My name is Michele Keller.  I live in Altoona, PA.

On March 27, 1999, I held my sister's hand as she gave birth to a beautiful,

perfectly healthy baby girl with thick auburn hair.  My sister, the baby's

father and I all cried tears of joy.  I jumped up and down uncontrollably.  I

was so happy.  I had wanted her baby to be a girl so that my own daughter

would have a playmate and someone to grow up with.  They named her Amanda

Renee.

In early June 1999, Amanda went to her doctor for her vaccinations.  On that

very day, the doctor claimed that Amanda was "perfect".

On June 23, 1999, I received a phone call at work to immediately go to my

sister's house.  When I arrived, there were police cars and ambulances all

around.  My father sat on the front porchsteps bawling.  Amanda was dead. 

Inside, my sister was lying on the floor begging someone to wake her up from

this nightmare.  Amanda's father looked like a zombie.

I immediately dropped to the floor and held my sister.  After a few seconds,

I was ushered out of the house so that the scene could be investigated and

the parents could be questioned.

Amanda's death was declared as SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome).

Shortly after that day, I began researching SIDS.  I found that SIDS occurs

way more often than I had ever imagined.  There were actually many people

that I knew fairly well who had lost either a child or sibling or other

relative to SIDS but had never discussed it with me until I lost my niece.

I began to realize that something just was not right with this thing called

SIDS.  It just was not making sense that this many perfectly healthy babies

were just dying without warning and without any known reason.  I found it

hard to believe that researchers were putting the effort they claimed into

finding a cause and cure for SIDS and were coming up with virtually nothing.

When I stumbled across information that linked vaccination to SIDS, I set out

to disprove (in my own mind) such a ridiculous theory.  There was no way that

this complicated 'disease' could have such a simple explanation.  Surely if

vaccination was a cause, this would have already been known and the problem

would have been solved many years ago.

What I found was so much information that just made too much sense to simply

ignore.  The majority of SIDS cases occurs between the ages of two and four

months.  This is precisely the same time that babies are given their first

set of vaccinations.  Boy babies are at a higher risk of dying from SIDS and

also are reported to be more likely to have adverse reactions to

vaccinations.  Breastfed babies are at a lower risk of dying from SIDS. 

Breastfed babies are more capable of fighting off diseases (such as those

being injected through vaccination) because of the natural immunities that a

mother's milk provides.  In Japan, when they raised the age that first

vaccinations were to be given, SIDS was nearly eliminated.

I took these common sense links between SIDS and vaccinations and started

asking questions.  What I came across was what I refer to as "The Coincidence

Theory".  No one could reasonably explain away these links.  Over and over

and over again I was given the same answer.  "It's just a coincidence."  Now

I believe wholeheartedly that many coincidences can occur, but their is a

limit to what my mind is willing to accept as 'just coincidence'.

Most people did not want to even hear the suggestion that vaccination was a

possible cause for SIDS.  Many became rude and some refused any further

contact with me.  They could not give me any reason for their behavior and no

common sense facts that would disclaim any of the information that I had been

finding.

Can you believe that the investigating staff that escorted me out the door of

my sister's home on that horrible day, would go through the effort to

question two loving parents on the worst day of their life, yet would not

even bother to ask if Amanda had recently received any medications or shots

that could have caused a bad reaction?  Why didn't they ask?  Is there a

reason that they do not want this information documented?  My guess is that

if it isn't documented, no one will really know and no one can use the

statistics to build a solid case.

In October 2000 a very good friend of mine lost her one-year-old grandson

within a week of receiving his MMR vaccination.  His doctor told his mother

that he was in perfect health the day he gave him this injection.  The

details of this case are very unsettling and of course vaccination is not

listed as the cause of death for this child either.

These are two cases that I personally know of that you will not find in any

of the statistics that claim vaccinations are almost always completely safe. 

You will not even find them listed as a possible reaction.  These two deaths

of perfectly healthy children have been completely dismissed of any

possibility of being caused by vaccination.  I have to wonder how many other

possibilities have been eliminated from the statistics that I have read.