An updated Cochrane review, covering more than 23 million children, confirms the efficacy of MMR vaccines and finds no evidence for a link with autism or a range of other conditions.

The review assessing vaccine effectiveness and potential harms adds another 74 studies to those canvased in the last update in 2012, and for the first time, includes data on use of MMR plus varicella vaccine and the tetravalent MMRV vaccine.

Two studies of more than one million children provided moderate certainty that there was no evidence that the vaccines were associated with autistic spectrum disorder, with rates of diagnosed cases similar between vaccinated and unvaccinated children, the researchers say.

“In agreement with results from other studies and reviews, we did not find a significant association between autism and MMR exposure,” write the authors, noting that although the infamous 1998 Wakefield study that linked the vaccine with autism had been fully retracted, concerns about adverse events continue to be promulgated.