Re: Vaccines and Autism - my Response to the WSJ

October 28, 2007

hmmm, i seem to remember a pediatrician sitting on the front row of the infamous

oprah show - i believe she was of middle eastern decent - who had children and

did not believe there was a link between vaccinations and autism.

Hill wrote:

Dear Editors of the WSJ,

This letter is in response to " Vaccines and Autism " By ARI BROWN

October 27, 2007.

Anyone who doesn't have to wrestle with the question of what caused

their child's autism can take solace in the panacea of what they

believe is the complete safety and effectiveness of vaccines.

Dr. Brown opines from her own double-sided paradigm: 1) Her kids

were fortunate enough to dodge the bullet of adverse effects from

vaccines and 2) she encountered a single patient with chicken pox

who then contracted a raging strep infection and died. While this is

undeniably tragic, I would hope that if this child had died as a

result of a vaccine, as some do, this doctor would be equally as

vocal about their potential dangers. However, too many pediatricians

dismiss those children as sacrificial lambs for the sake of the

greater good - unfortunate expenditures - and the experiences of

these children do not result in the sweeping condemnation of all

vaccines by the AAP. Similarly, a child with a very unusual case of

an infectious complication unrelated to a childhood disease most of

us of contracted and survived without so much as a scar, should not

serve as a universal example of why the vaccine program is essential

and safe for all children.

No matter how well-intentioned, Dr. Brown cannot possibly feel the

true desperation of parents directly affected by this disease. This

is evident in that she expects them to ignore any theoretical causes

until the research comes and we have the answers we need. This

generation of children needs answers now, and diligent parents have

no choice but to play researcher, scientist and, yes, sometimes even

physician, until the science is there and they are given the support

and attention they deserve from the medical community.

Dr. Brown needs to acknowledge that, in addition to needing help

navigating the maze of treatments and the research that is lacking,

as long as they do NOT have these answers parents are, indeed, left

searching for these answers on their own due to the very limited

window of opportunity for effective interventions for autism. So

let's not demonize moms like McCarthy who in due diligence and

good faith are sharing their experiences to benefit a generation of

children who, at present, have nothing else to go on and not a

second to lose.

Her attempt to discredit Ms. McCarthy is weak. While Ms. McCarthy

may have noticed that her son, Evan, didn't smile as early as other

children, this could have been an indication of susceptibility to

and compromise from the many vaccines he had already received by

this age. The MMR may have simply been the triple-whammy assault

that sent him into his rapid regression and seizure state. Her

confusion of Hep A, B, and C is easily enough explained - what

parent can keep them straight? As far as mercury in vaccines, does

Dr. Brown know that Evan never received a thimerosal-laden flu shot?

That his vaccines were 100% mercury free in 2002? Since the FDA

never required a recall of thimerosal containing vaccines despite

their known neurotoxicity, and vaccine lots were permitted to be

used up as long as it took, it is highly possible that Evan did

receive mercury in injectable form. In her entire book, with these

as the only points of contention cited by Dr. Brown, I hardly find

Ms. McCarthy's account uncredible. Instead, I find Dr. Brown's

failure to disclose her status as spokesperson for the American

Academy of Pediatrics indicative of potential bias and questionable

motive.

As soon as I hear from a pediatrician who has a child with autism

and fully supports the U.S. vaccine schedule as published, I will

sit up and take notice. Until then, moms like McCarthy have my ear.

Hill

Plano, Texas

>

> --- An article from Wall Street Journal!--------------

>

> Vaccines and Autism

>

> By ARI BROWN

> October 27, 2007; Page A8

>

> Dangerous vaccines that harm kids. An epidemic of disabled

children,

> hurt by

> an uncaring medical establishment.

> Sounds like a B-grade Hollywood thriller. But this is supposedly a

> true

> story as told by actress McCarthy, author of the best

> seller, " Louder

> Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism. "

> When I heard Ms. McCarthy tell Oprah and Larry King that vaccines

> caused her

> son's autism, I had a flashback to a cold winter's night, 13 years

> ago. I

> was the senior pediatric resident on call in the Intensive Care

Unit.

> Cradled in the arms of her parents, a seven-year-old girl was

> brought to the

> emergency room at Children's Hospital Boston. The girl had come

down

> with

> chickenpox a few days earlier -- she had a fever and hundreds of

> itchy skin

> lesions. That night, she had taken a turn for the worse. Her fever

> shot up

> to 106 and she became confused and lethargic. She was unresponsive

> and limp

> in her mother's arms.

> The ER doctors suspected that her open sores allowed Strep

bacteria

> to get

> under her skin and rage through her bloodstream. Now she was

> in " multiple

> system organ failure " -- every square inch of her body was

shutting

> down all

> at once. IVs were placed into her veins to start fluids,

antibiotics

> and

> medications to stabilize her heart and blood pressure. She was

> placed on a

> ventilator machine to breathe. Then she was brought to the

Intensive

> Care

> Unit.

> By the time I met my patient, she had tubes coming out of every

> opening and

> weeping skin lesions all over her body. I was used to blood and

> gore, but it

> was hard to look at her and not cry. Imagine how her parents felt

> when they

> saw their once-beautiful little girl in this grotesque state,

> struggling to

> survive.

> My attending physician told me to grab dinner. This child would

need

> me for

> the rest of the night. I returned to the ICU to find that my

patient

> had

> gone into cardiac arrest and died. I watched, helplessly, as the

> nurses

> placed the little girl into a body bag.

> Fast forward five months: The first chickenpox vaccine was

approved.

> That

> day, I vowed never to let a child on my watch suffer from a

disease

> that was

> preventable by vaccination.

> That's a story that doesn't grab headlines or guest shots on Larry

> King.

> Vaccines are one of mankind's greatest scientific achievements.

This

> year

> alone, they prevented 14 million infections, $40 billion in

medical

> costs,

> and most important, 33,000 deaths. Yet vaccines are victims of

their

> own

> success. Today's parents are unfamiliar with the diseases they

> prevent, but

> these diseases are alive and well in the U.S. -- I have personally

> seen

> children suffer from them.

> Call it the New McCarthyism: Who cares about 100 years of

scientific

> research? Vaccines are evil, because the Internet says they are.

> When a

> well-meaning parent like Ms. McCarthy blames vaccines for her

child's

> autism, it's dangerous. Celebrity books come and go, but the

anxiety

> they

> create lives on in pediatricians' offices across the country. A

> small but

> growing number of parents are even lying about their religious

> beliefs to

> avoid having their children vaccinated, thanks in part to the

media

> hysteria

> created by this book.

> Parents go through stages of grief when their child is diagnosed

> with a

> disorder like autism. We all want to blame someone for our

> suffering. That's

> understandable. Was there something we could have done as parents

to

> prevent

> this? But why hasn't the media called out Ms. McCarthy on all the

> medical

> inaccuracies in her book? Has anyone actually read it? I have --

> cover to

> cover. Here are two revealing points:

> Ms. McCarthy told Oprah that her son was a normal toddler until he

> received

> his Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine (at 15 months of age). Soon

> after --

> boom -- the soul is gone from his eyes. Yet she contradicts

herself

> in her

> book: " My friends' babies all cracked a smile way before Evan

> did . . . he

> was almost five months old. " Which is it? Was he normal until his

MMR

> vaccine or were some of the signs missed before he got that shot?

> Ms. McCarthy also contends that mercury in vaccines caused damage

to

> her

> son's gut and immune system, leading to autism. Yet the mercury

> preservative

> Ms. McCarthy assails was removed from the childhood vaccination

> series in

> 2001. Her son, Evan, was born in 2002. It's hard to trust Ms.

> McCarthy's

> medical degree from the University of Google -- she comments about

> the

> Hepatitis C vaccine that wreaked havoc on a friend's child. An

> inconvenient

> truth: There is no Hepatitis C vaccine.

> Doctors do need to do a better job of guiding families through the

> maze of

> autism treatments. I also desperately want to know why autism

> happens and

> how to treat it. But let's put our energy into funding autism

> research and

> treatment, not demonizing our vaccination program.

> Ms. McCarthy is in the trenches, fighting for her son. I, too, am

> fighting.

> I am on the front lines everyday, trying to keep our kids healthy

and

> protected. And, after all I have seen, one thing is certain -- I've

> vaccinated my own kids and would do it again in a heartbeat.

> Dr. Brown, a pediatrician in Austin, Texas, is a fellow of the

> American

> Academy of Pediatrics.

>

October 28, 2007

Did she have children with Autism?

>

> hmmm, i seem to remember a pediatrician sitting on the front row of the

> infamous oprah show - i believe she was of middle eastern decent - who had

> children and did not believe there was a link between vaccinations and

> autism.

>

> Hill <emilyrhill@... <emilyrhill%40hotmail.com>> wrote:

> Dear Editors of the WSJ,

>

> This letter is in response to " Vaccines and Autism " By ARI BROWN

> October 27, 2007.

>

> Anyone who doesn't have to wrestle with the question of what caused

> their child's autism can take solace in the panacea of what they

> believe is the complete safety and effectiveness of vaccines.

>

> Dr. Brown opines from her own double-sided paradigm: 1) Her kids

> were fortunate enough to dodge the bullet of adverse effects from

> vaccines and 2) she encountered a single patient with chicken pox

> who then contracted a raging strep infection and died. While this is

> undeniably tragic, I would hope that if this child had died as a

> result of a vaccine, as some do, this doctor would be equally as

> vocal about their potential dangers. However, too many pediatricians

> dismiss those children as sacrificial lambs for the sake of the

> greater good - unfortunate expenditures - and the experiences of

> these children do not result in the sweeping condemnation of all

> vaccines by the AAP. Similarly, a child with a very unusual case of

> an infectious complication unrelated to a childhood disease most of

> us of contracted and survived without so much as a scar, should not

> serve as a universal example of why the vaccine program is essential

> and safe for all children.

>

> No matter how well-intentioned, Dr. Brown cannot possibly feel the

> true desperation of parents directly affected by this disease. This

> is evident in that she expects them to ignore any theoretical causes

> until the research comes and we have the answers we need. This

> generation of children needs answers now, and diligent parents have

> no choice but to play researcher, scientist and, yes, sometimes even

> physician, until the science is there and they are given the support

> and attention they deserve from the medical community.

>

> Dr. Brown needs to acknowledge that, in addition to needing help

> navigating the maze of treatments and the research that is lacking,

> as long as they do NOT have these answers parents are, indeed, left

> searching for these answers on their own due to the very limited

> window of opportunity for effective interventions for autism. So

> let's not demonize moms like McCarthy who in due diligence and

> good faith are sharing their experiences to benefit a generation of

> children who, at present, have nothing else to go on and not a

> second to lose.

>

> Her attempt to discredit Ms. McCarthy is weak. While Ms. McCarthy

> may have noticed that her son, Evan, didn't smile as early as other

> children, this could have been an indication of susceptibility to

> and compromise from the many vaccines he had already received by

> this age. The MMR may have simply been the triple-whammy assault

> that sent him into his rapid regression and seizure state. Her

> confusion of Hep A, B, and C is easily enough explained - what

> parent can keep them straight? As far as mercury in vaccines, does

> Dr. Brown know that Evan never received a thimerosal-laden flu shot?

> That his vaccines were 100% mercury free in 2002? Since the FDA

> never required a recall of thimerosal containing vaccines despite

> their known neurotoxicity, and vaccine lots were permitted to be

> used up as long as it took, it is highly possible that Evan did

> receive mercury in injectable form. In her entire book, with these

> as the only points of contention cited by Dr. Brown, I hardly find

> Ms. McCarthy's account uncredible. Instead, I find Dr. Brown's

> failure to disclose her status as spokesperson for the American

> Academy of Pediatrics indicative of potential bias and questionable

> motive.

>

> As soon as I hear from a pediatrician who has a child with autism

> and fully supports the U.S. vaccine schedule as published, I will

> sit up and take notice. Until then, moms like McCarthy have my ear.

>

> Hill

> Plano, Texas

>

> >

> > --- An article from Wall Street Journal!--------------

> >

> > Vaccines and Autism

> >

> > By ARI BROWN

> > October 27, 2007; Page A8

> >

> > Dangerous vaccines that harm kids. An epidemic of disabled

> children,

> > hurt by

> > an uncaring medical establishment.

> > Sounds like a B-grade Hollywood thriller. But this is supposedly a

> > true

> > story as told by actress McCarthy, author of the best

> > seller, " Louder

> > Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism. "

> > When I heard Ms. McCarthy tell Oprah and Larry King that vaccines

> > caused her

> > son's autism, I had a flashback to a cold winter's night, 13 years

> > ago. I

> > was the senior pediatric resident on call in the Intensive Care

> Unit.

> > Cradled in the arms of her parents, a seven-year-old girl was

> > brought to the

> > emergency room at Children's Hospital Boston. The girl had come

> down

> > with

> > chickenpox a few days earlier -- she had a fever and hundreds of

> > itchy skin

> > lesions. That night, she had taken a turn for the worse. Her fever

> > shot up

> > to 106 and she became confused and lethargic. She was unresponsive

> > and limp

> > in her mother's arms.

> > The ER doctors suspected that her open sores allowed Strep

> bacteria

> > to get

> > under her skin and rage through her bloodstream. Now she was

> > in " multiple

> > system organ failure " -- every square inch of her body was

> shutting

> > down all

> > at once. IVs were placed into her veins to start fluids,

> antibiotics

> > and

> > medications to stabilize her heart and blood pressure. She was

> > placed on a

> > ventilator machine to breathe. Then she was brought to the

> Intensive

> > Care

> > Unit.

> > By the time I met my patient, she had tubes coming out of every

> > opening and

> > weeping skin lesions all over her body. I was used to blood and

> > gore, but it

> > was hard to look at her and not cry. Imagine how her parents felt

> > when they

> > saw their once-beautiful little girl in this grotesque state,

> > struggling to

> > survive.

> > My attending physician told me to grab dinner. This child would

> need

> > me for

> > the rest of the night. I returned to the ICU to find that my

> patient

> > had

> > gone into cardiac arrest and died. I watched, helplessly, as the

> > nurses

> > placed the little girl into a body bag.

> > Fast forward five months: The first chickenpox vaccine was

> approved.

> > That

> > day, I vowed never to let a child on my watch suffer from a

> disease

> > that was

> > preventable by vaccination.

> > That's a story that doesn't grab headlines or guest shots on Larry

> > King.

> > Vaccines are one of mankind's greatest scientific achievements.

> This

> > year

> > alone, they prevented 14 million infections, $40 billion in

> medical

> > costs,

> > and most important, 33,000 deaths. Yet vaccines are victims of

> their

> > own

> > success. Today's parents are unfamiliar with the diseases they

> > prevent, but

> > these diseases are alive and well in the U.S. -- I have personally

> > seen

> > children suffer from them.

> > Call it the New McCarthyism: Who cares about 100 years of

> scientific

> > research? Vaccines are evil, because the Internet says they are.

> > When a

> > well-meaning parent like Ms. McCarthy blames vaccines for her

> child's

> > autism, it's dangerous. Celebrity books come and go, but the

> anxiety

> > they

> > create lives on in pediatricians' offices across the country. A

> > small but

> > growing number of parents are even lying about their religious

> > beliefs to

> > avoid having their children vaccinated, thanks in part to the

> media

> > hysteria

> > created by this book.

> > Parents go through stages of grief when their child is diagnosed

> > with a

> > disorder like autism. We all want to blame someone for our

> > suffering. That's

> > understandable. Was there something we could have done as parents

> to

> > prevent

> > this? But why hasn't the media called out Ms. McCarthy on all the

> > medical

> > inaccuracies in her book? Has anyone actually read it? I have --

> > cover to

> > cover. Here are two revealing points:

> > Ms. McCarthy told Oprah that her son was a normal toddler until he

> > received

> > his Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine (at 15 months of age). Soon

> > after --

> > boom -- the soul is gone from his eyes. Yet she contradicts

> herself

> > in her

> > book: " My friends' babies all cracked a smile way before Evan

> > did . . . he

> > was almost five months old. " Which is it? Was he normal until his

> MMR

> > vaccine or were some of the signs missed before he got that shot?

> > Ms. McCarthy also contends that mercury in vaccines caused damage

> to

> > her

> > son's gut and immune system, leading to autism. Yet the mercury

> > preservative

> > Ms. McCarthy assails was removed from the childhood vaccination

> > series in

> > 2001. Her son, Evan, was born in 2002. It's hard to trust Ms.

> > McCarthy's

> > medical degree from the University of Google -- she comments about

> > the

> > Hepatitis C vaccine that wreaked havoc on a friend's child. An

> > inconvenient

> > truth: There is no Hepatitis C vaccine.

> > Doctors do need to do a better job of guiding families through the

> > maze of

> > autism treatments. I also desperately want to know why autism

> > happens and

> > how to treat it. But let's put our energy into funding autism

> > research and

> > treatment, not demonizing our vaccination program.

> > Ms. McCarthy is in the trenches, fighting for her son. I, too, am

> > fighting.

> > I am on the front lines everyday, trying to keep our kids healthy

> and

> > protected. And, after all I have seen, one thing is certain -- I've

> > vaccinated my own kids and would do it again in a heartbeat.

> > Dr. Brown, a pediatrician in Austin, Texas, is a fellow of the

> > American

> > Academy of Pediatrics.

> >

>

October 28, 2007

BRAVO !!!!!!!!!!!

Vaccines and Autism - my Response to the WSJ