Aluminum and Asthma
Author: Ryan Hassan, M.D., Boost Oregon's medical director and pediatrician working at Oregon Pediatrics in Happy Valley.
A new CDC-funded study published on Sep 26, 2022 found an association between aluminum exposure from vaccines and asthma. In this post, I’ll talk about what that means for parents making vaccine decisions for their children.
Do Vaccines Increase the Risk for Asthma?
The available data says no. Multiple peer reviewed studies (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 16) have looked for a relationship between vaccination and asthma and other allergic diseases and have found no correlation. Any single study showing a contradictory finding is likely flawed. It should not be considered conclusive evidence of any link between vaccines and asthma until it is corroborated by multiple other studies.
There is also good reason to suggest that aluminum adjuvants in vaccines in particular are not a risk factor for asthma. Asthma rates in the U.S. steadily increased from 1980 until 2009, leveled off, and then decreased in recent years. Aluminum adjuvant vaccines were added to the children’s recommended vaccine schedule in 1991, and have remained since. Because asthma rates rose before aluminum adjuvant vaccines were added and fell afterward, vaccines cannot solely account for trends in childhood asthma rates.
Also, scientists have calculated exactly how quickly aluminum from vaccines will be absorbed into the bloodstream and eliminated from the body, and found that the burden on infant’s bodys from aluminum adjuvants is significantly less than the established minimal risk level at which we might start to see negative effects (19).
This study does not show: 1) that vaccines cause asthma; 2) that aluminum in vaccines causes asthma; or 3) that aluminum in vaccines increases the risk of asthma. The authors themselves write, “these findings do not constitute strong evidence for questioning the safety of aluminum in vaccines.”
So What Does This Study Show?
This study shows a small correlation between aluminum adjuvants and asthma. That correlation decreased when the authors accounted for breastfeeding and whether children were fully vaccinated. For children with eczema, there was no association between aluminum adjuvants and asthma when controlling for breastfeeding, or among fully vaccinated children.
This is an observational study, not an experiment, in which the authors looked at data from a national vaccine database called Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) to determine how much aluminum children were exposed to from vaccines in the first two years of life, and which children developed asthma between 2 and 5 years of age. They used that data to determine if the amount of aluminum children received from vaccines showed any relationship to the risk for developing asthma.
A major problem with this kind of study is that there are countless other variables that can skew the outcome.The authors of this study did their best to control for other variables, such as prematurity, food allergies, interactions with the healthcare industry, and eczema. But they were unable to control for many of the most important risk factors for asthma, including exposure to allergens like mold or dust mites, exposure to lung irritants like tobacco smoke or air pollution, parental education level, and annual household income. They also did not account for any of the numerous other ways that we are exposed to aluminum every day through our skin or intestinal tract, including in our food, water, air, and health products (there is more aluminum in breast milk than in vaccines (18)). Any one of these factors could be responsible for the association found in the study.
The most important thing that this study shows us, though, is that the CDC is committed to ensuring vaccine safety and transparency.
Is It Plausible That Aluminum in Vaccines Could Lead to Asthma?
Maybe. It is possible that the association found in this study represents a true causal link between asthma and aluminum adjuvants. The authors based the hypothesis for this study on limited animal data, and prior research showing that aluminum adjuvants work by causing our immune system to create more Type 2 Helper T cells, also called Th-2 cells, and fewer Type 1, or Th-1 cells. This could theoretically increase the risk of allergic diseases like asthma, which are mediated by Th-2 cells, and reduce the risk for autoimmune diseases like Type 1 Diabetes, which are mediated by Th-1 cells. To support this theory, they cite another observational cohort study, published in December 2021, that also used VSD to show that aluminum exposure from vaccines was associated with a reduced risk of developing Type 1 Diabetes (17).
It therefore stands to reason that if aluminum from vaccines does increase the risk for asthma, then it also reduces the risk for diabetes. It is interesting to note that, even though these two studies were nearly identical in their methods, no one is rushing to get more aluminum in order to reduce their risk of diabetes..
But What If Vaccines Did Increase the Risk for Asthma?
The CDC and the FDA are not recommending any changes to the childhood vaccination schedule based on this study, and I will continue to fully vaccinate my baby girl according to the CDC schedule, and recommend that my patients do the same. That’s not just because this study doesn’t provide meaningful information about the risk of asthma after vaccination; it’s also an acknowledgement that the benefits of vaccination are massive by comparison to the theoretical and unlikely risk of asthma.
Even if we did confidently show that vaccines slightly increase the risk for asthma, I would still confidently vaccinate my baby girl. Why? Because choosing whether or not to vaccinate is not a choice between vaccine side effects and no vaccine side effects; it’s a choice between vaccine side effects and the risks of remaining unvaccinated. The risks of contracting diseases like measles or polio are much worse than a slightly increased risk for asthma.
Vaccine preventable diseases are around us every day, and pose a serious threat to unvaccinated children everywhere. I’ve treated babies in the NICU with pertussis who spent the first months of their lives on ventilators because their parents didn’t vaccinate them. I’ve performed CPR on a baby with an infection of the brain and blood caused by meningococcus (a vaccine-preventable bacteria) who died on the table. Earlier this summer, an unvaccinated person in New York developed paralysis from polio, and there are likely already thousands of unvaccinated New Yorkers who have undiagnosed polio from exposure to contaminated water (15). These are the consequences of non-vaccination.
How Can I Reduce My Child’s Risk for Asthma?
Don’t put your child at increased risk for vaccine-preventable diseases by withholding life-saving vaccines from them based on incomplete data.
If you want to reduce your child’s risk for asthma, I recommend you eliminate their exposure to tobacco smoke and spend time with them in nature. You can optimize the air quality in your home by changing your air filters regularly, keeping your floors and bed sheets clean, and filling your home with house plants, which are nature’s best air purifiers. You could also take steps to reduce the amount of air pollution you generate and advocate for policies that do the same.
It is understandable and appropriate to have questions and concerns about this new study. I hope that, by explaining why I am still confident in vaccinating my baby, I have helped you to remain confident in vaccinating yours.
For more information about aluminum in vaccines, check out this resource from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. . If you still have any questions about this study, or other vaccine questions in general, feel free to reach out to us directly at info@boostoregon.org or boostingourvoices@gmail.com (we may answer your question on our podcast!).
Vaccines and Asthma or Allergies | Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (chop.edu)
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Vaccine Ingredients - Aluminum | Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (chop.edu)
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