A-CHAMP Action Alert - NY Times needs to hear from you!

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From the Action Center

A-CHAMP

Action Alert

June 26, 2005

A-CHAMP calls NY Times Mercury/Autism Article

Intellectually Dishonest, Attacking Parents of Neurologically Injured Children

Times writers assist suppression of critical thimerosal safety information

New York, NY - Advocates for Children's

Health Affected by Mercury Poisoning (A-CHAMP), the nation's only political

action organization working to advance the interests of children injured by

mercury in vaccines, calls the New York Times June 25 article “On

Autism's Cause, It's Parents vs. Research,” irresponsible,

inaccurate, and inflammatory journalism. According to A-CHAMP board member

Bobbie Manning, “The Times has launched a vicious attack on the autism

community in a transparent attempt to influence public

perception about the growing body of scientific evidence linking mercury-containing

vaccines and neurodevelopmental disorders that now affect one in six American

children.”

Despite communicating for over ten months with an A-CHAMP spokesperson,

receiving hundreds of transcripts, internal communications, and documents

showing government and industry collusion in withholding negative safety

information on the mercury-based vaccine preservative thimerosal, “The

Times has written a factually inaccurate and intellectually dishonest article,

demonstrating a consistent pattern of support for pharmaceutical industry spin

in covering the autism/vaccine debate,” states Manning.

Throughout the past ten months, Times reporters and O'Connor repeatedly

surrendered the opportunity to inform the public of the suppression of safety

information about mercury-containing vaccines, despite the evidence provided

them. When offered documents showing that vaccine manufacturer

Merck was deceptive in a 1999 press release indicating that mercury was to

be immediately removed from the Hepatitis B vaccine while many doses contained

the neurotoxin well into 2002, suggested the story be given to another

major newspaper. The Merck story was later reported in the Los Angeles Times.

A-CHAMP members are aware that many parents, organizations, doctors and researchers

provided information that was also ignored. Instead, the NY Times decided to

cherry-pick parent correspondence and isolated incidents in an unfair

sensationalistic effort to paint parents in a negative light.

" It’s a sad day for journalism when the National Enquirer writes a

more honest, intelligent, and accurate story on this issue than the New

York Times " , said A-CHAMP’s Bobbie Manning. " I would say it was

poorly researched, but that doesn’t go far enough. This was a vicious

hatchet job, designed solely to discredit the overwhelming evidence that nearly

an entire generation of children was overexposed to mercury through vaccines,

and that countless children now suffer from disabilities directly attributable

to that exposure.”

Instead of reporting on documents incriminating to both the pharmaceutical

industry and some within federal regulatory agencies, the Times chose to

highlight a handful of communications from distraught, heartbroken parents,

ignoring the thousands of requests for open and honest examination of the issue

that have yet to be acted upon by government officials. A-CHAMP

board member Lujene observes “These reporters threw away the

evidence handed to them on a silver platter and instead engaged in a smear

campaign against parents trying to help their children recover

from mercury poisoning. Refusing to disclose the smoking gun

documents we know to be in their possession calls into question the motives and

agenda of the New York Times and its editors.”

A-CHAMP requests that you please take a moment to contact the

leadership of The New York Times express your displeasure at their biased

reported by visiting A-CHAMP's

Take Action Page. One click will allow you to

send an e-mail to the following:

Byron Calame, Public Editor

Jill Abramson, Managing Editor - Newsgathering

Gail , Editorial Page Editor

Rich, Associate Editor

A copy

of your letter will be sent to Arthur

Sulzberger, Chairman and Publisher of The New York Times.

Thanks,

The A-CHAMP Team

www.a-champ.org

Please

take a moment to send a message to The New York Times: Click

here to let your voice be heard!

For more information, go to www.a-champ.org

.. To view studies and documents on the thimerosal/autism link, visit www.nomercury.org/science.htm