Sleeping sickness by swine flu vaccine

Study: Mixture of swine flu vaccine and drug enhancer increases the risk of sleeping sickness

24/12/2013

Almost four years ago, the so-called swine flu broke out. Many children and adolescents became the vaccine „Pandemrix“ injected. Since then, the incidence of sleeping sickness (narcolepsy) has risen sharply. Scientists have known the cause for a long time.

Three studies conducted in Sweden, Ireland and Finland have found increased cases among vaccinated children and adolescents. According to the study data, the risk after a pandemrix vaccine increases to 3.6 to 6 additional cases per 100,000 minors. So far there is no such study in Germany.

Why the swine flu vaccine increases the risk of sleeping sickness was not explicable on previous research. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) suggests that interaction with genetic factors could play a role. Furthermore, experts suspect that additional influences such as certain infectious diseases, especially respiratory diseases, could be partly responsible. However, the exact mechanisms are largely unknown and could not be determined by previous studies.

Researchers from Finland have found in a study that children who have taken part in a H1N1 mass vaccination have a 12.7 percent increased risk of developing narcolepsy. The study was conducted among students aged 9 to 14 years. As a comparison group, children were used who were not vaccinated.

The researchers suspect that it is not the vaccine itself that is responsible, but the drug enhancer. This contains the substance adjuvant AS03. This could, according to scientists, "potentize with the virus". Thus, an "interaction between drug enhancer and vaccine is the cause of the increased risk of narcolepsy".

Narcolepsy is actually a very rare disease. According to the German Society for Sleep Medicine (DGSM), around 40,000 people suffer from sleeping sickness. The Paul Ehrlich Institute reports that one in every one million new children in Germany suffer from it each year. In the event of an outbreak, those affected usually suffer from sudden sleep-deprivation, the loss of muscle tension, an unnatural sleep pattern and sleep paralysis. Usually the symptoms vary in their frequency and severity. To date, it has not been conclusively clarified how and why the disease develops. Physicians assume that environmental influences and genetic preloads are the probable triggers.

One hundred percent of the researchers are not sure. There must be other factors that trigger sleeping sickness. But the vaccine pluss amplifier is not enough to trigger the serious illness. However, a connection can be established, since the proportion of narcolepsy increased sharply in vaccine-intensive countries such as Sweden or Finland. For Germany, there are no separate findings to date. (Sb)