Good morning -

One thing I've learned over the years debating was to be careful about the "correlation/causation" logical fallacy. As soon as I read the statement above, I looked up to see what the prevalence was for all children, not just those who are vaccinated, and yes, Black children as a whole are more likely to be found with Autism Spectrum Disorder than those of other races.

In other words, it appears the vaccine had nothing at all to do with the increased prevalence of autism among Black people, that the increase was *already* there. For example, one could just as accurately state that McDonald's is racist because while Black and White people eat McDonald's, more Black children wind up being diagnosed with ASD.

You know I don't deny for a moment the racism that informs every segment of American society, but in this, if other Black men and women don't get vaccinated against COVID, many more may become infected and die, or if they don't die, wind up with the long-term health effects we're beginning to see.

Again, YES, there is a long, long history of racism in the medical community...but that doesn't automatically mean it applies in this instance.

Please don't be an anti-vaxxer - modern vaccines save lives of every race.

Here's my link for the prevalence of autism among races:

https://www.aappublications.org/content/early/2014/03/27/aapnews.20140327-1