The NYTimes profiles Paul Offit, author of Autism's False Prophets. Offit has been taking the anti-vaccine lobby to task over pseudoscience, and he hasn't been winning many friends in the process:
Those backing Dr. Offit say he was forced into the role. Opponents of vaccines have held rallies, appeared on talk shows like "Oprah" and "Imus in the Morning," been the heroes of made-for-TV movies and found a celebrity spokeswoman in Jenny McCarthy, the actress and former Playboy model who has an autistic son. Meanwhile, the response from public health officials has been muted and couched in dull scientific jargon.
"If the surgeon general or the secretary of health or the head of the C.D.C. would come out and make a really strong statement on this, I think the whole thing would go away," said Dr. Peter J. Hotez, president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, who has a severely autistic daughter whose disease, he argues, is genetic.
Asked why public health officials have been reticent, the acting
surgeon general, Dr. Steven K. Galson, issued a statement saying that
"childhood immunizations are one of the greatest achievements of all
time" and that "scientific evidence clearly shows that vaccines do not
contribute to autism." He has spoken on issues like obesity, tobacco,
air travel and exercise, but his office said he had not been questioned
by journalists about vaccines and autism.Dr. Offit's book, published in September by Columbia University
Press, has been widely endorsed by pediatricians, autism researchers,
vaccine companies and medical journalists who say it sums up, in
layman's language, the scientific evidence for vaccines and forcefully
argues that vulnerable parents are being manipulated by doctors
promoting false cures and lawyers filing class-action suits."Opponents of vaccines have taken the autism story hostage," Dr.
Offit said. "They don't speak for all parents of autistic kids, they
use fringe scientists and celebrities, they've set up cottage
industries of false hope, and they're hurting kids. Parents pay out of
their pockets for dangerous treatments, they take out second mortgages
to buy hyperbaric oxygen chambers. It's just unconscionable."
Offit's book is on my too-read list.
I too would appreciate strongs statements for policy-makers and
regulators clearly stating that vaccines do not cause autism.
Particularly I would appreciate it from Sanjay Gupta if he becomes surgeon general.
The debate over vaccines and autism -- not really a debate on facts
because the facts are clear, mostly just shouting -- is becoming in my
mind a test case of how we convey scientific information to the
public. If we step back and allow cranks to control the discourse,
well, that is exactly what they are going to do.
On the other hand, simply making explicit what the science says may
not be enough. The authors of the NYTimes article mention actress
Amanda Peet's activism promoting vaccines. Anti-vaccine groups -- and
anti-psychiatry groups associated with Scientology -- have been using
celebrity spokespeople for years. But this can cut both ways: there
is no reason that the proponents of science can't use them as well. Another example is the We campaign which utilizes politicians from both sides of the political spectrum to help fix global warming.
I think Offit's book is an important first step -- making the case
clear. But now we need to go out and sell that case to a massive
audience.
The consequences of failing to do so in terms of recurrent childhood infectious diseases are too fearful to contemplate.
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there is no point of arguing with people who didnt experience adverse reaction of vaccine (or it various contents). My child started to have flushes, body pain and convulsions 15 minutes after receiving his 12 month vaccines. In the next 2 weeks it was continuing including diarrhea, non-responsiveness, loosing weight... among other things. Slowly after that my son started to keep his mouth open not realizing it which means his oral motor skills regressed. He is now 2 and still exessively drooling if you dont ask him to close his mouth. Convulsions slowly stopped, some reactions still come and go. People thinking that vaccines and my sons reaction is coincidence must be retarded. And those who plainly do not believe this must just trying to advocate their own beliefs. When there is some new idea in society 96% of people spending their time advocating their old beliefs. I guess unless every single family will not experience things like these families do, minority will be discriminated.
What a thick wall of ignorance!
H
First of all, I think most parents would take measles over autism any day of the week. But please stop saying that opponents are anti-vaccine - they are simply advocating for safer vaccines. It's obvious you're mischaracterizing their position to make them sound like a bunch of loony parents.
Offit is a vaccine researcher. What does he know about autism? I'm not convinced that vaccines cause autism in a subset of kids yet either, but Offit mistakenly goes as far as to say that medical treatments don't work for autism. I can say with 100% certainty that my son's condition approved dramatically within two weeks of starting a wheat-free, dairy free diet. How does he explain that? He lost all credibility in my opinion when he expanded the dialogue beyond vaccines.
Doug C
hundreds of resaerchers using data from many thousands of cases say vaccines dont cause autism- you- using one case where you have a big bias say they do. i wonder why no one want to listen.
the same goes for the treatment you claim has worked- how can you show that the improvement wouldn't happen anyway, how is it measured- I'm afraid the only thing we can be 100% certain of is that you cannot get a statistically significant result with an experiment on one person.
Doug C's first sentence is the blissful paradox of successful vaccines: "most parents would take measles over autism". Worldwide *mortality* rates from measles (that means *CHILDREN DYING*) were 873,000 in 1999. Doug gets to write that sentence because measles vaccines work, and we in the U.S. haven't had to deal with epidemic measles deaths in 50 years.
Doug, define "safer" ? Those antivax gleefuly ignore any and all research that demonstrate that vaccines are safe and cost-efficient.
I cannot help notice that I have never seen any of those groups announce fundraisers for vaccine research. But all they want is "safer" vaccines. Which vaccines are the safest, which vaccines are the worst ? All of them, apparently.
Look, I clearly stated that I'm not convinced that there's a link between autism and vaccines. My point is that Offit overstepped his bounds when questioning the drastic improvement of many children with autism; he is not an autism specialist. My son is a patient of an extremely qualified, mainstream pediatric neurologist in Pittsburgh, and he prescribed the gluten-free, casein-free diet and certain mineral supplements to improve his autoimmune system. Within two weeks, his GI system returned to normal (after six months of chronic diarrhea); he abruptly began making eye contact; he stopped flapping his arms; and he stopped squealing and hopping on his toes. How do you explain that? Wouldn't that make you a believer? And wouldn't it p#ss you off to hear some righteous individual say that autism is genetic so just move on? These are hard-working families who want the best for their kids.
Love to see your responses, and then it's back to work.
Look, I clearly stated that I'm not convinced that there's a link between autism and vaccines. My point is that Offit overstepped his bounds when questioning the drastic improvement of many children with autism; he is not an autism specialist. My son is a patient of an extremely qualified, mainstream pediatric neurologist in Pittsburgh, and he prescribed the gluten-free, casein-free diet and certain mineral supplements to improve his autoimmune system. Within two weeks, his GI system returned to normal (after six months of chronic diarrhea); he abruptly began making eye contact; he stopped flapping his arms; and he stopped squealing and hopping on his toes. How do you explain that? Wouldn't that make you a believer? And wouldn't it p#ss you off to hear some righteous individual say that autism is genetic so just move on? These are hard-working families who want the best for their kids.
Love to see your responses, and then it's back to work.
Well, perhaps with the exception of a few like Roald Dahl. You pays your money and takes your chances; the difference is that we know, quite precisely, what the consequences of measles are and have very good reason to believe that vaccines don't cause autism.
Which means that your "A, B: pick one" is a false choice.
Right up until you ask, "what will it take for you to say that they are safe enough?"
What would it take to change your mind?
Three points:
First, it's a false dichotomy to say that parents would take measles over autism. Vaccines don't cause autism. The science is quite clear on that. Neither does mercury in the thimerosal in vaccines. The epidemiology and science are just as emphatic about that. Consequently, there is no choice to be made.
Second, the "pro-safe vaccine" gambit characterized by Jenny McCarthy's "Green Our Vaccines" slogan is almost always a dodge for antivaccine views. This can be easily demonstrated by asking a parent who makes that claim a simple question: What, specifically, would it take to convince you that vaccines are "safe" enough that you would then be willing to vaccinate your child? In other words, what specific "toxins" would have to be removed or what specific "evidence" would it take to get you to change your mind?
Their answers are invariably vague and/or impossible-to-meet standards. I've argued with one parent who demands "100% safety" when nothing in medicine is 100%. My usual retort is to ask whether she takes her child with her in the car. After all, even with car seats, the chances of dying in a car crash or being injured are orders of magnitude greater than the risk of injury from vaccines. Or I like to point out the example of baseball, which accounts for well over a hundred thousand visits to the ER each year and several deaths. If you're going to demand "100%" safety, then such activities are clearly far too risky and many orders of magnitude more riskier than vaccinating. They also don't have the disease-fighting effects of vaccines.
In any case, people who want "safer" vaccines usually have no clue what, exactly, that means, or they just don't care. They just know they don't trust vaccines or are opposed to vaccines. If you tell them just how safe vaccines are, they tend not to believe you or to shift the goalposts. Their "pro-safe vaccine" statements serve to camouflage their antivaccine views as a politically convenient way of not attacking vaccines. In other words, to appropriate your own words, the "pro-safe vaccine" gambit is a way of mischaracterizing their position so that they do not sound quite as loony as they would otherwise.
Moreover, it's not as though scientists aren't also interested in safer vaccines. Huge amounts of research are done to try to find safer and more effective vaccines.
Third and finally, as for Offit "overstepping" his bounds, clearly he did not. You don't have to be an "expert" on autism to realize that correlation does not equal causation, that the plural of "anecdotes" is not "data," and that there is no convincing evidence that "biomedical interventions" do anything to "cure" autism. I actually wish there were, but there isn't.
Humans are pattern-seeking animals. it's very easy to be fooled by individual experience and observations. The scientific method is, in fact, a method to minimize that tendency to be fooled. It is a reflection not of the hubris of scientists but of their humility in realizing that they are human too and just as prone to bias and finding causation in correlation where none exists.
Don't let Nisbet see this, Jake. He'll be telling Offit to sit down and shut up!
Look I'm not a scientist - I'm just a parent who cares about his son. I don't know why I even bothered posting. If you don't want to believe I've made my child better, so be it. As long as he's thriving due to my hard work, who cares what any of you think anyway? I guess part of me wants the world to know that these kids can get better. Besides, I'm in corporate communications for a huge company.... I should know that most of you responding are probably just blog monitors for Big Pharma and their PR firms anway. Or members of some "coalition" that's funded by pharma companies. None of you are the least bit concerned with treating autism.
"Offit is a vaccine researcher. What does he know about autism?"
Oh ok, then 99.9% of the autism "activists" should be silenced as well, unless they have an appropriate SCIENTIFIC background. Let's start with Ms. McCarthy and work our way down, shall we?
Ooh ooh I just noticed the tried and true tactic "well you disagree with me so you're paid by BigPharma". Stay classy.
@ Doug C
Look, I don't think anyone is trying to imply that you don't love your son. I'm sure that everything you've done for him has been with the best of intentions. I can't imaging what it must be like to have someone you love so much have such a difficult challenge to face.
That being said, having strong feelings about your son and his challenges does not give you license to ignore scientific evidence. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but it's true. There are mountains of evidence that show that vaccines do work, that they are a very safe medical procedure, and that they do not have anything to do with causing autism. It also does not give you license to create evidence where there is none. Just because your son's improvement happend to coincide with a change in diet does not mean anything. When you're dealing with a disease like autism that has a long, slow progression, it's very easy to make errors of correlation and causation.
Just one more thing. When people disagree with you and present alternative arguements in a calm and civil way, and you respond by calling them names, it makes you look really juvenile.
It's a pretty damn poor excuse for a father who only wants his son to thrive if Dad can take the credit.
Or did you mean something else?
--
dcs, father of two LD sons who are thriving thanks to their own hard work.
Vaccines always have problems getting credit for the good they do because they lack good iconic images.
When a vaccination goes wrong, as they rarely but inevitable will, there is a crippled child and a crying mother and the inevitable wounded male 'seeking justice' from those who 'did this to my child'. It is a ready-made ad campaign. Snap the picture, blow it up, and plaster it on a billboard and all you need to add a a few pithy words to make it complete.
On the other hand a few billion people getting smallpox vaccination and Not getting smallpox is a non-event. A couple of million people Not crippled or deformed by measles doesn't lend itself to easy photographic exposition. There is no blood and there is no shirt.
Safe, effective vaccines and the profound good they do are much harder to bring to public notice at the same deeply effecting visceral level. This gets ever harder as the number of people who remember the time before vaccines declines as they age and die. In many ways vaccines are a PR victim of their own success.
I'm always struck by how the people old enough to remember polio kids in leg braces and the fear that came every summer, and the maimed and deaf measles victims, and the waves of death and disfigurement from smallpox that swept across the third world all see vaccines as one of the single best technological developments ever. How vaccines were like Pandora's box in reverse. Horrible crippling diseases that strode across the land seemingly sucked into little glass vials and tossed out with the trash. Magic that works.
I suspect that one of the reasons so many Libertarians resist and resent vaccination is that they like to maintain the illusion that hey can 'do it all themselves'. Vaccination and the defeat of smallpox wasn't something any one person could do. It was a cast of millions from government, science and industry cooperating with the public at large and in the name of the public at large that turned the tide. Collectivism and socialism worked. Individuality and unenlightened self-interest was an obstacle along the way.
Paul Offit's book is very interesting and well written, but the book written by pediatrician Robert Sears too:
Sears RW. The Vaccine Book Making the Right Decision for Your Child, Little Brown and Company 2007.
As far as I have read the only studies done on autism and vaccines, have deliberately excluded all low birth weight babies, and then only compared vaccinated children to children vaccinated on a different schedule.With a truncated range and no control group, how can this be considered scientific?
Which study specifically do you feel best supports the idea that vaccines might not cause damage in a susceptible percentage of the population?
By the way, what is the effect of testosterone on the removal of mercury or aluminium from the human body? What is the rate of autism in males versus female?
Why is autism more common in premature babies? When does the blood brain barrier develop and provide protection from viruses and toxic metals?
What do animal studies indicate about thimerosal and aluminium?
Can live viruses effect neurological damage in susceptible individuals?
Would you be able to identify the difference between the vaccine induced damage suffered by Hanah Poling, and a "typical" case of autism?
Hannah Poling apparently met the DSMIV criteria for autism. A quick search of peer reviewed articles appears to indicate the possibility of increased rates of mitochondrial dysfunction in autistic children. And the latest in genetic research seeems to identify amongst many others, a gene involved in glutamate transport that would effect toxic metal removal.
I don't have all the answers,and vaccines may only be involved in a small percentage of autistic cases. It seems however,you don't even know how to ask the right questions.
If you have asked these kinds of questions and have answered them to your satisfaction please explain or direct me to the studies you used.
So much bluster, so little substance. For those of you who believe vaccines are 100% safe, read the actual inserts for each vaccine; also read the excipient list for each vaccine on the CDC website (and be sure to note that "mercury free" is not actually free of mercury and that children can and do receive 30 needles containing 14 diseases by the time they are 2). More recommended reading, for those of you who survive the first assignment should include the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting database - pay special attention to "hot lots." Finally, visit the CDC website, again, and read about these "dread" diseases you are so certain will kill our children; pay special attention to statements like the following, "Most people infected with the polio virus have no symptoms." FYI, it is likely that DDT caused the paralysis, not the polio virus.
Now, here's another tidbit to chew on...Does Tylenol work? How do you know? Maybe that headache was going to go away anyhow, so the Tylenol was only coincidental. Or how about Claritin? Maybe your allergies are all in your imagination...Some families (only about 13,400 that I communicate with) see significant change with elimination of gluten and casein (and, gasp, soy, preservatives, and artificial colors/flavors) from their children's diets.
I know it is sacrilige in your book to actually home-make organic meals and treats (yes, my kids eat cake, cookies, muffins, candy, popsicles, "ice cream," chips, pancakes, waffles, toast, and more in addition to three squares - they are not deprived). Most families who follow this road have had at least one incident of "infraction." If the proof is in the pudding, then there is no doubt for them how big an improvement diet can make; the majority of us who suffered one infraction will pretty much stand on our heads to avoid another! So, if you are lucky enough not to carry the Autism albatros, try walking a mile in your "friend's" shoes before you open your mouth to criticize the decisions s/he undoubtedly spent hundreds of hours researching and soul-searching about.
Props to hera, those are the questions that should be answered. Further, despite my having done thousands of hours of research into this subject, I have yet to find a single study that concludes vaccines are 100% safe, and the manufacturers readily admit the vaccines are, at best, 80% effective (and this is only for an indeterminate amount of time, they hope 1 - 8 years). Even worse, some are administered to newborns and infants "off-label," and others administered concommitantly when contra-indicated to be administered in this manner. Most sad is the fact that, thanks to the "success" of the vaccine program (more likely, good handwashing and proper sanitation and sewage) many nursing mothers have never had the diseases (though some develop passive immunity through exposure), so they cannot impart solid immunity to their infants through breastfeeding, putting those infants at risk.
Of course, very few of the rabid pro-vaccine ranters will bother to perform any research that is not bought and paid for. Thus this debate continues its useless cycle and 1 in every 6 children coming into the world will have a developmental disability that could, likely have been prevented. But hey, what's 1 in 6 when disease could possibly have caused similar results for, at worst, 1 in a thousand (who contract the disease, since not all exposed would)...And to that point, how do we know that the few un- or under-vaccinated children who die or are disabled from a disease would have both developed immunity as a result of vaccination and not succumbed to an adverse event because of the vaccine introduction of the very same disease (and the many toxic chemicals that get injected alongside)?!
Autism is indeed linked to vaccination, just in a way that most people haven't thought of yet.
Acetaminophen is often administered to babies before vaccinations, and pediatricians also tell parents to dose as needed for fever and pain in the days following vaccination. Pregnant women are often told that the only "safe" drug to take for pain is acetaminophen.
What's the relevance, you ask?
Acetaminophen is known to deplete glutathione. This is why an overdose will land you in the ER and possibly kill you due to liver failure if it's not caught early enough. In an overdose, glutathione stores are used up, and the liver can no longer process the acetaminophen. Glutathione is a critical antioxidant that is needed to process many toxins that our bodies are exposed to everyday. (This includes mercury) It plays an important role in immune function and is necessary for the structural function and integrity of the intestinal tract. So...when you give acetaminophen to a baby before vaccines, you are disabling that child's detoxification system and depleting glutathione when he needs it the most-to process the contents of the vaccine.
I am the parent of two autistic boys. One fully vaccinated and one not vaccinated at all. There was a time that I was so convinced that thimerosal in vaccines was what was responsible for my older child's autism, that I refused to vaccinate my next son. However, when the younger child started showing signs of autism, I knew that there was something else going on.
The only medications that I took during my pregnancies were the prenatal vitamins and Tylenol for headaches, as well as Tylox (which contains acetaminophen)for pain after my cesarean.
In addition to the autistic symptoms, my younger child had wheezing episodes as a baby and toddler that he outgrew as he got older. Preliminary studies are already beginning to link asthma to prenatal and early childood acetaminophen use, which makes sense when you consider how critical adequate glutathione is to lung function.
Science has yet to conclusively prove that acetaminophen is linked to autism, but look at when autism rates started climbing...it was right after aspirin was linked to Reye's Syndrome. Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, but this parent plays it safe from now on, and keeps acetaminophen far away from her kids.
What is a "too-read list"?
A List to be read as well as the books?
Autism is one of what I believe are a number of what are called passive developmental disorders- and autism is the most common. Autism is a disability caused by a brain development disorder of unknown cause, yet some suspect the cause is some sort of neurological dysfunction. Usually, symptoms of the disease present themselves before the toddler reaches the age of three. Before Autism was more understood, others labeled them as childhood schizophrenia or as having a psychosis or mental retardation.
Out of 16 related characteristics, eight must be present to be considered autistic, according to others. As with all passive developmental disorders, the person expresses language, social, and behavioral difficulties. Treatment includes what are called psychotropic medications that delay the progression of the disorder, as well as relieve some of the symptoms of one who is autistic. Behavioral therapy is common as a treatment regimen as well. Boys get Autism much more than girls.
Then there is the controversy between many who claim that thimerosal- a preservative containing mercury, which is a neurotoxin that was used in vaccines until 2001, was the catalyst for autism in children. Over 5000 lawsuits have been filed because of this belief, and some have been successful for the plaintiff. Yet most agree the correlation between thimersal and autism is void of scientific merit. Furthermore, the cases of autism have not decreased since the preservative was discontinued in 2001.
Aside from Autism, the other four passive developmental disorders are known as autism spectrum disorders.
Aspergerâs Syndrome is more common than autism, and the symptoms are milder, as there is minimal delay in language abilities, if at all. What is expressed with Aspergerâs syndrome is mild autistic symptoms. In time, the patient may express atypical personality disorders, though. While intelligence is within normal limits with the Aspergerâs patient, social interactions and abilities preset difficulty for such a patient. As with Autism, medications and behavioral therapy are treatment regimens with one with this syndrome
Rettâs Syndrome or disorder presents with not only atypical behavior, but also suffers from restricted physical growth and movement. There is cognitive and social impairment as well. The disorder affects mostly girls, and the cause is due to a gene mutation.
Chldhood Disintegrative disorder is rare, and is 10 times less common than autism. The disorder has a late onset with mild autistic symptoms. The disorder affects mostly boys, and regression is sudden and possible with this disorder. Skills lost with this disorder may be language, social, self-care, as well as play or motor skills. Decreased function or impairment with this disorder may include social skills and behavioral flaws. Central Nervous System pathology is a suspected cause of this disorder.
Finally, there are passive development disorders that are not otherwise specified. This may include atypical autism, for example. Yet as with the rest of types of these disorders, the symptoms vary in their intensity, and the range of abilities of these developmental disorders vary widely as well. Medicinal treatment along with cognitive and behavioral therapy prove to be most beneficial for all the different types of Passive Development Disorders that unfortunately exist for unknown reasons,
Dan Abshear