My daughter Lyla Rose Belkin died on September 16, 1998 at the age of five weeks, shortly after receiving a Hepatitis B vaccine booster shot. The following comments are intended to be a heads up to parents and potential parents about the risks of the Hepatitis B vaccine (HBV), and a firsthand report questioning the scientific legitimacy of the vaccine industry, which provides $800 million of annual revenue to Merck – the company which makes the Hepatitis B vaccine distributed in the US.
Lyla Rose Belkin was a lively, alert five-week-old baby when I last held her in my arms. Little did I imagine as she gazed intently into my eyes with all the innocence and wonder of a newborn child that she would die that night. She was never ill before receiving the Hepatitis B shot that afternoon. At her final feeding that night, she was agitated and feisty -- and then fell asleep and didn’t wake up.
The autopsy ruled out choking. A swollen brain was the only abnormal finding. Most doctors I spoke to at the time said it must have been Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), a catch-all diagnosis for unexplainable childhood mortality.