Ministry downplays link between vaccine and ME

The Ministry of Health says vaccines are not linked to the rare condition chronic fatigue syndrome, but it is monitoring developments in Norway, where recipients of a meningococcal B vaccine are being studied for a possible link.

The vaccine was given to more than 130,000 teenagers in the late 1980s in Norwegian trials and was the parent of the vaccine against the epidemic strain of meningococcal disease in New Zealand.

It was used in trials in New Zealand, but not in the mass vaccination programme in which more than 1 million young people have been vaccinated, the ministry says.

After a payout by Norway's patient injury compensation authority to a person with chronic fatigue syndrome (also called myalgic encephalomyelitis or ME) in 2003 following the trials, reportedly 70 more people who took part have been diagnosed with the condition.

Around 180,000 people took part in the vaccine trials, of whom around 136,000 received the vaccine, the rest having placebo injections, the ministry says.

NZ vaccination programme director Dr Jane O'Hallahan said yesterday the ministry was in contact with Norway's public health institute.

She understood from an official at the institute that the cohort which took part in the Norwegian trials, now aged 29-33, had a rate of chronic fatigue syndrome "no higher than before or after that birth cohort. We need to get that confirmed ... which is what we are seeking to do at the moment."

Dr O'Hallahan said no cases of chronic fatigue syndrome had been recorded in the database of adverse events following vaccination in the New Zealand programme.