The Un-Truth About Autism
There have certainly been many questionable articles dismissing the suspected vaccine-autism connection, but the San Francisco Chronicle opinion-piece (The Truth About Autism) written by Kaiser Permanente pediatrician Dr. Rahul K. Parikh is probably one of the more egregious in its twisting of the truth.
Parikh begins by discussing one of his patients:
“Since learning of her son’s diagnosis, Andy’s mother had been vigilant. In her research, which she presented to me in a binder, she was positive about two things:
First, Andy was part of an epidemic of autism that has afflicted kids during the past 20 years. Second, the routine, life-saving vaccines that Andy had received during the first two years of his life had at least contributed to — if not been — the cause of his illness.
On both of these issues, nothing could have been further from the truth.”
One would think such a bold statement denying a vaccine-autism link would be followed by strong supporting evidence. However, Parikh fails to provide that.
Instead, Parikh says:
“The increase in autism cases is due to a better understanding of the disorder and its prevalence.”
Parikh goes on to provide nothing but subjective reasoning to support this claim:
- There is “more professional and public awareness.”
- Kids previously classified as mentally retarded or developmentally disabled are now classified as autistic.
- There is greater incentive to diagnose kids with these disorders because kids diagnosed on the autistic spectrum qualify for state aid.
Question:
If the increase is just a case of better diagnosis, where are all the 40 year-old autistic people? If there has been no change in the rate of autism, there should be millions of autistic older adults.
And, yet, there aren’t.
Seriously, how many people over the age of 35 can even remember one person with autism while in school as a child?
Anyone who has interacted with autistic children knows that their behaviors are readily observable and difficult to hide. It is highly unlikely that autistic children would not have been noticed or mis-classified in previous generations.
Today, a classroom without a child (or several children) with autism is atypical. In fact, many school districts are buckling under the financial pressures created by the need for separate classes and programs for autistic children.
Parikh goes on to cite questionable epidemiological evidence as “proof” of no vaccine-autism connection:
“And although the research results have been soundly disproved by several subsequent studies (a 2002 study in the New England Journal of Medicine evaluated more than 500,000 children), the myth about autism and vaccines remains widespread.”
New England Journal of Medicine? 500,000 children? Sounds impressive, right? Surely that was Parikh’s intended purpose for including those details.
Parikh continues:
“Even though large, well-conducted studies have shown no link between thimerasol and autism, the compound has been removed from most vaccines because medical professionals feared a rash of vaccine refusals by parents.”
Uh, well not really.
In 1999, the FDA asked vaccine manufacturers to remove thimerosal from child vaccinations after adding the mercury contained in the existing vaccination schedule and finding that it well exceeded government exposure safety levels (by more than 100 fold). Existing vaccine stocks with thimerosal were not ordered recalled, so children may have received shots containing mercury for several years following the FDA request.
Today, thimerosal remains in the vast majority of flu shots (now part of the recommended vaccination schedule) given to children, adults, and even pregnant women. The CDC places no warning on giving mercury-containing flu shots to any group. Additionally, thimerosal is found in several other adult vaccines, including the tetanus-diphtheria booster shot. You can find a complete list here.
The fact is that not only can epidemiological studies not prove causation, but, as has been highlighted frequently in the past, some of the studies that Parikh cites as proof of no connection were also either of extremely poor statistical design and/or were revised until the desired statistical results were achieved.
For example, journalist Sharyl Atkinson details the latter in an excellent recent CBS News blog post:
“…One of the best examples of this is the landmark autism/vaccine study published in Pediatrics. Early in his study, the lead author, CDC’s Dr. Thomas Verstraeten, found statistically significant associations between the amount of mercury (thimerosal) exposure kids got from their childhood vaccines, and a wide range of brain disorders. However, the published version of the study (the one the authors say is accurate) found no evidence of a link to autism. Not disclosed was that Dr. Verstraeten had left CDC midstream during the study and had gone to work for Glaxo, a vaccine manufacturer. That failure to disclose was criticized in a later publication of Pediatrics, but it got little mainstream attention. Also getting little attention was a letter from well-respected scientists, also in Pediatrics, who echoed what parents of autistic children had been saying for months: they questioned the use and exclusion of certain data from Dr. Verstraeten’s study that eventually reduced the statistical ties between vaccines and neurodisorders…”
Parikh says:
“Stephen Goodman, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University, has reviewed autism statistics for the past 30 years, and has this perspective: “The explosive increase that has been claimed is almost certainly not true. The numbers, if they’re rising, are not rising very quickly.”
Goodman said this even in light of a recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that shows 1 in 150 children are autistic. That’s because the study tells us only the current numbers of kids with autism. It says nothing about trends.”
So, if we are to listen to Dr. Parikh, the severity of the trend is of more importance than the fact that 1 out of 150 children are diagnosed with autism.
Can you imagine if 1 out of 150 children were being diagnosed with cancer? Going blind? Becoming paralyzed?
Can you imagine the public uproar that would ensue?
Parikh says:
“And on trial here, for absolutely no scientific reason, is the medical breakthrough of the 20th century — vaccines that definitively prevent disease and have saved, literally, countless numbers of lives.”
For “absolutely no scientific reason”? Here, Parikh displays either his dishonesty or his ignorance.
There is, of course, a copious amount of scientific evidence suggesting a possible link. Surely (hopefully?) Parikh knows that such biomedical evidence is being used as a primary basis for the current vaccine court case. The fact that Parikh and other professionals and “experts” write opinion pieces like his that conveniently fail to discuss the biomedical evidence, doesn’t deny its existence.
In fact, journalist and author David Kirby has put together a solid short list of the evidence from studies conducted by researchers at leading institutions:
(Citations later added by Kirby in a separate newsgroup posting.)
1) Many children with autism, probably due to genetics, are deficient in certain sulfur-based proteins that defend against heavy metal accumulation in humans. The proteins, which include glutathione, are called “thiols,” and sometimes “mercaptans,” from the Latin mercurium captans, or literally “mercury capturers.”
UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS – ARKANSAS CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL
PUBLISHED IN BIOLOGY2) Many children with autism show signs of heavy metal accumulation, including elevated levels of proteins called “prophyrins” a bio-marker of lead and mercury toxicity. They also present with low levels of mercury in baby haircuts, (versus control children) suggesting a heavy metal “efflux disorder” that prevents the proper metabolism and excretion of heavy metals.
LABORATOIRE PHILIPPE AUGUSTE, PARIS, FRANCE
PUBLISHED IN TOXICOLOGY AND APPLIED PHARMACOLOGY3) Exposure to extremely low doses (micromolars) of thimerosal, previously thought to be safe, shut down 25% of brain stem cells, in one lab study.
UNIVERISTY OF ROCHESTER
PUBLISHED IN PLoS BIOLOGY4) In another, low-level exposures of a few minutes duration killed many of the immune system’s “dendritic” cells, disrupted production of immune-system messenger chemicals called “cytokines,” and caused inflammation.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT DAVIS
PUBLISHED IN ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES (NIH)5) Meanwhile, many children with autism show signs of immune deficiency AND hyperactivity, as well as cytokine imbalances and inflammation, (they also show signs of chronic autoimmunity, where the immune system attacks the body and brain).
U.C. DAVIS M.I.N.D. INSTITUTE
POSTER PRESENTATION AT THE 2005 INTERNATIONAL MEETING FOR AUTISM RESEARCH (IMFAR)6) Organic ethylmercury from thimerosal crosses the blood-brain barrier in primates, where it quickly converts to inorganic mercury, which can remain trapped in the brain for decades.
UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRIMATE CENTER
PUBLISHED IN ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES (NIH)7) Inorganic mercury trapped in primate brains caused neuro-inflammation (ie, rapid brain growth) by activating “glial” cells in the brain.
UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRIMATE CENTER
PUBLISHED IN NEUROTOXICOLOGY8) Autopsies on autistic human brains found chronic inflammation, apparently linked to the brain’s immune system and produced by activation of its “glial” cells.
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY SCHOOK OF MEDICINE
PUBLISHED IN ANNALS OF NEUROLOGY9) Another autopsy study also showed ongoing neuro-inflammation, possibly from heavy metal exposure, and signs of autoimmunity. (Other studies have found rapid brain growth in infants with autism.)
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
PUBLISHED IN CLINICAL NEUROPSYCHIATRY10) Thimerosal can disrupt a chemical process called “methylation,” critical for gene expression, neural function, memory and attention, and the production of sulfur-based “thiol” proteins like glutathione.
NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY
PUBLISHED IN MOLECULAR PSYCHIATRY11) Plaintiff lawyers will also show data from a study of birthday videos proving that many kids with autism were meeting or exceeding developmental milestones at age one, only to have tumbled into a wordless, autistic world by age two. They will also show home videos of plaintiff children, before and after their own regression, and in many cases, of the same children a few years after experimental treatments — including chelation (for heavy metal removal) and methyl B-12 (for repair of methylation) — that seem to have vastly improved their condition.
UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
PUBLISHED IN ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES (NIH)
You can find more discussion of these studies and the biomedical evidence on the excellent Generation Rescue website:
Evidence: Battling Misinformation
Parikh says:
“Unfortunately, Rollens and groups like Defeat Autism Now have shown little inclination to rethink their dogma.”
They have little reason to, given the mounting evidence of a vaccine-autism link and the significant improvements experienced by thousands of children treated with a biomedical approach.
Unfortunately, it is Parikh and groups like the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics that have shown little inclination to rethink their dogma.
Parikh says:
“Autism is a relatively young disorder, having first been described in the 1940s.”
Coincidentally, vaccines including the mercury-containing preservative thimerosal were introduced just prior to that time.
Parikh says:
“Although we are working very hard to get to the bottom of its causes and treatments, it’s going to take awhile.”
Read: Leave this to the “experts.” If you’re the parent of a child affected today, well, sorry about that.
In her blog post, Atkinson warns of the dangers of such an approach:
“While government scientists, advisors and pharmaceutical companies have been responsible for infinite lifesaving and life improving medical advances, they are not infallible …
… Recent history demonstrates that too often, government health officials, mainstream doctors and pharmaceutical companies aren’t on the leading edge of alerting us to health risks; they’re bringing up the rear. Patients feel left to fend for themselves, seeking independent research and opinions on their own. They and their dogged, relentless determination have often been the catalyst that eventually brings medical dangers to the forefront.”
Parikh says:
“On the other hand, we need to consider the parents of healthy kids, who worry about epidemics because a small but vocal group of autism advocates grab headlines and steal the truth.”
“Steal the truth,” Dr. Parikh?
No, they’re not stealing the truth. They’re seeking and demanding the truth because several of the institutions responsible for identifying that truth have either dragged their feet and/or abdicated their responsibilities entirely.
Parikh concludes with:
“That’s a shame, because parents have a lot of real things to worry about these days, like finding and affording a healthy and safe environment to raise their kids in, or making sure they can find a place to give them a good education. Given these challenges, they don’t deserve the extra burden of false fear.”
Finally, some things we can all agree on. A safe environment, a good education. Who can argue with those goals? Like baseball and apple pie.
Yet, how ironic is it that Parikh ends his exercise in obfuscation with a plea to eliminate the promotion of false fears, while at the same time using just such false fear himself in both his prior paragraph:
“…consider the parents of healthy kids, who worry about epidemics because a small but vocal group of autism advocates grab headlines and steal the truth.”
and in the final sentence of his opinion-piece:
“And if those lawyers trying to blame vaccines succeed, it’s a victory whose only result will be more childhood morbidity and mortality.”
Parikh would have you believe that the vaccine court is all about evil trial lawyers bent on extracting riches from the government and that a victory for parents means doom for society’s overall health.
For the parents and children affected by autism, nothing could be further from the truth.
The majority of the families affected by autism are not anti-vaccine. They are simply against a vaccination program that includes vaccines containing mercury, a potent neurotoxin, at levels well beyond the safe exposure level determined by the EPA. (The formaldehyde, aluminum, and other ingredients included in many vaccines also aren’t much in favor.)
Families are also questioning a vaccination program that has expanded greatly without adequate testing for the interactions between different vaccine antigens and the potential long-term effects of them on the immune system.
Kids today receive on average 39 shots between birth and 18 years of age. Twenty-five years ago, kids received only 11 shots.
Did we experience childhood disease epidemics in the U.S. 25 years ago?
No.
Atkinson notes in her blog post how many practitioners, scientists, and others take an unreasonable position on this point:
“Government scientists, advisors and vaccine manufacturers often take an all-or-nothing approach to vaccinations.
Government officials and infectious disease experts I’ve spoken with are fearful that if vaccine side effects are better publicized, or if a link between vaccines and autism and ADD were made, the public would overreact and lose faith in the entire vaccination program. The result, they’re afraid, would be parents refusing to give their children any vaccines, leading to new, deadly epidemics of preventable diseases. That indeed would be a disaster. However, their fears have resulted in something I call an all-or-nothing approach: they tend to promote nearly all vaccines for nearly all children as equally necessary and equally safe. Yet at the same time, if asked, they agree not all vaccines are equally safe, equally beneficial, equally necessary and equally tolerated by each individual child.”
Bottom Line
There is simply no excuse for risking the long-term health of 1 out of 150 children in this country for the sake of unquestioning compliance with a greatly expanded vaccination program that continues to include vaccines containing mercury, a known and potent neurotoxin.
As Kirby points out in his post, this isn’t just a U.S. issue. Currently, thimerosal is in most vaccines given to children outside of the U.S., Western Europe, and Russia. Are the recent increases in autism rates in China, India, and many South Asia countries also resulting from better diagnosis, or could the introduction and expansion of vaccination programs be playing a role?
The vaccine-autism link deserves closer attention and more robust research. Hopefully, despite the dogma of Parikh and others like him, we’ll see it happen and develop a better understanding of the actual truth for the sake of both families affected today and future generations.
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You can read more about the vaccine-autism connection and find links to information about the current vaccine trial in this post:
Historic Vaccine Court Case Examining Mercury/MMR Links to Autism Begins
On my main website, you can read more about my approach to helping people affected by autism and related conditions such as ADD/ADHD.
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September 12th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
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