In the most recent edition of the Schafer Mercury Report, editor Lenny Schafer has a fascinating response to a letter writer. Its not really necessary to reproduce the letter, but Schafer’s response is a gem:
Myself and other autism activists believe there is enough evidence to support a causative relationship between mercury and autism in a court of law, in front of a jury, where standards of evidence are different than that of the narrow focus of scientific findings. And if you can convince a jury, you can convince the public. Since public health by definition is political, legal standards are even more so appropriate. The profound conflicts of interest amongst those who order, perform and draw conclusions from most of the no-connection evidence as alibis for vaccines, renders such evidence as tampered and thus, less than useless. The defenders of mercurated vaccines are in trouble and attempt to hide their malfeasance behind lab standards.
I mean _wow!_
This is a de facto admission that the scientific evidence to support an autism/mercury connection is very weak:
…. where standards of evidence are different than that of the narrow focus of scientific findings.
By ‘different’ Schafer really means ‘lesser’. I mean call me naive here but I was under the impression that the debate with the mercury militia on one side and the AAP, CDC, UK Gvmt, NHS, and ourselves – autistic advocates – were having was a _scientific_ debate. How silly was I? According to Schafer:
Since public health by definition is political, legal standards are even more so appropriate
Public health is by definition political? Really? Only if you can only see one thing at a time maybe. Widen the lens a little bit and I think every medical research scientist, patient and doctor/nurse might see public health as something a little bit more than a simply political process.
This is a debate at its core about what it means to be autistic. What causes people to be autistic. How in God’s name can that be political beyond the kind of infantile number crunching the Generation ‘6000% increase’ Rescue go in for? The people who have politicised this debate are the ones who employ media manipulation specialists such as Fenton Communications.
But hey – lets not worry about that – lets not worry about the *fact* that learning more about autism is a core scientific responsibility. Turning it into a manipulated football to kick about at the whim of a lawyer is much more realistic.
Schafer is absolutely right that scientific standards are greater than legal ones. Stronger, more stringent, demanding of _actual_ evidence. Maybe Schafer could remind me: was it science or a jury that discovered electricity? Was it science or a jury that discovered penicillin? Science or a jury that took men to the moon? Science or a jury that discovered our place in the stars? Our place in nature? Our place in the future?
But then again:
…if you can convince a jury, you can convince the public…
Because y’know, science is _hard_ . Stick instead to trial lawyers so we can let the sort of people who got OJ Simpson cleared, or the Birmingham Six banged up to sort out the tricky concept of autism. Great idea.
_”The profound conflicts of interest amongst those who order, perform and draw conclusions from most of the no-connection evidence as alibis for vaccines, renders such evidence as tampered and thus, less than useless.”_
Yeah, its all a big conspiracy. Like the one that saw SafeMinds purchase the domain evidenceofharm.com or the one that saw Wendy Fournier of the NAA build Kirby a website, like the one that had Richard Deth listed as an expert witness without his knowledge, or the one that tried to smear Paul Shattuck, or the one that had the Chair of the NAA working for thiomersal lawyers Waters and Kraus, or the one that saw Andrew Wakefield allegedly filing a patent for a rival vaccine to MMR *before* he published his paper, or the one that had Kirby add on two years to his statement regarding when the thiomersal connection would be in trouble, or the one that saw RFK Jr talking about the results of a study from the Geiers several months before it was published, or the one where the Geiers started patenting Lupron therapy, or the one where Generation Rescue placed words in the mouths of scientists.
Its true that your scientific case is very weak Mr Schafer. Without that science, so is your legal one.
Left Brain Right Brain 
If the GENES don’t fit… you must acquit.
Paul Offit made the point that one thing that went wrong in the “Cutter incident” was that Roosevelt had just died and the politicians were doing some kind of emotional immolation (or whatever — tearing their Brooks Brothers shirts… crying Oh, my GAAAWD the president died, my must destroy polio in the next 10 minutes…) That’s what it sounded like. And so they ramped up a process in a few days that should have taken longer to make sure everyone was using the best checks and safeguards…
but this was public health in the hands of politicians so actually what might have been a stunning victory over polio, was a slightly less stunning victory (but still a great vicotory) because in the rush to produce the vaccine at the behest of politicians all the batches weren’t getting tested well enough and the procedure had some problems that allowed some virus to hide inside some cells or something. (Here come the antivaxers, can you hear the rush of the Harpy wings?)
If you had put it to a jury at that time, the jury would have said, “Hurry up already, Summer is coming (this was Spring) and every Summer loads of kids end up in Iron lungs and I don’t want my kid walking on crutches for the rest of his life.”
Now we have parents who have never known the potential dangers of vaccine preventable diseases who are want to disembowel themselves (much like Schafer does on a regular basis) in front of a jury… not “for the good of the nation” but for their own self interest… which would be fine if their kids had actually been harmed by vaccines, but they weren’t.
One of the funniest things is advice that someone gave on a mercury-parent board a year or two ago… that is, “Make sure you get the Doctor’s Data (whatever lab) to test your kid so you can take those results into court…” But those results are worse that a joke and would be laughed out of court. No lawyer in his right mind would offer them as proof when they are patently misleading and absolutely, utterly non-standard. If the parents had standard tests, the same ones that others who really do have heavy metal poisoning use, then they might have a point.
It’s like if the parents walk in front of the judge with tears streaming down their faces…
“Juhhhuuuuhhhddgge…(sob) it’s sooo not faaaahaaairrrr,
I paid for a 10 foot long car but the one I got is only f-five f-feeeet l-lohonnnnng (sob) (hiccup, sniff, blows nose)”
and the petitioner holds up a home made ruler with each “inch” mark about 2 inches from the next, a “one foot” ruler that is more than 2 feet long. “Seeee! I measured it my seh-helf (sob) with my own ruuuulller (sob)”
They don’t stand a chance in a court if anyone knows a drop of science, but they stand a chance in court where all the decisions are made on emotion and scientific sounding inuendo.
More conspiracy, partly out in the open. From Februrary ’05 a “leading light in Autism Biomed got disgusted with an argument over Bradstreet’s goodness and posts to her own Yahoo! Group:
_”… A few years ago an individual claiming to have a Ph.D. was posing as a parent on various autism lists, promoting herself and her protocol. It was brought to light that she never graduated from highschool and received her degrees from a diploma mill housed in a strip mall in Northern California. I also discovered that many DAN! members were aware that this woman was a fraud. I confronted a highly respected DAN! member and asked him why no one was bothering to expose this woman. His response was, “Parents are emotionally devastated by this kind of stuff. No one wants to see that.”
Pam,summed it up quite well with, “Gotta be careful what you say and how you say it on these lists. People are placing a lot of faith in their practitioners and comments like those below just get the faithful riled up!””_
There they go with those pesky standards like: “PhD’s” should actually be more than high school drop-outs.
This was the thread where it came from a few individuals that Bradstreet had allegedly been disciplined by DAN! for recommending exorcism and where they alleged that he did a bait and switch with cheap Secretin substitute (secrepam?).
I heard that you can’t find a lawyer to take a thimerosal case now… makes you wonder how hard they are working to make it a viable case or if they’ve gone back to asbestos and breast implants or something. It kind of looks like the parents are doing all the work now.
MsC: “I heard that you can’t find a lawyer to take a thimerosal case now… ”
Dig this….. http://www.ryar.org/thimerosal/
I quote (removing advertising crap):
*start*
Thimerosal
Thimerosal is a chemical that has been used as a preservative in vaccines since the 1930s. This chemical has been the topic of controversy for many years, and has been associated with neurodevelopment problems and autism in children. Thimerosal contains the second most toxic substance there is, mercury, which is what causes these ill effects. Thimerosal is added to vaccines to prevent bacteria and spoiling, and is in most vaccinations that are administered to children.
Due to its link with adverse effects, Thimerosal was banned from over the counter medications in 1998. In 1999 Thimerosal began to be withdrawn from all other vaccines as well. That said, studies have been carried out and have indicated that there is no link between these effects and the use of Thimerosal. However, statistics and figures seem to indicate otherwise. Since the 1980s, the number of vaccinations administered to children has increased, and in the same time autism in children has risen from 1 in 10000 to 1 in 250.
The figures that indicate a link between autism and Thimerosal have resulted in a number of lawsuits, which have been filed over the past few years. These Thimerosal claims have been made against the manufacturers of Thimerosal and against the drug companies that have produced vaccines containing Thimerosal. The connection between mercury and autism development has given substance to these claims, with investigative research results showing that certain levels of mercury can increase the risk of autism in children.
In 1999 the FDA issued a report that stated: “infants who received thimerosal-containing vaccines at several visits may be exposed to more mercury than recommended by federal guidelines for total mercury exposure.” This led to the filing of the first Thimerosal lawsuit. This was followed by a mass influx of individual and class action lawsuits, and many parents refused to allow their children to receive childhood vaccinations that were preserved by Thimerosal. In addition to this, despite the fact that in 1999 vaccine manufacturers were advised to stop using Thimerosal in their vaccines, there was no recall carried out, and these vaccines were still widely available.
Through the filing of Thimerosal lawsuits, it is hoped that the vaccine companies and manufacturers will be forced to further investigate the effects of Thimerosal upon children. Of course, the lawsuits are also to enable parents to gain compensation for ill effects suffered by any children that were given Thimerosal preserved vaccinations. The settlement is designed to cover medical expenses, income loss, suffering, and punitive damages.
Anyone that feels that their child may have suffered as a result of being given Thimerosal preserved vaccinations is advised to contact a drugs litigation lawyer as soon as possible. You could be entitled to compensation for the suffering of your child, but it is vital that you contact an experienced lawyer as soon as possible to improve your chances of being able to file a complaint. A Thimerosal lawyer will be able to advise whether you have grounds to file for damages, and what your chances of success are, based on the circumstances.
The influx in Thimerosal compensation claims and lawsuits has seen many law firms employ specially trained lawyers in this field.
*endquote*
These bastards are covering their arses well, no?
On the one hand: “That said, studies have been carried out and have indicated that there is no link between these effects and the use of Thimerosal”
On the other: “The connection between mercury and autism development has given substance to these claims, with investigative research results showing that certain levels of mercury can increase the risk of autism in children”
They have to indicate the fact that no study has shown a definite causl link between Hg-poisoning and autism. They get round this, and manage to drum up business by using this:
” However, statistics and figures seem to indicate otherwise. Since the 1980s, the number of vaccinations administered to children has increased, and in the same time autism in children has risen from 1 in 10000 to 1 in 250. ”
But the use it in the absence of anything could fuck up their chances of making a buck or twenty on their prospective clients’ problems.
I don’t know any other country where you can find a *thimerosal* lawyer!!!!
David wrote:
“I dont know any other country where you can find a *thimerosal* lawyer!”
It’s definitely sick. I lived in the biggest hot-spot for asbestosis cases in the US for about 6 years starting about 12 years ago, then I moved back to California. It was and is a real mess with lots of people (to a great extent they are smokers) dying of mesothelioma which is an ugly lung cancer caused by asbestos fibers (and grossly aggravated by smoking as I understand it). I have close relatives who still live there (several) and some of them have some asbestosis, but no one has cancer (yet) perhaps because they aren’t smokers.
At any rate, the mining corporation that exposed them was/is pretty bad and probably knew some of what they were doing. But the lawyers aren’t even getting THIS right. The compensation doesn’t seem like it’s being distributed right, even now. If you live where the “epicenter” is, you can get some help, the CDC or some outfit like that, moved in specialists just as I was moving out of there. But the stuff with the asbestos was put on trains and the asbestos is found at various places where it was unloaded, and those folks are up a creek without a paddle… IF the news reports are correct.
I wasn’t exposed to the asbestos, or there’s no reason to think that I was. The stuff was everywhere, practically, in that town 20 years ago.
My point is, some of the Thimerosal lawyers are also “asbestos lawyers,” if they are thimerosal lawyers, to me, they are scum, no matter who they are trying to get money for.
http://www.hugesettlements.com/articles/waters_kraus_meso_profile.htm
http://www.autismlawyer.net/
America is such a litigious society… it’s actually quite scary what the lawyers and businesses will come up with as the next big issue of litigation 😦
I think that the “epidemic” was not (heh… JBJr eat your heart out!) invented by Eli Lily in 1931… it was invented by a bunch of US law firms who needed another free meal ticket.
_it was invented by a bunch of US law firms who needed another free meal ticket._
Yes, some lawyers looking for the funds to pay for a new sports car, and some scientists looking for funding for research. “Epidemic? Sure we’ll get you some money, right now!,” says the legislature …
I wrote a paper about 8 years ago on tort reform. Best bad jury award: a woman won 1 million for her claim that a MRI scan destroyed her psychic ability. But didn’t she know that was going to happen?
Heard a report last week on the diet aid fen-phen litigation. Trial layers had set up mobile clinics with people they trained to do echo cardiograms. Anyone with valve damage who had taken these drugs were considered eligible for the group settlement. Some people were hurt by these drugs, but many people with prior health problems were added to the case to increase the lawyers take.
Many toxicologists like me would like to test on lawyers instead of rats, because you don’t become attached to them like you do rats. So if your kid has autism, contact the law firm of Dewey, Chethem and Howe.
Ruth said: Many toxicologists like me would like to test on lawyers instead of rats, because you don’t become attached to them like you do rats.
Are there any studies to suggest lawyers can be useful models of humans?
I’m not sure why this has turned into a “let’s bash the lawyers” thread. As a father of an autistic daughter, I have learned from boards such as this that I need to strive to make make her feel loved and accepted for who she is, that I should appreciate and value her differences and not make her feel belittled because of who she is. I make an honest effort to live up to those standards. But now, from this board, I learn that because of who I am (a lawyer) I am not a “useful model of human” and that I am less valuable than a rat.
Yes- I know the people saying those things will claim that they were making jokes and probably think they were being very charming and witty but go through what they said and replace the word lawyer with “autistic.” If someone were to say that autistics were less valuable than rats and were to ask if “there any studies to suggest autistics can be useful models of humans,” I can’t imagine that too many people here would be laughing. Perhaps instead of just preaching tolerance of those who are different from you, it might be a good idea to practice it as well.
It is especially bothersome to me because tort lawyers, of course, hold businesses (and everyone else) accountable for the harms they do to others. What on earth is wrong with that? Bad legal cases happen but they tend to get corrected just as bad science does (the case of the person who lost his psychic abilities from an MRI was overturned on appeal).
Kevin Greenlee,
You are right of course. Please accept my apology.
KG-
Sorry for the offensive attempt at humor. I will try to make my case more objectively. I do think there has been a decline in the standards of some in the legal community. Yes, bad cases are often overturned, but should such frivolous cases be brought before a jury in the first place? The day after the FDA issued warnings about Vioxx, full page ads appeared in our paper, looking for clients. Their tone implied Merck was guilty. What chance is there of establishing the real role of Vioxx in heart attack with that kind of climate? I have a clotting disorder and cannot take NSAIDS for my joint pain, now I’ve lost the chance to use a drug that helped me. I would rather my doctor and I evaluate my risk and choose accordingly.
There are bad companies and bad docs, and I want them out of business. But I fear many good doctors are choosing not to take the riskier cases (OB-GYN) and innovative products are not coming to market because of fear of unscientific litigation. Why bother with costly, technically exacting research when junk science wins in court?
Although Mr. Grennlee (based on the wording of his comment) and I would ordinarily be on the opposite side of the bar, his points are very well-taken. There is nothing wrong about holding entities accountable.
I think Kev’s post is somewhat naïve. We now have such an interdependent relationship between what should be a scientifically driven industry and the government agencies responsible for public health (not unlike the “military-industrial complex†President Eisenhower warned of), that public health questions are now decided more by the political process rather than by laboratory and clinical work. Witness the public pronouncements of Paul Offit, whose recent contributions to the debate have been to influence political policy by lecturing on the law ⎯ and doing it badly at that.
Justice might indeed be best served by forestalling the legal debate until after the scientific debate is determined with some degree of certainty. But that’s not going to happen for a number of reasons, and I don’t think one can blame that on greedy lawyers as much as on policy makers who are trying to shut off the pursuit of an answer.
Wade, I agree “There is nothing wrong about holding entities accountable” but thimerosal litigation seems to be moving well beyond the role of pharmaceutical industry watchdog. I’m all for holding entities accountable when there is ample evidence to suggest said entities have caused harm.
As an attorney, do you feel the judicial system is sufficiently able to interpret and adjudicate science and technology issues?
As far as the correction of bad science or legal cases, how was the Dow Corning breast implant class action suit “corrected” once the bad science and expert witness testimony was re-examined?
In cases like the Wakefield-MMR debacle, a retraction doesn’t go very far toward correcting damage that is already done, and I’m not even talking about the undermining of public confidence in the vaccine program. Half of the commenters on this blog still suspect or believe that kids with autism have guts full of measles virus.
“Justice might indeed be best served by forestalling the legal debate until after the scientific debate is determined with some degree of certainty.”
Wade, this is where I think you’ve missed the point. There really isn’t a scientific debate, that’s an assertion on your part. The degree of certainty you seek is not likely to be found in the science, that’s not already available (yet not believed by groups that let their decision making be guided by belief rather than examination of the evidence).
662,000 confirmed cases of real lead toxicity are on the CDC books for children under the age of six between 1997-2004. Where are the policy makers? Where are the publicly angry parents and chelationists?
_”Justice might indeed be best served by forestalling the legal debate until after the scientific debate is determined with some degree of certainty. But that’s not going to happen for a number of reasons, and I don’t think one can blame that on greedy lawyers as much as on policy makers who are trying to shut off the pursuit of an answer.”_
Hmmm. I’m not sure how my post got interpretted as a ‘greedy lawyers’ post. It certainly wasn’t about greedy lawyers but about using a process ill suited to the process at hand to decide an outcome.
The issue I have with what you’ve written there Wade is that I cannot see how it is possible for a jury to decide what constitutes autism and what doesn’t. The facts are that nobody knows and trying to shortcut our way to a legally advantageous answer serves _the truth_ very, very poorly indeed.
If anyone feels that they are being hindered in their pursuit of the truth then that’s one thing. If however anyone feels that they have a right to litigate a convenient answer because standards of law are less stringent than standards of science then that’s something else entirely.
_”that public health questions are now decided more by the political process rather than by laboratory and clinical work”_
I’m not suggesting this doesn’t happen. What I’m saying is that by continuing to allow it to happen and by continuing to assume/pretend that this processes encompasses the whole of public health we risk removing any element of control over standards of science – we might just as well allow scientific debate to meet a legal standard in all cases.
I also think that those who are pursuing litigation with such fervour that they form autism organisations chaired by people soliciting clients over the internet have a large part of the responsibility in the end result of the legal process outstripping the science here.
We cannot allow this to become an issue settled by the law.
clone3g : As an attorney, do you feel the judicial system is sufficiently able to interpret and adjudicate science and technology issues?
In general, the system does a pretty good job of handling very technical disputes, and scientific and technical cases are decided correctly every day. The press, of course, is quite astute at picking up on the bad ones. That is not to say that the system is perfect; it is not. But courts not only attempt to correct substantive errors, but also to improve the decision-making process to avoid similar errors. For example, the Daubert decision of a few years back had a tremendous impact on what scientific and technological evidence comes before the courts. In other words, judges are very aware of the risks that junk science can poison the process, and they are doing something about it.
Dad Of Cameron : There really isn’t a scientific debate, that’s an assertion on your part.
With all due respect, it’s not just an assertion on my part, but on the part of a great many people, including scientists. There are certainly people like Dr. Offit who keep insisting that the debate is over, but the only “evidence” they can cite consists of four epidemiological studies that all have methodological problems. especially consider the stated opinion of the primary author of the only US study that is ever mentioned, who referred to the conclusion as a “neutral” finding, and that further study was warranted. No, Dad, the scientific debate is far from over.
“In cases like the Wakefield-MMR debacle, a retraction doesn’t go very far toward correcting damage that is already done, and I’m not even talking about the undermining of public confidence in the vaccine program. Half of the commenters on this blog still suspect or believe that kids with autism have guts full of measles virus.”
Clone, the latest research on this topic reported to find measles virus in the guts of autistic children. We briefly discussed this on another thread and I understand you and others don’t believe or don’t take this new research seriously. I forget if it was you but someone said they had an issue with the “F gene amplicon” method used by Krigsman and had been following this topic for a long time. I suppose we’ll need to wait for the full study to be released in June but I’d be interested in hearing the “whole story.”
Wade: the scientific debate is far from over.
Wade, very little hinges on the epidemiological studies. Had they revealed and association, then there would be more reason to explore possible biological mechanisms by which thimerosal may cause the symptoms of autism. Since there is very little biological evidence to support a role, the epidemiological evidence merely supports the lack of evidence.
If you think the scientific evidence is so compelling, why is it so easily dissected by a bunch of bloggers?
“If anyone feels that they are being hindered in their pursuit of the truth then that’s one thing.”
Kev, That is a HUGE part of this. Personally, it will take a lot for the CDC to regain my trust and I don’t think I will ever trust them when it comes to autism. I do believe they have hindered autism research and I am cautiously optimistic that the NIEHS will be able to pick up where the CDC left off in Generation Zero of the VSD study.
This is from “A-CHAMP” the political action committee.
These are the folks behind ACHAMP
Bob Krakow – the lawyer who (reluctantly?) reported that another child was almost accidently infused with disodium EDTA, except they read the CDC statement that that wasn’t a good idea and turned the doctor down. The guy who accidently misquoted Paul Offit about who was behind the 6000% ad.
Rita Shreffler -?
Bobbie Manning – I think she has a vaccine lawsuit pending
John Gilmore – sometimes poster (troll?) to aut-advo group.
Lujene G. Clark – nasty tempered female who attacked Kev in writing saying he wasn’t worth listening to because he must be mentally ill since he had ASD relatives. Thinks her “previously normal” son descended into the hell that is Asperger’s at age 8 or 9 after a flu shot.
Below the ACHAMP press release thing… my favorite part: “an explosing in neurodevelopmental disorders,…”
I love it when people get on their high horses and make pulbic annoncements with spelling mistakes. One time Kirby sent out a press release about “univerisity” experiments that supported his conspiracy theory.
_We are experiencing an *explosing* in neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism, among our children. Twenty years ago the incidence of autism was approximately 3 or 4 cases in 10,000 children. Today around 60 children in 10,000 are diagnosed with autism, *a fifteen fold increase*. Once considered rare, autism is one of the most common serious chronic diseases afflicting our kids. It is an epidemic. A crisis. What is being done about it?
Not Much.
But now there is a bill pending in Congress that would require our government to allocate substantial resources for research into the causes of and the possible treatments for autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. The bill would provide significant funding for autism research, including funding for the research of environmental causes, and investigation of the effect of toxic agents, including vaccines, on the immune, gastrointestinal, metabolic and endocrine systems of our children.
The bill provides for *significant oversight of the research and funding process by parents and other members of the community.*
The autism community has never been so unified and dedicated in purpose to any legislative initiative as it is in supporting the Combating Autism Act. Numerous autism groups worked hard last fall to revise original proposals to hammer out a bill that all of us can support._
Emphasis added.
Hey, how many autistics (besides the ones who are flaming mercury parents) will be overseeing the spending of this money?
I wonder where they got the 1500% (15 fold) increase. What’s with that?? Where’s the 6000% increase? This is a profound (75%) decrease in the number of autistic children in this country in just a WEEK! Call the press. Call the national guard. Or is ACHAMP acting as a tool of big pharma?
I notice that Wade has not joined the discussion on my blog about why the autism rates in Canada are comparable to those in the USA when most kids in Canada have never had a thimerosal containing vaccine.
Then there is the case of Britain where Ken Aitken used to argue that there was not enough mercury in UK vaccines to explain the rise in autism. He went on the record with that before a committee of enquiry. That was when he was an expert witness for MMR litigants. Now he is a DAN! doctor, sorry, I mean a DAN! practitioner as he does not have a medical degree. And he was clearly backing the mercury hypothesis in a presentation which I blogged last year.
It seems logical to me that if the UK, USA and Canada all have broadly similar rates for prevalence of ASDs and if all of them have different levels of thimerosal exposure in vaccines then it cannot be vaccines that are to blame. We should be looking for a common factor to explain the reported increase in prevalence. There are all sorts of reasons why this might be the case. We should only be looking for an environmental toxin to explain the increase if we have evidence that increased prevalence reflects an increase in incidence.
There hasn’t been a “15 fold increase” in autism, there was the adding of PDD,nos and Asperger’s to the counting so that the current level of “autism” is the same or at the most a doubling of what it was 30 years ago, or a 100% increase, which can be easilty accounted for by social changes and changes in the gene pool, which will be easy enough to show in vaccine parents soon enough.
There is nothing but vague assertion and science that has been thoroughly misrepresented in the press by people like NAA with Claire Bothwell at the head (for one) and ACHAMP which has vaccine litigants in mind and in charge. And then there’s Kirby whose book is full of inuendo and factual error and loads of truthiness.
Wade, you think there is enough evidence to implicate thimerosal but you are wrong. Dead wrong. If you tried to make your case tomorrow or even in 3 years you’d have nothing but lousy science and DDI lab reports. There has been no epidemic which is what you all are so het up about.
You can’t begin to prove anything vaguely like an epidemic in court, so it’s time to change tactics. Maybe asbestos causes autism. Maybe paint fumes.
Y’all have been totally suckered by quacks and the judges can see that, or should. Then all they have to do is look at the backgrounds of the Geiers (bad stats and Lupron) and Bradstreet (exorcism, padding the resume) and Hayley (conflicted?) and it’s all over for y’all. Burbacher’s study stinks. Hornig is a mercury mom, James is a mercury mom. And no of the “leaders” has cured his or her child, but Buttar and he’s not even pushing the stuff he said cured his child now. He’s gone to IV. No one has found mercury in the brains of deceased autistics. No one is looking at what happens to kids today who are getting TCVs (WMDs).
I think you are badly mistaken if you think a judge is going to buy this DAN!-NAA-Kirby line of garbage. I could be wrong of course, there are some dumb judges out there. It’s just hysterical that Lenny wants it all decided now in court. Maybe ‘cuz it’s all going against you in the labs. Maybe some of the lab rats are deserting the sinking ship and Lenny knows it. Maybe the lawyers aren’t taking any more cases because they know the ship is sinking.
Personally, I don’t attack all lawyers because Anne is a lawyer. I also think that the ambulence chasers are human scum, they know what they are and don’t care… baby needs a new Maserati.
Worth repeating:
“No, Dad, the scientific debate is far from over.”
Throw out your calculators, beeotches, and pick up a feelings-ometer.
/This product is Tom Cruise-approved.
“With all due respect, it’s not just an assertion on my part, but on the part of a great many people, including scientists.”
Yet it remains an ASSERTION. Further, the ‘scientists’ you are likely referring to, have not presented any real science to support this ASSERTION. Merely being labeled ‘scientists’ is meaningless. Science is about the methodology, and by definition includes the welcome process of real peer-review. A great many people holding a “belief” is not scientific evidence of anything! Remember the geocentric, planetary motion, and germ theory believers from history, as discussed in a previous thread? I know you understand the silliness of the argument based on the number of bleevers, why do you continue to use it in a discussion related to “scientific debate”.
“No, Dad, the scientific debate is far from over.”
Wade, with all respect due you as well, if you really look at the science and only the science, it boils down to: A) Does mercury cause autism? and B) Do autistics have higher levels of mercury? There is no real science to prove either of these two hypotheses. The remaining scientific question would obviously be, well then what is/are the etiologies of autism? And that is not a subject for debate, it’s a subject for research.
Referring back to the original post…I think Schafer’s statements are extraordinarily telling.
Lenny’s right in that proof in a court of law (especially a civil court where only a “preponderance” of evidence needs to support your position) is far different than scientific proof. One only needs to look at John Edwards’ legal case history for examples of that. Daubert might have helped judges remove some of the wheat from the chaff, but I’m sure the Mady Hornings and Richard Deths of the world with their PHD’s and university positions will get to espouse their vaguely contributory findings in a court of law if it comes to that.
In matters of science and especially public health, very often the legal case often proceeds far faster than the scientific inquiry. How many doctors were found in courts of law of causing cerebral palsy due to inappropriate labor and delivery procedures, for example…only to find that those procedures most likely had nothing to do with CP in the first place.
The legitimate question I ask is this, though. How much of this “inquiry” is based on a true desire to gain scientific knowledge of autism and its causes, and how much of it is driven by potential profit? (whether that be the promotion of quack therapies or jury awards in a civil lawsuit) Drug companies aren’t the only ones to have something to protect, IMO.
“The legitimate question I ask is this, though. How much of this “inquiry†is based on a true desire to gain scientific knowledge of autism and its causes, and how much of it is driven by potential profit?”
A question I’d add is, how much of this “inquiry” is driven on some deep-seated need for psychological self-preservation by “believers”. I think it possible that many simply have way too much emotion invested in it, and pursue it only for some deluded concept of potential intellectual exhoneration. I know this is a lame analogy, but it’s kind of like that silly Fear Factor TV show where the people have been served up a plate of boiled cow testicles or live bugs – they’ve taken the first bite and despite the reality, they chow down (barely holding back spewing) so as not to be perceived as one of ‘the ones’ who caved in. Giving in now, to many, may mean admitting years of personal and career foolishness – a reality that would be understandably difficult to face, if it was even recognized as a possibility.
DoC,
I do think there’s some sunk cost fallacy mixed in here – if you’ve already plunked down a large amount of capital (whether it be political, intellectual or financial) on a particular idea, many people will continue to invest in that idea even when it appears to be futile. If you have made bold statements asserting that vaccines cause autism and find you can’t back it up, you may continue to invest in “making your case” long past the point that it makes logical sense to.
“if you really look at the science and only the science, it boils down to: A) Does mercury cause autism? and B) Do autistics have higher levels of mercury? There is no real science to prove either of these two hypotheses.”
DoC,
I think you’re rushing to judgement. Do you really think we have enough studies to answer the two questions you pose? I can truthfully state that there is no real science to disprove either of those two hypotheses.
And you’re focusing on a very narrow portion of the total picture. What if vaccines are causing immune disorders in babies that subsequently leads to autism? There are several studies you might even acknowledge as “real science” that show immune disorders in autistics.
“If you have made bold statements asserting that vaccines cause autism and find you can’t back it up, you may continue to invest in “making your case†long past the point that it makes logical sense to.”
Anonimouse, If you’re implying that we’re past the point that it makes logical sense to continue investigating vaccines and their potential role in autism I’d be very interested to hear why you believe we’re at that point. Surely, you can’t be relying on flawed epidemiology that only focused on a vaccine preservative.
DH: I can truthfully state that there is no real science to disprove either of those two hypotheses.
You don’t need science to disprove it, you need science to prove it. Until then…..
What if vaccines are causing immune disorders in babies that subsequently leads to autism?
Well what if? Once mercury is dismissed as a cause nobody will listen to talk about other ways vaccines may cause autism. Y’all shot your foots.
David H.
Go back and read Kevin’s orginal post.
It’s specific to mercury.
“I think you’re rushing to judgement. Do you really think we have enough studies to answer the two questions you pose? I can truthfully state that there is no real science to disprove either of those two hypotheses.”
Those two questions were not posed by me. They are the crux of the mercury causes autism hypothesis – not scientifically proven. Lack of disproof in no way strengthens an unproven hypothesis (see appeal to ignorance). I can truthfully state that there is no real science to disprove that autism is caused by sunspots – should we spend a lot of time and money studying that, so people who might believe it can rest assured that it ain’t sunspots?
“And you’re focusing on a very narrow portion of the total picture. What if vaccines are causing immune disorders in babies that subsequently leads to autism? There are several studies you might even acknowledge as “real science†that show immune disorders in autistics.”
Hmmm. Ya think it might be a good idea to drop all the mercury nonsense and focus the research elsewhere? Perhaps the mercutrophs are counterproductive in the big picture.
Hi
I agree with Wade when he say
the scientific debate is far from over.
The fact is that today the picture of 1000 pieces (?) want to be seen with 10 or only with 1 ( that is discarded by those to construct it with 10).
Sorry, I did not find the truth, I am searching for. I do not have either the 1000 pieces, but I am suspicious that this is the point: a very high number of pieces (perhaps 1000 is too low really).
Who has studied enough the effect of COMBINATION of insults to susceptible children?? Where are the studies about the combined
effect of vaccines and thimerosal and allergens
and crowded schedule and antibiotics and
childhood infections in susceptible children
since birth, like the autistic ones, in immune system and gut and CNS? Where are
the studies about the epigenetics in autistic children and environmental insult?? What about polymorphisms in people susceptible to HM published manuscript- not on autistic children up to now? The recent published literature about vaccines warns over and over on susceptible people, once and again.
Where are the studies of these kind?
Ma Luján
The place to start, if you want to look at environmental insults is the result of studies like the CHARGE study where they take a large number of kids and examine as much as they can the toxins/stresses/whatever in their environments and then try to corellate that with phenotypes and geography, etc.
The place NOT to start is just any old place someone is screaming about. Vaccines are not the most logical place to start, from what I can tell. PCBs would make much more sense as a place to start. Take the screaming antivaxers out of the picture and think calmly, “where do we start?”
If you think calmly you know that there was no boom in autism, so what you want to look at is whatever has been at a fairly constant rate in the past 20 years. If you think you can solve a problem where there are different interactions of 1000 items as potential causes, and where the interactions change day to day and where you can’t reconstruct what happened 3 years ago… The complexity has just reached insanity.
If you think it’s worth it to pin down exactly what causes autism in some kids, and you think it’s safe to start down a road that might lead to the obliteration of autism…
You gotta start where the clues are. If there are genes that are more common among some groups of autistics, what do those genes do?
With a puzzle you take the pieces with the straight edges and start to construct the outside you don’t pick up 19 radom pieces and try to make them fit together, throw them down and pick up another random 19.
Take away the lawyers, frantic parents in denial and the antivaxers who lie, put in their place scientists pursuing facts and there’s no reason to start with vaccines as a good place to look. NO reason. It’s illogical.
But if you think that all the scientists are in collusion to protect thimerosal manufacturers, then why even discuss it? You (the generic “you”) are already in the tin foil hat brigade.
“I can truthfully state that there is no real science to disprove that autism is caused by sunspots – should we spend a lot of time and money studying that, so people who might believe it can rest assured that it ain’t sunspots?”
Are sunspots a neurotoxin? Was the sunspot theory declared biologically plausible by the IOM?
“Ya think it might be a good idea to drop all the mercury nonsense and focus the research elsewhere?”
No, but we do need to increase the research to include vaccines as a whole and not as a individual ingredient or preservative.
Maria said: Where are the studies of these kind?
Why would we need more studies? Everyone knows its the thimerosal. Where have you been? 🙂
I have what looks like a piece of the sky here, it’s blue so it may be water, hard to tell. I can’t find any border pieces and I think the dog chewed up a few. It would sure help if we still had the box so we knew how many pieces are included and what the picture is supposed to look like when we are done.
My approach is to take the pieces that sort of fit and force them. Just press really hard and they’ll go eventually. I forget, what are we talking about here?
“Are sunspots a neurotoxin?”
Thems is sign of radiation David. You know that radiation can alter DNA, right?
DH: No, but we do need to increase the research to include vaccines as a whole and not as a individual ingredient or preservative.
Post Thimerosal Era Research Organization for Suspicious Allthings Unknown Rescue.
Forum On Suspicious Substances and Ingredients Litigation
Mike Stanton said,
“most kids in Canada have never had a thimerosal containing vaccine.”
According to The public Health Agency of Canada, as of 1 may 2002, over 20 vaccines licensed in Canada contain thimerosal, in concentrations ranging from 0.005% to 0.01%, and before 2001 no thimerosal free Heb B was available.
” It seems logical to me that if the UK, USA and Canada all have broadly similar rates for prevalence of ASDs and if all of them have different levels of thimerosal exposure in vaccines then it cannot be vaccines that are to blame.”
If a genetic predisposition to mercury is to blame, and I believe one does exist, then how do we know how much mercury it takes to trigger toxic effects? In other words, Mike claims that 3 different countries have similar ASD rates but different rates of thimerosal exposure, but we don’t know if the smaller thimerosal exposure in the UK, or if the smaller Canadian size dose was still enough to trigger autism in these predisposed indivduals. Just because the UK and Canada used less doesn’t explain away a link in my opinion.
” We should only be looking for an environmental toxin to explain the increase if we have evidence that increased prevalence reflects an increase in incidence.”
I agree and I think that the most likely “environmental toxin ” is mercury and that the problem was compounded by injecting high doses of it directly into the blood stream of babies.
KC:In other words, Mike claims that 3 different countries have similar ASD rates but different rates of thimerosal exposure, but we don’t know if the smaller thimerosal exposure in the UK, or if the smaller Canadian size dose was still enough to trigger autism in these predisposed indivduals.
So if any amount is sufficient to trigger autism in genetically predisposed individuals, rates should be steady from the time thimerosal was introduced right up to present day, right?
Again, what is this genetic predisposition? Did you notice the idea of genetic predisposition to mercury poisoning didn’t appear until sometime in the last 3 years. I guess Hornig & James invented it like Liliy invented autism.
“Just because the UK and Canada used less doesn’t explain away a link in my opinion.”
What link? Did you mean it doesn’t falsify the unproven hypothesis?
You know absolutely nothing about injections, do you KC? Or are you just trying for drama with, “directly into the blood stream of babies”?
Clone: “So if any amount is sufficient to trigger autism”
Did I say any amount? Nope!
The genetic predisposition could be, the inability to be able to detoxify mercury.
“Did you notice the idea of genetic predisposition to mercury poisoning didn’t appear until sometime in the last 3 years. ”
Okay, and your point would be?
You guess Hornig, James, Lilly, invented autism?
This is all a big guessing game. Unless someone’s guess is that mercury is linked to autism, then their will be study after study stating what autism definately is not. How often do you see so many studies stating over and over again what does not cause a disease or a disorder? How often do you see the IOM say that it’s definately not this but then give no direction to proceed next. This is not a guessing game at all!
D of C,
I don’t know, maybe I was just going for drama. You take it however you want. Trying to convince you otherwise would be a waste of my time.
I know absolutely nothing about injections? That’s kind of a broad statement. Are you going to educate me?
“The genetic predisposition could be, the inability to be able to detoxify mercury.”
Damn KC, are you a bot – stuck on repeat?
If this were true, autistic kids would have higher levels of mercury, and remember when Kev said,
“Something else about the ‘poor excretor’ theory: if autistic people are such bad excretors why aren’t there lots of reported acute mercury poisoning deaths amongst autistic people? Mercury is fatal at high enough levels. If they are such bad excretors then one would expect acute mercury poisoning to be a common cause of death amongst autistic people.”
This was only a few days ago.
I know absolutely nothing about injections? That’s kind of a broad statement. Are you going to educate me?
Either you know the difference between IM/IV/SC or you don’t. If you do, then you’re going for drama.
IM/IV/SC
IM is intramuscular, IV is intraveinous, and SC in subcutaneous. Excuse my spellings.
They all get into the bloodstream.
“Poor excretor theory” – I would like to see a long term study on what the number one cause of death is among autistic adults, and what their life expectancy is. If it’s cancer and heart disease, and a shorter life expectancy then I would say that mercury and heavy metals are killing them in the long run.
Do a search on pubmed for “heavy metal toxicity and cancer”, you will get 1942 results, and then do the same search on Toxline and you get 199. Or a search on mercury and heart disease.
Mercury and disease on Toxline, 9167 results and on pubmed, 1088 results.
KC, you’re a good sport. Hopefully you see that saying “injecting high doses of it directly into the blood stream of babies” would only refer to IV, which you know is not the case. Using such language only serves to make you sound alarmist when it is contrary to the truth. I’m not sure what you’re basing “high” on, other than higher than today. Surely you can read the bottom of a DDI report and see what amount of Hg is considered unsafe.
As I understand it, autism alone may not necessarily have any effect on life expectancy. Mental retardation as a cormorbidity has been shown linked to increased mortatlity due to things like seizures and drowning.
Source.
If an IM or SC injection is “into the bloodstream” then so is getting mercury via eating a tuna sandwich.
There is a massive amount of research going on in autism, there are little peeks into the causation of the variouis forms – the autisms. These people are putting “the puzzle” (Ick, shades of the puzzle ribbon and Autism Speak’s puzzle piece, etc.) together in very interesting ways.
When people follow good hypotheses they get findings that someone else can build on (and reproduce), they leap-frog off of each other. You can see Mottron’s group doing this. They are making real world headway into understanding how the autistic brain works. The whole area of the senses in autism is like a red-headed stepchild (apologies to those of you with red-headed children). This is just a horrifically stupid oversight. Kids will be helped by this reasearch, the brain of autistics will be better understood.
So while this handful of scientifically illiterate (Maria excepted) people and their antivax psychotic friends are feeding lies to the media on a near daily basis, there is real research going on where real scientists are saying,
“HEY! I found the horse’s nose!”
“You found the horse’s nose! Wow!!! I found the kitten’s tail.”
“Really?? I was looking for the kitten’s tail.”
“Hey guys and gals!! I found the top petal on the yellow rose!”
“Wow!! we’ve been waiting to complete the yellow rose! Now I can start looking for the purple bucket handle.”
They are making headway and it’s not leading toward mercury but away from it, which is probably why Lenny is freaking out now. Some of their “key scientists” may be deserting the sinking ship. Some of their key (rat-like) lawyers may be saying, “dude, this is a sinking ship, we ain’t sinking another penny into this thing.” They gotta know that the numbers of autistics are not dropping in the 2-4 age range in California. There goes there pretty little lie.
http://beincharge.ucdavis.edu/
Here’s the CHARGE study, they are leaning away, far, far away from mercury as having a relationship to autism and they’ve been looking for it, too. Just not finding it.
You’re right, it’s not “directly” but indirectly. It still goes into the bloodstream. My point was that, mercury would have to be much more toxic by injecting into the body than by ingesting it through pollution.
I appreciate you calling me a good sport.
From the Pubmed study ” Causes of death in autism “, that you referenced to,
“Elevated death rates were observed for several causes, including seizures and accidents such as suffocation and drowning; elevated mortality due to respiratory disease was observed among persons with severe mental retardation. Overall, excess mortality was especially marked for persons with severe mental retardation, but life expectancy is reduced even for persons who are fully ambulatory and who have only mild mental retardation. ” .
“_Myself and other autism activists believe…_” -Lenny Schafer autism activist.
Isn’t that supposed to be, “I and other autism activists believe….”
Or, “I, myself, as well as other autism activistis believe…”
Just curious.