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A Link Between Autism and Thimerosal?
tessellation writes "Environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has just published a review of evidence for the link between thimerosal (a mercury-based preservative added to vaccines until 2003) and the autism epidemic. It also details attempts by the FDA and CDC to protect the drug industry from litigation by producing favorable results rather than objective studies: '"Four current studies are taking place to rule out the proposed link between autism and thimerosal," Dr. Gordon Douglas, then-director of strategic planning for vaccine research at the National Institutes of Health, assured a Princeton University gathering in May 2001. "In order to undo the harmful effects of research claiming to link the [measles] vaccine to an elevated risk of autism, we need to conduct and publicize additional studies to assure parents of safety." Douglas formerly served as president of vaccinations for Merck, where he ignored warnings about thimerosal's risks." How often are studies successfully altered by funding agencies to conceal negative results?"
Take 100 rats. Give 50 to a random selection of students and give them 5 tests to perform. Give the other 50 to a random selection of students and give them the same 5 tests to perform, but tell the students that these are specially bred laboratory rats which have been genetically tested to ensure they are more accurate when testing for human disease (or whatever fairy tale your students are likely to buy). The results from the second group will not match the first. There will be a statistically significant difference between them.
How we know is more important than what we know.
> And I don't see how they can't be held liable if a link isn't found.
Could you rephrase that with a few less n'ts?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
This smells fishy. Especially considering most of the authors of the original 1998 study suggesting a link between the MMR vaccine and autism have apologised and had their paper retracted by the Lancet due to a conflict of interest. Furthermore, a recent study of Danish children has shown rates of autism continued to increase even after the removal of thimersol from vaccines (via a MetaFilter discussion of this topic).
Now, don't get me wrong; it may still be the case that thimersol or some other vaccine ingredient contributes to autism. However, the balance of evidence from qualified medical researchers is against this viewpoint at the moment, and it's unethical of Mr Kennedy to start spreading what is essentially FUD unless he has the epidemiological data to back it up.
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Then some counterpoints to the article:
And finally, as was posted earlier, the MetaFilter thread is well worth reading before making up your mind one way or another.
Autism is not on the list of known effects and many of those who do make the link are involved in expensive remedies that have no established effectiveness whatsoever. As such, I would regard them as being just as dubious as the American pharmaceutical industry.
Now, it is well established that the CDC and FDA have been involved in gross coverups and scandals - not too long ago, they were caught having forged the results of "studies" in Africa on an antiviral. The results weren't merely "not good", they were utterly bogus. Further research actually showed that patients had a distinct habit of dying from the medication, which was damn inconvenient for those wanting to make a fast buck.
It is entirely possible that certain vaccinations MAY have untoward impact on the brain - we don't know all of the allergic responses to vaccinations and have no means of predicting them in advance. (Why do you think you're asked to sit and wait, after getting shots? Because they need someone to prop the wall up?)
However, the link is unproven to be connected with autism and if you look at the mechanics of autism, there is no reason to believe that that is where the link lies.
Autism involves sensory overload shutting parts of the higher levels of the brain down. This is why a severely autistic child is quite capable of interacting with environments that are relatively slow-moving and over a very small fraction of the field of vision. Anything more simply puts the brain into shock.
It is also why geeks are commonly associated with higher-functioning autism and aspergers, as computers are generally not moving a great deal. The range a person needs to contend with is vastly reduced.
Nobody - absolutely nobody - knows the cause of autism, or how to diagnose it except empirically. There are no diagnostics beyond observing a person's responses, which is somewhat medieval. Studies of autism involving PET, CAT, fMRI or EEG devices are limited at best (I know of exactly none), so the amount of neurological data is limited.
Autism is likely to be genetic, as couples on the autistic spectrum do seem to have a higher chance of producing autistic children, but even that is not really proven. It could equally well be dietary. No gene has been found linked to autism, despite some work in this area, which raises the possibility that there is no gene to be found.
In the meantime, I don't suggest cutting back on vaccinations over fear of autism, though because vaccinations can have unexpected effects, I don't advise ever taking a vaccination unnecessarily. It is not something to mess with. On the other hand, superbugs, misdiagnosed lethal infections, killer viruses, etc, are considerably more lethal. If a vaccination is a live hand grenade, the pathogens we live with are a live neutron bomb.
My advice to those concerned about any kind of mental disease is to increase your intake of follic acid to twice current recommended levels, increase your intake of fresh fruits and don't mix citric acid and vitamin C with anything with a high metal content (tea, coffee, swordfish, etc) as those two CAN (under some circumstances) increase your uptake of some of the nastier metals.
Do that and I don't think you'll have anything to worry about. At least, nothing more than usual.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
I agree with you that the data and results are "fishy". But you are asking the wrong question. Kennedy doesn't have to be a "qualified researcher" in order to publish something in Salon.com, even something with scientific content. Salon.com is not a scientific journal, it's an on-line magazine for journals and writers, and Kennedy qualifies as one of those. Furthermore, anybody who has not been living under a rock for the last several decades will know his background and status.
As a scientists, I hope the day will never come in which only "qualified researchers" can publish on controversial issues. Voting age citizens are supposed to be able to comprehend, judge, and evaluate information for themselves.
First of all, I should say that I don't believe the hypothesis to be true based on the data presented.
However, while observer bias is an issue in many studies, it probably wasn't one here: it did not involve an experiment in which experimenters could have shown bias; the hypothesis ("thimerosal causes autism") wasn't even known or stated during data collection.
Riiiight.
The RIAA charges $17 for a CD and you call it "over priced" and "evil". Drug companies fix pricing so that they're more expensive than hard core narcotics and they're an "industry that does a lot of good".
Funding research for you to exploit isn't "doing good". It's just a matter of "doing business".
Many savants lose thier skills when they are forced to improve their socual and comunication skills.Autism is different than brain damage due to toxins.Many high functioning autistic people do not want to be cured.I think that normal people waste too much energy discriminating against others that are different.Too much mercury intake causes brain dammage, not autism.Riding a motorcycle without a helmet may cause brain dammage, not autism.
Even a layman could have guessed that autism is often (if not always) the result of environmental factors.
Except that there's a lot of evidence that shows that autism is the result of genetic factors.
At some point, somewhere, the entire internet will be found to be illegal.
One of the surprising apsects of autism is the number of people who have had dramatic recovering from it by chelating metals out of their body - quite surprising indeed.
Damien
I had scarlet fever in high school, and got completely over it (including rheumatic fever and hives) in a couple of weeks.
My grandfather had scarlet fever in high school and it took him more than a year to get over it.
Too bad they made me get a penicillin shot. I probably would have been cured much quicker without it, like my grandfather.
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
The link between thimerosal is shaky at best. There have countless studies looking at populations like the swedes who removed ALL thimerosol from their vacines and still had the same number of autism cases. Autism is not going to be an easy fix. Parents of autistic children focus on mercury and other contaminates because there are pathological similarities between mercury poisoning and autism. Someone is eventually going to bring up the research who found a strain of rats that were deathly allergic to thimerosal so I want to touch on this too. This population of rats was screen for their allergy to thimerosal. It would be like taking a population of dogs who were allergic to cats, and breeding those dogs which had the worst allergies to the cats, Repeat indefinetely as rats/mice can breed every 2 weeks or so. Also this research will not allow any one else to use these mice as they are a patented strain of mice and the last I heard he wasn't going to allow outsiders to use them because he wanted first crack at all possible research from them. This crusade against thimerosal is based on peoples ignorance and inability to erlationally look at the evidence. It is a quick way to blame for a illness that no one is at fault for. 30 yaers ago people blaimed distant mothers as the cause of autism.
And I don't see how they can't be held liable if a link isn't found. After all, if a woman is a crackhead or drinks a lot, she can be held accountable for her child's defects (and negligence).
A crackhead can't get a rider written into the Patriot Act or an Omnibus spending bill, as the pharmaceutical industry has.
IAAP (Psychologist), and I've worked with hundreds of children with all sorts of neuropsychological problems, many of these being Autistic-Aspergerish in nature.
I am not commenting directly on your son's friend's case, as I haven't even met them, and all sorts of things happen to cause problems for children. Heavy metals do cause massive neurological problems in children, and I have seen the effects. Having said that:
It is extremely common in the Autism-Asperger's communities for families to come up with all sorts of explanations, and to be victims of all sorts of charlatanry. These families love their children, and are deeply troubled by the problems they and their children have due to Autism-Asperger's spectrum problems. The children are generally wonderful and normal in more ways than not, but wrestle with serious social and emotional difficulties that pain the families to watch. These families will do anything that might work, and because they often have the money, can do anything that might work. As a result, they become the victim of all sorts of wild speculation and hoodwinkery.
In my experience, one of the most common examples of this charlantry is heavy metal testing. It's not uncommon that parents will hear about some place to do heavy metal testing. They'll do the test, and some "expert" will send a report to them on it. Generally these reports always claim that there's elevated levels of some heavy metal in the child. However, if you go to some independent source, and have them review the report, they'll tell you that the levels are well within--even well below average levels for children. Often the elevated "heavy metals" listed won't just be well below average levels, but won't be heavy metals at all, or will be metals that are actually beneficial medically or, at least, unrelated in any sense to any documented illness.
Nevertheless, because they have this "report" to hold onto, parents will explain to others how their child was "tested and found to have elevated sensitivity to/levels of/exposure to heavy metals." These parents aren't stupid, or irresponsible, they're just victims of people who are taking advantage of their distress and desparation.
You don't have to be a large greedy corporation to make money off of people's misery without scientific data to back you up.
Here is the brunt of the IOM study/panel:
Skeptism is how science progresses. If you have read the "Structure of Scientific Revolutions" (had to do it for a class), you would see this is how science is forwarded. That said, studies has been published in both Europe and the U.S. clearly showing no link. Skeptism, when shown to be unfounded needs to be put to rest. Literally millions of lives have been saved by vaccination programs worldwide.
The current theory favored by many experts is that autism is a genetically-based disorder that occurs before birth.
Studies of persons with autism are finding abnormalities in brain structures that develop in the first few weeks of fetal development.
The original report, published in the Lancet in 1995 included a editorial piece criticizing it, partly due to its very small study population (12 patients). Another facet of the story that is oft left out of the discussion is that the hypothesis, which had no data associated with it, was that perhaps the MMR vaccination prevents gut absorption of minerals and vitamins which caused the autism.
Anyway, there is alot of data involving this, which I have referenced below. I would like to note that I have been taking this primarily from a piece written by Dr. Barrett. The collection is quite complete and slightly longish. Have a go at it.
References
Argh. The laws of science be a harsh mistress.
I'm sorry to hear that your son's development has been set back by something. However, I doubt it has anything to do with thimerosal, seeing that the MMR vaccine used in the US, MMR II from Merck, has never contained thimerosal. Thimerosal was used in DTaP (diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis), hepatitis B, and influenza vaccines.
Hey, dummy, how do scientific hypotheses get formed? Scientists turn casual observations - "hmm, these dietary changes seem to improve symptoms of autism" - or logical conjectures - "hey, mercury is really fucking poisonous in general - shouldn't we look for negative effects from giving so much of an untested mercury-containing substance to babies?" - into formal studies blah blah blah. This takes time - but the observations of parents will be a critical link in this chain. Those parents report chelating to have a positive effect very consistently.
Something else I'll tell you about parents and their children's medical problems: if you knew anything about dealing with a sick child - clearly you don't - you'd know that very easy in talking to parents to distinguish between overzealous, overoptimistic people who fool themselves and/or blame doctors at every opportunity and latch on to every quack cure in sight and those parents who are thoughtful, powerful agents in their child's care.
The suppression of information reported in the Salon article is fucking scary - large scale epidemiological databases showing dead obvious connections, then said data is removed from public view permanently by officials with deep industry connections defending their own policies. Whether the thimoseral connection shakes out or not, that public health policy was made this way is incredibly fucking stupid. But you don't care as long as you can take the lazy pose of a skeptic.
Science wouldn't progress quite so quickly without the parents observations being given credibility. Did you know that until the 1970s, most infant surgery - from circumcision on up - was done without anaesthesia? Why? Because scoffing skeptics like you (only with MDs) insisted their nervous systems were to immature to feel pain. In retrospect, we can see pretty clearly how stupidly obviously wrong that was. Striking a skeptical pose doesn't make you scientific, it just makes you arrogant enough to believe your version of things is "obvious" and others are "fooling themselves".
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
The only thing that is "scary" about that article is what a serious hackjob and scare piece it is. The sad thing is that I had a lot - a lot - of repect for RFK Jr before that article.
And don't take my word for it - please. Look it up for yourself. Take a look at the actual transcript of the meeting that RFK Jr sliced and diced from. Or if you're too lazy, look at the many blogs out there that have done the job for you. Autism Diva is a good place to start.