Letter to the Editor re NY Times story

[Guest guest]

Note: This is from another listserv.

-----Original Message-----From: Blaxill Mark Sent: Monday, December 27, 2004 1:52 PMTo: letters@...Cc: blakes@...; egoode@...; public@...; abmd Subject: [abmd] your latest autism story

To the Editor, You continue to cover autism irresponsibly. Your latest piece, by Benedict Carey, is among the most irresponsible to date. In it, he provides a platform for Bryna Siegel to attack the provision of services to autistic children, effectively supporting efforts to curtail services to struggling families, for whom intensive services is their one life line.

Taking yet another shot at parents, he also chooses to attack the gluten/casein free diet that many parents have found effective for their children. Since special diets promise no profit to researchers of pharmaceutical companies, little funding has been forthcoming. But the studies that do exist provide evidence both of abnormal immune responses to these foods (1-3) and clear improvements when children follow the diet (4). Trashing this practice without investigation of any kind is just bad reporting. Yet Mr. Carey seems too lazy to pick up the phone and meet with a parent, or even do a simple Pub Med search.

Your paper continue to glide past this simple, but important story: the rates of autism have exploded (5); the hypothesis that this is just better diagnosis is irresponsible and unsupported; no significant genetic finding has been consistently replicated; so therefore we must declare the autism epidemic a national crisis and seek its environmental cause. Why can you not see how important this is?

Sincerely, Mark F. Blaxill Cambridge MA

1. Jyonouchi H, Sun S, Itokazu N. Innate immunity associated with inflammatory responses and cytokine production against common dietary proteins in patients with autism spectrum disorder. Neuropsychobiology. 2002;46(2):76-84.

2. Lucarelli S, Frediani T, Zingoni AM, Ferruzzi F, Giardini O, Quintieri F, Barbato M, D'Eufemia P, Cardi E. Food allergy and infantile autism. Panminerva Med. 1995;37(3):137-41.

3. Vojdani A, Pangborn JB, Vojdani E, EL. Infections, toxic chemicals and dietary peptides binding to lymphocyte receptors and tissue enzymes are major instigators of autoimmunity in autism. Int J Immunopathol Pharmacol. 2003;16(3):189-99.

4. Knivsberg AM, Reichelt KL, Hoien T, Nodland M. A randomised, controlled study of dietary intervention in autistic syndromes. Nutr Neurosci. 2002;5(4):251-61.

5. Blaxill MF. What's going on? The question of time trends in autism. Public Health Rep. 2004;119(6):536-51.

This e-mail message may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not an addressee or otherwise authorized to receive this message, you should not use, copy, disclose or take any action based on this e-mail or any information contained in the message. If you have received this material in error, please advise the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this message.

Thank you. Autism Biomedical Discussion (abmd) is a group of parents and professionals dedicated to the exploration and pursuit of biomedical research and treatments for children with autism. Any comments made during the course of normal list discussions are for informational purposes only and should never replace medical treatment or diagnosis. No matter how strongly you might disagree with information shared by another list member, it is mandatory that all exchanges on list be carried out with courtesy and respect. Thank you.

[Guest guest]

Hello Mark,

thank you for the post. We have put our child on a casin and glutten free diet and see improvement. However, it is difficult to know whether or not the improvement is the result of the diet or other factors. Our child has was diagnosed with autism (atypical autism) at the age of 4. This diagnosis was given to her at the same time testing revealed seizures. We have been told that the seizures and the autism are probably due to a purine disorder. A diet was implemented that restricted the intake of purines. This was forsaken a few years later. Does any of this sound familiar to you?

Thanks for the studies you cited in your post.

Raingirl 480

[Guest guest]

Hello Mark,

thank you for the post. We have put our child on a casin and glutten free diet and see improvement. However, it is difficult to know whether or not the improvement is the result of the diet or other factors. Our child has was diagnosed with autism (atypical autism) at the age of 4. This diagnosis was given to her at the same time testing revealed seizures. We have been told that the seizures and the autism are probably due to a purine disorder. A diet was implemented that restricted the intake of purines. This was forsaken a few years later. Does any of this sound familiar to you?

Thanks for the studies you cited in your post.

Raingirl 480