Should I give my baby the MMR or have the vaccinations done separately?
Medically reviewed by Morag Martindale, GP and family planning doctor
Written by Megan Rive
It's best to immunise your child against measles, mumps and rubella with the MMR vaccine, or against measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox with the MMRV vaccine. No country in the world recommends giving the measles, mumps and rubella vaccines separately.
Your baby will be offered the MMR vaccine when he’s 12 months old, and the MMRV vaccine when he’s 18 months old.
You may have heard about a study in 1998 by Andrew Wakefield that claimed there may be a link between the MMR vaccine and two medical conditions: autism and inflammatory bowel disease. The research was flawed and has since been discredited. The author has also been struck off the medical register.
Many extensive, rigorous, well-respected studies have proved that there’s no link between the MMR vaccine and autism. MMR doesn’t increase the risk in autism or trigger autism in susceptible children, such as those with autistic older siblings.
A Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety, commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO) also found no evidence that the MMR vaccine causes autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
There’s not enough evidence to suggest that vaccines in early childhood cause auto-immune conditions, such as inflammatory bowel disease, or that they trigger allergies.
You may also be worried that the MMR could overload your baby’s immune system and prevent the vaccine from working. This isn’t the case. Your baby’s immune system is stronger than you think. It protects him from the thousands of fungi, parasites, bacteria and viruses that he’s exposed to every day. His immune system can cope easily with the MMR.
The WHO says that it’s just as safe for a child to have combined vaccinations as it is to have individual vaccinations.
Single vaccines aren’t available in Australia. The reasons for this include:
Many of us may never have seen a case of measles. So it's easy to forget how nasty an illness it can be. If your child is under one, he’s especially at risk of catching measles, mumps and rubella, and developing serious complications.
Measles in particular can lead to serious conditions. These include meningitis and inflammation of the brain (encephalitis). It’s these complications that can make measles extremely serious, or even fatal.
Mumps can have similar complications to measles, but it can also cause swelling of the genitals in boys (orchitis). Orchitis can lead to infertility.
Rubella is a mild illness in children, but is devastating to an unborn baby if a mum-to-be catches it in early pregnancy. The point of immunising the whole community is to reduce the risk of this happening.
Read more about how immunisation safely protects your child.
Your baby will be offered the MMR vaccine when he’s 12 months old, and the MMRV vaccine when he’s 18 months old.
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Many extensive, rigorous, well-respected studies have proved that there’s no link between the MMR vaccine and autism. MMR doesn’t increase the risk in autism or trigger autism in susceptible children, such as those with autistic older siblings.
A Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety, commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO) also found no evidence that the MMR vaccine causes autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
There’s not enough evidence to suggest that vaccines in early childhood cause auto-immune conditions, such as inflammatory bowel disease, or that they trigger allergies.
The WHO says that it’s just as safe for a child to have combined vaccinations as it is to have individual vaccinations.
Single vaccines aren’t available in Australia. The reasons for this include:
- Your child will need more injections, which means more possible times he’ll experience discomfort or side-effects.
- A certain amount of time has to pass between each dose. If the vaccines are given separately, your child is vulnerable to infection while he’s waiting for the next vaccine or dose.
- With more injections needed for single vaccines, your child will need more appointments. Some children may not finish the course of vaccines, leaving them unprotected.
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Many of us may never have seen a case of measles. So it's easy to forget how nasty an illness it can be. If your child is under one, he’s especially at risk of catching measles, mumps and rubella, and developing serious complications.
Measles in particular can lead to serious conditions. These include meningitis and inflammation of the brain (encephalitis). It’s these complications that can make measles extremely serious, or even fatal.
Mumps can have similar complications to measles, but it can also cause swelling of the genitals in boys (orchitis). Orchitis can lead to infertility.
Rubella is a mild illness in children, but is devastating to an unborn baby if a mum-to-be catches it in early pregnancy. The point of immunising the whole community is to reduce the risk of this happening.
Read more about how immunisation safely protects your child.
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Megan Rive is a communication, content strategy and project delivery specialist. She was Babycenter editor for six years.
