Young and mentally ill: bipolar, asperger's, cuts in services

[Guest guest]

Dear Ms. Crist,

Your articles about bipolar and its familial and societal context (1) are

appreciated.

I ask that you obtain, peruse, and contemplate some peer-reviewed articles

published in

journal indexed by the National Library of Medicine. These articles document

that

physician- and nurse-injected thimerosal causes neurologic damage in children. A

CDC study

(Verstraeten et al 2000) had similar findings (original document available at

citation

16).

Since then Verstraeten & colleagues (virtually all of whom receive funds from

pharmaceutical companies, as documented in Congressional testimony) have been

fudging the

data. In fact, Congressman Weldon, M.D., R-Fla, has written an official

letter to

the current CDC director and has asked her to investigate (15 has full text of

letter).

The controversy about injected thimerosal (which is 49.6% ethylmercury by

weight) is

blossoming. If you consult with UCHSC, AMA, or Am Ac Peds representatives, you

are likely

to be told that thimerosal does not injure children. Yet people who have

investigated

deeply (eg, Congressfolks Dan Burton, R-Ind, Weldon, and others) have come away

believing

that the CDC and certain allies have been fudging data and rushing those data

into print

(eg, Verstraeten et al 2003 in " Pediatrics " ). Furthermore, the fact that

peer-reviewed

journals are publishing studies documenting thimerosal's adverse effects (eg,

5, 7-12)

counteracts the CDC's fudge-masters.

On Dec 29, 2003, the Wall Street Journal published an editorial about thimerosal

(4). As

it turns out, the editorial writer had not known about the peer-reviewed,

published

studies documenting thimerosal's adverse neurologic effects in children (eg,

5,8).

Recently, two media have presented fairly accurate summaries of the growing

controversy

about thimerosal (2-3).

Assembled by autism parents, these sites are very informative and had pdf files

of some

published papers & official letters.

http://www.factsformedia.com/

http://www.safeminds.org

You may share this email as you deem appropriate.

Binstock

Researcher in Developmental & Behavioral Neuroanatomy

P.O. Box 1788

Estes Park CO 80517

1. Young and mentally ill

[several articles]

By le Crist, Rocky Mountain News

cristg@... or 303-892-2231

January 3, 2004

http:www.rockymountainnews.com

2. CDC study raises the level of suspicion

http://www.insightmag.com/news/573542.html

3. Missing the Mercury Menace?

by Neil Munro

National Journal January 3, 2004

http://www.nationaljournal.com

[PHOTO 1: The CDC director faces a dispute over mercury in vaccines that is

likely to

heat up soon. PHOTO 2: Dave Weldon: A physician, he wants CDC data on mercury

and

autism to be shared with outside researchers.]

Parents of autistic children are vigorously challenging a new study by the

Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention. The study concludes there is no consistent

evidence that

a mercury-based preservative in CDC-mandated vaccines has caused an increase in

the

number of children with autism.

A CDC official who helped write the study accepted the critics' charge that it

contained

many children too young to be diagnosed as autistic. " This is true, " said

scientist

DeStefano.

The CDC's manipulation of the study data, say the parents, hides the true autism

rate and

obscures the link between autism and vaccinations. The parents and some

scientists argue

that the large increase in autism rates over the past decade was likely caused

by some

children's genetic vulnerability to mercury in additional vaccines that the CDC

mandated

after 1990. The mercury is in a preservative called thimerosal.

After 1999, vaccine makers ended the use of mercury in routine childhood

vaccinations,

following a request from government officials -- although the officials never

stated that

the

mercury was harmful. But the mercury dispute is likely to heat up soon because

CDC

director Gerberding and Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy

are weighing a proposal by a panel of vaccine experts to give children between

the ages of

6 months and 23 months as many as five flu shots. Gerberding and can

recommend that the flu shots be mercury-free, or they can allow many additional

children

to receive mercury-laden shots.

The CDC would not say whether Gerberding will urge that thimerosal be left out

of the

2004 flu vaccines. According to Rep. Dave Weldon, R-Fla., Gerberding has said

she is

considering whether to appoint an outside ombudsperson to investigate the

possible link

between autism and mercury. Weldon, a physician, wants the data used in the new

study

to be shared with outside researchers.

This seemingly arcane fight has enormous stakes. If the parents are right, then

many

infants overseas are endangered by vaccines that contain mercury. Moreover,

American

parents could follow the example of parents in the U.K., where public distrust

of the

government's vaccination professionals has reduced vaccination rates and spurred

harmful

outbreaks of measles and other diseases. Several pharmaceutical companies could

be

forced to pay billions of dollars if parents' groups are victorious in

anti-thimerosal

lawsuits

in which the CDC study and other reports are being used as ammunition. This

fight has

already reached Congress: In early 2003, Democratic senators defeated a

Republican

effort to win legal protections for the companies that made

thimerosal-containing

vaccines.

The CDC's report, published in the November issue of Pediatrics, summarized a

three-year study of brain-related diseases in children. The study, titled

" Safety of

Thimerosal-Containing Vaccines: A Two-Phased Study of Computerized Health

Maintenance Organization Databases, " began in 1999. It was conducted by a panel

of four

CDC vaccine experts and four employees of the two HMOs that provided data on

more

than 100,000 children. The study examined the incidence of a wide variety of

medical

problems and concluded that no consistent connection existed between the

mercury-containing vaccines and the diagnosed neurological problems in children

born

between January 1992 and December 1998. Overall, " the risk [of autism] does not

change... from the lowest level of exposure [to thimerosal] to the highest

level, "

DeStefano said.

But to reach this conclusion, CDC experts reduced by roughly 45 percent the

number of

children in the study who were age 4 or older, said Mark Blaxill, a member of

Safe Minds,

an Atlanta group that opposes the use of mercury in vaccines. Because autism is

normally

diagnosed only after age 4, the CDC's method greatly reduced the number of

children in

the study who could be found with autism, Blaxill said.

According to the report, the older children were excluded because their health

records

were incomplete. DeStefano declined to say why the CDC did not exclude a

comparable

proportion of the younger children, to balance out the age groups in the study.

" We could

follow up on it " by launching another study, he said.

The CDC's exclusion of the older children is akin to excluding many older people

from a

study on the hazards of smoking, said Mark Geier, a geneticist and a vaccine

specialist

for

25 years. Geier has investigated the mercury issue for Weldon and gives

expert-witness

testimony on behalf of parents and some companies in vaccine-related lawsuits.

Blaxill said the CDC's professionals also disguised the incidence of autism by

treating

early symptoms of autism as other illnesses. For example, many autistic children

are

initially classified before age 4 as having speech and language delays or

" misery

disorder. "

The inclusion of many children too young to be definitely diagnosed with autism

would

result in autistic children's being mislabeled with other ailments, such as

those very

speech

or language delays, Blaxill said. " It is true, " DeStefano said, that the study

could have

mislabeled young autistic children. But, he added, " this study just provided an

initial

evaluation. " CDC officials are now preparing a follow-up study of 300 autistic

children

and 900 other children, for publication in 2006, he said.

The new study's database was divided by gender for some analyses, but the

results were

combined in tables for the final article in Pediatrics. Because as many as 90

percent of

autistics are boys, these tables hide links between autistic boys and mercury

amid a

population of relatively healthy girls, Geier said. He says that such an

approach is like

using men's low rates of breast cancer to downplay the cancer's rate in women. A

CDC

statement said the analysis of boys and girls " mirrored the results " in the

Pediatrics

article.

CDC officials also divided the study into many small studies and then

highlighted the

differences in the sub-study results to dismiss a link between autism and

mercury, Blaxill

said. For example, he said, the data from the larger of the two HMOs show a link

between

mercury and autism, but CDC professionals tried to discredit the link by citing

differences

in the second HMO's data set, which was only one-eighth as large as the first

one's

sample. The CDC should have either set aside the data from the smaller HMO, or

combined all the HMO data, Blaxill said.

" If we had done that, " DeStefano countered, " the results from [the larger] HMO-B

would

have overwhelmed [the smaller] HMO-A. " Instead, the scientists tried to perform

the

same analysis on both HMO data sets, in hopes of discovering a matching trend,

he said.

Blaxill cited data prepared by the CDC authors in 2000 and released under a

Freedom of

Information Act request lodged by Safe Minds. The figures showed that the rate

of

" neurodevelopmental disorder " -- a catchall term that encompasses autism -- was

six times

as great among 14,739 children given more than 75 micrograms of mercury by the

third

month of life as it was among 4,510 children who were given no mercury.

With Weldon's backing, Geier won limited access to the CDC database used in the

new

study and then looked at those children who got diphtheria, tetanus, and

pertussis shots

both with and without mercury. This analysis showed " more than a twentyfold

increase in

autism " among the children who got mercury in four of these shots, Geier said.

Statements in government e-mails, in conversations, and in documents obtained

under

Safe Minds' FOIA request have intensified the parents' suspicion of DeStefano

and the

CDC. In a July 2000 meeting of the study's authors and advisers,

ston, a

pediatrics professor at the University of Colorado, said, " I do not want [my]

grandson to

get a thimerosal-containing vaccine until we know better what is going on. "

ston

confirmed he said this, but would not comment on the CDC study, because he has

joined a

pending review of the controversy at the Institute of Medicine. The institute is

part of

the

private National Academy of Sciences.

The chairman of the CDC study, Verstraeten, has come under critics'

scrutiny

because he left the CDC to take a job with vaccine maker GlaxoKline. Yet

according

to e-mails and transcripts obtained by Safe Minds, in 2000 Verstraeten urged

fellow CDC

officials to carefully consider a link between mercury and autism: " I do not

wish to...

sound like being convinced that thimerosal is or was harmful, but at least I

feel we

should

use sound scientific argumentation and not let our standards be dictated by our

desire to

disprove an unpleasant theory. " Once Verstraeten had joined GlaxoKline,

" his

involvement in this study was limited to reviewing drafts of the manuscript, "

according to

a CDC statement.

Since 1990, an increasing number of children have been diagnosed with the most

acute

form of autism. In the 1980s, this diagnosis was given annually to roughly 1 in

10,000

children. But since then, experts have reported a huge increase. In five

counties

surrounding Atlanta, the rate has grown to roughly 1 in 375 children, according

to a CDC

study. According to the Education Department, 65,396 autistic children were in

federal

school programs in 2000, up from 12,222 in 1993. The 2000 total included few

children

under age 6.

Few adult autistics can work. Lifetime health care, therapy, and support costs

amount to

more than $1 million. Parents initially bear the financial burden, but as the

children

become

adults, the costs shift to the states or the federal government.

Some parents of autistic children say vaccinations gave their children more than

100 times

the maximum intake of mercury recommended by the Environmental Protection

Agency.

One of those parents is Lyn Redwood, a founder of Safe Minds. She is a nurse and

the

mother of a 9-year-old autistic boy, Will. " I have `before (vaccination)'

pictures where

he

is smiling, gorgeous, and looking at the camera, and I have `after' pictures...

and

there's a

shell of a child left, " she said.

###

4. The Politics of Autism: Lawsuits and emotion vs. science and childhood

vaccines

WSJ Letters <wsj.ltrs@...>

Monday, December 29, 2003 12:01 a.m.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110004487

5: An assessment of the impact of thimerosal on childhood neurodevelopmental

disorders.

Geier DA, Geier MR.

Pediatr Rehabil. 2003 Apr-Jun;6(2):97-102.

6: Reduced levels of mercury in first baby haircuts of autistic children.

Holmes AS, Blaxill MF, Haley BE.

Int J Toxicol. 2003 Jul-Aug;22(4):277-85.

7: A review of hepatitis B vaccination.

Geier MR, Geier DA, Zahalsky AC.

Expert Opin Drug Saf. 2003 Mar;2(2):113-22.

8: Neurodevelopmental disorders after thimerosal-containing vaccines: a brief

communication.

Geier MR, Geier DA.

Exp Biol Med (Maywood). 2003 Jun;228(6):660-4.

9: Mercury in infants given vaccines containing thiomersal.

Westphal G, Hallier E.

Lancet. 2003 Feb 22;361(9358):699; author reply 699. No abstract available.

10: Thimerosal induces micronuclei in the cytochalasin B block micronucleus test

with

human lymphocytes.

Westphal GA et al.

Arch Toxicol. 2003 Jan;77(1):50-5. Epub 2002 Nov 06.

11: Inhibition of the human erythrocytic glutathione-S-transferase T1 (GST T1)

by

thimerosal.

Muller M et al.

Int J Hyg Environ Health. 2001 Jul;203(5-6):479-81.

12: Homozygous gene deletions of the glutathione S-transferases M1 and T1 are

associated with thimerosal sensitization.

Westphal GA et al.

Int Arch Occup Environ Health. 2000 Aug;73(6):384-8.

13: Thimerosal induces DNA breaks, caspase-3 activation, membrane damage,

and cell death in cultured human neurons and fibroblasts.

Baskin DS, Ngo H, Didenko VV.

Toxicol Sci. 2003 Aug;74(2):361-8.

14: Mercury Burden In Autistic Children,

Bradstreet et al (JAPS 2003), available at:

http://www.safeminds.org/Bradstreet1.pdf

15: Here is Congressman Weldon's letter to CDC director:

http://momsonamissionforautism.org/Autism_Central/Dr_Weldon_Responds.shtml

16: Obtained via FOIA, here's the original CDC paper (2000) that confirmed the

link

between infant thimerosal-injections and various neurologic problems (including

autism) in

children.

http://www.factsformedia.com/factsformedia/index.map?107,624

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