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Autism an inside job: a webinar by 9/11 truthers and some names you might recognize.

8 Mar

For some reason autism and vaccines attract a certain fringe element. And for some reason certain segments of the autism communities are willing to join forces with this fringe. For example, consider years back when Andrew Wakefield spoke in Ireland with a new world order group at a rally called “The Masterplan: The Hidden Agenda for a Global Scientific Dictatorship”. Given this history I shouldn’t have been surprised when I ran across websites discussing a webinar held last year: “Autism 9.11 – An Inside Job: Vaccines – A Vicious Social Policy”. As you will see, the webinar includes some names that are familiar to those following the failed mercury/autism hypothesis.

Here’s the trailer for the webinar. It’s only three and a half minutes long and it’s annoyingly edited, but give it a watch.

“Born to be free. Vaccinated to be controlled”. Subtle, eh? OK, maybe in comparison to “The great culling had begun”.

In case you curious as to what the “inside job” is, and the 9.11 reference: to this team autism was an “inside job” just like 9/11 was an “inside job”. Yes, we are talking 9/11 truthers. Yes, people who think that the September 11 attacks in the U.S. were orchestrated by the government. Think this is too far out to be true? Think again:

“Is there anyone conscious who does not know that 9/11 was an inside job? Not anyone that I talk to. By now you also know that autism is an inside job as well. The crony corporatists (aka, “globalist elite”) expect to profit handsomely from the genomic disruption of our children.”

From that same page:

And what about the autistic children now becoming adults in the millions, the tragic victims of the Vaccine Big Lie? The Elite have plans for them, since they follow orders if their basic needs are met with predictable routine. They have been made into the perfect worker drones. Dr. Paul G. King told us that the vaccine schedule is being “fine tuned” to produce more “high functioning” autists for the new world order.

Yep. The rise in autism is not only real, but it is a government approved program to create a “Delta” (think Brave New World) class of workers. And, no, I’m not exaggerating.

In case you think you recognize the name in that paragraph, that would be Paul King of CoMeD. CoMeD is a group run by Mark and David Geier, major proponents of the failed idea that mercury in vaccines caused an autism epidemic. And apparently now Mr. King is telling is that “the vaccine schedule is being “fine tuned” to produce more “high functioning” autists for the new world order”.

Let’s take a look at the schedule for the “Inside Job” webinar:

SCHEDULE Autism: An Inside Job The England Hypothesis: Creating Delta Workers with Vaccines Tentative Webinar Schedule
[1] Introduction: Maj. Gen. Albert N. Stubblebine III (US Army, Ret.)
[2] Welcome: Rima E. Laibow, MD – We are all Vaccine Injured
[3] Focus: Ralph Fucetola, JD – Genomicidal Tech leads to GDS
[4] Thoughts on Individuality: General Stubblebine
[5] Viera Scheibner, PhD: The Fundamental Facts about Vaccination
[6] Christina England: Born to Be Free: Vaccinated to Be Controlled [7] Clint Richardson: Outsourcing our Children’s Minds, the CORE of the Problem
[8] Boyd Haley, PhD: Vaccine “Science” – Lies, Damned Lies and Shoddy Statistics
[9] Paul J. King, PhD: Mercury Murder
[10] Brian Hooker, PhD: Vaccine Lies to Build a New World Order
[11] Panel Round Table
[12] Q and A
[13] Conclusion: Genome Optimization Therapies: Think Globally; Restore Locally – Dr. Rima

I took the liberty of bolding the talks from people who may be best known to readers here. Boyd Haley is not heard from as much anymore, but he was very vocal during in the past decade promoting the idea that mercury in vaccines was responsible for the rise in diagnoses. He coined the phrase “Mad Child Disease” for autism. Nice, huh? Then there is Paul King with “Mercury Murder”. As I’ve noted, Mr. King is a member of CoMeD, an organization run with Mark and David Geier, the father-son team known for bad research, bad medicine and unethical behavior. Brian Hooker is an autism parent and long-time member of the “mercury militia” who appears to have splintered from the “mainstream” mercury groups and is possibly best known online for claiming that documents he has obtained through FOIA requests and other routes “prove” that the CDC and other orgs are covering up the claimed harm from vaccines.

The titles of those talks are a bit extreme, to be sure. And we have the webinar “trailer above” showing this to be a very fringe event. Of the talks, I can find only one online: Mr. Hooker’s talk is on YouTube. It’s long (about 40 minutes).

The first thing you may note that the title is different than the one in the schedule. Instead of “Vaccine Lies to Build a New World Order” we get “The CDC, Ground Zero for the decline of children in the United States.” Complete with mushroom cloud icon, just in case we didn’t get the meaning of “ground zero”. He pulls no punches, telling us that in his opinion there is a level of “voluntary manslaughter and murder” within the CDC. He calls the federal government “the hub of autism creation” with President Obama and the Gates Foundation exporting autism to other countries with mercury containing vaccines. He claims that every study showing vaccines don’t cause autism is statistically flawed. Except, of course, for those points he wants to cherry pick to support his argument. For those the statistics are valid. Instead of his toned down talk he prepared for the Committee on Congressional Oversight and Reform, here we hear all about how the CDC and the HHS are committing genocide.

There is a lot of discussion towards the end about how vaccines are being intentionally used to create a cheap workforce, what the promoters of the webinar call a “delta workers” (think Brave New World). It’s a favorite theme of the group hosting the webinar.

Autism-Inside-Job-Final[1]

With the subtitle “Depopulation, Delta Worker Drones and Autism Eugenicide”

At the end of the presentation we hear this exchange between Mr. Hooker and the host of the webinar:

Host: I’m thrilled to have you as a colleague and a fellow advocate for an end to vaccination.

Brian Hooker: Thank you and god bless you both, I really appreciate it.

Perhaps Mr. Hooker felt that it would be impolite to correct the host in her assertion that he is a “fellow advocate for an end to vaccination”. Perhaps not.

The webinar was made into an eBook. Boyd Haley’s talk changed to a “special message” entitled “CDC/NIH/IOM ABANDON SCIENCE!”. The title for Paul King’s contribution is “Mercury Madness” rather than “Mercury Murder”. And the title for Brian Hooker is “CDC: Ground Zero” rather than “Vaccine Lies to Build a New World Order”.

The “Educational Value” of the eBook is given as:

At the conclusion of this webinar, the participant will be able to discern whether vaccines are used because of the neurological damage they produce or in spite of it, leading to more informed vaccine choices for themselves and those they impact.

Yes, you’ve already heard this message. They think that vaccines are not only causing autism, but that this is an intentional effort by the government.

It would be easy to mock this webinar and the participants. It is very, very fringe. But it isn’t funny. It’s irresponsible.

I’d ask why the hell are Boyd Haley, Paul King and Brian Hooker lending their names to this irresponsible effort, but Mr. Hooker’s presentation makes it very clear. He’s not duped or fooled. He’s complicit[see below]. We can’t say for certain about Mr. Haley or Mr. King, but it’s not as though the message on that website is subtle or hidden.

No, this is no where near funny. For anyone who has read the damage these messages have caused within the autism communities knows: there’s zero humor in this nonsense.

Edit to add: Mr. Hooker has contacted me and informed me that he is not a 9/11 truther.
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By Matt Carey

More Canary Party financial documents

2 Mar

The Canary Party grew out of the “vaccines caused an autism epidemic” movement. It’s a small group based in Minnesota. They bill themselves as:

The Canary Party is a movement created to stand up for the victims of medical injury, environmental toxins and industrial foods by restoring balance to our free and civil society and empowering consumers to make health and nutrition decisions that promote wellness.

Last July I wrote about their financial documents in Financial documents for the Canary Party. In that article I made the incorrect statement: “The Canary Party is not a charity, so they do not file form 990′s with the IRS.”

It turns out that they do file form 990. I can’t find them on Guidestar (perhaps because they are new?), but I found this one online. It’s for 2011, when the party formed.

When I wrote last July about the Canary Party, I noted that the financial statements on the Minnesota State Websites indicated that in their founding year (2011) they were largely funded by donations from Canary Party members/officers/founders Jennifer Larson ($40,665) and Mark Blaxill ($15,000).

The form 990 linked to above was an amended form, filed in July of 2013. Coincidentally, filed 10 days after my article about their financials. Per that amended IRS tax form for 2011, those amounts were not donations but loans.

The description of the organization’s mission is given as:

The time has come for a change. The mounting crisis in the health of children and other vulnerable groups has not only been ignored by medical authorities, it has been suppressed. As parents, citizens and advocates for the health of future generations, we must rise up to call attention to this crisis and take action to end it. In nominally democratic societies, which sadly are increasingly corrupted by the power of entrenched interests and economy of influence that surrounds the medical industrial complex, we can most effectively effect change by mobilizing for political action in order to take action against these corrupt forces. It is time to come together to form the Canary Party.

There’s another description as well, but you get the point. It’s a bit much, in my view, but not really out of line with their statements since.

At the time I wrote my previous article, it looked like the revenue to the Canary Party was decreasing. I wrote, “The Canary Party pulled in $72,000 in 2011 and $49,000 in 2012.” (at the time I didn’t know that a large part of the 2011 cash might be from loans). I noted that in 2012 a large fraction of their revenue came from a single donor, one Barry Segal, who apparently has since become disaffected with the Canary Party. I noted:

Per another comment posted to Respectful Insolence, the association between the Canary Party and Mr. Barry Segal appears to be strained. As Mr. Segal accounted for $30,000 of the party’s $49,000 revenue in 2012, one does wonder what 2013 revenue will look like.

Well, from the State of Minnesota site, here is the 2013 financial report on the Canary Party.

The Canary Party took in $17,245 in 2013. Of that, $15,000 was from Mr. Segal on January 2nd. The Canary Party started the year with $15,562.14 and, after $32,300.02 in expenses, ended the year with $687.12 in the bank.

To recap revenue in the last three years:

2011: $72,000 (of which $55,665 may have been in the form of loans)
2012: $49,000
2013: $17,245

Year-end assets

2011: $9,259.07
2012: $15,694.19
2013: $687.12

In other words: revenues and assets are way down. One does wonder how long the Canary Party will last, given these trends.

I find redefining the initial donations as loans to be very interesting. I don’t see evidence that the Canary Party paid back any portion of the loans in 2013. And, given their financial status, I don’t see the possibility of paying back the loans as highly likely. I do have a speculation as to why they might redefine the donations as loans, but I’ll hold off on that for now.

edit to add: here’s the part of the form 990 where they state that they are correcting the original to classify the contributions from the board members as loans.

CP Form 990

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By Matt Carey

A cause célèbre for those claiming vaccines cause autism

1 Mar

If you participate in online discussions about autism and vaccines (and I’d advise you to spend your time more productively), you will often hear about how the U.S. Court of Federal Claims (the “Vaccine Court”) has compensated numerous cases of autism, the government just doesn’t admit it. These are often referred to as “secret” compensations, even though the decisions are in the public record. And, quite frankly, the families were not compensated for autism claims.

One family whose story has become a cause célèbre thanks to David Kirby is now the topic of a new Court decision. In this new decision, the court responds to the parents request to have past court documents redacted. They would like to stop being approached by members of the media.

Before we get to the new decision, consider Mr. Kirby’s story:

The parents, who did not want to be interviewed, specifically asserted that [child] “suffered a Vaccine Table Injury, namely, an encephalopathy” as a result of his MMR vaccination on December 19, 2003.” (“Table injuries” are known, compensable adverse reactions to immunizations.)

Alternatively, they claim that “as a cumulative result of his receipt of each and every vaccination between March 25, 2003 and February 22, 2005, [child] has suffered . . . neuroimmunologically mediated dysfunctions in the form of asthma and ASD.”

(child’s name redacted by me)

The parents didn’t want to be interviewed. They also presented two claims, one encephalopathy and one autism. Mr. Kirby focused on the autism claim, even though it wasn’t compensated. Mr. Kirby states:

Whether HHS agreed with [child]’s parents that his vaccine-induced brain disease led to ASD is unknown. The concession document is under seal.

Actually, it was known. The proffer of an award was titled “Proffer on Award of Compensation; Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR); Table Injury; Encephalitis.”

The child was being compensated for a table injury: encephalitis. Within that document, it is clearly stated:

On June 9, 2011, respondent filed a supplemental report pursuant to Vaccine Rule 4(c) stating it was respondent’s view that Ryan suffered a Table injury under the Vaccine Act – namely, an encephalitis within five to fifteen days following receipt of the December 19, 2003 MMR vaccine, see 42 C.F.R. § 100.3(a)(III)(B), and that this case is appropriate for compensation under the terms of the Vaccine Program

Emphasis mine.

Even with this information showing the family were not compensating autism clearly in the public domain Mr. Kirby tells us it’s “unknown”. Then, true to Mr. Kirby’s style, he leads his readers to the evidence supporting the possibility that it was ASD while never coming right out and saying it.

Perhaps the feds were loath to concede yet another vaccine case involving autism. Four cases in the Autism Omnibus Proceedings were recently compensated. Three of those cases are marked with asterisks, indicating the government did not conclude that autism can be caused by vaccines. But the fourth autism case that was paid out in 2013 ([child]’s case? We don’t know) has no such caveat.

Mr. Kirby was referring to the HRSA statistics page that lists vaccine court petitions filed and compensated. At the time Mr. Kirby wrote his piece, the statistics report did include autism cases. They no longer do, so you have to check archived pages to see what he’s referring to.

At the time of Mr. Kirby’s article, there appear to have been two cases where someone in the Omnibus Autism Proceeding did receive compensation (I don’t have reason to believe Mr. Kirby was in error, but the archived page doesn’t show four cases). Both of those cases had asterisks.

*May include case(s) that were originally filed and processed as an OAP cases but in which the final adjudication does not include a finding of vaccine-related autism

Mr. Kirby concluded with:

Meanwhile, as HHS says it “has never concluded in any case that autism was caused by vaccination,” it is still underwriting autism treatments such as ABA for children in its vaccine-injury program.

Which basically reads as “the government is making a distinction without a difference”. I.e. the reader comes away with the impression that the government really are compensating autism.

We knew then that these parents didn’t want to talk to the media. They didn’t want to speak with Mr. Kirby, to become his latest cause célèbre. And now we know that they still do not want this attention and we read once again that the case was not compensated for autism. From a recent decision:

“Petitioners have made these requests because they have had the misfortune of being frequently contacted by members of the media who mistakenly believe they were compensated for their alternative autism allegation when Petitioners were actually compensated for a Table Injury encephalopathy.”

Given the family’s clear intent to get out of the public’s eye, I am hesitant to put this article out. But perhaps, just perhaps, some of those using this family as part of their constant fight to keep the autism/vaccine idea alive might reconsider.

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By Matt Carey

Comment on: Wrong About Vaccine Safety: A Review of Andrew Wakefield’s “Callous Disregard”

23 Jan

Andrew Wakefield has been discussed here and elsewhere a great deal. Thankfully his presence in the autism communities seems to have retreated to a small core of supporters and the occasional parent convention where he can, yet again, defend himself. Yes, his supporters are vocal. And, yes, he continues to cause harm. But his heyday is long past.

Mr. Wakfield was stripped of his medical license after an extremely lengthy hearing. Mr. Wakefield chose to not present evidence at the hearing, chose not to appeal the decision and has, instead, offered up his defense in a book: “Callous Disregard”. Callous Disregard has been discussed online multiple times.

Mr. Wakefield and his supporters tend to make sciency appearing defenses of him. For example, there are claims that his work has multiple independent replications in various countries. If one checks the references used to make that claim, one finds the claim is, well, false. Citations in “Callous Disregard” often do not support the arguments Mr. Wakefield is making. But few people have the time to go through his prose, much less his references.

One gentleman has taken on that task. Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH, has published a paper: Wrong About Vaccine Safety: A Review of Andrew Wakefield’s “Callous Disregard” in which he debunks the main claims in “Callous Disregard”. Here is the abstract:

Abstract: On February 28, 1998, Dr. Andrew Wakefield published an article in the Lancet on 12 children “with a history of pervasive developmental disorder and intestinal symptoms. Onset of behavioral symptoms was associated, by the parents, with measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination in eight of the 12 children.” Though not claiming the MMR vaccine caused the symptoms, adding what parents thought certainly raised the possibility. Statements and articles by Wakefield suggested he believed such a link probable. Vaccination rates plummeted in the UK and outbreaks of vaccine preventable diseases followed. Investigative journalist Brian Deer uncovered dishonest and unethical medical practices by Wakefield, resulting in Wakefield losing his medical license. Rather than appeal the decision, Wakefield wrote a book, “Callous Disregard: Autism and Vaccines – The Truth Behind a Tragedy,” wherein he claims loss of his license was a political attempt to silence his criticism of vaccine safety. This paper examines the validity of Wakefield’s claims. A careful review of publicly available information makes it clear that Wakefield’s claims regarding vaccine safety are wrong. It is hoped that this review will be used by doctors and public health personnel to encourage parents hesitating to have their children vaccinated to question anti-vaccination claims in general, given that many proponents often refer to Wakefield as an authority and display in their own writings and pronouncements similar erroneous claims.

The paper is 17 pages as published and includes 142 references. His conclusion is quite strong, and includes this paragraph:

I have shown that every major claim Wakefield makes in his book concerning vaccine safety is wrong. I have given accurate quotes from both Wakefield’s book and sources that contradict his claims, including those he misquotes. Based on the old adage, “trust but verify,” where possible I have given the URLs to many of the documents and articles referred to in this paper. My hope is that those who take the time to check will realize that Wakefield’s claims regarding vaccine safety are not only wrong but also harmful, and that once this is realized, people will read Deer’s articles [3] and the British Medical Council’s findings [1,2] with an open mind.

How does he back up such a strong conclusion? Consider this point he makes in his summary (which is discussed at length in the paper)

Wakefield claims that a leading Swedish vaccine researcher, Dr. Christenson, told him that vaccine safety studies had not been carried out in Sweden; yet, gives references to two Swedish papers that extensively report on vaccine safety studies in Sweden, one of them coauthored by Dr. Christenson.

Yes, once again, we see Mr. Wakefield claiming something which the very references he uses show the opposite.

Consider Mr. Wakefield’s stance on the Urabe-strain containing mumps vaccine (a component of the MMR used for some time in the UK). Mr. Wakefield ignored the Urabe vaccine during his time as an expert for the MMR litigation in the UK but has more recently taken the story up as some sort of defense of himself. If that sounds confusing, it really isn’t. Mr. Wakefield thinks we all will just forget that he pushed his own pet theory 15 years ago and just listen to the fearful message he gives now.

Dr. Harrison states:

“Wakefield claims that the Urabe mumps strain contained in the MMR vaccine used in the UK starting in 1988 had been approved after the Canadians withdrew it. Not True.”

Yes, the UK didn’t approve the Urabe Strain vaccine after Canada withdrew it.

Canada licensed Trivirix in May 1986 [57]. The starting date for the UK for MMR vaccinations was October 1, 1988 [58,59]. The license for Trivirix was withdrawn in Canada in May 1990 stating: “Recent laboratory findings from the United Kingdom, Canada and Japan have provided sound evidence. . . In addition, the report states: “The infection follows the course of benign aseptic meningitis” [60]. The UK withdrew the Urabe-containing vaccine on September 14, 1992 [61].

Dr. Harrison also goes to great length to discuss how Mr. Wakefield’s characterization of the Urabe strain vaccine is inaccurate–painting a story of a dangerous vaccine where the evidence does not support this argument.

So Wakefield carried out an incorrect statistical analysis, claimed the authors combined the data when they did not, and incorrectly gave a shorter follow-up time. All of these inaccuracies move evidence from showing safety to showing possible harm.

Dr. Harrison concludes the paper with:

The only conclusion that can be reached from this review is that the title of Wakefield’s book is incomplete. It should read: “Andrew Wakefield’s Callous Disregard for the Facts.”

A rather bold statement given Mr. Wakefield’s litigious nature, having brought suit against the BMJ and Brian Deer and threatening an autism charity with legal action.

Mr. Wakefield’s supporters will likely ignore this lengthy takedown. Mr. Wakefield is dishonest. He lies. And the sad thing is that people believe him.

—
By Matt Carey

note: minor edits were made after this article was published

A vaccinated vs. unvaccinated study and, guess what, vaccinated kids do better on tests

22 Jan

One statement people make a lot on the internet is “where’s a study of vaccinated vs. unvaccinated populations?” Well, here’s one: The effect of vaccination on children’s physical and cognitive development in the Philippines.

When comparisons between vaccinated and unvaccinated populations are proposed, we usually think of the U.S. and trying to work with the small unvaccinated population in a larger vaccinated population. Here we see the reverse: a smaller vaccinated population in a majority unvaccinated population.

What did they find? Here’s the abstract:

We use data from the Cebu Longitudinal Health and Nutrition Survey (CLHNS) in the Philippines to link vaccination in the first 2 years of life with later physical and cognitive development in children. We use propensity score matching to estimate the causal effect of vaccination on child development. We find no effect of vaccination on later height or
weight, but full childhood vaccination for measles, polio, Tuberculosis (TB), Diphtheria, Pertussis and Tetanus (DPT) significantly increases cognitive test scores relative to matched children who received no
vaccinations. The size of the effect is large, raising test scores, on average, by about half an SD.

That’s right. Test scores are increased in the vaccinated population. Higher. They did better.

The study highlights many of the difficulties in doing a vaccinated/unvaccinated population comparison: how to control for confounds. The population that choses the minority approach, be it vaccinating (in the Philippines) or not vaccinating (as in the U.S.) are likely different in other respects as well. Small sample sizes also a limitation. The authors acknoweldge this:

While our results are statistically significant, the sample size is relatively small due to the restriction of the sample to the common support. In addition, the matching of treatment and control groups may be imperfect if there are unobserved confounding factors that affect both vaccination and cognitive development. We therefore do not see our results as definitive. However, the results do however highlight the potential significance of vaccination as a human capital investment and suggest that further research in this area is warranted.

So, let’s consider this question: if there is a real correlation, is it the vaccination itself (unlikely in my opinion) or preventing the diseases (much more likely)? Since as I’ve indicated, I tend towards the latter explanation, let’s consider this: another effect of herd immunity might be cognitive. Since my family and the vast majority of families in the U.S. vaccinate, many diseases are not seen here. Even the unvaccinated are protected.

So, when Jenny McCarthy or others say, “I’d take measles any day over autism”, aside from making the huge mistake of assuming that autism and vaccination are linked, she may be saying “I’d take a half-standard-deviation drop in cognition over vaccination”.

I await the inevitable, “we asked for a comparison of vaccinated vs. unvaccinated populations, but not that comparison”.

—
By Matt Carey

Mayer Eisenstein files for bankruptcy…again

22 Jan

Mayer Eisenstein is a go-to person in the vaccines-cause-autism community. He heads a large practice in the Chicago area and claims that his unvaccinated children do not have autism. He also was or is a part of the “Lupron Franchise”—a group of practitioners who took on the Geier idea that shutting down sex hormone production in autistics could be a treatment. It was a profoundly bad idea.

Mayer Eisenstein was the subject of an article in the Chicago Tribune: Autism doctor: Troubling record trails doctor treating autism. From that article:

Yet his suburban Chicago practice, currently known as Homefirst, garnered an alarming record: It was on the losing side of one of the largest U.S. jury verdicts — $30 million — ever awarded to the family of a newborn in a wrongful-death suit.

In court records dating back three decades, the families of dead and brain-damaged children repeatedly alleged that doctors who work for Eisenstein made harmful mistakes — sometimes the same error more than once. His practice also has been dogged by accusations in court records that its offshore malpractice policy was phony.

After the $30M verdict, Mayer Eisenstein filed bankruptcy. Which was not permitted. Again from the article above:

With bankruptcy off the table, a Cook County judge acknowledged the practice’s claim of insolvency, consolidated the $30 million verdict, five remaining malpractice cases and two civil fraud cases and ordered mediation.

Last July, the judge approved a $1.275 million settlement that Homefirst must divide among six families over seven years. Eisenstein’s practice made the first $100,000 payment last September, four months before he opened the autism clinic.

It appears that the $1.275M settlement noted above is the topic of a battle ongoing in the current bankruptcy filing by Dr. Eisenstein. Per the complaint:

The aggregate Settlement Amount of $1,275,000 represents a small fraction of the total of claims by the Personal Injury Plaintiffs, some of which had reached verdict and judgment.

In other words, it appears Mayer Eisenstein wasn’t allowed to avoid payment by filing bankruptcy, but he did reduce the payments dramatically. The settlement also included a payment schedule. The families claim that four annual payments for a total of $430,000 were made, then the payments stopped after 2011. They claimed (as of August 2013):

Installments to Be Paid on or Before: Amount

September 22, 2012 (not paid when due). . . . . . . . . . . . $ 140,000.00

September 22, 2013 (not yet due). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $ 150,000.00

September 22, 2014 (not yet due). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $ 160,000.00

September 22, 2015 (not yet due). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $ 395,000.00

Total due and unpaid and to become due $ 845,000.00

Per the docket, the case was scheduled to go to hearing last month.

In short, it appears that a multiple families were injured by Mayer Eisenstein and/or member of his practice. They sought and were granted damages, only to have Dr. Eisenstein negotiate those down in a 2004 bankruptcy filing. Dr. Eisenstein made some payments, but then stopped. And he now appears to be trying to avoid further payments as part of his new bankruptcy filing, which the families are fighting. Again.

Why, one might ask, didn’t the families get some secutity pledged to cover the settlement should Dr. Eisenstien stop payments? Seems a reasonable thing to do. The answer is they did. It appears that the property he pledged as security was not under Mayer Eisenstien’s control. In other words, when the families sought to get the property in lieu of the payments, they found that Dr. Eisenstein (who holds a law degree in addition to his medical credentials) couldn’t directly hand it over.

The records of the Office of the Recorder of Deeds of Cook County, Illinois disclose the following transactions for the property at 1101 Dodge, Evanston, Illinois, PIN 10-24-

208-032-0000:

(a) Karen Eisenstein (Mayer Eisenstein, M.D.’s spouse) took title by a deed recorded on April 29, 2002 as document number 0020384408.

(b) Karen Eisenstein transferred title to North Star Trust Co. Tr. # 36189 by a deed in trust recorded on June 11, 2003 as document number 0316239026.

25. Paragraph 6 of the Circuit Court order of July 12, 2008 further provides:

“6. Plaintiffs are to have secured creditor status in the event of an applicable bankruptcy filing.”

So, it would appear that Mayer Eisenstein pledged a property as security for the settlement—a property which he had transferred to his wife in 2002 and which she had transferred to a trust company, in 2003. In other words, to this layman, it appears that at the time he put the property up, it was effectively shielded from actually being used as security.

Another question that one would reasonably ask is why weren’t these claims paid by malpractice insurance? That gets very convoluted, but the original settlement agreement included the statment

“I. Defendants in this matter affirm that they do not have any liability insurance coverage for any of the claims of the remaining plaintiffs.”


Defendants would be Mayer Eisenstein and his practice. And here is where it gets convoluted. The current complaint states

45. At one of the meetings pursuant to Section 341 of the Bankruptcy Code, Mayer Eisenstein, M.D. stated that from time to time he has malpractice insurance to allow him to be on staff at an area hospital.

46. At that same meeting, Mayer Eisenstein, M.D. stated that he did not submit any of the claims to that malpractice insurance carrier, because, as he claimed, if he had the insurance would have been cancelled, and he could no longer use the hospital

47. If Mayer Eisenstein, M.D. had medical malpractice insurance coverage in place at a time when the claims or one or more of the Personal Injury Plaintiffs cases arose, then the
statement was false.

Maybe he didn’t have insurance. Maybe he did and didn’t submit the claims.

Let’s take a look back at the Chicago Tribune article. In addition to discussing the Lupron clinic Dr. Eisenstein set up, it also discusses his history with insurance:

He also dabbled in group health plan sales to Illinois families but tangled with state insurance regulators in the mid- to late 1990s. Regulators warned consumers in a newsletter that Eisenstein “continued to illegally market” the Homefirst Health Plan, based in the British Virgin Islands, even after they told him the plan was ineligible. Despite this, he continued selling the plan, records show, and they ordered him to “cease and desist.”

In an interview, Eisenstein said he was offering a “fraternal health plan,” not traditional health insurance, so he said he didn’t have to listen to regulators. He no longer sells health plans.

And, later:

After Nathan Howey’s death, Weiss Hospital sued Homefirst, Rosi and Eisenstein for fraud, alleging they misrepresented their Caribbean-based malpractice policy. Eisenstein testified that he was in St. Kitts helping one of his daughters, a veterinary student there, buy a condo when the lawyer who helped arrange the sale told Eisenstein he also sold malpractice insurance.
“I was tickled pink to get insurance,” he said under oath.

A Cook County judge called it an “improperly underwritten insurance plan.” Eisenstein, who says the policy is legitimate, agreed to pay Weiss $50,000 after mediation.

Yes, “tickled pink” to get insurance. From a Caribbean island real estate/insurance salesman.

For those interested, here are some of the documents from the case discussed above.

Case 13-01050, lawsuit

Exhibit A

Exhibit B

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By Matt Carey

Can we just drop “tsunami” from the autism discussion?

20 Jan

Todd W. over at Harpocrates Speaks discussed a recent video from Autism Speaks: Sounding the Alarm.  Todd’s article, Autism Speaks Sounds Fear notes how the Autism Speaks film uses the old “autism tsunami” rhetoric.

Why do we have to discuss how this is a bad idea?

Let’s leave behind the whole “substitute for calling autism an epidemic” thing. What’s a tsunami? It’s a mindless thing. A terrible event. It wreaks havoc on people.

I would invite Autism Speaks to explore the concept of “othering“.

“There is a tsunami coming. An estimated half a million children with autism will become adults in the next eight or so years.”

Fear. Fear autistics. They are coming to ruin our lives.

Othering.

Please stop it.

—
By Matt Carey

Jenny’s McCarthy’s vaccine narrative called into question

16 Jan

Jenny McCarthy is the face of vaccine rejectionism in America. The story she tells of how her son, Evan, became autistic after his MMR shot is arguably the origin myth for the anti-vaccine movement, and the legions of  “Warrior Mothers” who follow her. Now, a competing narrative from someone else close to Evan calls the myth into question.

“I have such tremendous guilt for not speaking up when I knew something wasn’t right,” says Joyce Bulifant, Evan’s paternal grandmother. “But I was afraid of Jenny, and didn’t want to be the interfering mother-in-law. I was more concerned about me than taking care of Evan.” She agreed to speak with AutismNewsBeat.

McCarthy’s many critics have pointed to her numerous contradictions. She told Oprah Winfrey, for example, and there is “no doubt in my mind” that the MMR vaccine caused her son Evan’s autism. But she has also written that Evan showed signs of delay by six months – one year before the shot.

“I don’t think she’s very fond of me, but I love her because she is Evan’s mother. It makes me sad that we don’t have a true relationship,” says Bulifant. “That makes me very sad.”

The elf on the shelf

Bulifant is no stranger to Hollywood. The Virginia native has been acting for more than 50 years, and is well known for playing Murray Slaughter’s wife, Marie, on the Mary Tyler Moore Show. She was also a regular on The Match Game, and appeared in Airplane! (1980). She lives in Palm Springs with her fourth husband, actor and composer Roger Perry. Joyce has 15 grandchildren, and they all call her LaLa. When she speaks of Evan, who was born in May, 2002, it’s easy to imagine he is the favorite.

“Evan was here for Thanksgiving, and he left a note on my fridge that I just can’t take down. It reads ‘Dear LaLa, I hope that you love me so much. Thanks, Evan. I love you to the moon and back.

P.S., the Elf is in the freezer with turkey.”

The elf is a small, felt doll that sits on a shelf.

“He used to be afraid of the Elf on the Shelf, but last year he started moving it around the house, hiding it in different places and making it reappear. He said it had magical powers,” says Bulifant. “I love playing magic with him. He’s so very dear. It’s like he has a sixth sense that I don’t have.”

That sixth sense sparks her sense of wonder. “I am dyslexic and so is my son (Evan’s father, John),” she says. “We do compensate when we don’t have all the typical skills. The compensation part fascinates me. T

o me Evan is magical and wonderful and I love him to death.”

Bulifant’s conversation is sprinkled with sweet and simple stories about the boy she loves.  One time at L.A.’s Getty Museum, she said, Bulifant and Evan were throwing quarters into a fountain to make a wish

“I wish you would always love me,” said Evan.

“I wish you would always love me,” she said.

“LaLa, that’s my wish!”

Bulifant said she was concerned about Evan’s months before his first birthday.

“I remember Christmas, 2002 (age seven months). I was bathing him in the sink, and trying to get him to giggle and respond to me, but he seemed detached. My family was a little concerned but I didn’t say anything to Jenny because I know children develop at different times. But I was concerned.”

And then there was the incident in the park, another example of how difficult it is to see autism in a loved one.

“We took him to the park, and he started running away from us. We called, but he didn’t even turn around. We wondered if his hearing was impaired,” sh

e says. “That didn’t seem right. So I was testing him in the car seat on the way home. ‘Where is your nose? Where are your ears?’ I asked Evan. He didn’t respond, and I wondered what was going on. Then, when we pulled up in the driveway, Evan suddenly pointed

to h

is mouth and said ‘mouth’, and then he pointed to his ears and said ‘ears.’ It was like he was saying ‘Silly gramma, I know where my mouth and my ears are!’”

Joyce has been active in dyslexia education and advocacy for years, and she called on her research contacts for help. “By the time Evan was 18 months old, I was convinced he had autism,” she says.

Bulifant was wary of approaching McCarthy, who had written two books by that time that made it clear she didn’t appreciate parenting advice from others.

“She wrote ‘I don’t want anyone telling me what to do as a mother,’” says Bulifant. “I was trying to be a good mother-in-law and a good grandmother at the same time. I don’t think I even said anything to John. Everything I read pointed to autism.”

One day, while John was off directing in North Carolina, and Bulifant was staying at Jenny’s Los Angeles home, the “Good Grandmother” spoke up, and asked the nanny about Evan’s development. The nanny reacted defensively.

“I want to ask you something. Have you noticed that Evan doesn’t always connect with me?“ asked Bulifant.

“Jenny is a wonderful mother and he always connects with me.”

“He does watch a lot of television, ” said Bulifant, “and I’m wondering if that means he’s not used to interacting.”

“Evan is fine and always interacts with me. “

Bulifant retreated. “I thought maybe I was just me being a silly grandmother.”

She and her husband left the house for a few hours, and when they came back nobody was home.

“I was terrified that something had happened to Evan.” Then John called, and said that Jenny was “very upset “about the conversation with the nanny.

“You just can’t say anything about Evan,” John continued. “She gets very upset.” He said McCarthy would not come back home until Bulifant and her husband left the house.

Which they did.

Back home, Bulifant wrote a letter of apology to McCarthy. “Jenny wrote back saying ‘You shouldn’t have said anything to the nanny. You should have said it to me.’ And she was right, I should have. I was just afraid. I didn’t want to be the interfering mother-in-law.

“It was very wrong, and that is something I have to live with,” says Bulifant.

McCarthy has told a similar story:

Others had noticed something different about Evan, too. “My mother-in-law said, ‘He doesn’t really show affection,’ and I threw her out of the house,” Jenny says. “I went to a play gym, and the woman [there] said, ‘Does your son have a brain problem?’ … [I said], ‘How dare you say something about my child? I love him. He’s perfect. You can’t say that about a child.’ I just had no idea.”

Bulifant says that after being “thrown out of the house,” she and McCarthy have only spoken a few times, and for the last two years have communicated only through occasional texts.

Seizures and celebrity

Evan’s autism, and Bulifant’s collision with McCarthy’s “strong personality” created another issue. It’s what she calls her “moral problem” for not speaking up sooner about McCarthy’s well-publicized anti-vaccine views. “I know enough about Evan that if I spoke up sooner, more kids would be vaccinated, and fewer would have died or gotten very sick. We’ve seen cases of measles in Texas, and whooping cough killed ten children in California. It breaks my heart. That’s the biggest moral issue in my whole life,” she says.

Vaccines are at the center of McCarthy’s shifting narrative. In one version she says “the soul was gone from Evan’s eyes” shortly after the boy’s MMR vaccine. Here is what she told Oprah in September, 2007:

“Right before his MMR shot, I said to the doctor, ‘I have a very bad feeling about this shot. This is the autism shot, isn’t it?’ And he said, ‘No, that is ridiculous. It is a mother’s desperate attempt to blame something,’ and he swore at me, and then the nurse gave [Evan] the shot,” she says. “And I remember going, ‘Oh, God, I hope he’s right.’ And soon thereafter—boom—the soul’s gone from his eyes.”

McCarthy’s narrative also includes two seizure episodes suffered by Evan, leading to an autism diagnosis. In Belly Laughs, she wrote Evan was diagnosed with a febrile seizure at 2 ½, and three weeks later, he suffered seizures which led to a cardiac arrest, and a diagnosis of epilepsy. By this telling, stereotypical autistic behaviors followed.

Bulifant says the first seizure came in the spring of 2004. Oddly, the news triggered in her a sense of relief.

“I knew that seizures are associated with autism, and that Evan would finally get the diagnosis he needed and finally get help. I wasn’t alarmed.”

The second seizure occurred the evening before Easter Sunday, in Bulifant’s home. “I had an Easter basket for Evan,” she says.

“It was the night before Easter. Evan was so tired that he fell into my arms. I laid him on his bed and took off his shoes and when I looked at him I saw his little eyes rolled into the back of his head. I yelled for John to come quickly. We called 911. John held Evan’s hand and said ‘Don’t worry, you are in a safe place.”

Paramedics arrived. “Jenny was a mess. I now know what ‘wringing you hands mean’, because that’s what I was doing.” The EMTs “bagged” the boy because his breathing was shallow, says Bulifant, then took him to the local emergency room. Jenny rode in the ambulance. Anxious hours followed in the waiting room while doctors stabilized Evan and then allowed family to visit.

Evan’s first words were “Look at that air conditioning vent.”

Jenny and John left Palm Springs with Evan and drove straight to Cedars Sinai Hospital in LA, where he was diagnosed with epilepsy. Joyce felt like screaming – “No, it’s autism!” She had had enough.

“I said to John ‘I now insist that you go to UCLA to see a neurologist.’” By McCarthy’s telling, it took the neurologist 20 minutes to arrive at a diagnosis.

A September, 2007 People Magazine article is typical of how McCarthy tells the story:

This was another seizure, she thought, “but this one is different. He’s not convulsing.” Instead, “foam was coming out of his mouth, (and) and after a few minutes, I felt his heart stop,” she said.

When the paramedics arrived, she told them about Evan’s heart. “They looked at me like I was crazy. I don’t know why,” she said. Only, as they discovered for themselves, the child’s heart was no longer beating, so they administered CPR.

“Why, God? Why me … Why? Why? Why?” McCarthy recalled thinking in those desperate moments, but then, she said, an inner voice came over her. “Everything’s going to come out okay.”

Because there was no pediatric hospital near her parents’ home, Evan and McCarthy drove three hours back to Los Angeles, during which time Evan suffered several more seizures.

Dramatic effect

Another unfortunate dimension to McCarthy’s assault on children’s health is her endorsement of unproven, costly, and potentially harmful alternative therapies for autism. She is front and center at the annual AutismOne conference, where speakers have recommended bleach enemas and chemical castration. Her charitable foundation, Generation Rescue, actively promotes  “a wealth of biomedical therapies that treat the underlying issues of autism inside the body.” These include chelation, hyperbaric oxygen, anti-fungals, anti-virals, and cannabis.

When asked what she thinks of the autism cure industry that Jenny has captained, Bulifant demurs. “I think there is value in eating right and exercise for all children,” she says, her voice trailing off.

But what about telling autistic children they are vaccine injured, or that the soul has been sucked from their eyes? Jenny and her angry mob, as she has called her followers, regularly describe their children as train wrecks, zombies, and worse.

“Jenny says things for dramatic effect,” says Bulifant “I don’t understand that type of thinking. Evan is incredible. One of our favorite things to do is to go looking for lizards. He spots them where I can never see them. I ask him ‘How did you even begin to see that?’”

Still, Bulifant doesn’t hesitate to describe McCarthy as “a very good mother, very caring and trying to do the best for Evan,” adding “I don’t know why she says those things.” She describes her son as good father, and regrets how John has been portrayed as distant and uncaring.

“John never spoke up when Jenny said unkind things about him. I asked him why, and he said it would turn into another ‘Hollywood he said – she said’, and that he wanted to be a gentleman about it, and didn’t want to hurt Evan.”

Does she worry that Evan may one day think he lost his soul to autism?

“I hope that Evan never realizes the things have been said about him. I just don’t want him to ever be hurt. I don’t know if he will ever realize what has been said about him. I hope not.”

Bulifant tries to expose her magical grandson to the arts whenever possible. “I took him to see Billy Elliot, and he loved that. His little mind is working all the time. ”But those bonding opportunities have dwindled since McCarthy moved to the Chicago suburb of Geneva last year. Now, Bulifant watches The View to see new pictures of Evan, and to hear the latest stories.

She says Jenny is doing well on The View.

_____________________

Update from Joyce Bulifant:
I understand and have great empathy for parents of autistic children who want to know the reason for their children’s autism. They understandably latch onto anything they can find as a reason. That might be what Jenny did when Dr. Wakefield gave incorrect information about vaccines. I don’t think she did this maliciously. She just needed a reason.
If people know Evan showed signs of autism before his MMR vaccine, parents wouldn’t be afraid to vaccinate their children, thereby saving lives and much suffering.

Celebrities and seizures: Evan’s grandmother speaks out

12 Jan

Jenny McCarthy is the face of vaccine rejectionism in America. The story she tells of how her son, Evan, became autistic after his MMR shot is arguably the origin myth for the anti-vaccine movement, and the legions of “Warrior
Mothers” who follow her. Now, a competing narrative from someone else close to Evan calls the myth into question. “I have such tremendous guilt for not speaking up when I knew something wasn’t right,” says Joyce Bulifant, Evan’s paternal grandmother.

“But I was afraid of Jenny, and didn’t want to be the interfering mother-in-law. I was more concerned about me than taking care of Evan.” She agreed to speak with AutismNewsBeat.

McCarthy’s many critics have pointed to her numerous contradictions. She told Oprah Winfrey, for example, and there is “no doubt in my mind” that the MMR vaccine caused her son Evan’s autism. But she has also written that Evan showed signs of delay by six months – one year before the shot. “I don’t think she’s very fond of me, but I love her because she is Evan’s mother. It makes me sad that we don’t have a true relationship,” says Bulifant. “That makes me very sad.”

– more at
autismnewsbeat.com

Jenny McCarthy, autism families are not your shield

7 Jan

Jenny McCarthy just got herself in the news again. She felt harmed by an article on a celebrity news website and threatened them with legal action. Here’s her statement:

Stories circulating online, claiming that I said my son Evan may not have autism after all, are blatantly inaccurate and completely ridiculous. Evan was diagnosed with autism by the Autism Evaluation Clinic at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Hospital and was confirmed by the State of California (through their Regional Center). The implication that I have changed my position, that my child was not initially diagnosed with autism (and instead may suffer from Landau-Kleffner Syndrome), is both irresponsible and inaccurate. These stories cite a “new” Time Magazine interview with me, which was actually published in 2010, that never contained any such statements by me. Continued misrepresentations, such as these, only serve to open wounds of the many families who are courageously dealing with this disorder. Please know that I am taking every legal measure necessary to set this straight.

Emphasis mine.

As I already noted elsewhere: don’t use my family as your shield.

Your conventions promote absolute nonsense posing as “therapies”. Forcing disabled children to drink bleach solutions or take bleach solution enemas. Shutting down the sex hormone production in disabled children on the mistaken idea that this will help to remove “toxins”. Chelating disabled kids for faux mercury poisoning.

For parents like me who reject your nonsense, you describe us as: “[they] fall into this victim role, and they like it”

News stories about you, correct or incorrect, open no wounds for me.

You added that line to paint yourself as a leader of the autism community. You aren’t.

Stand up and distance yourself from your previous stances on vaccines. That would be leadership. Tell your organization and your parent convention that some of these “therapies” are harming children and you won’t promote them. That would be leadership.

Using autism for self promotion, like you are doing here, that’s not leadership.

—
Matt Carey

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