In the days following the latest in an increasingly long line of studies repudiating the MMR/autism hypothesis, adherents to this belief system have clung wildly to the flotsam and jetsam that is pretty much all that is left to hang on to.
On the ADC Online forum, John Stone encapsulates this position with a letter I’ll go through point by point:
Of the original 1770 Special Educational Needs (SEN)cases in this study 255 were Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Of the 1770 735 dropped out, then a further 780 were excluded for reasons which are not transparent. 255 were left (a different 255 from before): some ASD, some just SEN but we do not know in what proportion. Then, exactly 100 were excluded because of inadequate blood tests. Of the remainder 101 had ASD (less the 40 per cent of the original 255 autistic cases). None is reported to have bowel disease (the sub-group of Wakefield’s study) or adverse reaction to MMR.
This is numerical hoopla and means nothing. The key to Stone’s frustration is the last sentence of this paragraph and the first one of the next:
It is not clear what the scientific purpose of this study is…….None is reported to have bowel disease (the sub-group of Wakefield’s study) or adverse reaction to MMR. This, of course, makes this a distinct group from the children referred to Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues at the Paediatric Gastroenterology department of the Royal Free Hospital in the 1990s and slighlty beyond.
Stone is arguing that because none of the ASD subjects were found to have bowel issues that disqualifies them as being like Wakefield’s subjects.
Methinks someone has missed the point.
The issue is one of clinical science. Wakefield claims to have found a clinical link between the measles live virus component of the MMR which causes bowel issues with associated autism. However, the Cedillo hearings drove a rather large nail into that particular coffin.
Professor Stephen Bustin is the worlds foremost PCR expert. Bustin uses PCR every day in his work, he has 14 papers in the peer reviewed literature on PCR, over 8 book chapters and is personally the author of the ‘A to Z of Quantitative PCR’ which is considered ‘the bible’ of PCR. One of his papers has been cited over 1,000 times. Another has been cited over 500 times. He both organises and speaks at international PCR conferences. His testimony regarding the Unigentics lab used to find the measles virus in the guts of these autistic kids was invaluable.
Bustin examined the Unigentics lab findings and procedures in great detail (spending over 1,500 hours in the lab itself) and found that the lab (which has now gone bust as a business) made a fairly basic error of science when looking at Wakefield’s samples:
“…Now, these are from samples that should have been discarded according to the SOP from Unigenetics because there was no GAPDH present, i.e., the RNA is degraded. If you look at the Cts for the F-gene which they reported as positive you can see they’re the same. Now, if this is degraded RNA yet I’m getting the same Cts for my F-gene target this can’t be RNA because it would have been degraded.
That’s what the GAPDH showed me. Now, if it isn’t RNA it has to be DNA. If it is DNA it can’t be measles virus it has to be a contaminant.”
In other words, the samples Wakefield provided to Unigentics were useless because Unigenetics own documented lab procedure says they were. But they used them anyway. The results were a bombshell. If the RNA is useless (which the lab process defines it as being) it can’t actually be RNA. If its not RNA then it must be DNA and if its DNA then it can’t be measles virus because measles virus doesn’t exist as DNA.
What the Unigentics lab detected in Wakefield’s samples were contaminants. There’s no way that Unigentics could possibly have been detecting measles virus.
This was backed up by Chadwick who checked Wakefield’s work (at his request). He also did a PCR test.
Q. What results did you receive from the gut biopsy materials for measles RNA?
A. They were all negative.Q. They were always negative?
A. Yes. There were a few cases of false positive results, which I used a method to see whether they were real positive results or false positive, and in every case they turned out to be false positive results. Essentially all the samples tested were negative.Q. Did you inform Dr. Wakefield of the negative results?
A. Yes. Yes.
So not only are the samples Wakefield provided useless, the testing he asked Chadwick to perform showed they were useless. And yet he went ahead anyway.
Its also worth noting that every subsequent piece of MMR science (save one unpublished poster presentation) went through Unigenetics lab and went through the same process as Wakefield’s.
So lets be frank – the idea that Wakefield found measles virus in the gut of autistic kids is plain and simply wrong. He screwed up.
The issue then becomes one of probabilities: given that there is no scientific reason to believe MMR causes autism with bowel disorders, it is nonsensical to only look at autistic kids with bowel disorders. And in answer to Stone’s question ‘It is not clear what the scientific purpose of this study is…’ the answer is plain – it has scientifically illustrated that autistic kids had exactly the same measles antibody response as non-autistic kids. No difference. At all.
Stone continues to attempt to muddy the scientific waters:
There is presently not enough consensus about the etiology of ASD to assume there is any single origin, nor anything to rule out ASD subjects having gut symptoms which justify on occasion invasive procedures. The NAS apparently consider that there is a sub-group which is being denied sympathy, investigation or treatment, and this is in itself troubling. It also suggests that this study is not representative since no such cases are included, and it does not address their problems.
This is slipperiness taken to almost artistic levels. Stone is quite right there is no consensus about etiology of autism. That does not mean we cannot say what doesn’t cause it though. And based on the available science, MMR ain’t it.
The paper further does not attempt to claim that autistic kids don’t have gastric issues and Stone’s implication that it does and his attempt to gain the mainstream ground by invoking the name of the NAS is grasping and dishonestly representative of the NAS’s statement. They do _not_ claim, infer or consider that there is any such sub-group. What they suggest is that the MMR debacle has led to some doctors dismissing some parents fears about their kids bowel issues as hysteria. This is, of course, unacceptable but Stone is simply attempting to manipulate the NAS statement for his own ends.
“The NAS warning relates to the GMC hearing involving doctors Wakefield, Walker-Smith and Murch which is set to resume on 25 March approaching. I do not think it is being unduly cynical to query the publication of this study at the present time as a media event, bearing in mind that it seems to have been carried out five or six years ago.”
This is either again deliberately misleading or an example of conspiracy hysteria. From what I can tell the study was commissioned five/six years ago. Not carried out.
Stone concludes:
Meanwhile, the plight of autistic children with gastro- intestinal symptoms is excluded both from the study and public attention, as if they did not exist. The NAS statement warned of “creating further confusion” and this is precisely what this study and its media exposure has done.
Children with gastro issues and autism were not ‘excluded’ they just weren’t found. Maybe they really don’t exist? Maybe Stone would’ve preferred that the study authors fabricate a few subjects?
The bottom line of this gastro/autism issue is that there is no science to back up the opinion Stone has. On the other hand there is plenty of science that indicates there is no link between MMR and autism. Far from this study creating confusion, it has simply shown up the shortcomings of Wakefield’s bad science and Stone and his ilk are in reality the people desperately attempting to create enough confusion for Wakefield to escape unscathed.
Left Brain Right Brain 
Children WITH AUTISM MAY have bowel issues. And I worded that deliberately just that way.
My eldest (8) who has NVLD w/ S/L delay is intolerant to dairy (casein protein). Dairy causes nightmares (daily), night-terrors (daily including naps), daily diahhrea (with NASTY rashes) AND makes him STONED.
BUT, removal of dairy IS NOT A CURE. I could write a cured book (should I mention the hours of speech therapy?? :))… but although he APPEARS normal to an outsider… he still has AUTISM.
Within 48hrs of removing dairy all the above symptoms were gone. 7 days later we put a tiny bit of butter on one of those freezer pancakes. Dh even attempted to wipe it off. Within an hour he was in the playpen (he was 2.5yrs old), there wasn’t a surface hard enough to smash his head off of. We had a 24hr nightmare before it ran it’s course….
BUT… my youngest (6) the Severe, non-verbal one… does nothing for. Except now due to a lack of having dairy since he was 6mths old… he’s lactose intolerant. Not, b/c he has autism.
Oh… an BTW… they’ve had their vaccines… and no.. they were born with it. Although, I do think prenatal care (high bp and the care I rec’d) did do more harm than good.
Lets not get onto the subject of ABA… one day maybe I’ll forgive myself for that mess… appears my little one has…
Never judge autism by it’s cover.
S.
Sorry for the sidetrack, but I fixated on this statement:
Bustin examined the Unigentics lab findings and procedures in great detail (spending over 1,500 hours in the lab itself)
Yeah. A world expert spent months of his time checking up on someone else’s bad job. How much good research could have been done with the time and money spent chasing Wakefield’s claims?
A good discussion of where Wakefeild went wrong on PCR is here:
How Science Works
“What they suggest is that the MMR debacle has led to some doctors dismissing some parents fears about their kids bowel issues as hysteria. This is, of course, unacceptable but Stone is simply attempting to manipulate the NAS statement for his own ends.”
Interesting. My son does have bowel issues. He pretty much most of the time has diarrhea. when he goes to new schools/daycare I have a terrible time convincing them that no, this is normal for him, he’s not sick.
I’m pretty sure his autism has nothing to do with vaccines. My favorite analogy is the autistic symptoms and regression started when he started walking (and walking/running was a stim and he stopped doing anything else), so maybe in hindsight if all these people think they shouldn’t have vaccinated their children maybe I shouldn’t have let mine walk? Please note that is a rather sarcastic analogy, and it is my way of explaining how ridiculous I feel the vaccine debate is. I do wonder if there are some children with allergic reactions to the vaccine in which the trauma of the allergic reaction might trigger the autism (mental and neurological issues can be triggered by trauma) but that’s like saying no one should have peanut butter because a small percentage of the population is allergic… The vaccines prevent diseases that are most often deadly to young children, so we can’t hold them off until the child is 3, like we do with peanut butter, either…
I also find the whole mmr debate interesting, because I’ve heard one of the diseases it vaccinates against, rubella, can cause autistic symptoms. So by not getting your child vaccinated, you effectively put your child at risk for autism…
It bothers me that a quack’s study has led to drs ignoring bowel issues. Not sure if that’s caused my own son’s dr to not to be too concerned about it – part of it I’m sure is that he seems otherwise healthy – very active, good height weight, appetite, etc, etc; he does seem to have a ridiculously high metabolism, but then we let him constantly eat so the high metabolism doesn’t seem to be doing him any harm (and I think the dr may thing the diarrhea is a result of the high metabolism), that they aren’t concerned – however bowel issues to me tell me he might be uncomfortable and therefore his discomfort might interfere with communication and behavior, just because I know when I don’t feel good, the last thing I want to do is play nice and communicate well, and with someone who already has difficulties, I can’t imagine how worse it is… But I’m not really sure where to start on trying to piece together what’s causing his issues, because he needs to eat so much and is occasionally picky, it’s very difficult to regulate what he’s eating… it’s also difficult to parse what is quackery and not quackery when looking into digestive issues in children…
navi, just a small correction. Rubella can cause autism if an embryo is exposed (early in the mom’s pregnancy). So a child or baby that gets rubella can’t become autistic, but that baby or child or adult who gets rubella can easily spread it to pregnant woman, or they can pass it on to someone else who will expose a pregnant woman, etc.
If much of the population is vaccinated against rubella they can knock it out pretty effectively, and it’s safer for pregnant women to live outside of a sterile bubble at home.
It’s possible that moms exposed to the flu are more likely to have ASD kids, too. So being vaccinated against flu can protect the pregnant women around the person and protect their unborn child. The “flu as cause of autims” hypothesis is theoretical, from what I understand, and rubella-as-cause is not theoretical, but no one *needs* to get the flu and the risk from a flu shot is very low, so it’s good for lots of people to get the flu shot unless they know they are allergic to eggs or chicken.
On a side note: Both me and my ASD kid got our flu shots this year. It was the kind with thimerosal in it. We didn’t feel more autistic afterwards for some reason.
HOOPLA
A study that ignores most of the participants and fails to find a clinical finding in most patients is not a study.
Imagine what would be said in reverse if this study found problems?
Bustin took 1 500 hours to find problems with one study.
To eliminate the results which don’t please you to the tune of 60 per cent doesn’t need 1 500 microseconds to find a SERIOUS flaw in the study. What a JOKE.
Right, that was coherent. So John, are you saying Bustin is wrong and Wakers and his pals really did find measles?
How would you design a study to test the hypothesis that kids with autism are full of measles virus?
Wanna try that one again John? This time with a coherent point? Don’t just make random statements. Back them up.
I love how Dan Olmsted responded to the latest study debunking the MMR=autism claim by stating unequivocally: “Yes, the MMR causes autism.” (But also noting, “That’s just one man’s opinion” — as if these matters should be decided the same way they do things on “American Idol.”)
At this point, someone should just strip a “Mission Accomplished” banner across that site and be done with it.
This is a sick and sad site.
To all the regulars…
my god get a life !!!
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/595579/recent_autism_studies_do_little_to.html
Speaking of sick and sad, M. Campaigne:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20080213-9999-1n13measles.html
Some people hold the “opinion” that the measles vaccine causes autism. It is, however, pretty much fact that the measles virus causes measles.
So Campy, which ilk are you of: a) Thimerosal = autism; b) thimerosal + mmr = autism; c) vaccines (all) = autism; d)govt is out to get me; or (e) all of the above?
Navi – if you return to here again. My Dev Ped informed me “some kids are like that” when it came to the diahhrea.
Had my kid been “normal”, they would have told me to start pulling foods and to find out which ones were causing the Irritated Bowel Syndrome and run a blood gluten test (which we had and was neg). B/c that it what it is. IBS runs in my family, but he wouldn’t listen to that.
Cure – no. But, how do you toilet train a child that has constant diahhrea? And if I feel miserable on the days the IBS flares, why wouldn’t my son. And if I have foods that make it worse, why wouldn’t my son.
Constant diahhrea is not “normal” whether you have Autism or not.
S.
Excellent points.
Well, apparently it IS (e)all of the above: