No, get the flu during pregnancy does not predispose to a autistic child. American researchers are sweeping aside in a new study the possible fears of expectant mothers who could be infected with an influenza virus this winter. The disease would not be linked to a risk of giving birth to an autistic child. This belief is reported in the newspaper JAMA pediatrics after observing a panel of 196,929 women who gave birth in California between 2000 and 2010 as well as the state of health of their children. In all, nearly 1,400 women (0.7%) have caught the flu while pregnant and 45,231 (23%) were vaccinated against this infection.
Of the 196,929 children born, only 3,101, or 1.6%, were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). For the researchers, this does not lead to a significant link between the flu during pregnancy and autism in children. Americans also refute the idea that influenza vaccination could be associated with the risk of autism in children. Again, no cause-and-effect relationship has been uncovered. A finding that should not lead to any questioning of current vaccine policies, according to the researchers. In France as in the United States, vaccines against influenza arouse suspicion. Last year in France, only 48% of patients at risk were vaccinated against the flu (source: website santepublique.fr . To encourage the French to protect themselves against the flu virus, pharmacists have just obtained from the government, and this for an experimental period of three years, authorization to vaccinate against influenza.
A controversial link between autism and the flu in pregnant women
Previous work carried out in 2012 by researchers from the University of Aarhus in Denmarksuggested an association between influenza in pregnant women and a risk of autistic disorder in children. But the causal link had not been established. This study – conducted on 97,000 children born between 1997 and 2003 including 976 diagnosed with autism – concluded that women who had the flu during pregnancy had doubled their risk ofgiving birth to an autistic child.
Each year, 2.5 million people on average are affected by the flu in France.
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