People sometimes ask why this blog is all about vaccines when it is supposed to be about autism. Of course it is not all about vaccines. But it must seem like that because a lot of the time I am responding to the argument that vaccines are a cause of autism. Why do I bother when there is no scientific basis for any of the supposed pathways?
MMR was only ever supported by the work of one team of researchers grouped around Wakefield and working for the lawyers pursuing claims for compensation against the vaccine manufacturers. The testimony of Bustin and Chadwick at the Omnibus Autism Proceedings demonstrated the flawed nature of much of that research. Other scientists have failed to replicate Wakefield’s findings and epidemiological studies have shown no connection between autism and MMR.
Thiomersal, a mercury based preservative that used to be found in minute quantities in some childhood vaccines, has also been blamed. A speculative paper suggested similarities between the symptoms of mercury poisoning and autism. This idea was thoroughly debunked but the idea persisted because the growth in reported prevalence of autism in the USA coincided with an increase in the number of vaccines containing thiomersal. Advocates for this theory never adequately explained why autism numbers in the UK were growing at least as fast as those in the USA while the number of thiomersal containing vaccines [TCVs] in the UK never increased. And when TCVS were eliminated from the recommended childhood vaccine schedule in the USA in 2002 the numbers continued to rise.
The latest “theory” that we give our children “too many too soon” and overwhelm their natural defenses ignores the simple fact that advances in vaccine development mean that the entire vaccine schedule contains less active ingredients than ever before. A single dose of smallpox vaccine with 200 antigens contained more antigens on its own than all today’s vaccines put together. And in 1960 smallpox plus polio plus diptheria, tetanus and pertussis vaccines delivered 3,200 antigens!
“Too much too soon” is part of the “Green Our Vaccines” campaign. It is coupled with a spurious argument about toxins in vaccines. The Green Our Vaccines list of alleged toxic ingredients has been thoroughly dismissed. There are some potentially toxic chemicals used in vaccine production. These have all been tested for safety and are necessary to prevent contamination during production, storage and delivery of vaccines. I wonder how many of us use equally potent ”toxins” to cleanse work surfaces on which we prepare food for our children.
Their “science” is non-existent. But the anti-vaccine element have proved impossible to ignore because the media continue to give them publicity. And this publicity has contributed to the decline in vaccine uptake, paticularly the MMR. For example last month the Daily Telegraph published a ridiculous story entitled “MMR; the debate that will not go away.” Yesterday the Telegraph, with no apparent sense of shame, carried another story, “Teenager dies of Measles as cases continue to rise, Government officials say.”
This young man did have problems with his immune ystem which made it difficult for him to have vaccinations. Instead he relied on the “herd immunity” conferred on society when sufficient people are vaccinated to prevent a disease taking hold. 95% is usually held out as the threshold figure. But thanks to previous scare stories in papers like the Telegraph coverage is much lower. 84% of two year old have had the MMR. But only 75% of 5 year olds have had their second shot. In London the situation is worse with figures of 71% and 50% respectively according to the Independent. Measles is once again becoming endemic in the UK with 461 cases so far this year.
Most cases are thankfully not fatal. But they can still cause terrible illness. A woman in Blackpool nearly lost her daughter to the complications of measles.
Leah, who picked up the disease from her brother, was rushed into Blackpool Victoria Hospital on June 4 and kept on a drip for four harrowing days.
Mrs Hartley explained: “She had an horrendous sounding cough, a sky-high temperature, an upset stomach, conjunctivitis and she couldn’t stay awake.
“At one point she woke up and was hallucinating so she started screaming and crying, it really was terrifying.
“My mind was racing and I didn’t think she was going to pull through it – I never would have believed measles could make anyone so ill.”
Out of curiosity I visited the JABS forum. JABS claims to be neither pro nor anti vaccine. But it comes across as anti-vaccine and a supporter of the mmr-autism connection. Both the Telegraph report on the death from measles and the Independent report on the rise of measles were posted there on Saturday afternoon. Thus far at 1.00am on Sunday morning the young man’s death has been read 29 times with no comments. But the Independent report on the endemic has attracted 88 readers and comments like these.
Natural measles exposure is the best immunity you can get so I would imagine many parents will welcome this news with open arms.
One case of measles [in which a young man dies] makes the front page thousands of cases of autism unmentioned…agenda or what???
MMR RIP
if they can now justify mentioning individual measles cases, [He means a measles death]when normally they dismiss them in favour of epidemiology, then this must give the green light to discussing adverse reaction individual cases??
I will continue to post stories about vaccines in order to remind myself of what happens when quackery combines with conspiracy theory to drive out reason and compassion. Let us hope that the need to post such stories will diminish as the link between vaccines and autism is finally severed.
June 22nd, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Andrew Wakefield, MMR, journalism, mercury, vaccines |
9 comments
I suppose the people behind Green Our Vaccines had a plan. While Jenny and Jim were grabbing the headlines in America David Kirby was dispatched to the UK to address Parliament, no less, and give a public lecture followed by press interviews and media coverage. While the Jenny and Jim Show drew the expected response from critical thinkers in the blogosphere it was largely ignored by the mainstream media. Apart from the celebrity chasers nobody thought a rallying of the faithful to march against vaccines was particularly newsworthy.
Over in the UK poor old David Kirby managed less than that. My thanks to Kev for persuading his MP to attend the parliamentary briefing. He was the only one to turn up along with 4 peers of the realm. The media ignored the event completely. Not even the Telegraph turned up. Perhaps their previous execrable piece on vaccines and autism that the splenetic Dr Aust deals with so admirably, was a blessing in disguise. They are probably too embarrassed to let a junior hack anywhere near the story for a long time to come.
Perhaps the press had all gone to Regent Hall for his public lecture. Thanks to Rob Hinkley for going along and giving us this account. No press there either.
Kirby’s visit had been advertised partly as a chance to meet the press, but there were no press (no print, no radio, no TV, no internet, nobody) at the lecture. Kirby said that he’d been interviewed by the BBC but they’d decided not to broadcast it, and he said he’d been commissioned by the Daily Mail to write an article but then they’d decided not to publish it. One lady in the audience (I got the impression she might have been one of the organisers of the event) said she was a journalist [Sally Beck?] but hadn’t been commissioned by anyone to write about what Kirby had to say, and that although she knew all UK science journalists had been notified about the lecture “not one of them has even phoned to ask if they could come”.
Clifford Miller knew why.
“I’ve got good information that our Department of Health threatens DA-notices against the press” over vaccine stories, and “I’ve got no confirmation of this from the press but I have it on good authority from within the civil service … Is our government using a spurious security argument to protect Glaxo Smith Klein?”
Yes, Clifford. You can read Defence Advisory notices that the Department of Defence issues here. No mention of vaccines. Shame.
Perhaps the media are finally wising up to the fact that these tales of doom supported by dubious science are no longer newsworthy. I hope so.
June 8th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Quackery, journalism, vaccines |
2 comments
Green our vaccines? What does that mean? Tomorrow we may find out. Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey are leading a march in Washington to demand safer vaccines. According to TACA they want to remove all the toxins from vaccines and change the schedule so that children receive less vaccines and get them later in life. But according to Kev over on Left Brain/Right Brain Jenny went on the record with this gem;
I am surely not going to tell anyone to vaccinate. But if I had another child, there’s no way in hell…….for my next kid—which I’m never going to have—there’s no way.
Now that sounds anti-vaccine to me not pro-vaccine. But I will assume for now that nobody behind the Green Our Vaccines Rally, not TACA, not Generation Rescue, not NAA, not HEAL, not Moms Against Mercury, not Safe Minds, none of these groups are anti-vaccine. All these groups agree with the official line from Jenny and Jim. According to TACA
While Jenny and Jim support the vaccine program, like many, they feel vaccines are too toxic. This country has the ability to provide a safer vaccine supply and schedule to our children.
One part of Green Our Vaccines is to remove the toxins. Now I am assuming that they do not mean the real toxins in vaccines, the weakened forms of diseases that teach our immune systems how to resist the real thing if we should ever come in contact with it. That would not Green our vaccines. It would denature them. No they just want safer vaccines. So what would they remove?
Thiomersal/Thimerosal, the mercury based preservative is gone from nearly all childhood vaccines according to the FDA. And for the flu vaccine that still contain it there are alternatives.
Aluminium/Aluminum is a necessary adjuvant. It makes the vaccine more effective so children need less shots. I thought that was another of the aims of Green Our Vaccines - less shots for children.
Formaldehyde is a natural product. It is sometimes used as an antimicrobial in vaccine production but it is also produced in our bodies as a byproduct of our metabolism. Removing antimicrobials from the production process would definitely Green Our Vaccines in the way I greened a piece of cheese that lay forgotten in my fridge.
Perhaps they mean some of the products that are allegedly found in vaccines like antifreeze. Actually only one ingredient in antifreeze, polyethylene glycol, is used to inactivate one brand of flu vaccine. It is also a common ingredient of many cosmetics and toothpaste and is totally safe.
The other aspect of the call to Green Our Vaccines is to reduce the number of vaccines and give them later in life and at greater intervals. Now, I may be a victim of government propaganda. But, to my mind tiny babies are vulnerable to all sorts of dangers from real diseases and the sooner they get the protection of the recommended vaccine schedule the better.
Perhaps some enterprising journalist will ask some specific questions of Jenny and Jim about how the details of how they propose to Green Our Vaccines. I am sure the answers would be entertaining and instructive.
June 3rd, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, politics, vaccines |
50 comments
Over on Left Brain Right Brain Kev has just blogged this article in the Mail. The article starts in typical tabloid style:
There is little hope given to parents of children with autism. Mainstream medicine offers no explanation for the cause of this life-long learning disability, thought to affect one in 100, and there are no effective treatments.Perhaps the most cruel characteristic of the condition, which impairs communication development and ability to relate to others, is that children often develop normally until about two years of age, when they suddenly ‘regress’, becoming mute, withdrawn, refusing to make eye contact and prone to tantrums.
Many never take part in mainstream education and some require full-time care, even as adults.
In the absence of solutions, desperate parents are increasingly turning to the world of alternative medicine in their search for a cure.
Or does it? There are the usual buzzwords - hope, desperate, cruel. But autism is described as a life-long learning disability, not strictly true but better than the usual this devastating disease. And the headline
The great autism rip-off …
How a huge industry feeds on parents desperate to cure their children
suggests more substance than I have come to expect from a paper that has done more than most to promote Andy Wakefield and the MMR scare over autism. Now they are investigating the claims of alternative therapists who sell dubious treatments to parents on the back of the media hype about vaccines and autism. The world is turning.
Journalist, Barney Calman posed as a parent and contacted 5 different Defeat Autism Now (DAN) practitioners. All charged serious money just to talk to the parent on their own and suggested an expensive battery of tests without ever seeing the child. All were happy to discuss a variety of treatment options and claimed great success while pointing out that their therapies might not work for a minority of children.
This is the beauty of quackery. You pay money for tests that indicate treatment. But they do not indicate if the treatment will work. So the parent moves on to the next practitioner in the hope of finding the one therapy that will work for their child.
First up was a former GP, David O’Connell who took £440 in consultation fees without ever seeing the child and recommended a barrage of tests on blood, stool and urine costing a further £1546. His recommended treatment is Secretin! He claims that previous studies were flawed. What, even this one? As I wrote elsewhere
The CEO of Repligen had a double interest in Secretin. He was not just another businessman looking for a profit. He was also the parent of two autistic children. He wanted it to work and he was ready to pay handsomely to make it work. Unfortunately his company’s research, rigourously conducted to satisfy the US regulatory bodies, “failed to meet the study’s dual primary endpoints.” That has not stopped other, less scrupulous individals from continuing to promote secretin and even homeopathic secretin as a cure for autism.
O’Connell goes on to state that
I’ve not published my findings in peer reviewed journals because I am unwilling to submit children to double blind trials.
But he will submit them to unproven treatments like Secretin at £450 monthly injection and immune globulin at £550. These quotes are revealing.
‘The only limiting factor is money.’
[...]‘The more injections a child has, the better the result,’ he says.
‘Autism can be a life sentence if you do nothing about it. And the sooner you start treatment, the more chance it will work.’
Parents used to be blamed for causing their child’s autism in the bad old days of Bettleheim’s refrigerator mothers. Now they are encouraged to blame themselves and then pay large sums for unproven and potentially harmful treatments in order to ease their guilt.
Next up was
Dr Asha Rekha Chagarlamudi, a locum GP who runs ‘The Autism Clinic’ one day a week from her home, a semi-detached house on a private estate in Bromley, South-East London.
She recommended IV chelation (Remember Abubakar Tariq Nadama?) and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. (HBOT) She does not seem quite as mercenary as O’Donnell but I was a little perturbed because she is the medical advisor to the Autism Treatment Trust in Edinburgh. That is an eight hour drive away, which is not very convenient if the non-medical Dr Amet in Edinburgh needs treatment advice. Like Dr Chagarlamudi Dr Amet has an autistic child herself and was featured in this blog.
Dr Amet makes the striking claim that her series of blood and urine tests (£480) will give a complete picture of your child’s health and what has caused his autism. Her follow up consultation (£400) will discuss the test results and devise a treatment plan consisting of a special diet and supplements contains no mention of the IV chelation and HBOT recommended by her medical advisor 440 miles away, down in Kent, which is probably for the best.
Surprisingly, the cheapest therapist is based in that bastion of privilege and private medicine, Harley Street. Dr Damien Downing will do an initial consultation, urine and blood tests, follow up and seven rounds of transdermal chelation for just under £700. The only drawback is that transdermal chelators do not work
[S]ome enterprising doctors have formulated skin creams containing chelators like Transdermal DMSA. There are glowing testimonials for TD DMSA on the web. But DMSA is water soluble and so it is extremely unlikely that it could ever pass through the skin. Think about it. Our skin is a barrier that acts to keeps the water in. Without it we would dehydrate and die. It also keeps the water out. We do not absorb water like a sponge when we bathe or shower. So how does the DMSA pass through our skin? It does not. And so there is no way for it to have any effect on our bodies at all.
Calman also went to Dublin to meet
Dr Gabriel Stewart, a specialist in chelation therapy for adults, who tells me he tries to dissuade parents from giving their autistic children intravenous infusions ‘not because it’s dangerous, but because it isn’t effective in clearing mercury from the blood’. Consequently, Archie was not suitable for treatment.
He also warns that some ‘DAN! doctors’ are less than reputable.
‘All you need to do is attend one conference in the US and you can say you’re a DAN! doctor - and many of them aren’t medically trained.’
All this is true. It is also true that Dr Stewart is also a DAN doctor. While his refusal to use IV chelation on children is commendable his website reveals that he is a member of ACAM, whose ambiguities over the use of EDTA were exposed at the time of Tariq Nadama’s death. And he has bought into the entire DAN protocols for treating autism. The scientific bases for these protocols are being seriously challenged by expert witnesses in the Omnibus Autism Proceeedings that are taking place in the USA. See this example where the expert testimony of Dr Dean Jones is discussed.
All in all, an excellent piece of journalism from Mr Calman, marred only by a factual error in a sidebar on What is Autism. The prevalence figure of one in a hundred refers to the entire autistic spectrum. So called classic autism with associated learning difficulties is closer to 1 in 500.
June 1st, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, DAN!, Quackery, biomedical interventions, chelation, mercury, vaccines |
4 comments
If I could be in London next week for David Kirby’s PR visit these are some of the questions I would like to ask him. You may care to add your own.
Your book, Evidence of Harm, explores the premise that a 150 per cent increase in the mercury burden in US vaccines (from 75 to 187 microgams of ethyl mercury) that began in 1987 caused the dramatic rise in recorded cases of autistic spectrum disorder in the USA. Given that exposure to ethyl mercury in vaccines in the UK remained at 75 micrograms until it was finally removed in 2004, and we experienced a similar growth in autism, what possible relevance could your book or your theories have for the UK?
Thiomersal was completely removed from US vaccines and stocks exhausted by 2002. Yet autism rates have continued to rise. Do you agree that whatever plausibility there was to the thiomersal hypothesis when you were writing your book, it is contradicted by the data and should now be rejected? Are you now prepared to state publicly that there is no evidence of harm? That vaccines do not cause autism?
In your public debate with the journalist Arthur Allen you conceded that autism rates had not declined in line with your predictions after the removal of thiomersal from vaccines but went on to invoke other environmental sources of mercury such as toxic plumes crossing the Pacific from Chinse coal powered power stations, forest fires in California and even the smoke from crematoria. The UK is not being overwhelmed by pollution either from China or the USA and our autism rates are at least as high as yours. How do you explain this?
The organizations that are sponsoring your visit have been scathing in the past about the conflict of interest of scientific researchers who have repudiated any connection between mercury and autism. Does the fact that you are sponsored by anti-vaccine groups like Safe Minds and Generation Rescue and your current journalistic output is published on the Generation Rescue blog, The Age of Autism, create any conflicts of interest for you that might affect you impartiality as a journalist or are you happy with your role as a publicist for these organizations?
In recent months you have returned to the vaccine bandwagon, this time claiming that a significant number of autism cases are down to a reaction to vaccines that triggers a pre-existing mitochondrial disorder. You base your arguments on confidential documents leaked to you by people connected to Hannah Poling whose case is in the process of being settled at the US Court of Federal Claims. It is very difficult for us to judge the situation based solely on your speculations and the public statements of the Polings. When journalist Ken Reibel asked the Polings at the Autism One conference last month if they were prepared to release Hannah’s medical records and allow her treating physicians to comment publicly his press credentials were revoked and hotel securiy were summoned to expel him from the building. Surely this one sided speculation should cease until the case is settled and the science can be freely discussed by those qualified to do so?
May 31st, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, journalism, mercury, vaccines |
14 comments
Lord Hodgson, who is sponsoring David Kirby’s speaking engagement at the Palace of Westminster, has made good use of his position in the House of Lords to question government ministers on vaccine safety. He is particularly interested in thiomersal/thimerosal and has even enquired after its use in cosmetics.
On December 16, 2002
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked Her Majesty’s Government:
How many of the standard vaccinations that children receive in the United Kingdom contain thiomersal; for how many years these standard vaccinations have contained thiomersal; and what research has been carried out into the cumulative effects of the mercury content of thiomersal on infant children.[HL429]
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath replied:
Vaccines containing thiomersal (a mercury-containing compound known as thimerosal in the United States) have been in use for over 60 years. The only vaccines used in the routine United Kingdom childhood immunisation programme which contain thiomersal as an excipient in the final product are diphtheria, tetanus and whole cell pertussis (DTwP) and diphtheria and tetanus vaccines.
In 2001, the Committee on Safety of Medicines (CSM) reviewed the available data relating to possible neurotoxicity of thiomersal in vaccines and advised that there is no evidence of harm caused by doses of thiomersal in vaccines. The CSM concluded that the risk: benefit balance of thiomersal-containing vaccines remains overwhelmingly positive. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) in the United States also published a detailed review of the evidence relating to possible neurotoxicity of thiomersal in vaccines in October 2001. The IOM findings were consistent with the CSM conclusions.
We are aware of two new studies in the UK looking at the relationship between mercury in vaccines and neurodevelopmental disorders in children. One of these studies is funded by the Department of Health and uses the Avon Longitudinal Study of Pregnancy and Childhood. The other study is using the General Practice Research Database and is funded jointly by the World Health Organisation and the Public Health Laboratory Service (which receives its funding from the department). Neither of these studies supports an association between thiomersal exposure through the UK programme and neurodevelopmental disorders in children. The results of these studies have been made available to the department and a summary of the findings is available in a report to the US Congress which has been placed in the Library.
In addition to the above studies, evidence from a recent study by M Pichichero et al (published in the November 30 2002 Lancet) showed that giving vaccines containing thiomersal does not raise blood levels of mercury. The findings of this paper suggested that ethylmercury is rapidly eliminated from the blood after administration intra-muscularly. The levels of ethylmercury in the blood were no higher than in samples taken at birth—before any vaccines had been received.
On January 27, 2003
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbots asked Her Majesty’s Government:
Whether each child will by its 16th week of life have received, as part of the standard diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (DTwP) immunisation programme, 150 micrograms of thimerosal which, in turn, contain 75 micrograms of mercury; and, if not, how much each child will receive.[HL1023]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Hunt of Kings Heath) replied:
The recommended vaccine for routine immunisation of children against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis remains diphtheria, tetanus and wholecell pertussis (DTwP) vaccine. A course of primary immunisation with DTwP vaccine consists of three doses starting at two months, with an interval of one month between each dose. Each dose of the standard DTwP vaccine contains 50 micrograms of thimerosal (containing 25 micrograms of ethylmercury). Therefore, by 16 weeks the total thimerosal exposure would be no more than 150 micrograms (75 micrograms ethylmercury).
This is significant. In 2003 the exposure to thiomersal in the UK was the same as that in the USA in 1987. Then the USA added the thimerosal containing vaccines HIB and Hep-B to the infant vaccination schedule. These raised the exposure levels for ethyl mercury in 6 month old infants who were fully vaccinated from 75 micrograms to 187 micrograms. Throughout the 1990s recorded rates for autistic spectrum disorders rose both in the UK and in the USA. In fact the UK has consistently recorded higher rates compared to the USA. The headline figure in the US is currently 1 in 150. In the UK it is around 1 in 100.
Whatever the cause for the increase, one would expect it to be the same for two countries who share so many other features. Thiomersal is obviously not the reason for the increase in the UK. So why invoke it to explain the increase in the USA? And why is our noble lord so concerned to invoke thimerosal in the UK? This is even more pertinent when we consider Lord Hodgson’s next foray into the world of vaccines, which confirmed that the infant vaccine schedule in the UK is now thimerosal free.
On October 11, 2004
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked Her Majesty’s Government:
What is the difference in cost between Pediacel and the vaccine currently in use.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Warner) replied:
Pediacel costs over £5 more per dose than the vaccines previously used.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked Her Majesty’s Government:
Whether Pediacel will be the only form of vaccine available for the immunisation of children against diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, HIB and polio, or will others be available on request.
Lord Warner replied:
For infants, Pediacel will be the only vaccine supplied by the National Health Service because it provides the best protection against these serious infections.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked Her Majesty’s Government:
Whether the inactivated polio vaccine, part of the new five-in-one vaccine, is incompatible with the preservative Thiomersal.
Lord Warner replied:
Thiomersal is not a component of the new vaccines as it would render the inactivated polio vaccine component ineffective.
So there you have it. There was never very much thiomersal in the UK vaccine schedule and now there is none. Case closed. But two months later Lord Hodgson was back on the case.
December 8, 2004
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked Her Majesty’s Government what they propose to do to increase the level of public trust in their vaccination and immunisation programme. The noble Lord said:
My Lords, the trigger for my decision to ask this Question was the Government’s sudden decision in August this year to introduce a new five-in-one child vaccine called Pediacel. Pediacel replaces the four-in-one vaccine previously used and adds polio to the diptheria, tetanus, pertussis and haemophilus influenzae type B—HIB—vaccine. The other critical by-product of the introduction of Pediacel has been the withdrawal of the preservative thimerosal which consists of 50 per cent ethyl mercury.
The withdrawal of a toxin as potentially harmful as that contained in thimerosal from infants’ vaccine, however small the amount contained therein, is a positive development on which the Government are to be warmly congratulated. However, I am not clear as to why this step was taken, if one is of a cynical turn of mind, in early August during the holiday season when minimum press comment could be expected.
He is still pursuing the argument that thiomersal was dangerous to health and had no place in childhood vaccines. He is implying that the government knew this all along and sneaked the thimerosal out of the vaccines in the same underhand way that they had originally sneaked it in. There follows a good bit of politicking on the same theme before he comes to the scientific evidence for thiomersal’s harmful nature
Most recently, a study by Doctors Hornig, Chian and Lipkin of Columbia University, published online on 8 June 2004 in the Nature publication, Molecular Psychiatry, indicated that postnatal exposure to thimerosal can lead to the development of autism-like damage in autoimmune disease susceptible mice. This reinforces previous studies, such as the works of Dr Mark and Dr David Geier, showing that a genetic predisposition in combination with certain environmental triggers can cause an increased risk of an adverse reaction.
I do not know who led Lord Hodgson to Mady Hornig’s infamous mouse study. It was probably the same person who introduced him to the Geiers’ less than monumental contribution to the literature of autism. I do not know if he actually read this tosh or was merely informed about it as part of a briefing. If he read it he was obviously not qualified to judge its merits. You might describe it as a failure of Peer review.
The noble lord then continues with his twin themes of government incompetence in undermining confidence in their own vaccine schedule and simultaneously implying that the schedule is not safe anyway. But this combination of politicking and scientificking is fundamentally dishonest. Lord Hodgson advocates for the sort of bad science that has had a demonstrable effect in undermining public confidence in vaccines on both sides of the Atlantic. He contributes to the scare stories and then admonishes the government for is ham-fisted response to those scare stories. He continues:
To a Written Question I put down on 22 January 2003, the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, the Minister’s predecessor, answered that,
“there is no evidence of harm from thiomersal contained in vaccines. Therefore, the CSM advised that the benefits of immunisation with thiomersal-containing vaccines outweigh any potential risks of vaccination”.—[Official Report, 22/1/03; col. WA 101.]
Such responses exemplify the Government’s reaction to the thimerosal debate over the past two years. Until August this year the Government gave the impression that it was much ado about nothing and there was no reason for thimerosal to be withdrawn. In August, at the height of the holiday season, thimerosal was suddenly withdrawn.
Whether thimerosal does have an effect on certain autoimmune disease sensitive infants may be proved or disproved in times to come or there may never be a conclusive result. But what does matter is that the Government should maintain the highest degree of transparency and openness in their communications with the public in this important and sensitive area.
There we have it. The only thimerosal debate in the UK that I am aware of is the one initiated by Lord Hodgson. He knows full well why thiomersal (I will stick with the UK spelling, even though the noble lord has recently taken to using the American version) was removed. Pediacel does not require it. In fact thiomersal reduces the potency of the IPV component. There has never been any firm evidence to suggest that thiomersal causes harm to people.
Lord Hodgson is arguing from some very poor studies that it could cause harm and what if it did and what is the government going to do about this hypothetical danger that is completely lacking in empirical evidence and no wonder people are losing confidence in the vaccine programme and just look at MMR and its ALL YOUR FAULT. And so it goes on. Etc. etc. for another 1300 words.
Lord Hodgson is an intelligent and able politician. Unfortunately he has been sold on some very dubious science and agreed to lend his name to a PR exercise fronted by David Kirby. Perhaps he should be told.
May 28th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, Quackery, mercury, politics, vaccines |
6 comments
It had to happen. David Kirby, the erstwhile journalist and ersatz apologist for the mercury malicia is visiting Britain, paid for by Generation Rescue. There will be a public lecture on Wednesday 4th June, 6:30pm at Regent Hall, Oxford Street and a book signing and Q&A on Friday 6th June, 4:00pm at Gudrun Jonsson’s Biopath Centre in Kensington whose
unique philosophy focuses on a combination of the traditional healing arts from the sub-continent, biopathic treatments, and the latest scientific health and beauty advances. By combining these three concepts, Napier Road has developed an innovative and refreshing approach to health and beauty, which aims to reverse the degenerative processes of the body and promote general wellbeing.
So no surprises there, then. What is surprising is Kirby’s opening gig at the Palace of Westminster. According to an email circulating on numerous web forums
Mr. Kirby will speak about recent legal, political and scientific developments in the United States in the ongoing vaccine-autism controversy. The briefing is open to Peers in the House of Lords, Members of Parliament, their Staff, members of the Media, and Invited Guests. It is sponsored by His Lordship Robin Hodgson, Baron Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, Shropshire.
Kirby and a biopath makes sense. Hack ‘n’ Quack sounds about right. But what is the connection between Kirby and Robin Hodgson? Hodgson was deputy chairman of the Conservative Party from 1997 to 2000 when he became a life peer. His wife is chairman (sic) of the Conservative Women’s Association. As a member of the House of Lords Robin Hodgson acted as a front bench spokesman on Trade & Industry and Home Affairs between 2002-2006. I do not know if he is a member of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Autism. But he revealed that he has a son with ADHD when he introduced a parliamentary debate on the subject of Attention Deficit Disorders on February 5th, 2003.
Lord Hodgson on ADHD
Families with ADD/ADHD children need help. To get help, they need joined-up government across the Department of Health, the Department for Education and Skills and local social services. The key is early diagnosis, so that families, schools and, where appropriate, social services are aware of the condition. Taking medication can then become the norm. By contrast, children who are diagnosed later have probably already experienced several years of underachievement and failure and are more likely to be oppositional and unprepared to co-operate with medication, thus in many cases condemning themselves and their families to a living hell.
We need to spread more awareness of the condition among the teaching profession. It is estimated that 90 per cent of teachers have had no special training on how to recognise the symptoms of ADD/ADHD.
Most importantly, we need immediately to begin a programme to build awareness among social workers. For the most part, they do not seem to appreciate the strain on a family living with a severely ADD/ADHD child. There is therefore little or no respite care. Rather, too many social workers have been inclined to see erratic behaviour by a child as evidence of child abuse. No one suggests that there is any malice in that; I am sure that everyone’s intentions are good; but there is profound ignorance that we must tackle.
He could just as easily be talking about autism and the problems we face from inadequate services provided by people without proper training or resources who are ill-equipped to understand our needs. And there is much in the debate in similar vein. There is also much else that we are familiar with.
Lord Hodgson on Quackery
Although medication undoubtedly has an important part to play, it is not the only help for which parents may reach. Indeed, for some children it does not work at all; for others it may lose its effectiveness in their teenage years. Alternative approaches can be tried: for example, homeopathy, specialist exclusion diets, cranial osteopathy, megavitamin therapy, together with behaviour modification therapy, psychotherapy and others. We need to know more about their relative success and to inform parents, teachers and social workers about them.
Lord Hodgson on Thimerosal
So why has there been that increase in those conditions and what can we do to reverse the trend? It is unlikely that there is any one single cause. Genetics and heredity will probably be found to play a significant part. But what other factors are in play? One matter looks increasingly likely to be a significant contributory cause: the requirement in this country that every baby receives three injections in the first 16 weeks of life as immunisation against diphtheria, tetanus and whole cell pertussis—whooping cough, to laymen—(DTwP). As I understand it, each standard dose of the vaccine used in the UK contains 50 micrograms of a substance called thimerosal. Each dose of thimerosal contains 25 micrograms of ethylmercury. Mercury is a highly toxic substance. That means that, by the 16th week of life, every baby in this country, with an inevitably fragile immune and nervous system, has been injected with 75 micrograms of ethylmercury.
Lord Hodgson is not anti-vaccine
I must make it clear that this is not an attack on immunisation. Immunisation is an important part of child healthcare. But it is a question of what goes into the vaccines. Thimerosal is not an essential part of a vaccine; its function is as a preservative. There is a mercury-free vaccine licensed in this country under the name Infanrix DTaP. Although it is more expensive, that would be a small price to pay compared to the cost of a child with neurological damage.
But he does believe that a percentage of children are vulnerable to damage from mercury in the quantities that used to be present in the UK vaccine schedule.
The figure that has been suggested to me is 18 per cent of the whole.
Other contributions
Other speakers took up some of his themes. Lord Colwyn praised the Feingold diet and stated that study after study backs Feingold’s theories. He proposed vitamin B6 as an effective alternative to Ritalin and also blamed hypoglycaemia.
Earl Howe (not to be confused with Geoffrey Howe) admitted to reading
a most persuasive paper recently published in the United States, which concludes that the likelihood of a causal relationship between mercury in vaccines and autism is very great. If that theory is borne out, it has the most profound implications. I wholly agree with my noble friend that a great deal more research is needed.
The Earl Howe found Lisa Blakemore-Brown equally persuasive.
The notion that a child may have several disorders running alongside one another has been powerfully explained by a British child psychologist, Lisa Blakemore-Brown. She used the metaphor of a tapestry to illustrate that a child may present with various threads of difficulty; for example, ADD combined with Aspergers, or ADHD with a language impairment. Those threads may appear to be the same as those in another child but each individual will have his own unique weave of problems. The key to helping a child is discovering what threads are there and how they are interwoven. I believe that Lisa Blakemore-Brown’s book, Re-weaving the autistic tapestry, should be required reading in every LEA—and in the Department of Health. It is very persuasive.
Blame the Parents
I first came across Lisa Blakemore-Brown at a conference where we were both speakers. She made an eloquent, somewhat emotional speech, that relied more on anecdote than data to raise the question of false accusations of Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy against parents of autistic children. There seem to be a number of potential pitfalls for parents of autistic or ADHD children.
- Parents’ concerns about their child’s problems are dismissed. If they persist they are accused of MSbP.
- Parents who claim their child has biomedical problems [either as a cause or a consequence of their autism/adhd] that need special diets and other alternative therapies are accused of MSbP.
- The child’s behavioural problems are recognized but put down to abusive parenting. When the parents insist that their child is autistic/adhd they are accused of MSbP.
The Earl Howe actually spoke a lot of sense about MSbP in this debate. I would not be surprised if he had been briefed by Lisa Blakemore-Brown. Unfortunately she also believes in a vaccine induced autism epidemic. And, if we are to believe Aasa over on the JABS forum, Ms Blakemore-Brown is also responsible for bringing David Kirby to London.
From Peer to PR
Back in 2003 it may have been reasonable for Hodgson and others in the House of Lords to want more investigations into thimerosal in vaccines. They were right then and now to ask whether medication is necessarily the best answer to behavioural and neurological difficulties in children. They are to be applauded for taking up the thorny issue of false accusations against parents. But, while Lisa Blakemore-Brown may continue to weave all these issues into a single tapestry, five years down the line we have the science to say that thimerosal in vaccines is a broken thread. Kirby is not worthy of Hodgson’s patronage. Hodgson has allowed himself to be misled and misadvised in this affair.
May 27th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, Quackery, vaccines |
5 comments
CONSPIRACY
Remember the outrageous subpoena against Kathleen Seidel that was recently quashed? Clifford Shoemaker, the author of the subpoena was ordered to show cause,
“why he should not be sanctioned under Fed R Civ P 11 – see Fed R Civ P 45(a)(2)(B) which requires that a deposition subpoena be issued from the court in which the deposition is to occur and Fed R Civ P 45 (c)(1) commanding counsel to avoid burdensome subpoenas. A failure to appear will result in notification of Mr Shoemaker’s conduct to the Presiding Judge in the Eastern District of Virginia.”
His reply is basically that “a mere mother and housewife” could not possibly have written Neurodiversity.com on her own. She must have been prompted by malice and given material aid by the drug companies to pursue a campaign of intimidation against Clifford Shoemaker, his clients and his pet witness, Mark Geier. It is alleged that Kathleen is part of a conspiracy to protect the drug companies from the legitimate claims of parents of vaccine damaged children. As Kathleen says in her latest entry, Welcome to My Conspiracy
These documents offer a remarkable exposition of the grandiose, cartoonish conspiracy fantasies entertained by advocates of the concept of autism as toxicity and tort, and the arguments of those who seek to justify the perversion of legal processes in order to oppress their critics.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
Imagine if a piece of research exonerating vaccines was put forward by a drug company employee whose husband was working for the defense team at the vaccine court. The parents who claim that their autistic children are vaccine damaged would quite rightly be appalled if such a potential conflict of interest was concealed. This weekend three pieces of research were presented at the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) in London. All were co-authored by Dr Hewitson, all seek to demonstrate a link between vaccines and autism and the science has already been severely critiqued by Orac.
But there is more. Over on LeftBrain/RightBrain Kev has revealed that Dr Hewitson has her own potential conflicts of interest.
- She and her husband have an autistic child and are pursuing a claim for vaccine injury.
- Her husband is employed by one of her co-authors, Andrew Wakefield at Thoughtful House.
- She is affiliated to Defeat Autism Now.
This does not necessarily invalidate her work. But one wonders why Dan Olmsted, who is singing her praises over on The Age of Autism, neglected to include these details in his piece. Did he know? Did IMFAR know when they accepted her presentations? Of course it could just be another part of Kathleen Seidel’s conspiracy against anti-vaccine campaigners.
THE BIGGER PICTURE
It is important to scrutinize the claims of DANites, anti-vaxxers and their friends in the media. But in the wider world of autism there are more serious questions to engage with that pertain to the mainstream research and medical communities who exercise so much more influence over the world of autism than those on the pseudo-scientific fringe.
Is it right to refer to autistic people and “healthy” controls in a scientific presentation? How far are we justified in questioning the assumptions and methodology behind a lot of autism research? Under what circumstances, if any, is the medical model capable of yielding useful results? Who is paying attention to the ethical dimensions surrounding informed consent from autistic research subjects?
Larry Arnold, an autistic person who is also an autism researcher and a member of the board of trustees of the National Autistic Society raises these and similar questions in his initial reflections on IMFAR. After the tiresome but necessary task, so ably done by Kev, Orac and Kathleen, of dealing with some of autism’s stinkers it is good to be able to turn to an autism thinker like Larry.
May 19th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism rights, ethics, science, vaccines |
16 comments
Autism in Scotland
Scotland has a population of just over 5 million people. In 2004 The Scottish Executive published the Audit of Services for Autistic People Statistical Report. This was the result of a questionnaire sent out to all local authority/National Health Service partnerships. Two areas, Borders and Western Isles failed to respond and were excluded from the subsequent ananlysis of results. As a consequence the Audit deals with a total population of approximately 4.9 million people.
The Audit found 3412 children and young people under 18 with a diagnosis of an autistic spectrum disorder. The Audit could only find 645 adults with a diagnosis of an autistic spectrum disorder. This finding has been taken as further proof of a putative autism epidemic by journalist David Kirby writing for The Age of Autism. Unfortunately for Kirby, he obviously has not read the report in question. Instead he offers
Many thanks to Clifford Miller for furnishing the Scottish audit data.
Miller also furnished this graph which Kirby faithfully reproduces.
A misleading source
It looks like a figure taken from the Audit. But this figure is not in the PDF version that Miller links to. Nor is it in the word.doc that I have read. The clue is in those weasel words at the top of the figure, “Data Source.” Yes, Miller invented the figure based upon data gleaned from the audit. This would matter less if it was an accurate representation of the data source. But it is not. If we start at the bottom with “Average age of diagnosis of autism - approx three,” Average age of diagnosis is nowhere mentioned in the Audit. Furthermore, the Audit only contains data on people aged 3 years and older. So is Miller claiming that everyone in Scotland was diagnosed around their third birthday? How does he explain Howlin and Moore [1997] who found a mean age of 5.69 years for diagnosis in Scotland?
Miller’s second innovation is to give us four age groups: those born up to 1954, and those born in 15 year birth cohorts: 1955 - 1970, 1971 - 1986, 1987 - 2002. These are not the age groups in the data source. The Audit does not refer to date of birth. It refers to adults over 50, adults aged 25 to 49, adults aged 18 to 24 and children aged 3 to 18. As 18 is the legal age of majority in Scotland I am going to assume they mean “up to but not including 18″ when they refer to children. Of the birth dates you can derive from these ages: up to 1954, 1955 -1979, 1980 - 1986, 1987 - 2001, only the over 50s group matches.
Miller is also dishonest when he compares adults to children in the same graph. Data for children is derived from the responses of 13 NHS boards. Only 10 NHS boards provided adult data. Those missing are
Ayrshire and Arran - population 376,000
Forth Valley - population 300,000
Greater Glasgow - population 1,200,000.
So the figures for adults are based on a population of approximately 3 million rather 5 mllion. They exclude Glasgow, the most densely populated urban area in Scotland. None of this matters to Miller. He believes there is a world epidemic of autism in children, a pandemic that is caused by “vaccines.” He does not specify which vaccines, or which components or how they might be acting to cause his pandemic. He argues that if there is no pandemic there ought to be 500,000 autistic adults requiring 24/7 care in the UK. This is plain silly. Never mind that we are talking about a spectrum of need, where most autistic adults do not require 24/7 care. If Miller were right there ought to be 133,500 autistic children requiring 24/7 care in the UK. Some do require constant care but most clearly do not.
A tenfold error
So much for Kirby’s source. What does Kirby make of this material? It turns out that he makes a complete pig’s ear of it.
Let’s look at the numbers. There are approximately 34,000 young people with autism in Scotland, born during the 16 years from 1987-2002. That is an average of 2,125 cases per birth cohort. But among older people, born during the 31 years between 1955 and 1986, there are only about 600 reported cases, or just over 19 cases a year.
If the rate of autism in Scotland had remained unchanged between 1955 and today, then there are many, many uncounted adults going without support, services, or even much recognition.
In fact, at 2,125 cases on average per year, there should be 65,875 people with autism in Scotland between the ages of 22 and 53 years alone. But only 600 have signed up for any help at all, in a country with universal healthcare, no less.
Which begs a few questions: Where are the other 65,275 people in that age group with autism? Why have 109 out of every 110 adults with autism never sought, nor received, any special attention for their particular needs? Why have they not been counted? And why is there no national outrage over the neglect of so many thousands of fellow citizens going without services that they need?
In a country the size of Maine, with a population much smaller than New York City, it seems that the government would be able to locate and help these people.
Unless, of course, some of them are not there.
These figures are hogwash. Kirby may be able to use a calculator but he cannot read a graph. The figure is 3,400 not 34,000. Incredibly this post has been up for over a week now and nobody seems to have spotted such an egregious error, neither managing editor Kim Stagliano, nor editor Dan Olmsted and certainly not Kirby himself. And none of his supporters has posted a correction in the comments section, not even Barbara Fishkin who commented,
May 11th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
adults, autism epidemic, journalism, vaccines |
24 comments
David T Tayloe is a pediatrician from Goldsboro, North Carolina (NC) and president elect of the American Acadamy of Pediatrics (AAP) He seemed a decent fellow when I watched him on on the recent Larry King Show about autism. This is what he had to say, taken from the transcript of the show (with numerous interruptions [...] from Jenny McCarthy edited out.)
On Vaccines
“Well, first of all, the childhood vaccine program is the most beneficial public health program in the history of mankind. [...]
And you must have immunization rates that approach 90 percent to keep diseases such as polio, measles, whooping cough and diphtheria from coming in here from countries. They’re one plane ride away and we’re that close to an epidemic.
So, for the American Academy of Pediatrics to want to change the immunization program, there would have to be medical evidence — indisputable medical evidence that we ought to change it. Now [...] we’ve changed it about six times just in the last 10 years. We changed the whooping cough vaccine, we changed the polio vaccine, we changed the rotavirus vaccine.
KING: Why are there so many? TAYLOE: Because we’ve been able to develop ways to vaccinate children to prevent pain and suffering. Just in my practice, I’ve watched three children die of each of the different kinds of bacterial meningitis that we immunize for today. And it’s tragic when that happens. I, in my practice, have not referred a child to the compensation program for a vaccine-related injury [...] and our practice has seen over [...] over a hundred thousand kids a year. [...] They’re recommended.
On drug company donations to the AAP
TAYLOE: I would say it does not influence policy. We have very strict conflict of interest and ethical statements, and abide by the professionalism guidelines of the AMA and are very sensitive issues. Again, we’re not afraid of the truth about vaccines. We’re all for vaccine safety research, efficacy research, all of that.
On profit from vaccines
TAYLOE: I think vaccines are a very difficult way to make a profit in a pediatric practice, because the price of the newest vaccines are like 120 a dose, one dose. And the insurance companies don’t want to pay us much more than that very bare-bones amount for all the costs we have with the vaccines. Then the administration fees are less than what’s recommended by Medicare in most practices.So physicians, as a rule, are taking a loss on vaccines in their practices. But we feel so committed to the public health effort, that we’re going to do it. And just about half the children receive government funded vaccines, which are free vaccines that go to the states. There’s no profit at all there. You just give the vaccine and then charge a government controlled administration fee.So this is not a profit center for pediatrics. This is something that’s for public health that we all do. And it’s the right thing to do.
On listening to parents about autism
TAYLOE: At the American Council of Pediatrics we’re making some progress on that, because we had two policy statements in November, and a tool kit for our members. We’re getting 18 and 24 month screens. I like to screen between six and 12 months, carefully. [...]We are quite willing to work with anyone on this. We would like to be [...]
This all seems quite reasonable to me. Dr Tayloe is expressing the mainstream medical opinion on vaccines, which was why he was invited onto the show. But he is not just a mouthpiece for the AAP. Dr Tayloe heads a pediatric practise in Goldsboro NC and he is obviously motivated by a desire to care for children. I found the part were he talked about the children in his practise who died from diseases that can now be prevented with vaccines particularly moving.
However, not everybody shares my opinion. Those who cling to the notion that vaccines cause autism appear outraged by his comments. A lady who once claimed to bring “graciousness” to the debate about autism wrote on her blog:
Dr. Tayloe said that in his practice that has seen 100,000 patients that he has never referred one person to the Vaccine Injury Compensation Fund. If he has never seen a serious vaccine injury, it is not because he has not come across one, it is because he has his head up his ass.Tayloe is just dangerous.
This man has GOT to be removed from the position that he has been elected to before he takes office. I would take Karp in a second over this guy. Karp was wrong, but he wasn’t crazy person saying insane things with a smile wrong.
Actually, Dr Tayloe’s words show us how rare vaccine injuries are. There are around 60 million children aged 14 and under in the USA and around 60,000 pediatricians. Out of all the millions of kids who have been vaccinated, there have been less than 10,000 petitions (8,224) to the US Court of Federal Claims under the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program since its inception nearly twenty years ago in October 1988. Though I hesitate to contradict a gracious lady, it seems to me that, in the light of these figures, the likelihood of a pediatrician encountering a case of vaccine damage is low enough to encourage belief in Dr Tayloe’s statement.
Never mind. Our gracious lady suddenly adds an interpolation:
[UPDATE: OMG! Turns out the Vaccine Injury Compensation Court exists in part due to the 3.5 million dollar malpractice suit that Dr. David Tayloe lost in 1985 when a child he gave the DPT shot to magically got permanent brain injury!! That Asshole just got on TV and implied that he had never SEEN a vaccine injury in his practice!!! ]
Actually this was Dr Tayloe’s father, David T Tayloe Snr. Our David Tayloe, David T Tayloe Jnr. was still at medical school during the fateful immunization in 1974. The settlement was reduced to $1.1 million on appeal and the real culprit, if ‘culprit’ is an appropriate word in this case, was the practise nurse who failed to inform Dr Tayloe Snr. of a reported adverse reaction by the child to his initial DPT shot.
Incidentally, I wrote to the lawyer who prosecuted the case against Dr Tayloe Snr. and he told me that Dr Tayloe, “seemed like a nice guy who just made a mistake which was fatal to a baby.” Our gracious lady is less than gracious when she writes,
I got an email from someone Tayloe went to med school with that says this was his father. In thinking about where to adjust my judgmentalism meter, I think that I will retract my declaration that he is an asshole, and say that he is a dangerous, foolish man.
That is big of you, Ginger. Then you go on to say:
A jury told his own father that he was more than three million dollars worth of wrong for administering a shot that plunged a boy into brain damage, and he learned nothing from it, continuing to claim that ‘all vaccines are safe for every child’, and that there is no such thing as serious vaccine injury. (or maybe, but barely ever, as his statement last week was that there was not “any relationship between vaccines and permanent injury”, and this week he has downgraded his stance to “extremely rare”.) Even though it was not directly his, he should still know better because of his father’s legacy.]
Sins of the fathers? Even so, if that was my legacy I would be very much aware of the possibility of vaccine damage. And I am sure that Dr Tayloe Jnr is aware. But he must be equally aware of his profesional obligation to maintain the health of the nation by encouraging take up of the vaccine program. Considering his family history I can think of no man better equiped to lead the AAP in this task.
There are many people who presume to speak on behalf of the autism community. Very few of them speak for me. So, speaking entirely for myself, I just want to apologize to Dr Tayloe on behalf of all the people like me for the ill-deserved remarks that have come your way as a result of your appearance on the Larry King Show.
April 5th, 2008
Posted by
Mike |
Autism, vaccines |
7 comments
