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THIS JUST IN.... Correction... turns out that this is not Madsen, it is Thorsen. So swap the names out in your head. Denmark research still remains crappy so no changes needed there. AoA will be posting on it shortly. Initial post: Almost two million dollars is missing from Aarhus University, along with the lead researcher of the Denmark Autism studies on which the CDC has based their "no evidence of harm" opinion. His name has not been used in the articles, but the head of the program that they seem to be referring to is Kreesten M. Madsen, MD. Madsen was the lead author on the much disparaged "Denmark Studies", that our own pediatrician referenced when my husband asked, "are these vaccines safe?" to reassure that vaccines didn't cause autism. (Although he never mentioned autism, just asked if they were safe.) Thimerosal and the occurrence of autism. Negative ecological evidence from Danish registry-data
Madsen KM, Lauritsen MB, Pedersen CB, Thorsen P, Plesner AM, Andersen PH, Mortensen PB.
Ugeskr Laeger. 2004 Sep 13;166(38):3291-3. Danish.
MMR vaccination and autism : what is the evidence for a causal association?
Madsen KM, Vestergaard M.
Drug Saf. 2004;27(12):831-40.
Thimerosal and the occurrence of autism: negative ecological evidence from Danish population-based data.
Madsen KM, Lauritsen MB, Pedersen CB, Thorsen P, Plesner AM, Andersen PH, Mortensen PB.
Pediatrics. 2003 Sep;112(3 Pt 1):604-6.PMID: 12949291
MMR vaccination and autism--a population-based follow-up study
Madsen KM, Hviid A, Vestergaard M, Schendel D, Wohlfahrt J, Thorsen P, Olsen J, Melbye M.Ugeskr Laeger. 2002 Dec 2;164(49):5741-4. Danish. PMID: 12523209 [
A population-based study of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination and autism.
Madsen KM, Hviid A, Vestergaard M, Schendel D, Wohlfahrt J, Thorsen P, Olsen J, Melbye M. N Engl J Med. 2002 Nov 7;347(19):1477-82.PMID: 12421889 Try as Madsen might... he just couldn't find a link between autism and vaccines. But then again, there's no money in finding a link between autism and vaccines... not when CDC is paying for your research. And it looks like Madsen may be just fine with placing money above ethics... and even the law. And Madsen (if indeed, it is Madsen) apparently lied about his employment at a conference in Italy last year, claiming that he was still at Aarhus when he was not. I have commented in the past on what a piece of junk the Madsen thimerosal study was, you remember, the one that docs use to say that autism rates shot up as mercury was removed from vaccines, so it actually might protect kids from autism?!? It is useless, as the second to last paragraph of the study tells the reader that the database used changed its inclusion criteria at the time thimerosal was removed and autism rates went up, then ignores that in the very next paragraph, the conclusion, that states that removing thimerosal was followed by an "increase in autism" (not an increase in the autism database, which had been changed from only tracking inpatient cases, to all cases in the country). This of course invalidates the whole study. And despite that fact, and that it was done with researchers that actually work for the country's only vaccine maker, Pediatrics published it, CDC extolled it, and my pediatrician used it guide Chandler's vaccinations. The articles are from mid February, and I have not found any updated stories on this. Danish papers report that he is in the US, and and employed at (CDC stronghold) Emory University in Atlanta (apparently he has been for some time, while still at Aarhus, unbeknown to Aarhus, which is a no no), but his Linked In profile says that he is employed at Nycomed Pharmaceuticals in Zurich, Switzerland. So will Aarhus confirm that this is Madsen? And where is Madsen? And where is the money? And why isn't the GMC up in arms about this dishonest researcher? And what does CDC think about all this? And what moron actually believes that giving children a neurotoxin at 25,000 times the concentration allowed in drinking water will protect the child from brain injury? If anyone has any updates, or friends in Denmark that can help answer these questions... help us out with this one. Update from a reader: The CDC recruiting Madsen in 2001, email: Dr. Simpson (CDC): "Did they [autism rates] increase after 1993??"
Dr. Madsen: "Yes but not very dramatically and there could be more reasons for that. First of all we had a change from ICD8 to ICD10 in 1994 and furthermore our outpatient clinics were registered in our surveillance from 1995." On the irrelevance of Madsen's conclusions, if indeed they were valid in the first place: "Because the pediatric vaccination practices of Denmark differed greatly from those of the U.S. during the study period, Madsen's conclusions, even if relevant to Denmark, were certainly not applicable to the U.S."
- Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004 Two reports from the Danish media: SWINDLE FOR MILLIONS AT AARHUS UNIVERSITY
Aarhus Stiftstidende
By Maja Nielsen and Morten Ravn, translated by Ulla Danielson
Wednesday February 10, 2010
A big research project has resulted in a deficit of 10 million crowns in the budget of Aarhus university.
Police are investigating the case as fraud while the university has cut its links to the chief-investigator from Aarhus, writes Danish Daily Aarhus Stiftstidende.
The Aarhus-based scientist left his job at the medical health faculty in March last year. After a short period, the university began to suspect something was radically wrong. The suspicion increased.
Accordingly the university in collaboration with Board of Science and Innovation reported the case to the police of Eastern Jylland.
Among other things the now disputed research project maps out the cause of autism. Since 2002, the project has received more than 80 millions crowns from the American board of health,the CDC.
The University of Aarhus is in the process of issuing a declaration to a lot of institutions about the tangled case.
In this communication the director of the university, Joergen Joergensen, underlines that the aarhus-scientist no longer is connected with the university.
Researcher employed in more than one place
“At the same time it has become clear that the resigned leader of the research project has been employed doubly.
Without the university’s knowledge, he has been a payed employee at the University of Emory in the USA while he was still employed in aarhus.
"Of course that is not acceptable,” says head of press for the rector at the university, Anders Corell, to Aarhus Stiftstidende.
He does not want to say anything about the amount of money the University is missing. Neither will Anders Corell comment on the information provided to the newspaper talking about a fraud involving 10 million crowns.
Police inspector Boerge Frandsen from Eastern Jylland’s police confirms, that there is a report. The police has started to investigate the case.
”Yes, it is about fraud”, the police inspector says to Aarhus Stiftstidende.
He is not able to confirm or deny size of the amount of money or the consequences.
But so far the disputed chief investigator has not been charged.
On the move in the USA
The newspaper has learned that the investigations are hampered because it has been very difficult to find the key figure in the case.
Aarhus Stiftstidende has also unsuccessfully tried to get a comment from the aarhus-based scientist, who has his private address in hoejbjerg (outside Aarhus).
After he left the medical health faculty in Aarhus he participated, among other things, at a conference in Italy.
On that event his papers erroneously said that he was employed by the University of Aarhus.
Aarhus Stiftstidende has spoken to several sources, who say that the scientist, who has a PhD, is at the moment is on the move in USA. They describe him as a Stein Bagger type (a Danish financial fraud) who is eminently clever at raising money from funds.
“He can open the doors to the great money tanks. But all projects all the time had to grow bigger and bigger. He succeeded in raising a huge amount of dollars. Rules however was something that existed for the sake of others – not for him,” it has been said, sounding characteristic.
mani@stiften.dk, mora@stiften.dk Researcher accused of cheating Uni out of millions
The Copenhagen Post
February 11, 2010
A former lead research suspected of fraud now living in US and has not been questioned by police.
Aarhus University has confirmed that a former head of research at its North Atlantic Neuro-Epidemiology Alliances department has committed possible fraud amounting to 10 million kroner against several of the school’s research partners, reports Århus Stiftstidende newspaper.
Until last March, the man was head of an 80 million crown joint research project between the US government’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the University of Southern Denmark and Aarhus University.
Jørgen Jørgensen, Aarhus University’s rector, confirmed police charges have been filed against the former researcher and that it concerns a sum of around 10 million crowns.
Numerous applications for funding for the research were apparently signed with forged signatures.
The scientist – who is reportedly living and working in Atlanta in the US – resigned from his post last March. But he allegedly continued to pass himself off as the head of the international project, which dealt primarily with research into the possible causes of autism.
Aarhus University also claims that the researcher took another permanent position at Emory University in the US while still heading the Danish-based project.
Danish police said they were still investigating the case but had not yet sought cooperation from US authorities in the matter. They also have yet to question the man in connection with the case.
‘When we’ve gone through everything then we’ll decide whether there are sufficient grounds to charge the researcher or any others for forgery or fraud,’ said Børge Frandsen of East Jutland Police.
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Today in a conference call with Kathleen Sebelius and Thomas Insel, HHS told a small circle of autism groups that they would be releasing the new 1 in 100 autism rate on Monday. They cautioned however, that they didn't know if the increase was a real increase or whether greater awareness... changes in measurement methods... better diagnosis... blah blah blah... because apparently our government doesn't even read their own publications. The whole thing was so predictable that I could have written it for them yesterday. AAP will also be releasing autism information on Monday, but we were told that it was embargoed. Sebelius (before ditching out on the call five minutes in) also announced that Barack Obama was all over Autism, dropping 85 million for research into genetics, services, "evidence based treatment" (which is code for everything but biomedical which we refuse to research so it can't have any "evidence" so we don't have to recommend it) and telehealth (video conferencing for rural families). No where were the words, "diet", "vaccine", "environmental", "toxic", "neuroinflamation", "autoimmune", "recovery" or any of those other words that I was looking for, ever spoken. They did however excel in self-congratulations, Insel yelling "ouch!" at one point as he apparently dislocated his shoulder, while patting himself on the back. Pray for his speedy recovery. I am sure his Pharma Bros. can get him some good pain meds. The conference call was not announced to the press or public, but merely in an email sent out at 9 am inviting around fifty people in the autism community (almost exclusively friendly to the administration) to the 2pm call with a "sorry for the short notice". After listening to the call, my cynicism is increased, and I continue to encourage my readers NOT to wait for the government to do anything to prevent your child from contracting autism or to treat him. If you are reading this blog you are likely way ahead of Insel and company, and who knows how many years it will be before they catch up with us. If this is the Obama approach, then I expect it will be at least Summer of 2013 before we hear a conference call from the administration that dares to utter the shocking phrase, "gastrointestinal damage". They did talk about services, but I can't even give them the benefit of the doubt on that today. So when a child actually benefits from the 85 million being dropped on all this busy work, I will let you know. And if your child benefits from anything Obama/Sebelius/Insel does, then make sure to drop me a note. Until then, I just see this as talk because the heat is on and they have to look productive.
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Today Thomas R. Frieden, head of CDC appeared before House Committee Oversight and Government Reform and in a response to a question from Congressman Darrell Issa, said that the CDC would like to create federal mandates forcing vaccines on the public. Issa asked about the "push back" from the New York medical professionals to the states mandate that they receive the H1N1 and seasonal flu shot and the case that the state has for forcing the vaccines. Frieden expressed the opinion that he believed that the state mandate is warranted, and that he thinks such mandates should take place at a federal level, although not this year. This echos Julie Gerberding's comments to the New York Times last week in regard to the NY manndate that CDC wanted to implement forced vaccines while she was there. "The unions do not oppose vaccination “but we oppose a mandatory program,” he said. “This is: ‘You don’t get the shot, you’re fired.’ ”
Some prominent health experts, however, were delighted.
Dr. Julie Gerberding, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called New York’s move “a big deal.”
She had pushed for years for mandatory vaccinations — not just to protect health care workers, she explained, but to protect their patients, who are often aged, have weakened immune systems or are bedridden after surgery, which increases pneumonia risks.
“We tried to market the idea, to push people, to educate,” she said. “But looking back, broadly speaking, we failed. It’s time to look at a more aggressive approach.”
By contrast, her successor, Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, said last month that even though he expected a surge in swine flu deaths this winter and even though C.D.C. guidelines give health care workers first priority for the new vaccine, he would not push to make vaccinations mandatory." Apparently the NYT was only partially right that Frieden wouldn't push for forced vaccinations. He wants to force them, just not this year. I will add a transcript of Frieden's exact comments to the committee when it becomes available.
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... cdc quietly upped its autism numbers on their web site to 1 in 100 yesterday... sneaking it in on a friday... shhhh... don't wanna wake the press...Tina Cruz caught them:
CDC quietly revises autism rates to 1% of US childrenWhen I tried to verify the numbers, the CDC still lists the 2007 statistics of 1 in 150 in their official report, the new report has not been released) but the numbers on the webpage have been modified to reflect "1 in 100 to 1 in 300 with an average of 1 in 150" for prevalence in autism. The last modification that was made to the page was September 25, 2009.
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One autism mom is reporting the following: "We had an ASA Board member go to the national ASA Convention-new CDC numbers are 1:100 births. CDC considers it an epidemic...soon to be released, but not sure when. 1:66 births in military families. I just want to cry. How long until there are MORE people ON the spectrum than people NOT on the spectrum??!?" Let's see if she is right and CDC is ready to start to actually calling a duck, a duck.
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I missed writing about many stories this year, but wanted to call this to your attention to this story from February, as it represents a paradigm shift in CDC's autism causation stance.
From Age of Autism:
Las Vegas Sun Reports: CDC Admits Autism is Environmental
Las Vegas sun Managing Editor's Note: Thank you to Marshall Allen of the Las Vegas Sun for this article in which Dr. Catherine Rice, Director of the CDC's National Center for Birth Defects states that vaccines and other environmental insults are possible causes of autism. I think the genetics only crowd and vaccine deniers' luck is running out, don't you? Please click HERE to read the full article at the Las Vegas Sun. You can thank Mr. Allen for running this article HERE. Please do. Kim
So are there more autistic children, or is the broadening definition causing more children to be classified as autistic?
It’s impossible to say for sure, Rice said. Awareness of autism is increasing, which leads to more effective identification, but it’s also possible that it’s increasing. Even with the more inclusive definition, the number of autistic children seems to be on the rise, Rice said.
It’s not known what causes autism.
Researchers say environmental factors could contribute to the onset of the disorders. Studies have linked autism to air pollutants, pesticides, pet medications and even drugs used in the birthing process, such as Pitosin, Rice said.
“It could be anything from the exposures in our physical surroundings — chemicals around us in homes, clothes, products, medications we take and food we eat,” Rice said.
Rice said the recognition that environmental factors play a role in causing autism shows that there is common ground in the debate about whether vaccines play a role in the disorders.
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As part of CDC's project canvasing the public to find out about their vaccine safety concerns, they have hired a research/policy group, The Keystone Center, to take public statements at a series of "Stakeholder Meetings".
They will be holding public meetings in early January in these three cities, Ashland, OR specifically because they have a very low vaccine uptake rate and want to know why so many families are oping out of vaccinating.
If you are a parent with vaccine safety concerns, please consider attending and sharing your concerns.
I have participated in this project already, and believe that Keystone is earnest in their information gathering effort, however I will be shocked if CDC actually takes the information seriously, and earnestly (and honestly) addresses the problems in the vaccine program. It think that the more likely scenario is that this is PR busywork to make it look like they are taking things seriously, and they will continue on the same path they are on. Full steam on vaccines. (At their recently "Stakeholder Meeting" with vaccine manufacturers, vaccine safety was not the issue, greater liability protection and the elimination of regulatory hurdles for new vaccines was the issue. It was as if the increasingly loud public vaccine safety discussion didn't even exist.).
Because bottom line, CDC already knows ALL of the things that parents like us believe about the problems with vaccine safety and will be presenting during this project. As I told my interviewer at Keystone, "there is nothing that we are telling you that CDC doesn't already know. CDC reads my blog almost every single workday, and visited my site 5 times yesterday. They know all this, and they have not done jack with the information. They don't care".
However... despite my cynicism about this effort, I am encouraging you to participate. Let's get this all on the record so that when CDC ignores it yet again, or designs more bullshit studies that don't actually examine the questions in play, their brazen corruption will only be further highlighted.
Or...
Perhaps Tom Daschle will take over HHS and actually clean up this mess and make me look like a fool for doubting. Wouldn't that be nice.
One final note. Keep in mind as you read this that as low as the vaccine uptake rates are in Ashland, with one school having as many as 66% of children opting out of at least one vaccine, if not all, there have been no disease outbreaks. This is a town that should be closely watched. Just how low do vaccine rates have to go in a town before disease outbreaks occur? David Tayloe, head of AAP, claimed that vaccine uptake must be above 90% to prevent disease outbreaks on the Today Show this year.
This is a town that CDC should be doing serious research on, like the Somali's in Minneapolis and the Amish in PA. It would be a good place for CDC to start in doing a vaccinated v. unvaccinated study. But we all know they won't.
December 27, 2008
Immunization concerns
By Kira Rubenthaler
Ashland Daily Tidings
More than a quarter of Ashland parents choose not to vaccinate their children, and the government wants to know why.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is holding a community meeting Jan. 10 in Ashland to help its Immunization Safety Office prioritize vaccine safety studies beginning in the next five years.
Ashland joins Indianapolis and Birmingham, Ala., as three U.S. cities the CDC is tapping to solicit the public's concerns about vaccines.
"I think what's important about this is it's the government coming out and asking people's opinions, asking their advice, asking them to help set policy," said pediatrician Ben Schwartz, a senior scientific advisor in the Department of Health and Human Services' National Vaccine Program.
Ashland was chosen partly for its high rates of unvaccinated children, Schwartz said.
"We wanted to learn from people who had more concerns about vaccines," he said.
The CDC held the Birmingham meeting Dec. 13 and will hold the Indianapolis meeting Jan. 17 before the National Vaccine Advisory Committee's Vaccine Safety Working Group convenes in Washington, D.C., Feb. 4 to hear the results.
Ashland's meeting will take place Saturday, Jan. 10, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Ashland Middle School commons. Registration and a continental breakfast begin at 8 a.m. and lunch and refreshments will be provided.
Attendees must live within the city limits and be at the meeting all day. Participants qualify for a $50 stipend, which Schwartz said is a "reflection of how we value people's time" and is also aimed at recruiting a cross-section of the community.
The CDC hopes for about 75 attendees, and people must register in advance by calling facilitator The Keystone Center at (800) 219-6670 or going online to www.keystone.org/registration/ashland. For more information, including a link to the draft scientific research agenda, go to www.hhs.gov/nvpo/nvac/publicengagement.html.
High rates
While Birmingham and Indianapolis are more representative of typical communities, Ashland stands out with its "substantially higher" rates of unvaccinated children, Schwartz said.
Oregon requires schoolchildren to be vaccinated against 11 diseases, but parents can opt out by signing a religious exemption, which defines religion as "any system of beliefs, practices or ethical values."
Statewide, 3.7 percent of kindergarteners had exemptions in 2007, while 28.1 percent of Ashland kindergarteners were exempt, according to numbers provided by the Jackson County Health Department.
Ashland's numbers get even higher when broken down by school.
For 2007, 66.7 percent of students at Willow Wind Community Learning Center were exempt, while 65.9 percent of Siskiyou School students and 45.7 percent of John Muir Elementary students had exemptions, according to reports submitted to the health department.
At Walker Elementary, 23.4 percent of students had exemptions, while 15. 3 percent of Bellview students and 14.8 percent of Helman students were exempt.
Belinda Brown, Ashland's school nurse coordinator, said the numbers can be somewhat misleading because if a parent signs a religious exemption for one vaccination but follows the remaining requirements, the child is counted as an exemption.
Regardless, the numbers are still high, "and they're higher than we want them to be," Brown said.
A variety of reasons contribute to the high exemption rates, Brown said.
A small group faces barriers to vaccinating, such as not knowing where to get the shots or lacking money or transportation, but the school works hard to help parents overcome these obstacles, she said.
Some parents are adamantly opposed to immunizations for personal or religious reasons, Brown said, and many are worried about vaccine safety.
It's important to respect parents' choices, but the number of exempt students is troublesome, Brown said.
"It's been an area of concern for the school district and the community at large, and we've been thinking of ways to improve that," Superintendent Juli Di Chiro said at the Dec. 8 school board meeting.
If there were an outbreak of a vaccine-preventable disease, unvaccinated students would have to stay home until it passed. Meanwhile, the school district would be required to provide five hours of one-on-one tutoring each week to every quarantined student, Di Chiro said.
When parents want to sign an exemption, the school tries to make sure they understand the risks of not vaccinating, Brown said.
"It's our job to make sure everyone has the information they need," she said.
Studying the reasons
Information is key for Kaitlin Newman, Shauna Gargus and Joel Carrick, nursing seniors at Oregon Health and Sciences University who are studying Ashland's high exemption rates and how to bring the numbers down.
They have contacted community leaders and school administrators and designed an informational pamphlet, and they talked about their project at the Dec. 8 school board meeting.
Besides running the risk of contracting a serious disease, unvaccinated children also jeopardize others, the students said.
When large segments of a population are not vaccinated, it causes a drop in protection provided by immunizations, a loss of "herd immunity," the students said.
For instance, the elderly and newborn babies are susceptible to pertussis (whooping cough), said Jim Shames, the medical director for Jackson County's Health and Human Services and adviser to the students.
Until the baby is old enough to be vaccinated for pertussis, its only protection is for people around it to be immunized, he said.
"It really takes a community to protect a child," Shames said.
Some children can't be vaccinated for medical reasons, and people with cancer, AIDS and other illnesses that compromise the immune system are also susceptible to catching vaccine-preventable diseases, said OHSU nursing instructor Linda Brown.
Immunizations have largely eradicated many diseases — such as mumps, polio and measles — in the United States, so people don't see their devastating effects and don't think they need to vaccinate, the students said.
But as a tourist town with visitors from around the world — including places where these diseases still exist, Ashland is especially susceptible for an outbreak, the students said.
Many parents choose not to vaccinate because of concerns about reactions to immunizations, but serious reactions are rare, the students said.
"The most common reaction to a vaccine is a sore arm," Gargus said.
Some concerns, like the possible link between vaccines and autism, are unsubstantiated, the students said.
"There's a lot of fears that parents have that a lot of people believe but aren't scientifically proven to be linked to the vaccine," Carrick said.
Parents don't always give equal concern to the complications from the diseases the vaccines aim to prevent, Linda Brown said.
"There's a balance between the risks of disease and the risks of side effects," Shames said.
As a parent, it can be hard to know if you're doing the right thing, Linda Brown said. "And so many of the families in Ashland are very concerned about trying to do the right thing," she said.
A parent's view
Julie Freed is one of those parents.
For her, doing the right thing was not vaccinating.
After a "huge amount of research," Freed, a homeopathic and nutritional consultant, chose to abstain from immunizations for her daughter.
Arianna Marshank, now an eighth-grader at the Siskiyou School, has been vaccinated for tetanus, but has not received the other recommended childhood immunizations.
Freed has signed the religious exemption and has never had any trouble getting her daughter into classes or camps, she said.
Her decision to not vaccinate had a lot to do with the timing of the shots and the amount of them, as well as the potential for side effects, Freed said.
"It's more just the safety aspect and the respect for the immune system developing on its own and not inundating it with chemicals," Freed said.
The amount of vaccines recommended for young children is a challenge to an undeveloped immune system, she said. In addition to the preservatives and chemicals in the vaccines, some of them don't seem necessary at such a young age, she added.
She has also seen adverse reactions to vaccines.
Although nothing has been proven, links suggest that vaccines may cause learning disabilities, autism and SIDS, Freed said. Complicating the issue, there's evidence on both sides to argue for and against vaccinations, she added.
"We don't know. We don't know what these chemicals do to our bodies," Freed said.
Now that her daughter's immune system has developed and she's healthy and strong, feeding her wholesome, organic food and making sure she gets fresh air and exercise "are my choices at keeping illness at bay," Freed said.
Her friends span the range of vaccination theory, with some not vaccinating at all, some who selectively vaccinate, some who don't adhere to the vaccination schedule and some who follow all the recommendations, Freed said.
It comes down to personal choice, and it's important to make an educated decision, she said.
Freed is not opposed to vaccines, but "I do feel like people feel like they don't have a choice," she said.
Whichever option parents pick, it's not an easy decision, Freed said.
"I'm not going to lie. I've had sleepless nights," she said. "We all worry about our kids and are concerned about our kids. And we all want to do what's best for our children."
Kira Rubenthaler can be reached at 482-3456 ext. 225 or krubenthaler@dailytidings.com.
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From David Kirby:
The List Keeps Growing
By David Kirby
It’s getting harder to keep up with the list of scientists, doctors, and public health officials who now believe that a vaccine-autism connection is at the least possible, and should be researched further.
Earlier this week, Dr. Peter Fletcher, former Chief Scientific Officer at the UK Department of Health was added. Now, eight more prominent researchers have joined the group. (See list below – they are the last eight names added).
These are the authors of the new study, “Mitochondrial Disease in Autism Spectrum Disorder Patients: A Cohort Analysis,” who did chart reviews on Hannah Poling and two dozen other young people with autism and mitochondrial dysfunction.
In my opinion, it could well prove to be one of the most significant autism studies published to date. (My Huffington Post article on this is HERE:
Mito disorders, which might affect 7-to-30 percent of all children with ASD, can predispose kids to developmental regression following a stressful trigger. Such a trigger might come from a febrile infection – or it could conceivably come from a vaccine reaction, the authors wrote.
“There might be no difference between the inflammatory or catabolic (breaking down of tissue) stress of vaccinations and that of common childhood diseases, which are known precipitants of mitochondrial regression,” they said.
And then they wrote this: “Large, population-based studies will be needed to identify a possible relationship of vaccination with autistic regression in persons with mitochondrial cytopathies (cellular disorders).”
And so, they get added to the list.
The list keeps changing in other ways. For example, late last spring it listed, “all three presidential candidates” (Obama, Clinton and McCain). Soon enough, that will be changed to US President, Secretary of State, and a pivotal and potentially filibuster-busting Senator from Arizona.
Another change: Before, the list said, “Autism researchers at Johns Hopkins University Medical Center.” Now, those people can be named, along with their colleagues: Investigators at the Cleveland Clinic and Massachusetts General Hospital. I have also listed a Harvard scientist who sits on an advisory panel of the federal Inter-Agency Autism Committee (IACC).
It makes you wonder how long the term “fringe” can seriously be applied to people who believe that this debate is not over.
Finally, keep your eye on the draft National Vaccine Plan at HHS, especially this January - right around the time the nation gets a new HHS Secretary and, reportedly, a new Director of the CDC – both of whom could potentially be added to the list, as well.
-----------------------------------------------
In 2008, the following groups and individuals have advocated, or at least considered, further study of a possible vaccine-autism connection:
1) Presidenti-Elect Barack Obama,
2) Sen. Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State Designee
3) Sen. John McCain, Senior Senator from Arizona and pivotal minority vote
4) Dr. Julie Gerberding, Director of the CDC
5) Dr. Bernadine Healy, Former Director of the NIH and President of the American Red Cross
6) Rep. Brad Miller, (D-NC), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the House Committee on Science and Technology
7) Members of the HHS Vaccine Safety Working Group
8) Officials at the CDC’s Immunization Safety Office who drafted the federal vaccine safety research agenda, the National Vaccine Plan
9) Medical personnel at the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program of HHS, who ordered federal compensation to Hannah Poling for her vaccine-associated autism.
10) Dr. Martha Herbert, Harvard University, and other members of the Strategic Planning Workgroup of the federal Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC)
11) Members of the CDC’s Clinical Immunization Safety Assessment Network (CISA)
12) America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), the national association representing nearly 1,300 companies covering more than 200 million Americans
13) Research grant making officials at Autism Speaks
14) Dr. Douglas Wallace, Professor of Molecular Medicine at the University of California, Irvine, Director of the UCI Center for Molecular and Mitochondrial Medicine in Genetics, and member of the Scientific & Medical Advisory Board of the United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation
15) Dr. Peter Fletcher, former Chief Scientific Officer at the UK Department of Health
16) Dr. Jon Poling, prominent neurologist and father to Hannah Poling
17) Dr. Jacqueline R. Weissman, Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine
18) Dr. Richard I. Kelley, Department of Pediatrics, Johns Hopkins University Medical Center and Division of Metabolism, Kennedy Krieger Institute
19) Dr. Margaret L. Bauman, Department of Pediatrics and Learning and Developmental Disabilities Evaluation and Rehabilitation Services (LADDERS), Massachusetts General Hospital
20) Dr. Bruce H. Cohen, Neurological Institute and Pediatrics Institute, Cleveland Clinic
21) Dr. Katherine F. Murray, Genomic Department of Pediatrics and Learning and Developmental Disabilities Evaluation and Rehabilitation Services (LADDERS), Massachusetts General Hospital
22) Dr. Rebecca L. Mitchell, Genomic Medicine Institute, Cleveland Clinic
23) Dr. Rebecca L. Kern, Department of Pediatrics, Johns Hopkins University Medical Center and Division of Metabolism, Kennedy Krieger Institute
24) Marvin R. Natowicz, Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine
“HONORARY MEMBER”:
HHS Secretary Designee Tom Daschel, who said in November of 2002: “Mercury-based vaccine preservatives actually have caused autism in children.”
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I am a little speechless.
Apparently David Kirby has attained some sort of Jedi mastery and has gotten the Centers for Disease Control, The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Minnesota Department of Public Health snapping to attention to answer his questions. And all in one day!
One letter to each of them has elicited lengthy responses. This is in stark contrast to CDC's response to him in 2005. He wrote a big fat book about their malfeasance and their only response was to post a note on their web site that they were reading the book and would respond, and then just took down the notice a few months later with out ever responding.
Some sort of fire has been lit under some asses somewhere. Could it be in response to the rumor that Julie Gerberding is on her way out, and during her lame duckiness everyone is scrambling to make themselves look like they were doing the right thing all along so that if/when Secretary Daschel walks in the door on Jan 21 and asks to see the Poling files, their flesh will not burn under the white hot sunshine that starts to flood the place?
(Now you know what I dream about at night).
I will let you read for yourself, but the highlight of the work is this statement from CDC, in fact Julie Gerberding's officer itself, that Chemical Exposure will be shown to be one of the causes of autism through "today's research".
"While it is important to understand if autism is affecting any group of children disproportionately, it is also important to keep in mind that there are likely multiple causes of the autism spectrum of disorders. Most scientists agree that today's research will show that a person's genetic profile may make them more or less susceptible to ASDs as a result of any number of factors such as infections, the physical environment, chemical exposures, or psychosocial components."
-CDC Director’s Office of Enterprise Communication (OEC)
Oh... and they also mentioned that infections may cause autism as well.
Minnesota and the CDC Confer on Somali Autism Situation: CDC’s Office of the Director: Autism May Result from “Chemical Exposures”.
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In the past few months it has come to the attention of our community, via David Kirby's tenacious investigating, that the autism rate in the Somali community in Minneapolis looks to be 1 in 28.
Read that again.
The 1 in 28 Somali children in that community look to have autism.
I say "look to", because the Minnesota Department of Health's Judy Punyko, who collected the data from the school system in August order to confirm this number, and was supposed to have a report on Nov 15th, says they will need four more months to run the numbers.
Bullshit.
They have had time to run those numbers 8 ways to Sunday by now.
I would bet my house that they know that they have found an autism cluster that is on fire, and like the shenanigans in the Verstraeten study, they are inventing new math to try to hide the true incidence of autism in the Somali community.
Last weekend the Minnesota Department of Public Health held a PR party with the Somali community to assure them that they were hard at work on the problem, offered them no answers, and assured it was not the vaccines.
Totally Disgusting.
These people have been through hell and back, finally land in the Land of Promise, their kids get sick in obscene numbers, but the state government obfuscates and stalls and the federal government is no where to be found.
That is right... CDC has not even shown up in Minneapolis.
If there was ever a doubt that the Centers for Disease Control did not give a flying fig tree about autism, the fact that an autism cluster with a 1 IN 28 ratio does not even warrant a look, then it should be wiped away with this DISGUSTING inaction by Julie "Let them eat cake" Gerberding.
HOW HIGH DOES THE AUTISM RATE HAVE TO GET BEFORE THEY ACTUALLY DO ANYTHING!!!!!!! 1 IN 10? 1 IN 2?
I have not been so angry in a long time. These Somali-Americans and their children deserve better.
So I say today, WE ARE ALL SOMALI!
Idil and Abdulkadir, we got your back.
Here are the links to all the relevant stories so you can catch up and be as horrified as I am:
Is Autism an "American Disease?" Somali Immigrants Reportedly Have High Rates
Minneapolis and the Somali Autism Riddle
Somali Parents Give the Autism Forum a "C+"
Autism Strikes 1 in 28 Somali Children in Minnesota
Minnesota Tracked Down Pig Brain Disease, Ignores Autism?
Somali Gloves Come Off: Autism in Minnesota
An Open Letter to the Somali Parents of Minnesota
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From Reuters:
"... Delivery hospitals play a key role in the national strategy to prevent hepatitis B transmission and should have policies and procedures in place to ensure that hepatitis B vaccination is administered to all newborns before they leave the hospital, they emphasize." And by ALL they mean babies who weight 4 pounds 6.5 ounces and are "medically stable".
So they remain bullish on their one size fits all vaccine schedule, even for babies who have no medical history yet, even for a disease that the vast majority of them are not at risk for, even for a vaccine which many adult health professionals (who are required to get it because they come into contact with blood products of high risk individuals) report multiple health problems after receiving.
Note the rational given for this. Not the good of the individual infant, but as a key in their "national strategy to prevent hepatitis B transmission".
So your baby is drafted into the CDC's war on Hepatitis B, whether or not you want him to be, and whether or not it is in his best interest.
Mine was, and after his first Hep B shot he was left with three months of fevers and crying, and two years of bowel problems (until we put him on GFCF). And even though all this was reported to his doctors, they continued giving him the Hep B shot (contraindicated for any one who has reacted to it before) until he regressed into autism at 18 months following the FOURTH time they gave him the shot.
They know full well that some children will get very sick from this shot, yet CDC wants ALL children to have it with in 48 hours of birth.
How in the hell are then not in jail for this?
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From Linda Weinmaster:
It is with deep sadness that I inform the autism community that we have lost another hero. Dr. Frank Engley passed away last night. It is no exaggeration to say that Dr.Engley was the very first scientist to raise the alarm of the dangers of thimerosal with his landmark paper. This last year infused him with a sense of purpose and determination to alert the world that the use of thimerosal must be stopped. He was deeply saddened that the FDA never followed through with his recommendations on eliminating thimerosal from all human biologicals. It was my honor and privilege to know this incredible man. I will miss his brilliance and sense of humor. You are my hero Dr. Engley. Linda Weinmaster Vice President No Mercury Trustee; Alan D. Clark Research Foundation
From Anne Dachel:
The efforts of Dr. Engley to prevent this disaster will be a lasting
tribute to him. We need to remind the public of his early findings:
"Doctor Frank Engley a researcher and microbiologist who served on boards with the Centers for Disease Control, the FDA, and EPA throughout the 70s and 80s.
"I am afraid they have a tremendous amount of pressure being brought to bear by the medical profession, by the pediatricians, by congress, and by industry, and so they are under pressure&and someday they will have to live with the fact with what they said is wrong," Dr. Frank Engley.
Dr. Engley says the FDA knew about the dangers of thimerosal back in the 70s and 80s, when he served on its boards.
"Industries did not comment. They thought it was just generally going away. And it practically did. They came out with another report. The FDA about eight years later, and about 1998." Dr. Engley said.
"I would say to you, the FDA is partly to blame for the mecuricals still being on the market all that length of time. If they would have followed through with our 1982 report, vaccines would have been freed of thimerosal and all this autism as they tell me would not have occurred. But as it is, it all occurred," said Dr. Engley."
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Max Power: Kids, there’s three ways to do things. The right way, the wrong way, and the Max Power way!
Bart: Isn’t that the wrong way?
Max Power: Yeah, but faster!
The theme of the day is the outing of the efforts by Mainstream Medicine to deal with the problem of parents turning on their brains and doing their own research in to vaccines.
Medicine is quite upset that parents are no longer ignoring MainMed's conflicts of interest, swallowing their unsatisfactory answers to important vaccine questions and failing to notice pediatricians collective yawn at the autism epidemic (and the ADD epidemic and the diabetes epidemic and the asthma epidemic etc.) and deciding to go to other sources of information. The solution they propose?
They have decided to take autism seriously, engage the parent community a dialog that holds them to account in their vaccine statements, throw out bad research, design studies in partnership with parents that will answer the important questions and finally attack all the credibility and conflict of interest problems they have.
NO OF COURSE THEY ARENT, SILLY!
They are doing it the Max Power way. They are going to take the failing tactics of the past decade but this time do more of it with more famous people, better graphics and an interactive experience. And since giving inadequate answers to parents in the exam room has yielded such a poor result, they are going to take their bad shtick to You Tube.
On Age of Autism Katie Wright has a piece on the CDC's recent conference call to figure out how to get parents to just stop asking questions, and stop doing their own research and just vaccinate like they are told.
Docs are encouraged by Nurse Patricia Stinchfield to act compassionate and humor parents, but never encouraged to actually consider the idea that have a point. And right on cue she points us back to Dr. Paul, "100,000 vaccines at once" Offit:
"I like Dr. Paul Offit’s analogy of the ocean analogy. So describe to parents that the immune system’s like an ocean. And that at that first two month visit for example, they’re going to have eight antigens added to that immune ocean.
Think of it like eight cups of water being added to an ocean. It’s far from overload and far from being too weak to accept those." Since when has eight cups of water managed to change the behavior of the entire ocean, put it on high alert, and get it to seek out and kill every shark contained in it across the surface of the planet?
And how about this gloss over in teaching docs how to asses were the parent is coming from in order to talk them into vaccinating:
"Sometimes we’ll find parents that say well I came in at two months and they got a bunch of shots. I thought that was all that they needed.
What’s their experience? Maybe they have a person in their family who has had a significant side effect to a vaccine. What are their emotions? What are their beliefs? Try to determine that." Note that a family history of vaccine injuries is something to talk a parent down from, not something that the doctor should take into account and USE MORE CAUTION IN VACCINATING!
Nurse Stinchfield boils down the point of the conversation with parents in this telling statement:
"You want to keep the conversation focused. You want to control without being controlling...
We wouldn’t say to a parent, well your child needs open heart surgery, but that’s up to you. You can choose if you want to do that or not.
So I’m not sure why we say that when we’re talking about vaccines.
So the need for vaccination is the same as the need for open heart surgery, and parents should be "guided" to believe that they ultimately cannot say no to either.
So this is not an earnest conversation by any stretch. It is a manipulation with a predetermined outcome. "To control" the parent in to vaccinating.
And she also asks doctors to keep in mind that:
"...there is not a physiologic reason to design an alternative immunization schedule. And there’s no biological rationale for splitting up a dose, giving an (M) and an (R.) (instead of MMR)." And that is pretty much all the evidence we need to know that MainMed is not only not taking our concerns seriously but they are not even listening to our vaccine safety arguments.
Did I mention that the conference call was entitled , "Why Science Is Not Enough". Because, of course, there is no evidence of any link between vaccines and autism.
The most mockable part of this conference call? The fact that they didn't actually bring in mothers who are not vaccinating to actual hear their concerns, they brought mothers who were "in the vaccine business".
Katie was right, you need to read this thing for yourself. I could go on, but I think I have made enough points here.
Natural News has a story on a JAMA study on You Tube videos with the focus on countering the messages that urge caution in vaccinating.
"[YouTube is] the perfect venue for an anecdote, both positive or negative," Jennifer Keelan said. Wilson said that vaccine advocates can no longer ignore or marginalize anti-vaccine advocates.
"In the past that could work, but it's not going to work anymore. Now there are ways for people with these viewpoints to communicate with each other," he said. "These sites are now providing people with a mechanism by which they can bypass the conventional filters and get their messages out. It can be dangerous."
Some observations on this quote by this University of Toronto researcher.
First, it acknowledges that the plan of mainstream medicine for dealing with people who question the safety and efficacy of vaccines was to "ignore and marginalize" them.
Second, it acknowledges that there have been "filters" in place to keep any voice that critizes vaccination from being heard by the general public.
Of course we have been living this for years, so it is no surprise to us. But it is interesting to see docs finally admitting it.
Bottom line, The Semmelweis Reflex is still in full effect. Decades past with untold numbers of people died between the time Semmelweis discovered that doctors were making their patients sick by not washing their hands, and the time when germ theory was accepted by MainMed and docs actually started hand washing. How long will it take before they realize that they are harming their patients with their hubris and actually investigate and address the vaccine problem correctly?
The truly shameful thing? MainMed has the Semmelweis story to learn from, yet it does not learn.
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I was doing a search on Julie Gerberding when I came across some surprising video. Julie Gerberding talking candidly about smoking.
What was surprising to me was hearing her talk like a normal person. She spoke off the cuff about her thoughts on smoking and health policy, and she was not the least bit full of crap when she did it.
Now I have only heard her talk about vaccines and autism, and the person that she is when she talks about these two topics is not at all the person I see in the above video. When she talks about autism and vaccines she is rehearsed and condescending and carefully threads the needle with very specific, very qualified, very evasive language. (Watch the CNN video again, both the questions and her answers are pretty clearly from a script) Not in a million years would I expect to hear Julie speak extemporaneously on vaccine safety.
If there was ever any doubt that Julie was spouting bullshit when talking about vaccines and autism, it is dealt a death blow by hearing her talk about something else.
Nothing like hearing some one tell the truth to figure out when they are lying.
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Finally! The CDC's Clinical Immunization Safety Assessment Network is currently looking for subjects to "evaluate the association between viral vaccines and encephalopathy/encephalitis through a detailed evaluation of children with encephalopathy/encephalitis as well as control children".
Their message to doctors:
"If you have a patient who you think might be eligible for the study, please complete the following two questions and provide your contact information. We thank you for your help in this important study."
This is a HUGELY important subject, one we have been waiting for them to examine, and we want to make sure that they have all the subjects they need for this study, so please take a moment to see if your child might be a candidate.
Does your child have an encephalopathy?
According to HHS's Vaccine Injury Compensation Table symptoms are:
Loss of eye contact
Seizures
Not responding to external stimuli
Seems disconnected from the world around them
And the Merck Manual notes that these symptoms can be preceded by:
Nonspecific Gastrointestinal disorders.
If this sounds like your child, because boy howdy it sounds just like mine, call your pediatrician and let him know about the study to see if your child indeed has an encephalopathy and should be enrolled!
Oh wait... hold on a second... there are some exclusion criteria... Let me check them out...
Ok... so if your child has the above, but DOESN'T have:
A history of medical disease
A history of congenital problems
A history of developmental delay
Any immune system dysfunction
Any family history of immune dysfunction
Fevers and Seizures with in 72 hours
THEN they want to study them to see if their encephalopathy might have anything to do with their vaccines. You know, the HEALTHY kids with encephalitis.
So as long as the swelling in your child's brain that was caused by vaccines didn't cause or was not related to any of the above symptoms, CDC wants to get to know your child.
But that pretty much counts our all our kids... now doesn't it.
Never mind.
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