Are vaccines correlated with SIDS?

This story is about a baby, born at 35 weeks gestation, who ultimately died of SIDS around four months old. Before his death, he was hospitalized with RSV in February. On March 1, he was vaccinated and found dead during the night, March 4

It’s unlikely that the vaccine caused Mason’s death, as SIDS is a known cause of death, and vaccines are not correlated with SIDS.

SIDS often occurs in the age range when infants receive vaccines as part of their routine immunization schedule. Also, premature babies and babies who have recently had respiratory illnesses are at increased risk of SIDS.

The overwhelming consensus from multiple studies and medical organizations is that there is no evidence to support a causal relationship between vaccines and SIDS.  In fact, research has shown that infants receiving vaccines are at a lower risk of SIDS than those not vaccinated.

We also have the claim that the chance of death with pertussis is 0.00000625%. This claim is likely comparing the number of deaths from pertussis to that of the entire population. However, if you look at just babies who get pertussis in the first six months of life, half will end up in the hospital, 20% of them will end up with pneumonia, and 1 in 100 will die.

Also, prior to vaccination, the mortality rate of babies due to pertussis was 0.0045%. Because so many babies are now vaccinated against pertussis, it looks like vaccines have lowered that number significantly.