re: “He held fast to the belief that vaccines caused autism…

This is right. I think there have been something like 18 negative studies after Wakefield in almost 20 countries on 3 continents. The number of kids studied is >1 million. You can keep studying, but there's more than enough there to base policy on. The flip side that people haven't brought up on this thread is that not all kids can get vaccinated. They rely on herd immunity for protection from diseases that are considerably dangerous to all unvaccinated kids, but especially dangerous to them as immunocompromised kids and vaccine risks for them are also quite significant.

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Is that really the case? Did science really debunk this?

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Well, no, that's not how science works.

Having said that, I don't think vaccines cause autism. Folks are confused about correlation vs. causation. Yes, there has been a rise in autism rates since the vaccine schedule (lest we forget, that wasn't really a thing before the 1960s - the childhood vaccination program we are used to in the United States is younger than the atomic bomb, younger than rock and roll, hell, younger than Kelsey Grammar) was introduced and expanded over the years.

But so has the awareness of and the specialized research around autism. "Neurodivergence" would have been uniformly lumped together with intellectual disability, cognitive delay, etc., really before the mid-70s at the earliest.

On the other hand, introducing so many vaccines into developing children (I mean, a large number of shots are proposed for the very youngest and a fairly high frequency as to be alarming on its face) has the potential to cause all sorts of short- and long-term problems.

"Science" is not supposed to "prove" or "debunk" conspiracy theories. It is supposed to answer questions like, "Probable link", "frequency", "intensity" and "severity" of such problems.

"Science" is neither a sword nor a shield. It is literally a "method" that, when used correctly, can answer all sorts of properly framed questions.

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Here's the link you asked for. Sanitation and decrease in diseases

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Again, that article
does show the entire US revamping its sanitation system and hygiene practices in the time period Polio was almost completely eradicated.

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Are there even enough unvaccinated kids in the US to provide a sufficient control group for that analysis?

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yes, there are thousands of unvaccinated kids at this point.

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And you don't need 20x or 10x for there to be a correlation. 1.5 times would be statistically significant.

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but we don’t see that either.

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My point really wasn't angled the way you took it. What I meant was if you know that they are actively falsifying the individual cases of vaccine injury—and if you are one of the parents I mentioned earlier, you do know that, because you saw it with your own eyes—then why would you trust that they wouldn't falsify the data in the studies?

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that’s the issue you aren’t going to trust anything that doesn’t confirm your bias AND you’ve added a conspiracy theory that will never let you trust it.

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And finally, you didn't answer the question. What are you believing, as one of those parents?

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I would also be completely irrational about it.

but I can admit that’s an emotional response

Why can we not have study were they have a group with the Pharma Wet dream vaccine schedule we have now and a group were the kids get the 4 or so vaccines we got prior to the 1986 vaccine explosion?

You have to admit no matter how ideologically inclined that the vaccine law giving Pharma companies immunity and not having to do long term health studies caused a huge boon to the schedule. Ever company realized it was a cash cow and we have shite on it that honestly don’t belong (like Hep B or HPV)

That’s a fair point — but there is solid research on U.S.-licensed MMR vaccines & American kids.

Here's one from JAMA of 95,000 American kids. It didn't find MMR linked to autism or other major health issues. When vaccination rates drop, outbreaks rise — like the 2019 measles surge and the current one. Bodily autonomy matters, but vaccination isn’t just personal protection; it protects vulnerable people who can’t be vaccinated. Mandates exist to protect the broader community with evidence-backed policy. The data is there, and it’s pretty clear.

Cool, now do the other 12 or so shots US kids are given.

Look, I’m not a skeptic per se, but I don’t trust anyone anymore. If I choose not to vaccinate, the risk and vulnerability is my own. My body. My choice. That’s how it should be.

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HPV isn’t given to babies. it’s given to like 11-13 year olds and it’s done a fantastic job of lowering cervical cancer rates.

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Gardasil was approved in 2008.

In 1975, the cervical cancer rate was 13.91 per 100k.

In 2007, the rate was 6.39 per 100k. There was no Gardasil.

In 2021, the rate was 6.57 per 100k.

In 2007, the 5 year survival rate was 71.51%.

In the 2021, the 5 year survival rate is right around 71%.

LINK

“But what if your unvaccinated kid gives measles to a vaccinated kid?”

Awkward silence.

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If I’m a parent and I opt to assume this risk, I’m accepting that vulnerability and hurting no one else.

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That's not how infectious diseases work, baw. People don't just catch them. They transmit them too.