'Nothing to fear' from five-in-one vaccine, says Government official

There is "no problem" with a planned new five-in-one jab for babies despite fears it could lead to a repeat of the MMR controversy, a top health official insisted today.

There is "no problem" with a planned new five-in-one jab for babies despite fears it could lead to a repeat of the MMR controversy, a top health official insisted today.

Parent support campaigners called for assurances from the Government over the safety of any new combined vaccination amid concerns of links between jabs and childhood autism.

But Dr David Salisbury, head of immunisations at the Department of Health (DoH), stressed that the new five-in-one injection would be safe.

"There's no problem with five-in-one," he said in a GMTV interview.

"The first thing to recall is that babies have five vaccinations now and they will continue to have five vaccinations in the future."

Plans for a new combined jab will be set out when the DoH unveils a shake up of the vaccines system today.

The new jab will also replace the separate oral polio vaccine, which has been scrapped in a bid to avoid the rare cases of polio contraction.

However, campaigners who believe vaccines have damaged their children said they were "extremely worried" about the prospect of a new combined jab.

The new jab, which protects against diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, Hib and polio, will be administered to babies over two months old and is set to come into use in September.

The Department of Health has confirmed that mercury will be removed from the whooping cough vaccine in the new five-in-one jab.

The decision comes just weeks after researchers in the US suggested that a mercury-based preservative, Thiomersal, used in the vaccine could be linked to the development of autism.

But Dr Salisbury insisted there was no such connection between mercury and autism.

"There is good evidence from this country, hundreds of thousands of children have been studied," he said.

"There's no autism-mercury link."

Dr Salisbury went on: "I am really sorry for parents who are like ping-pong balls between one supposed expert and another supposed expert.

"It must be very difficult for them. I have great sympathy for that problem that they face."

Jackie Fletcher, the founder of Jabs (Justice, Awareness and Basic Support), a support group for parents who believe their children were damaged by vaccines, warned the Government that it could be heading for another row with parents.

She also predicted that it could spark a repeat of the controversy over the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine which was also linked to autism in a study.

"With five-in-one vaccines we would want to know what safety trials have taken place," she said. "How did they find out it was safe to do it in this combination?

"Increasing the combinations increases the potential for an adverse reaction and restricts choice for parents, when the Government said it wanted to improve choice.

"I am not anti-vaccine. I know they have been designed for a good reason. But I am concerned that we do not end up in another situation like MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) where pre-licence trials were proved to have been inadequate."

Liberal Democrat health spokesman Paul Burstow said: "The removal of mercury from vaccines is welcome.

"However, with regard to the proposed new five-in-one jab, we simply cannot afford to have a repeat of what happened in the case of the MMR vaccine.

"Not only must the science behind this decision be sound, but parents and the public must have confidence that all possible risks have been discounted before the new combined vaccine is put into use."