STATEMENTS BY SENATORS

Senator ANTIC (South Australia) (13:29): I rise to speak about recent data which shows that approximately one in 27 Australian children are now diagnosed with autism. Even more alarmingly, if this trend continues, by some estimates there may be as many as 1.2 to 1.3 million autistic Australians in the next decade. What's driving it?

Our experts can't exactly tell us what is driving it, but they can certainly tell us what is definitely, definitely, definitely not causing it—and that's the childhood vaccination schedule. I look at that and I say, 'Really?' Let's look at some statistics. In the 1980s autism was considered a rare condition, with a prevalence of around one in 2,500 children.

In the nineties it was about one in 500 and currently, as I said, it's one in 27 Australian children. Coincidentally, over the same period, the Australian immunisation program has bloomed dramatically. In the eighties and nineties there were relatively few on the schedule, and between the 2000s and 2010s additions included hep B at birth, Haemophilus influenzae type b, pneumococcal, rotavirus, varicella, meningococcal strains and boosters, crammed into every one of the first few years of life.

As the schedule grew, coincidentally, so did the rates of autism—but that's probably just a coincidence, isn't it. It certainly doesn't require any further investigation, does it. In the meantime, across the Pacific, late last year the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention updated its autism and vaccines page to say: The claim "vaccines do not cause autism" is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.

The US CDC hasn't ruled it out, but, rest assured, the Australian TGA has, saying their systems 'have not identified any safety signal suggesting a link between autism and any vaccine'. Oh, well! That's it, then!

There's no need to do any further studies! Do the studies. Protect our kids.