A new study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases is taking on one of the most bitter battles in the medicinal world: the link between autism and vaccines. Complied by researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the article considered large-scale experiments conducted all over the world and came to a conclusion that has already been made by scientists: there simply is no evidence that vaccines cause autism.
Up to the very early 2000s, US vaccines had a preservative known as thimerosal, which, by weight, is about 50% mercury. Thimerosal has long been the scapegoat of causing autism, even though no vaccine given since 2001 contained “more than half of a microgram of mercury - about what is found in an infant's daily supply of breast milk.” [NY Times]
Evidence is piling up that proves thimerosal has nothing to do with autism. “A study by the World Health Organization, for example, examined the health records of 109,863 children born in Britain from 1988 to 1997 and found that children who had received the most thimerosal in vaccines had the lowest incidence of developmental problems like autism. Another study examined the records of 467,450 Danish children born from 1990 to 1996. It found that after 1992, when the country's only thimerosal-containing vaccine was replaced by one free of the preservative, autism rates rose rather than fell.” [NY Times]
Still, the battle wages on in 2009. The reason behind why vaccines have been so enthusiastically slammed for being a cause of autism is simple: most children develop autism between the ages of one and two, the exact same time they are given a vast range of vaccines. For some, the cause and effect of this relationship is clear. “'My grandson received nine shots in one day, seven of which contained thimerosal, which is 50 percent mercury as you know, and he became autistic a short time later,’ said [one man] in an interview." [NY Times]
In “On Autism's Cause, It's Parents vs. Research,” one of the best articles written on the topic which first appeared in the New York Times and then in Best American Science Writing 2006, Gardiner Harris and Anahad O’Connor wrote a sweeping story of the battle between desperate parents and the researchers working tirelessly to find a cause of autism and the fractures between them. Even when the article was written in 2005, there had been five large studies to show no link between thimerosal and autism. However, “despite all evidence to the contrary, the number of parents who blame thimerosal for their children's autism has only increased. The issue has become one of the most fractious and divisive in pediatric medicine. ‘This is like nothing I've ever seen before," Dr. Melinda Wharton, deputy director of the National Immunization Program, told a gathering of immunization officials in Washington in March [of 2005]. ‘It's an era where it appears that science isn't enough.’”[NY Times]
That era has no end in sight. The new study published this month, headed by Dr. Paul Offit, tackles the three main hypotheses of vaccine-induce autism. The first hypothesis deals specifically with the vaccine for MMR (measles-mumps-rubella). The second is the ever-popular thimerosal. The third is a more holistic approach which states that “simultaneous administration of multiple vaccines overwhelms or weakens the immune system.” [IDSA] By looking at worldwide studies of all these hypotheses, the doctors at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia have concluded once again that there is simply no correlation between vaccines and autism.
But even with yet another article written to disprove the theories, the battle will not end here. The rate of autism diagnoses is on the rise (from roughly 1 case for every 10,000 births in the 1980's to 1 in 166 births in 2003 [NY Times]) leaving parents more desperate than ever to find a cure. And because there is nothing else to latch onto, vaccines will remain the scapegoat. There is very little doubt that another article will be published in two or three years retelling the same story, trying once again to clear vaccines of guilt.
In the meantime, however, the continuation of this fight between parents and doctors causes several problems, the least of which is the fact that money and effort continues to be put into theories that have already been disproven, distracting scientists from investigating the true causes of autism. Even more frightening is a new wave of parents choosing not to vaccinate their children because they believe vaccines are the root of autism. However, “with outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases on the rise due to some worried parents choosing not to vaccinate their children,’ Dr. Offit said, ‘Parents should realize that a choice not to get a vaccine is not a risk-free choice. It's just a choice to take a different, and far more serious, risk.’” [IDSA]
UPDATE: On February 12, 2008, a special court ruled against families seeking compensation in their contention that vaccines caused autism. The CNN article can be found here.
Comments
Anyone that reads all those studies (or this new compilation) should also read about those studies' failures at the Generation Rescue website.
This is a very one-sided piece. I encourage parents to read RFK Jr's article at Huffington Post for a more balanced view, it's called:
Autism, Vaccines and the CDC: The Wrong Side of History
You also don't mention that Paul Offit is the holder of the patent for the Rotavirus vaccine and has made millions from its use.
You also don't mention that no study has ever looked at vaccinated vs unvaccinated children, the only real way to see if the tens of thousands of parent reports of regression after vaccination are accurate. Please do your homework.
JB Handley
www.generationrescue.org
When I discuss this issue now with medical/public health personnel I cut right to the chase.
“This is what your profession is defending. You inject newborns and infants with levels of mercury 250 times higher than EPA hazardous waste levels. The type of mercury you use is more toxic than methylmercury (sometimes I have to explain why). By using direct injection, you are providing instant access to the bloodstream and thus all target organs. Even you must agree, babies are more vulnerable to mercury damage.” End of discussion.
It actually is not true that ethyl mercury (the type used in vaccines) is more toxic than methyl mercury (which is the type found in fish). In fact, science has shown that the amount of ethyl mercury included in each childhood vaccine was once roughly equal to the amount of methyl mercury found in the average tuna sandwich.
And "250 times higher than EPA hazardous waste levels" seems to be a rather exaggerated statement that only serves to undermine the point you are attempting to make.
Get your facts straight Kate. The concentration of mercury in multi-dose vaccine vials is 50,000 ug/l. This can be easily confirmed (25 ug/0.5 ml dose =50ug/ml = 50,000 ug/l). This is the current level in flu, menningcoccal and tetanus vaccines.
This from the EPA website; "If mercury levels in a waste exceed the Toxicity Characteristic Leach Test (TCLP) level of 0.2 mg/L (200 ug/l) for mercury, then the waste is identified as a hazardous waste based on the toxicity characteristic".
Studies show that primates exposed to equal doses of injected ethylmercury as compared to ingested methylmercury retain twice as much Hg++ in the brain. This type of mercury, following de-methylization of organic mercury, has been identified as the proximate toxic agent in degenerative brain disease (1).
(1) Burbacher T, Shen D, Liberato N, Grant K, Cernichiari E, Clarkson T. 2005. Comparison of blood and brain mercury levels in infant monkeys exposed to methylmercury or vaccines containing thimerosal. Environmental Health Perspectives. 113:1015-1021
Could someone explain why ethyl mercury might be more toxic than methyl mercury. I had always heard that methyl is more toxic than ethyl. It appears that Meg has not read all the reports she is citing. I have. When I read the British study from 1988 to 1997, I couldn't help myself and wonder when the next new drug announcement would come out that would proclaim that Thimerosal is good for intellectual improvement. Give me a break! Is that where things are going?
Hi Birgit. This article will answer your question:
Regressive Autism: Putting Together the Pieces
By:Michael Wagnitz March 12, 2007
Rates of autism spectrum disorders have been rising at an alarming rate according to the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education, Data Analysis Services. Most of the new cases are regressive or late on-set autism. The diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorders are based on behavioral symptoms rather than a specific medical cause. In addition to psychological symptoms, many parents and physicians report conditions indicating a compromised immune system and gastrointestinal problems. This review looks at the most recent clinical studies indicating the causative agent may be mercury and tries to put this complicated puzzle together.
Autism is a term used to describe a condition which affects the immune, gastrointestinal and central nervous system. It has been shown that many of the physical and behavioral symptoms identified in children diagnosed with autism have been previously present in past cases of mercury poisoning (Bernard et al.2001).
Currently there is no known cause of autism identified in the medical literature, but by sifting through the most recently published clinical studies, one could make a compelling case that the causative agent is inorganic mercury (IHg). Analyses of first baby haircut samples have shown that autistic children retain seven times more mercury than neurologically typical controls (Holmes et al. 2003). Studies show that Macaca fascicularis primates that were dosed with chronic levels of methylmercury (MeHg) continued to accumulate IHg in the brain 6 months after the MeHg dosing had stopped. This clearance group showed a significant increase in microglial activity in the brain. Results from mercury speciation of the brain in these primates showed that MeHg concentration plateaued at about 12 months while the IHg fraction, derived from the demethylation of MeHg, continued to increase 6 months later. Autometallographic determination of the distribution of IHg by cell types showed microglial and astroglial cells contained significant more IHg deposits relative to other cells. This data suggests that IHg present in the brain is the toxic agent and responsible for the changes in the microglial and astroglial population (Charleston et al.1996).
Chronic microglial activation is recognized as an important component of neurodegenerative disease and neuroinflamation and contributes to neuronal dysfunction and injury. The recognition of microglial as the brains immune system and the understanding that chronic activation of this system leads to pathological consequences, has been the primary explanation for the current concept known as neuroinflamation (Streit et al. 2004). In a 2005 study brain tissue was obtained during autopsy from autistic patients. The author’s data show an active neroinflamatory process in the cerebral cortex, white matter and in the cerebellum of autistic patients. Immunocytochemical studies showed marked activation of the microglial and astroglial cells (Vargas et al.2005).
Another piece of the puzzle is provided in a recently published study comparing mercury brain levels in infant Macaca fascicularis primates exposed to injected ethylmercury and infant Macaca fascicularis primates exposed to equal amounts of ingested methylmercury (Burbacher et al. 2005). Primates exposed to the ethylmercuy retained twice as much IHg in their brains in comparison to the methylmercury exposed primates. These primates were exposed to mercury levels at a rate equal to what children in the United States received via standard childhood vaccines from 1991- 2003. This study did not take into account additional ethylmercury exposure from Rho D immunoglobulin injections that children of Rh negative mothers would have received during pregnancy nor does it look at mercury excretion issues.
While the Vargas study did not involve the testing for mercury, this future research, if undertaken, could provide a valuable piece to this puzzle.
References:
Bernard S, Enayati A, Redwood L, Roger H, Binstock T 2001 Autism: A novel form of mercury poisoning. Med. Hypotheses 56:462-471.
Holmes A, Blaxil M, Haley B. 2003. Reduced levels of mercury in first baby haircuts of autistic children. Int. Journal of Toxicology 22:277-285.
Charleston J, Body R, Bolender R, Mottet N, Vahter M, Burbacher T 1996. Changes in the number of astrocytes and microglia in the thalamus of the monkey Macaca fascicularis following long-term subclinical methylmercury exposure. Neurotoxicology 17:127-138
Streit W, Mrak R, Griffin W 2004. Microglia and neuroinflamation: a pathological perspective. Journal of Neuroinflamation 1:14
Vargus DL, Nascimbene C, Krishnan C, Zimmerman AW, Pardo Ca. 2005 Neuroglial activation and neuroinflamation in the brain of patients with autism. Annals of Neurology 57:67-81.
Burbacher T, Shen D, Liberato N, Grant K, Cernichiari E, Clarkson T. 2005. Comparison of blood and brain mercury levels in infant monkeys exposed to methylmercury or vaccines containing thimerosal. Environmental Health Perspectives. 113:1015-1021
Joe says: "This type of mercury, following de-methylization of organic mercury, has been identified as the proximate toxic agent in degenerative brain disease."
Joe, what's your point. Autistic kids do not have degenerative brain disease
Right!??? The "thimerosal" red-herring again?
How much do you shills make for this propaganda?
Hi Keithwren, Give this a read:
Vargus DL, Nascimbene C, Krishnan C, Zimmerman AW, Pardo Ca. 2005 Neuroglial activation and neuroinflamation in the brain of patients with autism. Annals of Neurology 57:67-81.
In the “On Autism's Cause, It's Parents vs. Research,” article Gardiner Harris refers to the amount of mercury in vaccines as "miniscule". Is he refering to these numbers?
The concentration of mercury in multi-dose vaccine vials is 50,000 ug/l. This can be easily confirmed (25 ug/0.5 ml dose =50ug/ml = 50,000 ug/l). This is the current level in flu, menningcoccal and tetanus vaccines.
This from the EPA website; "If mercury levels in a waste exceed the Toxicity Characteristic Leach Test (TCLP) level of 0.2 mg/L (200 ug/l) for mercury, then the waste is identified as a hazardous waste based on the toxicity characteristic".
If a level of mercury 250 times higher than hazardous waste levels is refered to as miniscule, I'm going to take Mr. Gardiners word that parents don't have a clue!
"Another study examined the records of 467,450 Danish children born from 1990 to 1996. It found that after 1992, when the country's only thimerosal-containing vaccine was replaced by one free of the preservative, autism rates rose rather than fell.” [NY Times]
Could this be because in 1995 they started counting autistic outpaitents in addition to the autistic inpaitents? Since autistic outpaitents in Denmark numbered inpaitents by a factor of 13:1, you would expect a 13 fold increase in 1995-1996. Pretty tricky them researchers are! The NY Times though is never wrong on anything.
One thing I found interesting about the Denmarck study, the rates of autism in Denmark are 1:10 the rate of the U.S. In the thimerosal study from Italy last week the rate was 1:1704. Hmmm! The rates in the U.S. are now believed to be 1:80. Those silly researcher's wouldn't be fudging their data to please the studie's sponsor (CDC) would they?
Why are lies allowed to be printed in the newspaper and online? For starters, every vaccine since 2001 does NOT contain just .5 mcg. of Thimerosal. Some contain 25 micrograms of Thimerosal! This article is so loaded with mistruths and outright lies, I dont even know where to start.
It's tobacco science - epidemiological studies that supposedly "disprove" the autism/vaccine link, just as the tobacco industry paraded its epidemiological studies to "disprove" the tobacco/lung cancer link. Once again, we're falling for flawed studies.
I wonder if Paul Offit has an explanation for this:
103 dead babies according to the government data base called VAERS. Those babies died after receiving Rotateq or a round of vaccines that included Rotateq. Read them for yourselves please. Many deaths were within hours or days of vaccines.
This is why Paul Offit is such a busy man. The more he can villify parents, the more he can distract from the fact that his vaccine is killing babies.
I'm sorry I could not include a link on my previous comment due to the rules of this publication. To view the 103 infant deaths related to the administration or co-administration of Rotateq - the vaccine developed by Dr. Paul Offit, google these five words: age of autism vaers rotateq
Then click on the top link and when you get to the article, click on "Click HERE" to see the reports.
Dead babies don't lie.
Wow. I am shocked, shocked that Dr. Paul Offit is considered an objective "expert" on vaccines and autism. How about mentioning that he sold a vaccine for $108 Million. Would you use the CEO of Jack Daniels or the top executive of RJR Reynolds as experts on the dangers of alcohol and cigarettes. They can probably drag out some neat scientific studies for you. Maybe there is a study about leaches and blood-letting you could run too.
And just wondering how many parents the author of this story has ever talked to who have seen their children develop autism symptoms right after receiving their vaccines. One, two, any? Is that good science to not even talk to the people impacted. Or do you just believe everything every government agency says. Did you see the story this week that mercury was found in corn syrup which is used as sweeteners in most foods on the shelves of grocery stores. Did you also note that the FDA knew about this. No, I didn't think so. Didn't see that in your blog.
This story is yet another example of "vaccine happy talk" in which the reality of thousands of parents are marginalized.
I, like many others, including members of Congress, are waiting for an independent study which examines the full slate of vaccines given to today's children. The following is from a bill in front of Congress H. R. 2832. This bill would direct the Secretary of HHS to conduct or support a comprehensive study comparing total health outcomes, including risk of autism, in vaccinated populations in the United States with such outcomes in unvaccinated populations in the United States.
"Securing the health of the Nation's children is our most important concern as parents and stewards of the Nation's future. The Nation's vaccine program has greatly reduced human suffering from infectious disease by preventing and reducing the outbreak of vaccine-preventable diseases. Childhood immunizations are an important tool in the pursuit of childhood health." But, the bill notes, "The number of immunizations administered to infants, pregnant women, children, teenagers, and adults has grown dramatically over recent years. The incidence of chronic, unexplained diseases such as autism, learning disabilities, and other neurological disorders appears to have increased dramatically in recent years...Individual vaccines are tested for safety, but little safety testing has been conducted for interaction effects of multiple vaccines. The strategy of aggressive, early childhood immunization against a large number of infectious diseases has never been tested in its entirety against alternative strategies, either for safety or for total health outcomes."
Let's fund the study as called for by Congress. Would be great to see this type of study done. It has never been done and I think until it is done, this controversy will only continue.
And if you asked any parents, you hear that it isn't just mercury that is a problem. It is the overload of vaccines given to children. For my son, it was the MMR that did him in. In fact, doctors have told us he has measles in his small intestine. And this directly came from the live measles virus in the MMR.
Anyone got a cool link about that that will take any my son's health problems?
This latest study has some serious methodological defects.
Vaccines with “trace” amounts of Thimerosal, by definition, “contain less than 1 microgram of mercury (Hg) per dose.” For example, consider that the reduced-Thimerosal flu vaccine with 0.0002% mercury is equivalent to 1 microgram [µg] of Hg per 0.5 mL, or 2 µg of Hg per mL, which is the same as 2000 µg per liter; or 2000 parts per billion [ppb].
0.5 parts per billion (ppb) mercury has been shown to kill human neuroblastoma cells (Parran et al., Toxicol Sci 2005; 86:132–40).
2 ppb mercury is the U.S. EPA limit for drinking water .
20 ppb mercury destroys neurite membrane structures (Leong et al., Neuroreport 2001:12733–7).
200 ppb mercury is the level in liquid that the EPA classifies as hazardous waste).
25,000 ppb mercury is the concentration of mercury in multidose, Hepatitis B vaccine vials, administered at birth from 1991-2001 in the U.S.
50,000 ppb mercury is the concentration of mercury in mul-ti-dose DTP and Haemophilus B vaccine vials, administered 8 times in the 1990’s to children at 2, 4, 6, 12 and 18 months of age and currently “preservative” level mercury in multidose flu, meningococcal and tetanus (7 and older) vaccines. See the MedicalVeritas website for more information.
according to vaccine inserts and the CDC website..trace amounts can include up to 3ppm, not 1. And the writer needs to stop regurgatating media and CDC lies - thimerosal was not out of all vaccines by 2001. vaccines in warehouses and on doctors shelves with the full dose of thimerosal did not expire until 2007. MY son received full 25mcg of thimerosal in his DPT shot in 2003 - i have the maker and lot number. stop repeating the lie.
and most of the immune system's ability to deal with mercury in the body is found in the digestive tract which helps escourt it from the body. the body is at a severe disadvantage when it is injected into the bloodstream. the mercury does leave the bloodstream quickly, but cannot be accounted for in excretions, which means it gets holed up in the body and brain tissue. There have been studies showing everthying I am saying, but the CDC keeps chanting the lie, and ignorant reporters who have no idea what investigative journalism is, keep parroting the lie. get a new career, Meg.
In the first place, just because there is a study that makes your point, does not mean the theroy has been disproven.
Secondly, The last sentence in your article states that the risks on not vaccinating "are far more serious". Appearantly you and your source dont have to live with Autism everyday.
Trey Dockery
CEO, The Dockery Foundation
"Autism Education. One Person at a Time."
Meg, you said that a report “came to a conclusion that has already been made by scientists: there simply is no evidence that vaccines cause autism.”
THIS STATEMENT IS INCORRECT!
That conclusion has not been reached by scientists.
Please look at graph 3 on page 15 of the Thimerosal VSD Study dated 2/29/2000 by Dr. Thomas Verstraeten of the US Centers for Disease Control. It is marked “Confidential – Do Not Copy or Release” and was obtained using the Freedom of Information Act. See nomercurydotorg.
You see a relative risk for Autism of 2.48 for mercury exposure of 75 micrograms from Thimerosal at 3 months.
Then look at the CDC Simpsonwood 2000 meeting transcript at page 163. See safemindsdotorg.
Dr. Robert Brent, Developmental Biologist and Pediatrician from Thomas Jefferson University and Dupont Hospital for Children, says “The other thing is that each time you have an exposure there is a certain amount of irreversible damage, and that as you [increase] exposure the damage adds up. Not because of dose, but because they are irreversible.”
You may claim that the NY Times article “On Autism's Cause, It's Parents vs. Research,” is "one of the best articles written on the topic" but a contrary view was taken by the Columbia Review of Journalism.
"Drug Test" by Daniel Schulman called the NY Times piece "one-sided." It quotes leading scientists who protested the biased NY Times article: "Responding to the article in a June 28 letter to the Times (never published), signed by Susser, Lipkin, Hornig, and the epidemiologist Michaeline Bresnahan, the researchers wrote that “scientists pursuing research on mercury and autism are caricaturized as immune to the ‘correct’ interpretation of existing studies. Researchers rejecting a link are depicted as the sole voices of reason . . . . Whether mercury in any form (or any of several factors recently introduced to our environment) has anything to do with autism can and should be resolved with rigorous studies and respectful discourse, not moral indictments and denunciations.'”
To read "Drug Test" by Daniel Schulman go to: Columbia Journalism Review, 2005 Issue 6: November/December
Meg – you are writing as if you are covering a new study by Offit. Offit wrote an opinion piece, not a study.
2nd – concern over thimeresol does not begin and end with autism. A voluntary subset of 70% an Italian group exposed to low amounts of thimeresol proved that an incremental dose of just 75mg is sufficient to produce a statistically significant measurement of injury in girls resulting in language and motor impairment 10 years after the exposure.
Also, a full 25 milligrams of mercury are in current flu shots, and stockpiles of old shots were in use well past 2001. In mid 2002, the hospital my child was born in did not carry a thimeresol free hepatitis B vaccine.
You state “the doctors at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia have concluded once again that there is simply no correlation between vaccines and autism”, however, the article only looks at the correlation between MMR rates and autism, not all vaccines. A correlation can be explained, but you not say one doesn't exist between the number of vaccines in the schedule and the rise in autism, or the administration of childhood vaccines and the onset of autism.
Your quoted rate of 1 in 166 shows a willingness to look the other way. The CDC itself quotes that 1 in 150 8 year olds have an ASD. More recent studies have shown rates of 1 in 94 in New Jersey, 1 in 88 amongst military families, 1 in 28 amongst Somali immigrants in Minnesota, and a very recent UK study showing rates of 1 in 13 amongst children of mothers who took a particular epilepsy medication while pregnant.
You are very wrong to frame this as a fight between parents and doctors. A review of e-letters in Pediatrics will disagreement amongst doctors themselves on questions of vaccine safety, the schedule, and vaccine choice.
Finally, I have to ask how the case off Hannah Poling is being aggressively avoided. Hannah's injuries resembling autism were conceded as being caused by vaccines. We do not know how common her situation is. Some suggest the rate of mitochondrial disorders are in the range of autism disorders.
There are likely many causes of childhood developmental injury. There is a responsibility to determine who might be injured prior to vaccination. That responsibility has been shirked by those who declare the need for further research and discussion is over.
ugh - that should have been 25 micrograms of mercury still in many flu shots, not milligrams below.
Hi Joe! Thank you for the article about why ethyl mercury is more toxic than methyl mercury! I can see that that is possible. I have read about Burbacher before. I just haven't seen anything actually written by him even though I tried to find his reports. Wagnitz talks about testing mercury etc. Graham George now in Calgary, Canada, who used to be at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center has measured methylmercury coming from fish and going to the brain as it was happening. He gave a lecture a number of years ago in which he described his method.
Meg writes ‘Thimerosal has long been the scapegoat of causing autism, even though no vaccine given since 2001 contained “more than half of a microgram of mercury - about what is found in an infant's daily supply of breast milk.’ This is a lie. There is still twelve and a half to twenty five micrograms of thimerosal in flu shots, which are now routinely recommended to pregnant women and babies. This information can be easily found on the FDA’s website.
When my child was three we were told by the gastro intestinal specialist that she was seeing she might have autism. She was never subsequently diagnosed, but I did some research at that time, and one of the first things I did was call the Autism Research Institute, where I spoke with the late Dr. Bernard Rimland. When I asked him why the traditional medical establishment didn’t recommend that children with autism take megadoses of vitamin B6, which ARI was advocating at that time, his words chilled me to the bone. He said “I don’t know but it’s seemed to me almost as if they don’t want the cause to be found”, and when I asked him who ‘they’ were he said “there are a lot of people getting government money to do research.”
What I’ve found in the four or five years since I’ve read David Kirby’s Evidence of Harm is that the people who are willing to ignore the evidence for a link between autism and vaccines are not, for the most part, willing to do so without remaining anonymous. The vaccine damage apologists are down to a few like Paul Offit, who’s profited from vaccine patents and a book about the glories of vaccines, or the president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, someone who also has huge conflicts of interest in that pediatricians make a ton of money simply by making sure that vaccine compliance remains high. Or the neurodiverse—those unusual people who believe that there’s nothing really wrong with a child who can’t communicate except to yell in pain, who spins, who smears his feces on the walls.
Why do the vaccine damage apologists always pretend that there are no well respected scientists or doctors supporting parents who believe autism can be caused by vaccine damage? There are a great many, as a quick internet search will reveal. Why doesn’t Meg mention that the former head of the National Institute of Health, Bernadine Healy, believes there’s a great deal of evidence for a link?
In the years that I’ve spent trying to enlighten people here in the Cleveland area about vaccine damage, I’ve been banned from political internet chat rooms on both the left and the right, censored on local internet autism support forums, and threatened with arrest simply for standing on a public sidewalk and politely asking people if they’d like information about vaccine safety.
Ms. Goldberg has yet to apologise to me for lying to me and about me regarding this incident. Is she still the president of the local Chapter of Autism Speaks, or have they canned her yet? Rumor has it Autism Speaks has begun to see the light on vaccine damage, so one can hope.
The vaccine damage apologists are desperate indeed.
More and more scientists –and in my opinion most of those who retain an ounce of self respect-- have begun to admit that the evidence that autism is genetic rather than environmental is slim. There is only one reason that a vaccinated versus unvaccinated study has not be undertaken by the same public healthcare agencies that injected our children—oops—with toxic levels of mercury for decades. That reason is because they are horribly afraid of the truths that will then be so obviously revealed, not just about autism but many other chronic illnesses such as ADHD and asthma and other auto-immune disorders.
Robin Nemeth writes:
"More and more scientists –and in my opinion most of those who retain an ounce of self respect-- have begun to admit that the evidence that autism is genetic rather than environmental is slim."
Robin, you cannot divide environmental and genetic. Consider the end result of genetic mutations. Not only Autism, but also all the more than 8,000 genetic diseases are caused by gene mutations. Environmental toxins cause all gene mutations.
The minuscule amount of mercury in the blood stream is like a “drop in the bucket” compared to the amount of deadly chemicals that everyone that reads this post submits their family to every day in their own home environment.
The US Environmental Protection agency says that the air in the homes in urban and rural America is routinely 5 to 30 times as toxic as the outside air, and can be as much as 100 times as toxic. Consequently, the Agency (EPA) rates indoor air pollution among the top environmental health risks.
Scientists have been studying the effects of the pollutants our homes for decades. Their conclusion? "The combination of breathing the poisons and absorbing them through our skin from generation to generation has resulted in a catastrophic epidemic of health problems".
By now anyone is reading this will be No-Humming me. We know all these chemicals in our “Tide”, Cascade, Makeup, Tooth paste, hair spray, hand cream, etc have to be judged safe or the companies would not be allowed to make the stuff and sell it. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
Actually, they are determined to be safe before they any of them are put on the market! We should all be encouraged, and I probably should be ashamed that I brought the subject up.
Maybe not, we didn’t yet determine who is responsible for the testing to assure they are safe. There are more than 80,000 different ones. The responsible for determining their safety is… With NO testing on a life form, You would never guess… The chemical companies that make them! If they say they are fine and dandy, that is good enough! Feel safer now??
The Federal government will, and dose approve these Deadly chemicals for home care product. This process is completed in only a week, yes, only one week the government has found something they can approve. These same chemicals, if used in the work place require safety equipment that resembles a space suit, but in your home, you can wear them, ingest them, breath them, rub them on your body, or anything you decide to do with them!
The absorption of those deadly chemicals is overwhelming to the immune systems and consequently is adversely affecting every bodily organ for you, for your family, and even more especially for the baby in the womb.
Chemicals are a necessary part of our microscopic life. Natural chemicals, that is. When our microscopic life is bombarded with synthetic chemical interrupters, disaster can, and will occur.
The baby in the womb is at a critical window of vulnerability. In the nine months of gestation the human body undergoes phenomenal changes and its most rapid growth, making it especially susceptible to environmental toxins.
For the unborn baby, many different environmentally toxic synthetic chemical interrupters readily cross the placenta, which is the primary source of nutrients for the baby. It is through the placental circulation that these toxins may enter into the babies’ blood supply and are distributed throughout the developing organ systems. This does not allow the organs to develop appropriately. The end result is catastrophic.
While environmental toxins in the mother’s blood stream may result in enormous clinical effects in the mother, there may be much more detrimental, long-lasting, effects to the baby. As neurotoxins enter the babies’ blood supply, they can affect the specificity of the brain’s network of connections, permanently altering a child’s intelligence and the ability to development.
The developing brain with its complex network of connections is at greater risk to toxic insults than the fully developed adult brain." Compared to the mother’s dose of exposure, the developing infant is exposed to greater quantities of environmental chemicals per pound of body weight. This is compounded by the fact that developing babies have immature immune and metabolic systems, which may make the baby less able to detoxify harmful chemicals.
This gives us important information about the various conditions that are involved in what our newborn babies turn out to be… eaten up with cancer or with any other of the thousands of genetic diseases when there is no history in either side of the family tree.
If you would like information on many of the different ways your child can have a genetic disease that is not already a part of the family tree, email me and I will put it together for you.
keithwren@ourlifeline.net
Research by Laura Curran and colleagues may hold a clue to the perceived connection between vaccination and autism. Their research discovered that autistic spectrum symptoms are reduced during the time that infants have a fever. Rodney Cotterill had published details of similar findings in Nature as early 1985, in a paper titled 'Fever in Autistics', though there seems to have been little further research in this area until recently.
Autistic spectrum symptoms generally develop quite slowly. In a proportion of cases it could well be that, because of their slow onset, existing symptoms would not have been noticed at the time of vaccination. Vaccination can cause a fever. Fever reduces autistic spectrum symptoms, and these then return as it abates.
Because the symptoms return relatively rapidly as the fever comes to an end, and because parents may be more aware of nuances of behaviour at such times, this may be the point when symptoms which already existed are first noticed.
In these situations, when autism is subsequently diagnosed, they will not unreasonably conclude that as the symptoms appeared soon after vaccination it was the vaccination that caused the autism.
If this explanation for anecdotal accounts is indeed correct, it would go some way towards explaining the persistence of the urban myth. For to say that there is no connection whatsoever between the vaccination and the symptoms is, in effect, to call those parents who observe such a connection liars. A proportion will, not without justification, dig in their heels and say that the scientists are wrong; because the epidemiological conclusions deny the evidence of their own eyes.
The myth that the MMR vaccination causes autism can be expected to disappear only when this correlation, that the jab may cause symptoms to come to notice, is recognised and acknowledged. As the recent figures on measles infections show, the fear of vaccination has had damaging consequences.
Possibly what is needed is research into the roots of the urban myth, rather than assurances from politicians which no one really trusts. It's certainly a mistake to treat all parents as stupid.
David Pollard, you said “A proportion will, not without justification, dig in their heels and say that the scientists are wrong; because the epidemiological conclusions deny the evidence of their own eyes.”
Perhaps a bit of wisdom from Will Rogers, from the past and across the pond, might help here. “If stupidity got us into this mess, then why can't it get us out?"
David, epidemiological conclusions DO NOT deny evidence of harm. And scientists do not say there is NO evidence of harm.
I was just threatened by a computer person who works for the state judicial system about sending him the JFK, Jr. interview by scarborough & saying there must be something to Mercury connection. if both the left & right agree. He put himself out as a male who was interested in the National Org. of Women & became a vice pres in Hbg. Beware of false friends - I don't have to worry because I am also a 2nd Amendment supporter, he stays distant.
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