Archive | November, 2009

Parents in lawsuit over Thoughtful House treatement

14 Nov

Father takes ex-wife to court over son’s autism treatment is the title of a recent story on Statesman.com. The subtitle: Mother says intravenous treatment at Thoughtful House is unproven and too dangerous..

Yes, it’s about chelation. The kid has been undergoing chelation (suppository), but the father wants to do IV chelation. From the Statesman:

Mario Martinez wants his wife’s consent to let their 7-year-old son, William, undergo intravenous chelation — the use of chemicals to remove metals, such as lead and mercury, from the body. Martinez, 39, said he thinks his son is making steady progress at the Thoughtful House Center for Children in Austin by undergoing a less invasive form of chelation and wants the boy to start IV chelation.

The parents are divorced, with the father having primary care of the child. However, Thoughtful House requires both parents to consent to IV chelation.

The mother states that the suppository chelation has been ongoing for two years (yes, years) without progress, but with adverse side effects:

Juli Martinez said in an interview that her son has been receiving chelation in suppository form for two years, which she claims has made him ill. She said chelation hasn’t helped his autism but being in a regular classroom has.

The father has taken the mother to court to get the approval for the IV chelation.

Chelation is the process of removing metals from the body through drugs. Alternative medical practitioners (such as Thoughftul House) use chelation on the assumption that “heavy metal toxicity” is a factor in autism.

It isn’t. This is based on an incredibly bad hyptohesis (Autism is a “novel” form of mercury poisoning), and idea that actual medical toxicologists reject.

Chelation therapy for real heavy metal toxicity is not a prolonged process. Two years is very long. Chelation by suppository is a relatively inexpensive therapy. By contrast, IV chelation at thoughtful house involves $400 every two weeks in testing:

While there may not be scientific proof that chelation helps autism, anecdotal evidence exists, Mario Martinez said. He is willing to spend an extra $400 every two weeks on tests to make sure the twice-monthly IVs are safe, he said.

The father says that the IV chelation is great:

Mario Martinez, who has had primary custody of the couple’s two children since their 2007 divorce, disputes that chelation has made William ill and said that the boy had an IV chelation test that showed he easily tolerated it. He said it brought “immediate, dramatic results,” in which his learning and behavior improved.

I wonder what an “IV Chelation test” is? Did they do a round of IV chelation, without the mother’s consent? What about their rules that the mother has to approve?

Frankly, the mother should be the one taking the father to court.

The court proceeding has been put off until Dr. Jepson of Thoughful House can appear or give a deposition.

The mother is representing herself. Frankly, a medical toxicologist should step in to offer her some support to end this travesty.

Another example of irresponsible blogging by David Kirby

14 Nov

Autism Speaks recently put out what I consider to be a rather irresponsible press release. The Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) added a new objective, and Autism Speaks chose to frame it as “IACC includes vaccine research objective in strategic plan for autism research“. I’ve discussed that already, so I won’t go into more details here.

Instead, I want to take a look at how David Kirby treated this story. He blogged this as Top Federal Panel Endorses Autism Research That Includes Vaccines – Dueling Press Releases Ensue. Mr. Kirby takes on the role of (misinformed) cheerleader for the vaccine-epidemic groups that sponsor the Age of Autism blog, where the piece was posted. As you will see, he probably should have checked with his community before posting.

On Tuesday, the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC), Washington’s leading arbiter for directing federal funds to autism research, unanimously voted to recommend studies that include investigations into possible links between autism and environmental triggers – including vaccines – in certain subsets of children.

Mr. Kirby is invited to check the actual process of federal funding of autism research and the role of the IACC. He could watch the latest video of an IACC meeting, where Dr. Insel (director of NIMH and chair of the IACC) makes it clear that the IACC is an advisory and planning committee only. They are far from the “final arbiter for directing federal funds”. That is a minor point compared to the fact that the IACC did not recommend studies into the possible links between autism and vaccines.

This fact that the IACC was not committing to vaccine-autism research was not missed by some of his readers, who are quoted in the conclusion of his recent blog post. A conclusion which is rather confused in tone:

So, just to recap: The Federal Government’s top autism panel has voted unanimously to support studies into autism and its possible environmental triggers – including vaccination. In turn, Autism Speaks has cheered “including vaccine research objectives in the IACC plan” while its supposed rival, ASF, has equally cheered that “vaccine research (is) out of the IACC autism plan.”

Some parents I spoke with grudglingly accepted ASF’s view of events, however. “IACC took out ALL proposed vaccine research studies; They specifically elimated A) a vax unvax study, B) an unvaxed or partially vaxed sibs study and C) an adjuvant study – all gone,” one mother wrote. “They only left the word “vaccine” in a along laundry list of POTENTIAL future possible (translation never) study topics.”

Whether the IACC has recommended specific vaccine-autism research, or environment-autism research, vaccines remain on the list of possible contributors to autistic regression as far as the US Government is concerned.

And that is just how Congressional leaders intended it to be.

If parents are telling Mr. Kirby that the IACC is not really committing to fund vaccine research, how can this “just how Congressional leaders intended it to be”, since Mr. Kirby is asserting that the congressional intent is to include vaccine-autism research? It reads a bit confusing to me.

Well, it’s confusing because David Kirby has once again edited his post after the fact. Take a look at this screenshot of the original post:

kirby_backpedal

Yep, it’s different. Sometime after he posted his piece, he added the entire paragraph :

Some parents I spoke with grudglingly accepted ASF’s view of events, however. “IACC took out ALL proposed vaccine research studies; They specifically elimated A) a vax unvax study, B) an unvaxed or partially vaxed sibs study and C) an adjuvant study – all gone,” one mother wrote. “They only left the word “vaccine” in a along laundry list of POTENTIAL future possible (translation never) study topics.”

Yes, David Kirby wrote a post praising the IACC’s actions as funding vaccine research and then backpedaled when autism parents emailed him with the reality of the situation: the IACC did not commit to funding vaccine research.

He also edited out a comment where he refers to a statment by Alison Singer of the Autism Science Foundation as “And there was this, almost Orwellian statement: ”

I guess it was Orwellian until his own readers agreed with it?

Can you find where Mr. Kirby notes his change in that piece? Neither can I. A major change like this should be noted in the piece.

I’ll take a side-trip here into discussing Mr. Kirby’s mistakes and the way he handles them. Unfortunately, Mr. Kirby has a history of changing blog posts after the fact, even to the point of leaving clearly erroneous posts online without a comment.

A few examples:

He wrote a post, “CDC: Vaccine Study Design “Uninformative and Potentially Misleading“”. After Blogger (and epidemiologist) epiwonk showed the mistakes in that post, Mr Kirby rewrote the post, complete with a note about the error. In an odd move, he left first the erroneous post online. As epiwonk showed, even the second post was seriously flawed, but Mr. Kirby chose to leave it online.

Mr. Kirby made a serious misquote in his presentation to congressional staffers. No mention of the error was made in the power point slides he posted online.

He made a factor of 10 error in reading a graph for a blog post. He copied the blog post from the Age of Autism blog to the Huffington Post, and corrected the error in his Huffington Post piece without correcting the Age of Autism piece.

He made the rather simple error of mistaking the Obama transition teams Change.gov website for the change.gov website. Again, he posted to both the Age of Autism blog and to the Huffington Post. Mr. Kirby added a comment to the Huffington Post piece, but just deleted the erroneous post on the Age of Autism blog.

I make mistakes. Sometimes pretty spectacular mistakes. But I think it shows a certain level of disrespect from Mr. Kirby in how he handles his mistakes.

But, I’ve digressed from the main topic here: how Mr. Kirby handled the press releases from Autism Speaks and the Autism Science Foundation about the IACC’s new objective. Even without the confusing conclusion and the changes made after the fact, Mr. Kirby’s post is irresponsible.

It is one thing to take on the role of cheerleader/journalist as Mr. Kirby has done. But he gets to walk away from this community. He’s tried to walk away once, and he is now about to embark on a new career path taking on factory farming. In a few years when parents are complaining that the government hasn’t funded vaccine-autism research like David Kirby told us the government would…in a few years when the bitterness comes to the surface…where will David Kirby be? Will he be here to take responsibility for the mess he has created?

I admit, this is minor compared to the mess he made with convincing parents that autism was caused by thimerosal. How many children have been “treated” with chelation who wouldn’t have if Mr. Kirby hadn’t taken on this cause? How many of them regressed or were otherwise harmed? We will never know.

And he will never accept his role in this and his responsibility.

90% of autistic kids bullied?

13 Nov

A story just out from the Boston Herald state: Survey finds 90% of autistic kids bullied. The story starts out with:

A shocking new online survey has found that nearly 90 percent of autistic children in the Bay State have been targeted by bullying so violent and ruthless that a state lawmaker says teachers and school systems must be held accountable.

All kids are bullied to some extent, but I have no doubt that autistic kids get much more than their share of bullying.

I have to admit that the survey did not use the most rigorous methods as it was taken to convince legislators:

About 400 Massachusetts parents responded to the online survey between Sept. 23 and Oct. 12. The survey was prepared as part of an effort to pass legislation requiring that autistic children be taught bullying coping tactics as part of their individual educational plans.

With that acknowledgment, I’ll say it again, autistic kids get bullied more than typical kids. In some cases a lot more. A lot of us feel like our kids have great big bulls-eyes painted on them. Our kids have a hard enough time coping in schools.

I hope the Massachusetts legislature takes notice. I don’t know if including “bullying coping tactics” into IEP’s is the best response, but I know that doing nothing is the wrong response.

Edit to add: a second story from the Herald: Parents say schools look the other way

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Ineffective Treatment for Children with Autism

13 Nov

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) has grown in popularity over the last few years. This growth has occurred without any evidence that HBOT is at all beneficial.

A recent study, published in the journal Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders entitled Randomized trial of hyperbaric oxygen therapy for children with autism, explores this question.

The study was performed by CARD, the Center for Autism and Related Disorders and ICDRC the International Child Development Resource Center. CARD is a very large ABA provider run by Doreen Granpeesheh. Dr. Granpeesheh is also associated with Thoughful House, the Clinic founded by Dr. Andrew Wakefield. Dr. Wakefield, is the prime proponent of the notion that the MMR vaccine causes autism. ICDRC is the clinic run by Dr. Jeffrey Bradstreet, a prominent name in the autism alternative medical community.

As you might surmise from their press release, Center for Autism and Related Disorders Study Finds Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Ineffective Treatment for Children with Autism, they did not find HBOT to be effective.

Children were given 80 1 hour sessions in a Vitaeris 320 inflatable chamber (a model used commonly in HBOT treatment). 6-10 sessions/week were performed. Children were split into two groups matched by age and number of ABA hours already received. Parameters like supplement use and diets remained unchanged during the time of the study. For the treatment group the chambers were inflated to 1.3 atm, with enriched oxygen air (24-28% O2, compared to 21% for regular air).

The children were given multiple assessments:

All assessments were conducted by trained assessors who were blind to group assignment. To maximize the study’s ability to detect change in any symptom area relevant to autism, a large variety of assessments were used, including the following: the ABC (Aman & Singh, 1994), ADOS (Lord et al., 1999), Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning (BRIEF; Gioia, Isquith, Guy, & Kenworthy, 2000), Clinical Global Impression Scale (CGI; Guy, 1976), Parent Stress Index (PSI; Abidin, 1995), Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-III; Dunn & Dunn, 1997), Repetitive Behavior Scale (RBS; Bodfish, Symons, & Lewis, 1999), SRS, Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales—Second Edition (VABS-II; Sparrow, Cicchetti, & Balla, 2005), and the Beery-Buktenica Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration—5th edition (VMI-5; Berry and Berry, 2004 K.E. Berry and N.A. Berry, The Berry-Buktenica developmental test of visual-motor integration: Administration, score, and teaching manual, NCS Pearson, Minneapolis, MN (2004).Berry & Berry, 2004). The ADOS, BRIEF, PPVT-III, SRS, VABS, and VMI-5 were administered pre and post-treatment. The ABC, CGI, and RBS were administered weekly. The PSI was administered four times, once at baseline, twice during treatment, and once at completion.

The study was relatively small, with 46 participants.

Forty six participants began the study and 12 withdrew, resulting in 18 previous HBOT participants and 16 placebo participants completing all 80 sessions and follow-up measures. The primary reason reported for withdrawal was the travel required to the clinic. One participant in the placebo group withdrew after having a seizure for the first time. Mean participant age was 6.18 (previous HBOT 6.11; placebo 6.25) and mean number of ABA treatment hours per month was 109 (previous HBOT 114.7; placebo 103.3).

I won’t go into details about the specific outcomes, but the conclusion was pretty straightforward: HBOT had no effect.

No significant differences between the previous tHBOT and placebo groups were found on any of the outcome measures. Thus, the results of this study indicate that previous HBOT delivering 24% oxygen at 1.3 atm did not produce a therapeutic effect for the children who participated in our study. Therefore, previous HBOT at this dose is not recommended for the treatment of ASD symptoms.

I found it interesting how they referred to a previous HBOT study by Rossignal (another prominent member of the autism alternative medical community):

The results of this study corroborate the findings of the only other published study on previous termHBOTnext term which included a control group (Rossignol et al., 2009 D.A. Rossignol, L.W. Rossignol, S. Smith, C. Schneider, S. Logerquist and A. Usman et al., Hyperbaric treatment for children with autism: a multicenter, randomized, double-blind, controlled trial, BMC Pediatrics 9 (2009) 10.1186/1471-2431-9-21.Rossignol et al., 2009)—albeit, not the study authors’ interpretations of their findings. In both the Rossignol et al. (2009) study and the current study, both treatment and control groups improved over time, but the difference in improvement between groups appeared insignificant. In addition, the current study employed dependent measures which were far more comprehensive than in previous research on previous HBOT for ASDs, thereby increasing the probability that a therapeutic effect would have been detected if indeed one had been present.

Yes, the current study is consistent with the Rossignol group’s results, just not their interpretation.

Commentary:

There was much discussion and excitement earlier this year when the Rossignol group study came out. Do’C at the Autism Street blog compiled a list of many of the skeptical discussions. There has not been anywhere near the interest in the newer CARD study.

Will this mean the end of HBOT treatments for Autism? I sincerely doubt it. Take a look at Dr. Bradstreet’s website (Dr. Bradstreet being one of the coauthors of the current study showing no effect). The first page of the site still links to the older study by Dr. Rossignol’s group (claiming that HBOT is effective) and not his own study (which shows HBOT to be not effective).

Of course, it is all the more complicated since Dr. Rossignol is also one of the ICDRC doctors. The alternative-medical community is a pretty small pond, isn’t it?

Back to the question: will this mean the end of HBOT in autism? I wish I could make bets this safe. Of course not. No alternative therapy is abandoned. As shown above, one of the authors of this study showing that HBOT is not effective for treating autism and he hasn’t stopped.

Give Thanks for Your Healthy Child

13 Nov

healthy-kids-thanks-a-thon-logoGuest Blog post by Dawn A. Crawford, Communications Director at the Colorado Children’s Immunization Coalition.

At the height of the H1N1 scare it’s easy to forget why we are vaccinating children in the first place. We vaccinate children with the flu vaccine and all childhood vaccine to keep them healthy. We vaccine children to keep kids out of hospital ERs. We vaccinate children to keep them playing and, simply, being a kid.

This Thanksgiving season the Colorado Children’s Immunization Coalition (CCIC) has created a simple and free way for parents to share their gratitude for healthy children with the CCIC Health Kids Thank-A-Thon.

Parents, grandparents and mommies-to-be are encouraged to submit gratitude statements, photos, videos and blog online explaining why they are grateful for a healthy child on the Health Kids Thank-A-Thon website – http://www.childrensimmunization.org/thanks.

From these submissions, CCIC will spread gratitude for healthy kids all Thanksgiving weekend long (November 26 – 29) by tweeting parent’s gratitude on Twitter, creating a video for YouTube and updating their Facebook Fan Page.

How to Participate

1) Visit the CCIC Healthy Kids Thank-A-Thon website to tell us why you are grateful for your healthy child. We encourage you to include a picture of your family or a video of your healthy child.

2) Spread the word to co-workers, patients, neighbors, and friends by posting this flyer and forwarding this blog post

All submissions are due Monday, November 23.

Make sure to join CCIC for the Thanksgiving weekend in sharing gratitude for all our healthy kids.

Have a wonderful holiday season!

Flu vaccine ruins another life

12 Nov

Screw autism. Over in the US, yet another dangerous ailment was triggered by the dangerous, untested, unnecessary [insert blah blah here] flu vaccine….

Only two weeks after receiving his influenza vaccine, “Reuben” (not his real name), was struck with what he is convinced is an adverse event to the vaccine (also known as a “vaccine injury”) . Reuben began to notice the symptoms when it was painful to walk, noticed excess sweating, a foul smell coming off his skin, and saw his skin coming off in flakes. Numerous treatments with all sorts of home remedies were unable to help. Members of his family and friends began shunning him for his condition.

“I’m sure it was the flu shot,” Reuben said. “What else could it be? I didn’t take any medication, eat anything abnormal. In fact, the only thing I did different right before I got this was start a gym membership… You know… To be more healthy. I’d get up early, go work out, take a shower there and head to work. Life was good. And now this? I can’t even go to the gym because of this. Everyone stares at me as if I’m a leper.” Reuben took off his shoes to show his condition. The skin on his feet was flaking, oozing pus and blood. The odor was very foul. “I keep asking my doctor if he’s going to report it to the CDC,” Reuben says with frustration. “He says it wasn’t the flu shot. I just don’t believe him. Have you seen the crap they put in those things?” Reuben sighs, takes a breath, and says, “Maybe Jenny McCarthy will come help me like she helped that girl in Virginia?”

Athlete’s foot is a fungal infection of the skin of the feet. The fungus, Tinea pedis, thrives in warm, moist, dark environments. Feet that are covered up in shoes all day, without socks or other methods of absorbing feet sweat, are the perfect environment for T. pedis. In most cases, the condition resolves once the environmental conditions of the foot change through drying the shoes, wearing more absorbent socks, or applying foot powder. Over-the-counter and prescription medications are best to treat the condition fast and without side effects. In some people, such as those who are immune-compromised, the infection may spread beyond the feet. People should contact their health care provider if they notice that the infection has spread beyond the feet or does not get better after attempting to remedy the environment or applying medication.

Tinea pedis is acquired through contact with contaminated surfaces or sharing socks or shoes. Locker room and public shower floors are main sources of athlete’s foot infections since they are always moist, and many people with the condition may walk on them. To avoid acquiring athlete’s foot, keep your feet dry, use sandals or shoes on locker room or public shower floors, and use well-ventilated shoes. If you have certain conditions like heart disease or diabetes, pay special attention to any irritation of the feet or extremities as these may be a sign of poor circulation rather than an infection.

There have been no documented cases of athlete’s foot associated with the flu vaccine. What Reuben exhibits is a clear case of “recall bias”, where the correlation of the vaccine followed by an event like the foot infection is interpreted as being related. There is a principle in epidemiology and biostatistics which states that “correlation does not mean causation”.

Such a principle, however, is abandoned by certain groups where anything and everything that happens after an immunization is directly associated with the immunization no matter how biologically, statistically, or realistically impossible it is. If you feel that you have been harmed by a vaccine, please seek advice from your health care provider first and foremost. They have the training and knowledge that will never be replaced by celebrities, blogs, or any other anecdotal information.

REMOVE the “How Retarded Are You Quiz” Off Facebook

12 Nov

Believe it or not, there is a application/quiz on Facebook called “How Retarded Are You?”

Luckily there is also a movement to have this removed from Facebook, with the simple mission statement:

Let’s band together and get FB to forbid this ridiculously offensive quiz from being taken by anyone again.

If you are on Facebook, consider signing on to the petition. It’s another step in ending the use of the r-word.

The Special Olympics campaign is separate from this facebook movement, but I thought it worthwhile to include their Public Service Announcement here:

Autism Speaks misleads the public on the IACC’s stance on vaccine research

12 Nov

Autism Speaks recently announced that the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) included vaccine research studies into the objectives of the Strategic Plan. I’m sure many people who read their press release are thinking that the vaccine-autism research will definitely be funded. But, is this accurate? The answer is no.

According to the press release and the Autism Speaks website:

Autism Speaks is encouraged by yesterday’s decision of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) to include vaccine research studies in the objectives of the updated Strategic Plan for Autism Research. The new language, approved unanimously, calls for studies to determine if there are sub-populations that are more susceptible to environmental exposures such as immune challenges related to naturally occurring infections, vaccines or underlying immune problems. “This revised plan is an important step toward a more comprehensive approach to exploring the wide range of risk factors that may be contributing to autism,” said Geraldine Dawson, Ph.D., Autism Speaks chief science officer.

I’ve already noted that the statement Autism Speaks gave before the IACC was incorrect. Vaccine research was not a “clear directive” of the Combating Autism Act. You can check for yourself.

Alison Singer of the Autism Science Foundation, and member of the IACC, has a statement on the ASF blog, Autism Science Foundation Agrees with Decision to Keep Vaccine Research Out of the IACC Autism Plan.

The ASF blog notes:

Autism Science Foundation President and Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee member Alison Singer joined her colleagues on the IACC in voting to eliminate references in the autism strategic plan that could imply that vaccines cause autism or that call for additional vaccine research. “Draft materials submitted to the IACC suggesting vaccines and/or vaccine components were implicated in autism were rejected by the committee because the IACC determined that they were not based on good science,” said Singer. In addition, the two research objectives proposed that specifically called for additional vaccine research were not approved.

Also:

Singer added that some groups seem to be misinterpreting the inclusion of the word “vaccines” in the list of examples of immune challenges as a mandate for vaccine research, and have issued misleading statements. “Based on the votes taken yesterday, the IACC was clear in its position about autism and vaccines. But if there is public confusion about this new research objective then I will try to make sure we clarify it at our next meeting,” Singer said. The IACC will continue its work on the plan at a meeting on December 11, 2009 with the goal of finalizing the revised plan by January, 2010.

The entire statement can be read on the Autism Science Foundation’s blog.

It appears that Autism Speaks is placing a fairly major spin on a single action taken by the IACC. Again from the ASF blog:

The IACC also voted unanimously to add a new objective to study whether or not there are certain subpopulations that are more susceptible to environmental exposures such as immune challenges (including naturally occurring infection, vaccines, and/or immune disorders).

Compare that to the Autism Speaks announcement:

IACC Includes Vaccine Research Objective In Strategic Plan For Autism Research
Autism Speaks is Encouraged by New Language Recommending Funding of Vaccine Research

Or, worse yet, the first line of their press release: “Autism Speaks is encouraged by yesterday’s decision of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) to include vaccine research studies in the objectives of the updated Strategic Plan for Autism Research”

As I noted above, I am very confident that many people reading the announcement are expecting autism-vaccine research to be funded.

But this isn’t a “vaccine research objective”. This isn’t calling for “vaccine research studies”.

What it is, is an objective that mentions vaccines. It is a very important distinction. Take a close look, the objective does not call specifically for a vaccine project to be funded. It doesn’t even call for immune challenges to be funded. These are just listed as possible examples.

This is a small example of why the IACC needs to be very careful in how and if they discuss vaccines. Groups such as Autism Speaks can act incredibly irresponsibly in spinning any statement including the word vaccines.

Autism Speaks pushes the “legislative history” myth about the Combating Autism Act

11 Nov

Autism Speaks has announced (possibly incorrectly) that the IACC (Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee) has included vaccine language in the Strategic Plan.

Autism Speaks has posted their statement on their website.

Here is the statement (from their press release):

In enacting the Combating Autism Act (CAA), Congress intended that the federal government examine potential links between vaccines and autism. During the Senate debate over the CAA, Mike Enzi, Chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee, instructed that “no research avenue should be eliminated, including biomedical research examining potential links between vaccines, vaccine components, and autism spectrum disorder.” 152 Cong. Rec. S8772 (Aug. 3, 2006). In the House, Joe Barton, Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, was equally clear: “[T]he legislation rightfully calls for renewed efforts to study all possible causes of autism – including vaccines and other environmental causes… The important thing to understand is that there are no preconceived notions contained in this bill; the bill language is clear that we should follow every avenue that science opens to us in searching for a cure.” 152 Cong. Rec. H8787 (Dec. 6, 2006)

Beyond this clear directive of the CAA, Autism Speaks supports rigorous, evidence-based scientific research onto all aspects of autism from potential causes, including both genetic and environmental factors, to diagnosis and treatments. As such, we strongly urge that further vaccine safety research be included in the Strategic Plan for Autism Spectrum Disorder Research. Comprehensive “good” science should be the standard in all areas studied and there are aspects of vaccine safety research that have not yet been, and should be, considered.

It is also essential that all scientific research recommended by IACC and funded by the NIH be rigorous and evidence-based to engender the trust of the scientific, medical and entire autism community. Without a solid foundation that supports confidence in scientific conclusion, the entire portfolio of scientific research is at risk of losing community trust. Further, vaccine safety research will increase both the level of confidence in the safety of our nation’s vaccine program and the rate of participation, which is absolutely crucial for the prevention of serious infectious diseases.

Autism Speaks calls on the IACC to consider the importance of evidence-based science, trust, and to remain true to the critical legislative purpose of the Combating Autism Act and asks the IACC to include vaccine safety research in the strategic plan.

The statement that vaccine research is a “clear directive of the CAA” is, simply, false.

The CAA (Combating Autism Act) does not include the statements by congressman Barton and Senator Enzi are part of the congressional record. They are statements made by the individual legislators.

They are not a part of the Combating Autism Act, much less a clear directive of the Act.

IACC includes vaccine language in strategic plan?

11 Nov

I was unable to listen to yesterday’s meeting. But according to a press release from Autism Speaks:

Autism Speaks is encouraged by yesterday’s decision of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) to include vaccine research studies in the objectives of the updated Strategic Plan for Autism Research. The new language, approved unanimously, calls for studies to determine if there are sub-populations that are more susceptible to environmental exposures such as immune challenges related to naturally occurring infections, vaccines or underlying immune problems. “This revised plan is an important step toward a more comprehensive approach to exploring the wide range of risk factors that may be contributing to autism,” said Geraldine Dawson, Ph.D., Autism Speaks chief science officer.

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