Vaccinations

1. What is the recommended vaccination schedule?

Recommendations vary. Many parents decide not to vaccinate at all or use an alternative vaccination schedule, see:

What Your Doctor May Not Tell You about Children's Vaccinations by Stephanie Cave, M.D. – available through ARI.
A User-Friendly Vaccination Schedule by Donald W. Miller, Jr., MD

2. Where can I buy single-dose vials of vaccine?

These used to be manufactured by Merck but are no longer available. We don't know if they will be manufactured again - stay in touch with your compounding pharmacy.

3. How can I research my child's vaccinations – I want to know about the content of the vaccines he/she received?

If you have the lot numbers (your child's physician should have them on file), you can call the manufacturers and find out when the vaccines were made, then check the Physician's Desk Reference for that year to determine each vaccine's contents. There is a form you can use on NVIC's site as a "litmus test" - based on when you got shots and what manufacturer - that's the "Mercury Calculator"

You can also look for vaccine reaction reports posted for a particular lot # - it's a "hotlot" search of the government's adverse reaction database.

Contact numbers for childhood vaccine manufacturers:

Merck & Co., Inc.
One Merck Drive
P.O. Box 100
Whitehouse Station, NJ 08889-0100 USA
Phone: 908-423-1000
Monday-Friday 8:30 AM - 5:30 PM ET
web site contact info
Wyeth Lederle
5 Giralda Farms
Madison, NJ 07940
(800) 999-9384 (99-WYETH) Option # 1
web site contact info
Sanofi-Aventis
300 Somerset Corporate Bld
Bridgewater, NJ 08807-2854
Tel: 800-981-2491
web site contact info

4. If I don't want to continue to vaccinate my family, where do I find my state's guidelines for exemptions?

NVIC publishes theses guidelines state-by-state online.

If your state offers waivers based strictly on religious objections and you have questions about how your church views waiving vaccines, contact your church leadership for advice and information.

5. What can I do to PREVENT autism from occurring in subsequent children?

6. My doctor says the thimerosal in vaccines is "so little there's nothing to be worried about" - is he/she right?

From Boyd Haley, Professor and Chair of the University of Kentucky Department of Chemistry: "The EPA safe level for mercury exposure from the diet is 0.1 micrograms/2.2 pounds body weight and the vaccines preserved with thimerosal has 12.5 micrograms of mercury or 125 times the EPA safe level. This makes the vaccine exposure safe if your baby weighs 275 pounds." Also, the thimerosal is injected, not ingested, which makes it more toxic, and it is delivered with aluminum that enhances the neurotoxicity. So it is surprising a physician would be so dismissive and say the thimerosal is 'so small it is nothing to worry about.'"

7. Where do the heavy metals come from?