Re: MUST READ!! IOM Report, Mouse Study Continue Debate on Vaccine-Autism Link

[Guest guest]

,

Read my report. I posted this several weeks ago. Just confirms stupidity

of the FDA, drug manufacturers, Pediatricians, etc.

Interesting for everyone to read. Thimersol, the mercury containing

preservative was recommended for removal from cosmetics in 1980-81.

Cosmetics are not regulated by the government, however, cosmetic companies

follow the recommendations by an advisory group called the CTFA (Cosmetic

Fragrance & Toiletry Association) in Washington DC. The CTFA thought

Thimersol was too toxic to use in cosmetics back in the early 80's. The FDA

which regulates drugs/vaccines only thought about it potential harm until

the year 2000. How can a cosmetic regulatory agency protect us better than

the FDA. Incompetant government--right answer.

The common layman knows about heavy metal toxicity (lead, mercury, etc), so

why does not the agency to protect us (FDA) take so long. High school

chemistry class teaches you about dangers of heavy metals. So cosmetic

chemists knew about the dangers of this preservative 20+ years ago, and

removed it from products that we use to clean and decorate our bodies. Of

course, no cosmetics are ingested.

What Thimersol does is act as an antimicrobial in the body as it does in the

vaccine, meaning it kills bacteria. We have good bacteria and bad bacteria.

Thimersol does not know the difference and kills all bacteria. So what

organism now grows------YEAST. And yeast is an organism that replicates and

excretes toxins in the system. Left unchecked, because our " friend "

Thimersol is killing all the good bacteria, causes problems for the body.

Most people heard about yeast infections.

As your Pediatrician if he/she can explain the action of Thimersol to you.

Or will they say, " I have to agree with the American Pediatric Association

on the inconclusive links to mercury to autism " . Dah!

[ ] MUST READ!! IOM Report, Mouse Study Continue

Debate on Vaccine-Autism Link

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/480683

IOM Report, Mouse Study Continue Debate on Vaccine-Autism Link

Laurie Barclay, MD

June 11, 2004 - Thimerosal, the ethylmercury-based preservative found in

childhood vaccines, can increase the risk of autism-like damage in mice,

according to a report published online June 8 in advance of publication in

Molecular Psychiatry. However, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Immunization

Safety Review Committee released a statement on May 18 that scientific

evidence supports no association with autism for either

thimerosal-containing or measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccines.

Since 2001, all universally recommended childhood vaccines have been

available in single-dose vials without thimerosal, but some influenza

vaccines still contain the preservative. The MMR vaccine has never contained

thimerosal.

The IOM report is the eighth, and said to be the final, report on vaccine

safety. It was intended to alleviate long-standing concerns that mercury in

vaccines could cause autism, and it was based on five large epidemiologic

studies conducted in the U.S., the U.K., Denmark, and Sweden since 2001,

which consistently provided evidence that there is no association between

thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism.

After reviewing results from the mouse model and other studies reporting

links between thimerosal and autism, the panel also concluded that

hypotheses regarding how the MMR vaccine and thimerosal could trigger autism

lack supporting evidence and are theoretical only.

" This type of study, while certainly interesting, in no way substitutes for

actual human evidence, " IOM panelist Goodman, MD, MHS, PhD, an

associate professor of oncology and epidemiology at the s Hopkins School

of Medicine in Baltimore, land, told Medscape. " We don't have an animal

model for autism and we don't understand exactly what causes autism or what

its exact pathophysiology is in humans. So we don't understand it completely

in either system at the moment, and we certainly don't understand to what

extent one is a model for the other. "

Some experts suggest that the 10-fold increase in the number of children

diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders since 1985 cannot be explained

solely by genetic factors, although about one third of children with autism

have increased immune disturbances and a family history of autoimmune

disease. The investigators in the mouse model study hypothesized that immune

response genes linked to mercury immunotoxicity would predict neurotoxicity

after exposure to low-dose thimerosal.

According to lead author Mady Hornig, MD, an associate professor of

epidemiology and director of translational research at the Jerome L. and

Dawn Greene Infectious Disease Laboratory of the Mailman School of Public

Health at Columbia University in New York City, this was the first animal

model providing evidence that postnatal administration of low-dose

ethylmercury can lead to behavioral and neurologic changes in the developing

brain of genetically susceptible mice.

Using the U.S. immunization schedule for children, Dr. Hornig's group

calculated the timing and quantity of thimerosal dosing based on 10th

percentile weight of U.S. boys at age two, four, six, and twelve months, and

they administered the ethylmercury to a strain of mice susceptible to

autoimmune disease.

" The same immune response genes in mice that predict mercury-related

immunotoxicity also predict neurodevelopmental damage in our model and are

associated with the development of features reminiscent of those observed in

autism, " Dr. Hornig told Medscape. " These include generalized impoverishment

of behavioral responses and abnormal reactions to novel environments; brain

enlargement, correlated closely with the observed behavioral abnormalities

in exploration and anxiety; increased cell packing in the hippocampus; and

disturbances in glutamate receptors and transporters. "

The investigators suggest that these findings may allow identification of

autism cases associated with environmental factors, design of treatment

strategies, and development of rational immunization programs.

Immune response genes in humans homologous to those implicated in the mouse

model could be the human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles located in the

major histocompatibility complex (MHC) on chromosome 6, but genes that

modulate susceptibility might also include those coding for the heavy metal

binding protein metallothionein or the detoxifying enzyme

glutathione-S-transferase, or genes involved in DNA methylation and

epigenetic modulation.

" Even without knowledge of a specific gene association, we can consider the

impact of gene prevalence on our statistical capacity to demonstrate effects

of potential toxins in a population, should they exist, " Dr. Hornig said.

" Thus, our animal model findings have important implications for the design

of epidemiologic studies capable of evaluating the role of gene-environment

interactions in the pathogenesis of autism. "

However, the IOM panel already considered findings from the mouse model in

February when they drafted their report, according to panel chair Marie C.

McCormick MD, ScD, the Sumner and Esther Feldberg Professor of Maternal and

Child Health at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston,

Massachusetts.

" Although this model uses thimerosal...it assumes that autism is caused by

an autoimmune reaction, " Dr. McCormick told Medscape. " [The IOM report]

discussed the lack of evidence of autoimmune-mediated [central nervous

system] damage in the brains of autistic patients. "

The IOM panel acknowledged that mercury is a neurotoxin and that autism is a

devastating disorder meriting additional research into its pathophysiology

and treatments. However, they concluded that pursuing the link between the

two is unlikely to be productive, at least until susceptible subgroups can

be defined based on some meaningful biologic hypothesis.

" We didn't say that investigations shouldn't continue in the lab on the

effects of mercury, on the effects of thimerosal, and on the causes and

profiles of autism, " Dr. Goodman said. " Where the committee thought that

research dollars probably shouldn't go, at least for the moment, are these

large-scale epidemiologic studies linking autism and thimerosal exposure. "

But Dr. Hornig countered that the design of published epidemiologic studies

may have been inadequate to appropriately estimate risk. Although MHC and

non-MHC genes, age, sex, nutrition, route and frequency of administration,

and maturity of the metabolic, immune, and nervous systems are known to

affect mercury toxicokinetics, previous studies have not evaluated such

factors.

Despite the profound implications of her research for understanding outcomes

of exposure not only to mercury but to a wide variety of xenobiotics ranging

from toxins to infectious agents, Dr. Hornig is concerned that funding is in

jeopardy, because the IOM conclusions will guide decisions by the National

Institutes of Health (NIH) and by foundations supporting autism research.

" The pronouncement that research funds are better applied elsewhere

effectively forecloses any possibility of federal funding for an entire

field of research, " she said. " The timing is particularly unfortunate given

that we are only just beginning to define the mechanisms by which

environmental factors such as thimerosal interact with immune response genes

during early development. "

According to Dr. McCormick, the IOM committee recommended that " available

funding for autism research be channeled to the most promising areas, of

which the link with vaccines does not appear to be one. " However, they did

recommend continued surveillance of autistic spectrum disorder as exposure

to thimerosal declined.

Parents' advocacy groups such as the National Vaccine Information Center are

distressed by the firm position that the IOM panel has taken on the issue.

Compared with earlier IOM reports in 1991, 1994, and 2001, which concluded

there was insufficient evidence to accept or reject a link between vaccines

and autism, the present report uses stronger language.

Policy implications of the IOM report include not only research priorities,

but immunization policies.

" It was clear from the report that we were not giving thimerosal a clean

bill of health. Mercury is definitely a neurotoxin, " Dr. Goodman said. " We

didn't say that thimerosal is something that we should want in vaccines; we

said that the safest vaccines are indeed thimerosal-free vaccines. We only

said that the evidence favored that there was not a connection between

autism and thimerosal exposure. "

An additional concern regarding mercury exposure from thimerosal is that any

potentially neurotoxic effect could be cumulative with that of other mercury

exposures, such as maternal ingestion of seafood. Dr. Hornig explained that

ethylmercury, the form of mercury in thimerosal, is more rapidly converted

to inorganic mercury than methylmercury, the form found in contaminated

fish. Oral administration of thimerosal to adult, genetically sensitive mice

results in a severe autoimmune syndrome similar to that of inorganic

mercury. Such autoimmune reactions are less potent with methylmercury in

mercury-equivalent doses.

" The issue about minimizing exposure to thimerosal on top of the other

mercury exposures I think is a legitimate one, " Dr. Goodman said. " We live

in a world where there is exposure to mercury from multiple sources, and

some of it may be unavoidable. To the extent that there is mercury in the

air, we can't stop breathing. To the extent that there is mercury in certain

foods, obviously we can avoid fish, but anything else we may not know

about. "

Although a comparison of mercury exposure from thimerosal-based vaccines

with that from other environmental sources was outside the scope of the IOM

report, the panel recommended increased efforts to quantify the level of

prenatal and postnatal exposure to thimerosal and other forms of mercury in

infants, children, and pregnant women.

" Thimerosal was removed from vaccines as a precautionary measure to reduce

the exposure to mercury from all sources. There is no evidence that the

amount of mercury present in vaccines resulted in health problems, " Dr.

McCormick said. " Clearly, thimerosal-free vaccines would be preferred on

this cautionary principle. Equally clearly, thimerosal-containing vaccines

would be preferred to no vaccination; the hypothetical risk posed by

exposure to thimerosal is far outweighed by the very real risk of the

preventable diseases, which I might add are only one plane ride away. "

Cost is the major advantage of thimerosal-containing vaccine because the

preservative prevents contamination and allows packaging in multiple-dose

vials, whereas thimerosal-free vaccine has to be put in single-dose vials

and costs approximately $4 more per dose. But the IOM panel was not assigned

the task of cost-benefit analysis or its application to immunization policy.

" I don't think anybody, presented with the choice of thimerosal-free vaccine

versus thimerosal-containing vaccine that was equally effective, that

anybody would say that the thimerosal-containing vaccine was the preferable

one. " Dr. Goodman said. " The committee continued to recommend that

thimerosal-free vaccines should be created where possible and that exposure

to this preservative be minimized, with recognition that there are special

circumstances where the risks and benefits related to inclusion or exclusion

might lead certain countries or policy-makers to accept its inclusion. "

Dr. Hornig urged consideration of autism-related disability in any

cost-benefit analysis, and points out that expense, timely production, and

distribution of thimerosal-free vaccines are tractable issues.

" It is our privilege as an advanced society to not only have the means to

prevent death from and spread of infectious diseases, but to also have the

opportunity to carefully consider whether vaccines and other infection

control methods may be associated with any risks for a portion of the

population, including neurodevelopmental damage, and, if so, how to define

and manage these risks, " Dr. Hornig said. " To maintain public confidence in

immunization programs, we must provide sound assurance through solid science

that such confidence is warranted. "

The 2004 IOM report does not recommend a policy review of the current

schedule and recommendations for the administration of routine childhood

vaccines, but it does recommend that cost-benefit assessments regarding the

use of thimerosal in vaccines, whether in the U.S. or elsewhere, should not

include autism as a potential risk.

The Office of Special Counsel (OSC) is concerned that the IOM report will

provide the impetus for government and industry to eliminate autism from

cost-benefit analyses of thimerosal risks. The OSC is an independent federal

investigative and prosecutorial agency that functions as a secure channel

for disclosures of whistleblower complaints and abuse of authority. It is

currently questioning potential conflicts of interests underlying the

composition of the IOM panel.

Dr. McCormick described the Committee on Immunization Safety Review as an

independent group of 13 scientists from public health and medical

disciplines established in January 2001 in response to a request from the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the NIH. An IOM news

release describes this body as a private nonprofit institution providing

health policy advice under a congressional charter granted to the National

Academy of Sciences, and notes that the panel report was sponsored by the

CDC and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

On May 20, the OSC forwarded to congressional oversight committees hundreds

of disclosures alleging public health and safety concerns regarding the

possible link between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism, many from

parents of children with autism or other neurologic disorders. However, the

OSC does not have jurisdiction over disclosures from private citizens, and

none of the disclosures were from federal employees. Contrary to statements

from DHHS agencies, the DHHS Office of Investigations, and the American

Academy of Pediatrics, the disclosures claim that some childhood vaccines

with expiration dates of 2005 contain 25 µg of mercury and continue to be

produced and administered.

Other allegations are that some datasets that showed a relationship between

thimerosal and neurologic disorders no longer exist, that independent

researchers have been denied access to CDC databases, that

government-sponsored studies have not evaluated genetic subgroups, and that

government public health agencies have ignored an increasing body of

clinical evidence on the connection of thimerosal to neurologic disorders.

The citizens making these allegations call for immediate safeguarding of the

Vaccine Safety Datalink database and other relevant CDC data information.

They further claim that the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration

colluded with pharmaceutical companies at a conference in Norcross, Georgia,

in June 2000, to prevent the release of data showing a statistically

significant correlation between thimerosal exposure via pediatric vaccines

and neurologic disorders including autism.

The allegation is that study author Verstraeten, MD, who presented

these data at the conference, published a different version of the study in

the November 2003 issue of Pediatrics that did not show a statistical

correlation. An erratum in Pediatrics in January 2004 indicates that when he

worked on the study, Dr. Verstraeten was a CDC employee, and that he is

currently employed by GlaxoKline (GSK).

In April, Dr. Verstraeten wrote a letter to the editor of Pediatrics, which

was published in the April issue (2004;113[4]:932), voicing his opinions

that the CDC did not " water down the original results. " He stated that the

CDC screening study of thimerosal-containing vaccines " was perceived at

first as a positive study that found an association between thimerosal and

some neurodevelopmental outcomes. "

According to his letter, the study was a first phase conducted in two health

maintenance organizations (HMO), with the original plan being to conduct the

second phase as a case-control study, which the investigators realized would

be too time-consuming. Dr. Verstraeten urged that the second phase be

performed instead at a third HMO; it was, and this second phase did not

replicate the findings of the first phase.

" The investigators could neither confirm nor exclude an association, and

therefore more study is required, " Dr. Verstraeten writes. " The CDC has

taken its responsibility and is currently undertaking such additional

study. " Dr. Verstraeten further denied any allegation that GSK " hired [him]

away to manipulate the data before publication, " and explained that he and

GSK " had a very clear deal from the start of my employment that I would

finalize my involvement in the study on my own time and keep this

involvement entirely separated from my work at GSK. "

As a next step, the IOM panel recommends developing programs to increase

public participation in vaccine safety research and policy decisions, and to

promote constructive dialogue between scientists, government officials, and

the public about research findings and their implications for policy

development.

Molec Psychiatry. Posted online June 8, 2004.

Reviewed by D. Vogin, MD

---------------------------------

Laurie Barclay, MD Freelance writer for Medscape Medical News

Medscape Medical News is edited by Deborah Flapan, assistant managing editor

of news at Medscape. Send press releases and comments to news@....

Medscape Medical News 2004. © 2004 Medscape

__________________________________________________

[Guest guest]

I can top this absurdity.......I saw a pediatric metabolic specialist at

Mass General this past week and she actually told me that the Dan protocol

is a medically unproven science and I should not be doing this to my

child.She then said that he had to be misdiagnosed originally for him to be

acting so typical!!!!!!!!HA<HA<HA<HA<HA!!!!!Trust me I had plenty to say to

her. She then wanted to know EVERYTHING I AM DOING AND THE DOSAGES<Now we as

parents have to put up with this crap of them not believing our kids had

autism to begin with when we recover them?Enough is enough!

PS. My son was just given the school achievement tests along with all the

typical kids and included in the typical testing procedure(NO MODIFICATIONS

AT ALL) and he scored average.YAAAAAAAHHHHHHOOOOOO!

R

[Guest guest]

That's wonderful news!!!!

Re: [ ] MUST READ!! IOM Report, Mouse Study Continue

Debate on Vaccine-Autism Link

I can top this absurdity.......I saw a pediatric metabolic specialist at

Mass General this past week and she actually told me that the Dan protocol

is a medically unproven science and I should not be doing this to my

child.She then said that he had to be misdiagnosed originally for him to be

acting so typical!!!!!!!!HA<HA<HA<HA<HA!!!!!Trust me I had plenty to say to

her. She then wanted to know EVERYTHING I AM DOING AND THE DOSAGES<Now we as

parents have to put up with this crap of them not believing our kids had

autism to begin with when we recover them?Enough is enough!

PS. My son was just given the school achievement tests along with all the

typical kids and included in the typical testing procedure(NO MODIFICATIONS

AT ALL) and he scored average.YAAAAAAAHHHHHHOOOOOO!

R

=======================================================

[Guest guest]

Misdiagnosed? Yes, our kids were misdiagnosed -- as Autistic, PDD,

ADD, ADHD, Bipolar, on and on!! By the way, congratulations on your

son's progress!!!

Michele

> I can top this absurdity.......I saw a pediatric metabolic

specialist at

> Mass General this past week and she actually told me that the Dan

protocol

> is a medically unproven science and I should not be doing this to my

> child.She then said that he had to be misdiagnosed originally for

him to be

> acting so typical!!!!!!!!HA<HA<HA<HA<HA!!!!!Trust me I had plenty

to say to

> her. She then wanted to know EVERYTHING I AM DOING AND THE

DOSAGES<Now we as

> parents have to put up with this crap of them not believing our

kids had

> autism to begin with when we recover them?Enough is enough!

> PS. My son was just given the school achievement tests along with

all the

> typical kids and included in the typical testing procedure(NO

MODIFICATIONS

> AT ALL) and he scored average.YAAAAAAAHHHHHHOOOOOO!

> R