 1998 report, including the discovery of a possible new type of inflammatory bowel disease - have been confirmed since by other doctors in the US, Italy, and Venezuela.⁶
• The studies suggest that in some children brain damage leading to autism may be secondary to, or occur in parallel with, a disease in the intestine, findings that have important implications for our understanding and treatment of this disease.
• The intestinal disease has the features of a viral disease; measles virus is known to infect the intestine and produce the features described originally by Dr. Wakefield and colleagues.

This release was produced with the permission of the abstract’s authors. The opinions expressed in this press release do not necessarily reflect those of these authors.

1. Dr. Krigsman is currently Director of Clinical Services at Thoughtful House Center for Children in Austin Texas, in addition to his medical practice in New York. The children examined in this study were investigated in his New York clinic prior to his joining Thoughtful House. Dr. Krigsman has worked as a medical expert in the UK MMR litigation, specifically as a doctor who was able to confirm the presence of intestinal inflammation in autistic children. Dr. Krigsman is not acting as an expert on behalf of any other children in the currently reported study of measles virus.
   
   
2. Uhlmann V., Martin C, Shiels, Wakefield AJ, O’Leary JJ. Possible viral pathogenesis of a novel paediatric inflammatory bowel disease. Molecular Pathology 2002;55:84-90
   
   
3. Singh VK, Lin SX, Yang VC. Serological association of measles virus and human herpesvirus-6 with brain autoantibodies in autism. Clin Immunol Immunopathol. 1998;89:105-8.
   
   Singh VK, Jensen RL, Elevated levels of measles antibodies in children with autism, Pediatric Neurology, 2003;28:292-294.
   
   
4. Jefferson T, Price D, Demicheli V, Bianco E. Unintended events following immunization with MMR: a systematic review. Vaccine 2003; 21: 3954-3960
   
   
5. Demicheli V, Jefferson T, Rivetti A, Price D. Vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella in children (Review). The Cochrane Collaboration 2005
   
   
6. Balzola F, Daniela C, Repici A, Barbon V, Sapino A, Barbera C, Calvo PL, Gandione M, Rigardetto R, Rizzetto M. Autistic enterocolitis: confirmation of a new inflammatory bowel disease in an Italian cohort of patients. Gastroenterology. 2005;128:Suppl.2;A-303
   
   Balzola F., Barbon V.,Repici A., Rizzetto M., Clauser D., Gandione M., Sapino A., Panenteric IBD-Like Disease in a Patient with Regressive Autism Shown for the First Time by the Wireless Capsule Enteroscopy: Another Piece in the Jigsaw of this Gut-Brain Syndrome? American Journal of Gastroenterology. 2005;100:979
   
   González L., López K., Martínez M., Navarro D., Negrón L., Rodríguez R., Villalobos D., Flores L., Sabrá A. Endoscopic and Histological Characteristics of the Digestive Mucosa in Autistic Children with Gastrointestinal Symptoms. Preliminary Report. G.E.N. Suplemento Especial de Pediatría-Nº 1, 2005; pp41-47.

PERSISTENT ILEAL MEASLES VIRUS in a Large Cohort of Regressive Autistic Children WITH ILEOCOLITIS AND LYMPHONODULAR HYPERPLASIA: ReVisitation of an Earlier Study

Walker, S.J., Hepner K., Segal, J., & Krigsman A., Department of Physiology & Pharmacology, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27101 USA

Background: Autistic enterocolitis, consisting of a nonspecific ileocolitis coupled with ileocolonic lymphonodular hyperplasia (LNH), was first introduced as a new, potentially virus-induced disease entity eight years ago in a group of ASD children with developmental regression.

Objectives: The primary objective of this study was to examine ileal biopsy tissue in a large cohort of pediatric patients who carry a diagnosis of regressive autism and whose chronic gastrointestinal symptoms warranted diagnostic endoscopic evaluation, for evidence of measles virus RNA.

Methods: Patients who had been diagnosed with autism and who were referred to a pediatric gastroenterologist for evaluation of chronic GI symptoms were eligible to participate in this IRB approved study. For each patient, medical histories, vaccination records, histopathology reports, and ileocolonoscopic biopsy tissue were available for evaluation. Terminal ileum (TI) biopsy tissue was assayed by RT-PCR for the presence of measles virus RNA and PCR-positive samples were sequenced.

Results: Medical and clinical data have been collected for >275 patients who fit the study inclusion criteria. PCR analysis on TI biopsy tissue from an initial 82 patients showed that 70 (85%) were positive for the F gene amplicon. Fourteen have been verified by DNA sequence and an additional 56 amplicons are being sequenced now. Work is ongoing to assay the remaining specimens (~200) and to identify and assay relevant control tissue samples.

Conclusions: Preliminary results from this large cohort of pediatric autistic patients with chronic GI symptoms confirm earlier findings of measles virus RNA in the terminal ileum and support an association between measles virus and ileocolitis /LNH.

Sponsors: ARI; NAA; individual donations

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