A well-known anti-vaccine advocate is claiming that the hepatitis B vaccine is responsible for an increase in autism diagnoses over the last few decades. The video claims that children who received the vaccine as infants were more likely to be diagnosed with autism. One clip from the video has been watched over 700,000 times.
The high profile and widespread nature of the misinformation elevates its risk. Debunking messaging may emphasize that there is no evidence to support the claim that hepatitis B vaccines—or any other vaccine—causes autism. Autism spectrum disorders have been increasing steadily since the mid-1970s, nearly two decades before the CDC began recommending that newborns be vaccinated against hepatitis B. Since the vaccine rollout in the 1990s, infections in children have dropped 95 percent. Serious side effects have been reported in less than one in a million children vaccinated.
