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Experts with an agenda and newcomers with an agenda

28 Jun

Everyone knows that a good meeting needs to have an agenda. Most people also knows that science being forced to fit a pre-conceived agenda is usually useless.

With that in mind, Gardiner Harris of the New York Times delivers an excellent report that discusses a meeting being held today that will…:

<blockquote>….call together some of the world’s leading experts on an obscure disease to discuss the controversial case of a 9-year-old girl from Athens, Ga. [Hannah Poling]…. [and]…a 6-year-old girl from Colorado [who] received FluMist, a flu vaccine, and about a week later “became weak with multiple episodes of falling to ground” and “difficulty walking,”….She was hospitalized and underwent surgery and was finally withdrawn from life support. She died on April 5, according to the report</blockquote>

(inserts mine)

You can expect the usual suspects to come out with horror show after horror show about this poor little girl who died and how The Evil Vaccines ™ are to blame. However, the truth is that – as with all previous convolutions of the autism/vaccine hypotheses, correlation does not equal causation.

<blockquote>”After caring for hundreds of children with mitochondrial disease, I can’t recall a single one that had a complication from vaccination,” said Dr. Darryl De Vivo, a professor of neurology and pediatrics at Columbia University who will present at the meeting on Sunday and is one of the premier experts in the field.</blockquote>

De Vivo also said:

<blockquote>as many as 700,000 people in the United States had flawed mitochondria, and in roughly 30,000 of them the genetic flaws were expansive enough to cause disease</blockquote>

In an email conversation with Sullivan (a regular commenter and author at this blog), Sullivan pointed out how this 700,000 – an opinion offered by an expert in the field – differed wildly from the <a href=”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kirby/the-next-big-autism-bomb_b_93627.html&#8221; rel=”nofollow”>1 in 50</a> estimation offered by David Kirby which would result in 6,000,000 cases. Thats a fairly wild discrepancy.

Harris also quoted a great aunt of Hannah Poling who simply parroted the ‘green our vaccines’ nothingness:

<blockquote>What’s the schedule and number of vaccines?” Ms. Dunkle asked. “What’s the content of those vaccines?</blockquote>

In the case of the little girl who died, she had already received one set of vaccines with no incident. In the case of Hannah Poling, it is far from clear that the vaccines administered resulted in her autism diagnosis.

The bottom line for me is:

<blockquote>Many experts said infections could be so devastating to those with mitochondrial disorders that the risks associated with vaccines were far outweighed by the benefits. Still, none dismissed the notion that a vaccine could cause a decline in such children.</blockquote>

Which is, of course, true. Nobody disputes that people sometimes have adverse reactions to vaccinations. This is true of kids with mitochondrial issues as well as autistic people as well as people with no other issues at all. Its sad to me that people want to castigate vaccines for being imperfect. Nothing in life is absolutely assured and it is quite obviously far better for children to be as healthy as possible with a very small chance that a side effect may occur. This is even more true for kids with mitochondrial issues. Consier this statement:

<blockquote>Most of these kids [with mitochondrial issues] get a common cold, and either during the cold or soon after, the parents notice a drastic deterioration,” said Dr. Bruce H. Cohen, a neurologist at the Cleveland Clinic.</blockquote>

(inserts mine)

Now, if you said to these parents – we have a vaccine for the common cold. The chances of it working are very, very good but not 100%. The chances of it causing an adverse reaction are very, very low but not 0%. The chances of it causing a _fatal_ adverse reaction is even lower but still not 0% (I’ve got a figure of 1.3%<sup>1</sup>). The chances of your child becoming seriously ill following the common cold is very high. Do you want your child to have this vaccine?

I would imagine most of these parents would break your arm in the rush of trying to sign the acceptance papers.

Now, lets lengthen that scenario. The common cold vaccine is announced to the rest of the world and adopted into vaccine schedules. The usual suspects say how silly it is and how the common cold is ‘nothing’. They refuse to vaccine against the common cold. Herd immunity drops. A child catches a cold and sits next to a child with a mitochondrial issue at a GP’s surgery (for example). The vaccine the mito child has received doesn’t work – because we all know vaccines don’t work 100% of the time.

What will this ‘nothing’ common cold do to this mito child?

Society has an obligation to protect the weaker members of its society.

On that same theme, I noticed a new paper in my Inbox today. It discussed death rates of autistic people compared to the general population:

<strong> Mortality and causes of death in autism spectrum disorders: An update.</strong>

<blockquote> This study compared mortality among Danish citizens with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) with that of the general population……In all, 26 persons with ASD had died, whereas the expected number of deaths was 13.5. Thus the mortality risk among those with ASD was nearly twice that of the general population</blockquote>

Nearly half of the 26 deaths of autistic people were due to Epilepsy rather than autism itself.

I would like to ask the kind permission of those who continue to try and make a story from nothing about autism and vaccines that we be allowed to move the debate onto areas that really, really need a big light shining on them. The heavy death rate of autistic people from comorbidities such as Epilepsy would be a great place to start.

[1] I got this using the <a href=”http://www.medalerts.org/vaersdb/index.html”>VAERS DB</a> (yes, I know the limitations but I wanted to use a DB given credence by the autism/vaccine believers). Out of a total amount of entries of 227,795 there were 3009 reported deaths.

Autism Hub at USD and on NPR

25 Jun

Under the care of Dave Seidel and HollywoodJaded, the Autism Hub has gone from strength to strength. They are to be massively congratulated for all that the Hub has become.

However, two other people have driven the Hub into new areas this past year. These two people have demonstrated both singly and jointly exactly the ethos I hoped the Hub would have. Parents and autistic people speaking together.

One of the key areas Steve and Bev have worked in is getting the Hub to an academic audience and a public audience. Steve has worked tirelessly to arrange not one, but two Autism Hub based presentations to an academic audience. I’ve blogged it already but the University of San Diego is currently holding a conference at which Autism Hub bloggers are taking a large part.

Autism Hub at USD

Also on this issue, Steve and Bev appeared on National Public Radio station KPBS show ‘These Days’ to talk about the USD conference and the Autism Hub.

You can listen to the show in MP3 format. Bev and Steve do a fantastic job and it was great to hear the personification of the main idea behind the Hub (that of autistic person and parent to autistic people speaking together).

I wanted to offer a hearttfelt thank you to Steve and Bev for doing all that they have. It really does matter and it really is important. Thank you.

And now we know…

22 Jun

I had a snarky version of this all planned out and then realized this is too important to risk burrying it in my own strange humor.

The CDC has had two big studies on thimerosal in vaccines ongoing as a part of their response to the 2001 IOM report. One of these came out last year, looking at neurological disorders except for autism. In the post on that study, by Thompson et al., Isles noted:

A CDC study released yesterday found no evidence to support “a causal association between early exposure to mercury from thimerosal-containing vaccines and immune globulins and deficits in neuropsychological functioning at the age of 7 to 10 years

But what of the sister study? The one on autism? It is expected this year, but we have yet to hear about it…until now. A hat tip is in order to David Kirby, who unearthed this document. Mr. Kirby selectively quoted it, made a few mistakes and reposted a corrected version here.

OK, now it’s my turn to selectively quote. I’ll admit upfront, I make mistakes, maybe this is one…but I don’t think so. When I read Mr. Kirby’s original blog post Friday evening, I had to read the CDC document. And when I did, I noticed that it basically tips CDC’s hand as to the results of the thimerosal/autism study.

The document is a report by CDC director Dr. Julie Gerberding entitled:

REPORT TO CONGRESS ON VACCINE SAFETY DATALINK

It mentions the followup study to the Thompson study:

Another VSD study that builds upon the 2003 thimerosal screening study and was recommended by the IOM in 2001 is the VSD thimerosal and autism study. This case-control study is being conducted at three MCOs in which children with autism are being evaluated by certified specialists using standardized diagnostic assessments. Medical records and interviews with the parents of both the cases and their matched controls will be used to verify vaccination histories and information on other potential confounding factors. This study is in progress and the expected date of publication is September 2008.

I am not a very patient person, I don’t want to wait until September. I really don’t want to wait until September and find out at the end of the month that the paper was delayed for some reason. Well, as far as the conclusions go, we don’t have to wait.

Based on what Dr. Gerberding write, we now know that the study is done and submitted to a journal. CDC, and likely other parts of the government, know the results. So, how is CDC responding? Dr. Gerberding tells us:

In 2004, the IOM performed a comprehensive review of the scientific evidence regarding thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism newly available since its initial review in 2001. In its 2004 report, the IOM concluded that “the evidence favors rejection of a causal relationship between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism,” and further stated

While the [IOM Immunization Safety Review] committee strongly supports targeted research that focuses on better understanding the disease of autism, from a public health perspective the committee does not consider a significant investment in studies of the theoretical vaccine-autism connection to be useful at this time.

Although CDC concurs with the 2004 IOM findings, CDC is committed to completing its research undertaken in this area. CDC is currently completing the vaccine safety studies it undertook in response to the 2001 IOM report.

OK, so, with the data from their new study in hand, the CDC still agree with the 2004 IOM report. Further, they will continue the ongoing studies, but no mention is made of new studies to look specifically at thimerosal and/or mercury and autism.

Now, I realize that there are people out there who think that the CDC might sit on data and not react. But, let’s face it, the only result of the thimerosal/autism study that makes any sense given the actions at CDC is this:

Thimerosal Didn’t Cause an Epidemic of Autism

Based on the reaction from the CDC, there is no evidence of any increased risk for autism from thimerosal.

Yep, I’ve gone out on a limb on this. But I contend it is a pretty sturdy limb. Not like the feeble limb of thimerosal causation that got us to this point in the first place. That concept (it should no longer be graced with the title ‘hypothesis’) was based on methods that would have to take a few steps up the quality ladder to reach the level of the Verstraeten study that Mr. Kirby’s blog post is attempting to bash.

Thimerosal Didn’t Cause an Epidemic of Autism

Sorry, it just looks so good I had do it again.

Dear Mercury and MMR Militia

21 Jun

I want to write you all an open letter to offer you my opinion as to where you are going wrong. Before I do, I fully realise that this is a massive generalisation and that some of you won’t hold all the opinions I’m about to go through. I think though, that many of you do.

Three things prompted this open letter. First of all was David Kirby’s trip to the UK. Second was a comment from Kelli Ann Davies where she expressed surprise that some of us might know/guess/whatever the intentions of the science and medical community. Third was Ginger Taylor’s recent sulk about the AAP. I’ll touch on these things as I go through this.

You have a truly massive credibility issue which grows with every passing year. Once upon a time it was an issue with the science/medical community but now it is an issue with the general public. There are a number of reasons why this is so.

1) You cannot keep your story straight. You have (as I said to Kelli Anne) some first class marketing and PR people. As I recall, Lynn Redwood, Mark Blaxill and Sallie Bernard all have marketing qualifications. You also have numerous leading lights who are very, very rich. This means you have ample opportunity to lever your message into the heart of the US media system.

But that means nothing without a coherent story to sell. You don’t have one. I understand that you have recently talked about how the ‘story of vaccines’ has _evolved_ . That is stretching things more than a little. Its mercury, no its MMR, no its both, no its Aluminium, no its all three, no its all ingredients, no its the very vaccines themselves, no its the schedule they’re given. No – its ALL the above. And don’t forget the mitochondria!

The more ingredients you add to the pot, the more you have to explain why they are causative of autism. You didn’t even manage to do this when you were concentrating on just _one_ thing (thiomersal). The above is not an example of an evolving hypothesis. Its an example of an ever widening hypothesis as one after another, your original ideas have been taken down.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than David Kirby’s stumbling backwards and backwards:

In 2005, David said in a FAIR Autism Media interview:

It’s now 2005…..[W]e should see fewer cases entering the system [cdds] this year than we did last year.

When that didn’t happen he then said:

if the total number of 3-5 year olds in the California DDS system has not declined by 2007, that would deal a severe blow to the autism-thimerosal hypothesis…..total cases among 3-5 year olds, not changes in the rate of increase is the right measure.

That didn’t happen either.

You started off by pointing an air pistol at a target 20 feet away and missing. You worked your way through Magnums, Shotguns and Miniguns and kept missing. You currently have a canon wheeled right up to within a foot of the target and you’re _still_ missing.

2) Your science is weak and getting weaker. Sadly for you, the onus was (and still is) on you to provide evidence that vaccines in any of the myriad of hypotheses cause autism. Lets hypothetically agree with you that vaccines are in fact, fashioned by Satan and are in fact, tools of population control. That is not the point. The point is: _do they cause autism?_

There is not one paper that passes muster as valid science that offers corroborating evidence that any vaccine, any ingredient of vaccines or any schedule they are administered in causes autism. This is after over 10 years of trying to find one. What you are increasingly left with is a double conspiracy theory. In one barrel of the conspiracy theory, brave maverick doctors are having their research suppressed. In the other barrel of the conspiracy theory, Big Pharma shills are publishing science to refute the various vaccine hypotheses.

Of course, neither barrel is true. The brave maverick docs are not having their science suppressed. It is simply not good enough to pass peer review.

A good example of this is the science experts being presented at the Omnibus Autism proceedings. No Geier’s. No Jim Adams. No Boyd Haley. No Andrew Wakefield. At least, not so far anyway. And this is in the Vaccine Court, where standards of evidence are way lower than in a civil court, where – by the way – not a few of these same researchers science was not good enough to even be entered as evidence.

And you have this nasty habit of shooting yourselves in the foot. Only today David Kirby posted on the Huffington Post about how rubbish the VSD database was. The very same database the Geier’s recently used to allege a link between vaccines and neurodevelopmental disorders.

And the list goes on. The Hornig study? Refuted by Rick Rollens MIND Institute. The Nataf paper on Porphyrins? Liz Mumper, head of DAN! medical admits that even ‘normal’ children have raised Porphyrin levels. The Bernard et al paper? Refuted. Richard Deth’s work? Exposed and questioned.

3) Your choice of media people to represent you is doing you harm. I am not sure how the idea of latching onto Jenny McCarthy as a spokesperson for the anti-vaccine/autism connection came up. There are a few other celebs I can think of with more gravitas than McCarthy. In truth, you couldn’t have chosen worse. Already, she has made a public fool of herself (and you). As has her partner, Jim Carrey, with his ‘lazy ass’ FUBAR and calls to notice ‘warnings from the universe‘.

I understand that these events feel terribly cathartic to you but I would urge you to take off your rose tinted glasses and see how the real world perceives these kind of things. Its not good. Don’t take my word for it, go to a _mainstream_ news source, discount the people you know as friends/associates who are leaving comments and then see what people think.

You have also latched onto the words of Bernadine Healy. I can see why but she (is/was) a member of a paid lobby group that advances the ‘science’ of Philip Morris to put forward the idea passive smoking isn’t dangerous. How desperate do you have to be to turn to _this_ ‘authority’ for backup?

4) You cannot see that you are being humoured. I know that some of you have been very proud of your success in getting involved with things like the IACC and y’know, thats great – well done to you. And then there’s the ‘coup’ of getting the AAP to attend a DAN! conference and ‘work with’ them. But there’s one thing you seem to have forgotten. AAP members are medical scientists. They will go with the decent science.

I read a blog post from Ginger Taylor today which seemed to be telling the AAP their ‘window of opportunity’ to work with DAN! et al had closed due to the fact they endorsed a letter that a paediatrician had written on how to tackle parents who were nervous about vaccination.

Amusingly, Taylor also chided the AAP for not turning up to the ‘green our vaccines’ rally:

I warned that the window would only be open for a short time unless we saw real action, and would probably close around the time of the Green our Vaccines Rally if they didn’t show up for us in some respect.

Well the AAP didn’t show up for the rally and well… this certainly signals that the window is closed. They want it closed. And it looks like they may be locking it.

Can you not understand that to expect the AAP will turn up for a rally which touts such anti-science as Aluminium and Formaldehyde being at singularly dangerous levels in vaccines and Anti-Freeze being in them at all is the height of arrogant stupidity? Surely you cannot be that naive?

The truth is – and I get this from speaking to AAP, NIH, FDA and NHS members – that you had, and always will have, an opportunity to impress them with decent, peer reviewed science. That’s all you’ve ever needed. And that’s what you’ve never had.

5) The future. The person you’ve decided will be your public face is writing another book. <a href="http://stopthinkautism.blogspot.com/2008/06/today-autism-recovery-tomorrow-crystals.html"She says that:

It’s really an Indigo book…….We’re definitely the Indigos, you know, breaking down these walls so this, you know, New Earth behind us can happen.

And what’s your role in this?

…But people aren’t quite there yet and I kinda had to, not lower my vibration, change my vibration to focusing on the world hearing that message. Hearing that biomedical treatment does help these kids.

And then, slowly, you know I can put it in my speeches. and then in my last book I talked about the indigos and crystals. And I’m just like, I’m really following source, kind of I felt the need to do that, I’m just kind of dribbling it here and there until people, you know, have that spiritual awakening of spirituality.”

That’s where you’re going. You’re close to abandoning any kind of rational basis for your beliefs and just becoming Jenny’s followers in an Indigo Spiritual Awakening to herald in the New Earth..

The Irrelevant Objection Fallacy – I’m Insulted!

21 Jun

In some cases, the irrelevant objection fallacy can also bee seen as the, “shoot the messenger” fallacy, or in this case, maybe even, “shoot the straw messenger”.

Over at Age Of Autism, Ginger Taylor writes:

The American Academy of Pediatrics now recommends that pediatricians tell parents who don’t vaccinate their children that they:

Are “Selfish”
Are “Self-Centered”
Are “Complacent or Lazy”
Are often “Emotional” decision makers
Have “Unacceptable attitudes”

But they do not believe that insulting you like this is in any way coercing you to vaccinate your child.

Does the American Academy of Pediatrics really recommend that? Ginger’s assertion is based on is a sample letter from a private pediatric practice (All Star Pediatrics). The sample letter does in fact clearly communicate this practice’s position and opinions about the importance of vaccination and probably does serve a healthy portion of a ‘not-so-pretty look in the mirror’ at attitudes surrounding vaccination refusal. Yes, this sample letter is available on the AAP website, but, is it really a “recommendation” from the AAP?

This sample document was created by All Star Pediatrics. It is provided only as a reference for practices developing their own materials and may be adapted to local needs. This document does not represent official American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) policy or guidelines and the AAP is not responsible for its use. You should consult an attorney who is knowledgeable about the laws of the jurisdiction in which you practice before creating or using any legal documents.

If the sample letter from All Star Pediatrics is not official policy or guidelines, what is?

This maybe? (from the AAP Policy website).

What is the pediatrician to do when faced with a parent who refuses immunization for his or her child? First and most important, the pediatrician should listen carefully and respectfully to the parent’s concerns, recognizing that some parents may not use the same decision criteria as the physician and may weigh evidence very differently than the physician does.21 Vaccines are very safe, but they are not risk free; nor are they 100% effective.22 This poses a dilemma for many parents and should not be minimized. The pediatrician should share honestly what is and is not known about the risks and benefits of the vaccine in question, attempt to understand the parent’s concerns about immunization, and attempt to correct any misperceptions and misinformation.23–25 Pediatricians should also assist parents in understanding that the risks of any vaccine should not be considered in isolation but in comparison to the risks of remaining unimmunized. For example, although the risk of encephalopathy related to the measles vaccine is 1 in 1 million, the risk of encephalopathy from measles illness is 1000 times greater.22 Parents can also be referred to one of several reputable and data-based Web sites for additional information on specific immunizations and the diseases they prevent (see pages 52 and 53 of the Red Book25 for a list of Internet resources related to immunization).

Many parents have concerns related to 1 or 2 specific vaccines. A useful strategy in working with families who refuse immunization is to discuss each vaccine separately. The benefits and risks of vaccines differ, and a parent who is reluctant to accept the administration of 1 vaccine may be willing to allow others.

Parents also may have concerns about administering multiple vaccines to a child in a single visit. In some cases, taking steps to reduce the pain of injection, such as those suggested in the Red Book,26 may be sufficient. In other cases, a parent may be willing to permit a schedule of immunization that does not require multiple injections at a single visit.

Physicians should also explore the possibility that cost is a reason for refusing immunization. For a parent whose child does not have adequate preventive care insurance coverage, even the administrative costs and copayments associated with immunization can pose substantial barriers. In such cases, the physician should work with the family to help them obtain appropriate immunizations for the child.

For all cases in which parents refuse vaccine administration, pediatricians should take advantage of their ongoing relationship with the family and revisit the immunization discussion on each subsequent visit. As respect, communication, and information build over time in a professional relationship, parents may be willing to reconsider previous vaccine refusals.

Continued refusal after adequate discussion should be respected unless the child is put at significant risk of serious harm (as, for example, might be the case during an epidemic). Only then should state agencies be involved to override parental discretion on the basis of medical neglect. Physician concerns about liability should be addressed by good documentation of the discussion of the benefits of immunization and the risks associated with remaining unimmunized. Physicians also may wish to consider having the parents sign a refusal waiver (a sample refusal-to-immunize waiver can be found at http://www.cispimmunize.org/pro/pdf/RefusaltoVaccinate_2pageform.pdf). In general, pediatricians should avoid discharging patients from their practices solely because a parent refuses to immunize his or her child. However, when a substantial level of distrust develops, significant differences in the philosophy of care emerge, or poor quality of communication persists, the pediatrician may encourage the family to find another physician or practice. Although pediatricians have the option of terminating the physician-patient relationship, they cannot do so without giving sufficient advance notice to the patient or custodial parent or legal guardian to permit another health care professional to be secured.27 Such decisions should be unusual and generally made only after attempts have been made to work with the family. Families with doubts about immunization should still have access to good medical care, and maintaining the relationship in the face of disagreement conveys respect and at the same time allows the child access to medical care. Furthermore, a continuing relationship allows additional opportunity to discuss the issue of immunization over time.

I read the sample letter from All Star Pediatrics, and in my opinion, it follows the Clinical Practice paper on the AAP Policy website pretty closely. I encourage everyone to read it in its entirety before commenting.

Let’s take a look at what the sample letter from that pediatric practice states, that apparently “insulted” Ginger:

Re: “Selfish,” “Self-Centered,” and “Unacceptable”

Furthermore, by not vaccinating your child you are taking selfish advantage of thousands of others who do vaccinate their children, which decreases the likelihood that your child will contract one of these diseases. We feel such an attitude to be self-centered and unacceptable.

Ouch. Unguided by sound science or logic and reason, parents who refuse to vaccinate probably rely heavily on beliefs and things like communal reinforcement to internally justify their decisions. Having one’s beliefs challenged in an ethical context (social responsibility), but based on science (herd immunity) could be quite uncomfortable for some. Is it easier for someone to acknowledge a potential lack of social responsibility, or is it perhaps easier to cry, “I’m offended!”?

Re: “Complacent” and “Lazy”

The vaccine campaign is truly a victim of its own success. It is precisely because vaccines are so effective at preventing illness that we are even discussing whether or not they should be given. Because of vaccines, many of you have never seen a child with polio, tetanus, whooping cough, bacterial meningitis or even chickenpox, or known a friend or family member whose child died of one of these diseases. Such success can make us complacent or even lazy about vaccinating. But such an attitude, if it becomes widespread, can only lead to tragic results.

Hmmm. This looks more like a reasonable concern, and it’s expressed as a possibility.

Re: “Emotional”

We recognize that the choice may be a very emotional one for some parents.

Not too inflammatory in my opinion, but perhaps that’s just me.

At any rate, here’s the bottom line – this sample letter from All Star Pediatrics (which is not in and of itself an AAP policy or guideline), clearly communicates the position and professional opinions of All Star Pediatrics. In my opinion, this practice’s outlined policies seem mostly in-line with the Clinical Practice paper on the AAP Policy website. How it oulines those policies is direct, and very possibly quite uncomfortable for those who would refuse vaccinations. Objecting to that direct and potentially ‘uncomfortable for some’ tone, is irrelevant to the importance of preventing childhood disease.

What does any of this have to do with autism? Well, nothing really, but don’t shoot the messenger.

Nigerian Neurodiversity

17 Jun

Its refreshing to realise sometimes that there is a world ‘out there’ beyond the West and that they are living with autism too. And whats more, they aren’t considering it soulless, or sucking the marrow out of families, or organising pointless marches for people to exercise their right to blame others, or forming organisations that concentrate on blaming vaccines, or claiming that denying autism was anything except mercury poisoning in the past and now claiming its the vaccine schedule is just the evolution of a hypothesis, or making a tidy profit of the ignorance of parents.

No, what they’re doing is ‘serving humanity’:

Mr. Babatunde Willouhby,a masters degree holder, left his lucrative job to serve humanity by taking care of autistic and children with Down syndrome, amongst others. He is an administrator in an autistic school, named Hope House School, here in Abuja. While chatting with him recently in his office, I saw in him a man with passion for dealing and caring for a special group of children with slightly different behavioral pattern from those who the society will tag ‘normal children’.

and

Mr Ayiem……said the value he attach to the welfare of his son does not make him see the money spent as expensive, but an investment which is worth giving any individual with confidence that, though it will take time, his son will be independent some day.

and most of all

….socially people see it as a stigma, but I don’t. I have had occasions where I go out with her to supermarket, church and social gathering and you notice people looking at you in a particular way, but I don’t care because she is my daughter. I give her all my love and I display it publicly. I want her to know that she is one of the must loved children in the world.

………..

autistic children and children with Down syndrome can contribute significantly to the society ,if only they are accepted. When we are at home for instance, we help her with her school work by showing her what to do and what behaviour is proper. Of course, like any other child she may go off the track but we help her to do the right things.

……….

If you play any song on radio or on CD and ask who sang it, whether American or Nigerian, she will tell you the name of the artiste. How she knows the name of the artiste and their songs, I don’t know. So if she wants to take that line, I will encourage her all the way. Wendy to me, is one in a million and for me she is a normal child.” From this discussion with Mr Ojugbuna I saw the picture of a father who believes in his child and that was reflected in the behavior of Wendy.

Nigeria is classed as a developing nation (what used to be called ‘third world’). I’d say that in my opinion it has developed a whole hell of a lot further and faster than some people I can think of over in this supposedly enlightened culture.

More Talks for David Kirby

16 Jun

According to his HuffPo blog David is giving some more talks. This time not in the uninterested UK but in the NE US.

David says:

I sincerely encourage any and all vaccine-autism skeptics, critics, agnostics and cynics living in the northeastern US to please consider attending one of these talks, armed with all of your most pointed, difficult and critical questions.

I have some questions which, had family circumstances allowed, I would’ve liked to have asked David when he was over here. What I hope is that NE US skeptics who might be attending, will ask some of the following questions.

1) Given your book is subtitled ‘mercury in vaccines and the autism epidemic’, do you feel it has now been scientifically established that mercury in vaccines does not cause autism? If not, what peer reviewed journal published science touching on mercury in vaccines do you believe supports your books subtitle?

2) You say that during the talk(s) you will discuss ‘The Poling Case – in which the government conceded that vaccines induced autism in one little girl…’. Could you read out the statement from the government where they provide this concession – that vaccines induced autism – and also tell us where we can read it for ourselves, including the location of the source document.

3) Do you agree with Professor Sander Greeland (PSC witness for the families in the continuing Omnibus Autism Procedings) that if vaccines did cause autism and were responsible for ‘an autism epidemic’ that would be detectable in the epidemiological literature? If so, how do you account for all peer reviewed journal published science not establishing an autism epidemic?

4) IN 2005, you said in a FAIR Autism Media interview: ‘It’s now 2005…..[W]e should see fewer cases entering the system [cdds] this year than we did last year.’ – was that the case? If not, does this explain why you then said in a reply to blogger Citizen Cain: ‘if the total number of 3-5 year olds in the California DDS system has not declined by 2007, that would deal a severe blow to the autism-thimerosal hypothesis…..total cases among 3-5 year olds, not changes in the rate of increase is the right measure.’. Do you consider a severe blow has been dealt to the autism-thiomersal hypothesis?

5) Do you consider yourself a fair and impartial journalist on this issue? If so, could you explain how Wendy Fournier of the National Autism Association built your website? Could you further explain to us where you feel the vaccines-autism hypothesis falls down?

6) You state in your literature that a ‘former NIH director’ has stated autism is an epidemic. Is this Bernadine Healy, former member of The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition who are lobbyists for Phillip Morris and Lorillard Tobacco (amongst others) and claim that second hand smoking is not dangerous? Do you feel comfortable with her stance on medical science issues?

What about you Dear Reader? What skeptical questions would you like to ask – or have someone ask – David?

Quag-Geier

14 Jun

I propose that any researcher or scientist who unwittingly gets into a quagmire with the Geier’s should be referred to as being ‘quag-geier-ed’. Its a handy way of referring to people who’ve (possibly accidently) stumbled into a great big pile of shit.

I therefore nominate Professor Heather Young as the inaugural QuagGeier. She has published a paper with the Geier’s which alleged to find:

associations between neurodevelopmental disorders (NDs) and exposure to mercury (Hg) from Thimerosal-containing vaccines (TCVs) by examining the automated Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD)

One would imagine that any serious researcher who valued her career would be reluctant to associate with the Geier’s who have odd ideas about what is valid research but maybe Professor Young simply didn’t know.

Anyway, I forwarded the paper itself onto Epi Wonk, a blogger who:

…has a Ph.D. in epidemiology from an Ivy League university. Before that I got a bachelor’s degree from a different Ivy League college, a master’s degree in developmental psychology, and a master’s degree in medical sociology from another Ivy League University. I worked for more than 30 years as an epidemiology professor in medical academia and schools of public health, and in the senior biomedical research service at the Centers for Disease for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). During my career I have been the editor of two epidemiology journals and one more general biomedical journal. I am now retired.

So very, very bad was the quality of this paper that Epi Wonk took three (and possibly a couple more in the future) posts to tackle the numerous issues with it. I plan to recap them here but here is Epi’s take on the paper itself.

So in part I, Epi found the following:

dubious “imputing” or imputation lies at the bottom of the author’s little trick…..

Imputastion is simply – using known data to ‘guess’ at unknown data. Epi gives an example:

…let’s say a researcher has a file of data on children and 8% are missing data values on parent’s household income, 4% are missing data values on gestational age at birth, and 1% are missing data values on birth weight. She decides to use an imputation procedure to impute values for parental income, gestational age, and birthweight where they were missing. Perfectly fine, legitimate, and scientifically valid under most circumstances.

However, when we are dealing with something like autism….

She examines the data and sees that in certain cohorts in her study population the distribution of autism isn’t quite what she would like. So she “imputes” autism cases into the data set. Except that she’s not imputing a value on a variable for an existing study participant. She’s adding imaginary autism cases into the analysis. This isn’t imputation — it’s cooking the data.

Epi was very disturbed about this to the point that xe said:

This is just not done. It’s not valid. It’s not ethical. Adding imaginary cases into a data set borders on scientiific fraud.

Later on in the comment thread that developed, commenter Andrea asked:

Does this mean that Young, Geier and Geier added 45 and 80 cases that were not in the original data sets, that they MADE UP those 125 cases just to add imaginary data points to make the stats results look more like what they wanted?!

Thats exactly what happened.

In Part II of xes detailed look at this paper, Epi concluded that when it come to controls and particularly controlling for any confounding variables:

….there’s no attempt to control for, or adjust for, the confounding effect of birth cohort. Just one look at Figure 1 (or a basic knowledge about trends in autism) tells you the regression coefficients (slopes) are being driven by increases in autism risk over time. Given the increase in frequency of autism (and other neurodevelopmental disabilities) during time time period, you could do an ecological regression analysis of almost any factor that varied over time and you would find an an association with autism. I would bet that you could enter number of sushi bars per capita into an ecological regression and you’d find an association with autism rates.

This is not a good or valid paper. It seems, based on the expert analysis of a professor of epidemiology that this paper is fundementally flawed.

Competition Time

11 Jun

Icon Books sent me a review copy of the UK release of Unstrange Minds which is how I was able to review it so promptly.

However, this means I now have (count ’em) _three_ copies of Unstrange Minds – the galley Professor Grinker sent me, the US edition (never read it) and the UK edition.

Now I don’t need three copies so I’m going to give away the US edition (which is also personally signed by Professor Grinker – as evidenced by my pointing digit) to one lucky person (willing to post anywhere in the world).

grinker

So how to choose who to give it to?

Here’s a photo of the Green our Vaccines brightest lights. What I want you to do is caption it. The rules:

1) Nothing defamatory!
2) No swear words that begin with c or f
3) No reference to Evan McCarthy
4) Do as many as you like
5) Funny = good
6) No photoshopping the image
7) Post your entry either in the comment section of this post or in a separate post on your own blog and post the link to that here.

Go!

(click for bigger version).

Green our vaccines – the outreach effort

5 Jun

Whilst Team McCarrey were busy wowing the ‘hundreds‘ of people at the Green our vaccines rally yesterday, one face was notably absent from proceedings.

David Kirby was in good old Blighty, enjoying our lovely summer drizzle and grey skies.

Mr. Kirby will speak about recent legal, political and scientific developments in the United States in the ongoing vaccine-autism controversy. The briefing is open to Peers in the House of Lords, Members of Parliament, their Staff, members of the Media, and Invited Guests. It is sponsored by His Lordship Robin Hodgson, Baron Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, Shropshire.

Now, I’ll come clean. David and I had tried to arrange a meet up so we could rage amicably at each other over a huge quantity of alcohol. Unfortunately, as it so often does, life intervened and I had to cancel.

This meant I also couldn’t attend his talks.

However, I could do something. I could ask my MP to formally protest David’s presence in Parliament to brief Lords, Peers and MP’s. Truth be told I was pretty annoyed by this – why is it so easy for a journalist to swan in and command the attention of the government and opposition and yet untold hundreds of autistic people and their families never really get a look in.

My MP was agreeable and did a bit of reading up on the issues David would be talking about in his briefing so he could debate if needed as well as protesting on my behalf.

Turns out that this wasn’t strictly necessary. When my MP reported back to me this morning he told me that David was briefing an audience of one (1) MP (mine, who only attended as I asked him to) and four Lords (one of whom was David’s sponsor I would guess and his cronies). No press attended, aside from a few people/press my MP described as “….obscure journalists who have become consumed by this issue.” so I’m thinking probably oneclickgroup, JABS and various other marginal nobodies.

So, not the most auspicious of presentations. As it turns out though, something of a blessing in disguise – my MP seems quite keen on me getting the chance to present myself which would be interesting.

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