Stomping Through A Medical Minefield

As a pediatric nurse, I have seen babies with permanent brain damage from pertussis- coughing so hard they have intracranial hemorraghes. I have seen unvaccinated elementary age kids hospitalized for days and because of the post-tussive vomiting of pertussis. How about deadly, untreatable tetanus; present in the dirt everywhere( does not require a puncture wound, as commonly believed). These are not just benign survivable childhood illness like chickenpox (oh yes I did also see a child hospitalized with varicella meningitis and another with a large section of flesh taken out of her arm after varicella lesion became super-infected with bacteria- permanent damage to right arm)
While environmental heavy metals *may* play a role in autism, what about the lead in the Victorian homes yuppies love to fix up, the mercury in tuna and swordfish, the lead in the air and soil from air pollution? Let's focus on the huge issue of environmental pollution, not the trace amounts in vaccines- which are proven to have saved hundreds of thousands of children's lives!
The fact that autism symptoms appear at the same age as vaccines are given does not mean there is any causal connection. The simple fact is, autism begins to be come daignosable at around the same age as vaccines are give. Autism is know n to present as a initially sociable and interactive child who then withdraws. The fact the peditarician expressed concern at the 12 or 18 mos visit- at which the child also got shots- does not mean the shots caused the condition!
Studies have shown no drop in autism rates among unvaccinated children. There has been no drop in autism- in fact there has been a significant rise- even though vaccination rates have remained the same or even dropped (esp for MMR). If there were any connection, the autism rates should be dropping- not rising! A simple and obvious explanation for the rise in autism is one of diagnosis- children who previously would have been classified under other diagnoses of mental retardation are now recognized, due to more inclusive and comprehensive diagnositic criteria- as being somewhere on the "spectrum" of Pervasive Developmental Disorder. My great uncle, an Ivy League statistician professor with a PhD and no social skills, very likely had Aspbergers, but it was not recognized in the 1930's and hence he never was diagnosed (add to that list Einstein and a plethora of others!)
Now that vaccines are thimersol-free, there is little excuse for exposing your children to the KNOWN risk of deadly diseases, in exchange for a very remote, highly unlikely and wholly unproven "risk" from vaccines.

Sadly, another doctor that believes his MD stands for "Major Diety" and to make matters worse, profits from being obnoxious about it. Although the mercury was removed from MMR shots several years ago, it is still used in all flu shots, so children are still being injected with mercury annually. And also true, vaccinations alone are not the culprit in rising numbers of autism dianoses. As a parent of a child with autism (Aspergers) whose benefits have been cut to nothing because of budget woes, and whose health insurance refuses to pay anything to treat an "incurable" disorder, the last expert I want to hear from is this moron. Do I wish death on him? No way; I wish he has a dozen grandchildren with autism.

This is just arrogance. To think we know all the dangers of vaccines is rediculous. Many have never been properly tested and many already come with warning labels that doctors are hesitant to reveal unless you really press them for it. They try to downplay the side effects or potential problems like it's not a big deal that 1 in every 150 children are now suffering from autism or aspergers syndrome. I am not anti-vaccine. But at my core I reject the claim that giving an infant or toddler or preschooler multiple shots in one sitting, or over a few weeks time is remotely safe. I actually had to argue with my pediatrician's nurse one day when my 6 month old was due for a his next round of shots but had just been released from the hospital for spinal meningitis, and he had not fully recovered. I thought his body needed time to heal fully, several months was a good timeframe in my mind, but she really tried to pressure me to do them all RIGHT NOW while he was there for his check-up. What's wrong with these healthcare providers that they would believe it is safe to inject a sick child with a weakened immune system with several live deadly viruses???!!! COMMON SENSE says parents like me are more right than we are wrong and I believe the truth will emerge eventually. I have four kids, three are teenagers and one is 4. I wish I knew then what I know now. My middle daughter is now 15 and suffers from aspergers. She has had autistic tendancies since she was 5 months old, after a round of shots. It is not a coincidence and anyone who says it is doesn't have a child who may forever need to live at home because the medical profession and their government failed them so completely.

This energy should be focused more on making the shots seperate, making sure healthcare pays for seperate shots, and going back to the drug companies to hold them accountable for making these immunizations safer.

It seems to me it would be fairly easy to find out if vaccines are causing autism. Just do a study
comparing the rates of autism in children who DO NOT receive the vaccines - like Quakers for
example - to those WHO DO. Seems pretty simple. Why hasn't this been done? Are they afraid of what
the data would reveal?

Vaccines are poisoned and cause all sorts of dangerous health problems including death. But you like shooting mercury into your blood so it can deposit into your organs and brain. The HPV shot killed girls earlier this year. The flu shot kills people every year. All kinds of bizzare cancers are exploding everywhere but you love it.

Sodium Flouride is in rat poison and your city water. But you choose not to believe it. Your flouride tooth paste says to call the poison control center if you swallow it but you love it anyway because your dentist god told you it's yummy and good for you and ofcourse you love it like a good dumb slave.

Since mercury in your blood is so good for you maybe you should drink it with your meals you morons.

Claudia, you wrote ???The notion that vaccines cause autism, he writes, has ???been clearly disproved.???"

Regarding ???disproved??? this is an absolutely horrendous misstatement based on fantasy not fact. Dr. Verstraeten stated ???The CDC screening study of thimerosal-containing vaccines was perceived at first as a positive study that found an association between thimerosal and some neurodevelopmental outcomes.??? See PEDIATRICS Vol. 113 No. 4 April 2004, pp. 932 at http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/113/4/932

Dr. Verstraeten then states that a second study on a different group of children didn???t show the same results. Now since one half of the study for one set of children shows a risk of autism and the other one half of the study for another set of children is unable to find a risk - then half of the children studied still show evidence of a link. Dr. Verstraeten concludes that ???more study is required.???

So this is evidence of harm. Certainly it is not evidence of safety. Meanwhile at least one of every 150 children today is at risk of Autism in this current epidemic. And yet mercury is still in vaccines as Thimerosal!


Claudia you wrote "What I've learned in all this is to stick to the truth, talk about the science," says Paul Offit.

Regarding the ???truth??? Tennyson wrote that a ??????half truth is the blackest of all lies.??? The black half truth here is the failure to disclose that ½ of the study of children evaluated by Dr. Verstraeten of the CDC indicated a risk of autism.

Regarding the science, the USEPA banned mercury in 1990 from use in latex paint to protect children from mercury poisoning.
See http://www.epa.gov/ttn/atw/hlthef/mercury.html To simply pretend that mercury is less harmful injected into the bloodstreams of children or a pregnant woman certainly begs many questions. The first being ???just how dumb do you think the public is????


And Claudia quote Dr. Offit saying "It's not about me, it's about the data.???

Regarding this quote, it???s about both. Any claim of proven mercury safety is not based on data. And scientist and medical professionals with integrity will fully disclose potential conflict of interest. In the past we have seen to many ???say anything for buck??? scientists defending the tobacco industry.

In my opinion, my sons had a greater risk of becoming autistic then they ever did of contracting a disease preventable by vaccinations. Think about it. Kids have a 1 in 150 chance (that's a 0.7% chance) of becoming autistic. According to the CDC, 131 kids got the measles last year. According to the US Census Bureau, in 2007 there were more than 73 million children living in the US. Then a child has a 131 in 73 million or a 0.00017% chance of getting the measles. I'd rather my kids get the measles and spend two weeks in isolation or the hospital than have them live for over 50 years as a autistic two year old. I know that there can be other complications associated with the measles, but I'd still take them over autism any day if given the choice. As noted in my previous comment, I still believe in vaccinations, just not at the recommended schedule.

I am a mother of a boy that was born Autistic. He is perfect. Parents need to stop playing the blame game. Embrace and accept their Autistic child. There is so much positive support out there for kids with social developmental disorders that don't involve medicine, voodoo diets, chelation, or guessing. Work with what you have. Learn to play and play to learn. Now that is the best philosophy from a mom, who is no expert, or am I, who just loves her kid. Sincerely, Maggie Kinney Hoosick Falls, New York

I am trying to understand the anti-vaccine argument. If vaccines cause autism, how come all children who have their regularly scheduled vaccines do not have autism. Both my children had their regularly scheduled vaccines. My son was also a participant of the retroviruis study. They have not been diagnosed with autism. I believe autism is genetic. There was a program on the Discovery Health Channel of a couple who has 6 autistic children. Are we all to believe that this was caused by vaccines? How do you explain children who were autistic before vaccines were readily avaible. My mother, who is 64 years old, had a neighbor who had an autistic boy. The boy was 6 years older than her and he would sit on the porch all day in the summer rocking back and forth, no eye contact or verbal skills. Vaccines did not cause his autism. I think parents are looking for something to blame, which is a common reaction.

Dr. Offit is a hero. The vaccine he helped to create has dropped cases of rotavirus by 80 to 100%. This is wonderful. One of the worst and loudest of the antivaccine mothers said that her young daughter was made very sick by rotavirus in the past year and it took the girl months to recover. But is there gratitude to Dr. Offit? No.
These are the words of Julia Berle: "Eliza contracted Rotavirus, a severe viral infection that can cause diarrhea, severe dehydration and hospitalization, when she was barely 2 years old. Little Eliza was vomiting blood, having seizures and dropped so much weight that even her doctors could not figure out how to help her recover." Will those who hate Dr. Offit and want him dead vaccinate their babies with the rotavirus vaccine, even though it contains no mercury? No. I do believe they'd rather risk their own children's lives than to admit he could be right and they could be wrong. The media needs to shut down the access of the antivax parents to the public, instead of sticking microphones in their faces and saying, "but what do YOU say, Mrs. Jones???" The parents who believe that vaccines cause autism are much like the people who believed that the earth was being invaded by Martians when they heard the "War of the Worlds" radio program in 1938. The are caught up in a hysteria and they continually confirm that each other is correct and they are led around by the noses by outrageous and obviously lying quacks.
It does not help hysterical and deluded people (or their children) to validate a hysterical belief. Just as it would be wrong to tell a person who thinks that Martians are about to invade earth that they are correct. If the media would quit treating them like they are anything other than flat-earthers they would do other parents a huge favor and probably save many, many lives of children, and prevent more autistic children from being harmed by quack therapies.

Vaccines are not 100% effective. Not everyone develops immunity. Vaccination creates a "herd immunity" which prevents the spread of disease through a population. By some not vaccinating their children, this population immunity is weakened and can result in others getting infected. As Amanda Peet stated, these people who do not get their children vaccinated are parasites. Vaccinate your children people.