Adventures in Autism

Seth Mnookin is a Journalistic Carpetbagger Who Should Shut The Hell Up

2012-05-20T14:04:00.000-04:00

So, so sick of these people and the GARBAGE that they put out. Lost my temper a bit today.

Seth Mnookin is a guy that pretends to be a journalist, and writes hit pieces that encourage people to neglect the medical needs of children with autism. He is now attacking Autism One, about which he knows neither Jack nor Squat. My comment on his blog:

Autism One is amazing.

Seriously... it is like coming home. Being in a place where there is so much information and encouragement and people (both professionals and parents) with a driving passion to find things that will make your child's life better is like coming into the sunlight after having the crap beat out of you in a tornado.

You sit next to a mom, start chatting, figure out your child has a problem that hers used to have... "Does he also have X symptom? Have you had him tested for Y? Because Dr. M is speaking on that in two hours. Here is my phone number and email... if you think this might be what is happening with him, call me and I will get you a copy of Research Paper W, and you should call Professor T at University P. If he does have it, call me, I host a weekly conference call of parents dealing with it and they can offer tips on what worked when they did intervention Q, and what side effect L looked like in their child so you know what to be careful of."

And then you do it and he has it and you treat it and when he wakes up at 2 am with strange behavior K, and you can't your pediatrician on the phone, and Seth Mnookin is comfey in his bed and of no help... but that mom who was a stranger to you when you sat down is happy to take your call and let you know that, "Yes... 2 am Behavior K is something that we see often... it only lasts about three nights, no worries, call the doc in the morning." or "No... I have not heard that from anyone, might wanna stay up and keep an eye on it," or "Beth's son did that, and thirty minutes later he had a massive seizure. You might want to get to the ER."

Or should I call you at 2am to get your advice Seth? What with you being so invested in my child's health and functioning.

Hey... while I have you... Chandleras of late has been giggling in class a lot more, and it started at the same time that he got a mild rash on his back. Any thoughts on what that might be? Because my pediatrician never has answers to questions like this. Or should I just accept it because looking for a solution is anti-science and means I hate my child and don't accept him for who he is? Could you tutor him on the stuff he is missing in Social Studies because he can't stop thinking about how hilarious Phineas and Ferb are?

Oh... wait... I am going to Autism One in three days. There will be about 3,000 people there who will have ideas on what might be going on with him, have medical, dietary, and educational ideas on how to help him, and will be happy to call me for the next month to see how he is progressing.

But Seth Mnookin says I should not go because Jenny McCarthy likes to be naked. Gosh... tough call... find cutting edge solutions to make my beautiful baby happy, healthy, functional, social and educated from people who spend all day every day thinking about how to help kids like mine; or be in the same building with someone who is slutty. What to do, what to do.....

The things that that community has done for my son... well I cannot put into words how grateful I am for what people have risked and sacrificed and spent on our child and those like him. I have one doctor who spent 4 hours with me doing a detailed history, he guy is a fricking Columbo, and never charged me a dime. To be with people who could not give a crap what the world thinks of them, that they just want to see my baby healed and happy and living his best life... It is like walking into a hotel full of love and wisdom. And kids (and adults) can be as weird and difficult as they possibly can be, and instead of judgment and crass bitchiness like you put out... they are surrounded with understanding and affection and two dozen people with in year shot who drop what they are doing to figure out how to help (not jerks who declare them "disruptive" and have them escorted out of the building)... Seth... you are so clueless!!!

Seth... you truly have no idea how wrong, destructive and awful your writing is to children like mine. Chandlerwas severe when we started, and now he is happy, verbal and mainstreamed in a 4th grade classroom with an aid. Your opposition to biomedical treatment for children with autoimmune disorders, mito disorders, chronic viral and bacterial infections, and who have been poisoned (all of which resulted in neurological regression) is the avocation of child abuse and neglect! It is a joke. It is pathetic. It is cruel.

'Stop healing children! I declare it unscience and disallow it! Quick... get a petition out there to say we disapprove of making children healthier! Don't even TALK about new possibilities for children with autism! Put them in a closet and ACCEPT that they will stay sick, unhappy, aggressive, disconnected, confused, obsessed, anxious, afraid and stressed out beyond measure! To do otherwise is anti-science and means you hate children with autism!'

SHUT UP SETH! SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!

Autism One is freaking awesome. And strange how you don't mention that professors from Harvard also come, and that the keynote address is being given by a Nobel Prize winner.

People's children are sick and seizing and drowning and being assaulted in school, but Seth is on the story.. on the difference between "Free" and "A $25.00 processing fee?! for like two hundred hours of lectures on ALL topics autism... that is being streamed for free online?" Someone get this man a Pulitzer.

Mr. Mnookin... Go away and leave our kids alone. You clearly could not give a rodent's hiney, about our children, you have already declared parents like me who want to make their own vaccine decisions, "Total Assholes." We have registered your opinion. Now just stop talking.

Your journalistic carpet bagging is pitiful and transparent. If you were looking for a safe career move, you should realize that you came late to the party and this is a poor long term investment. If you had been making these claims like Orac in 2004, people might have listened, but biomed is now mainstream. The strange little club of people who want to let children with gut issues continue to suffer in them is coming apart quickly. Where I was mocked for taking gluten out of my son's diet eight years ago, there is now gluten free everything in every food seller in this country. And half my neighbors are gluten free to treat their own autoimmune issues!

And you did hear your friend Kurt Anderson's interview with Walter Zahorodny where he did not get the answer to the vaccine/autism question that he was quite expecting... didn't you? http://adventuresinautism.blogspot.com/2012/04/dr-walter-zahorodny-believes-vaccines.html

"Kurt Andersen (Seth Mnookin's friend): “I guess we know what they (the causes of autism) aren’t, for instance childhood vaccines. Right?”

Dr. Zahorodny: “Vaccines don’t play a significant role in autism increasing. Some small number of children probably do have autism because of an adverse vaccine reaction, but they don’t make for the overall rise.”"

If you have trouble discerning what he was saying... his answer to the yes or no question on whether vaccines can cause autism was YES! If you sit quietly and listen to which way the wind is blowing... that is happening a lot these days. But I don't know if you can hear it over the sound of you and your friends screaming "SCIENCE!!" at the top of your lungs.

The open secret it out. Vaccines can cause autoimmune reactions that cause brain inflammation that cause brain damage that cause "autism"! Addressing that autoimmunity and other factors allows the brain to heal. Addressing mito issues allow the brain to be powered. Addressing blood flow issues allows the brain to be oxygenated. Addressing GI issues allows the brain to be fed. Put it all together and the brain gets healthier and works better. THIS IS NOT ROCKET SCIENCE! It can be explained to the man on the street in 15 minutes. Everyone gets it now.

There is a reason that you are having to stomp your feet at every new media piece on vaccines, autism or biomed... because people are becoming educated, they know how much damage is being done, they know the vaccine program and the toxic assault on babies is not sustainable, that autism is a rising disaster, and that pretending that Off it is not completely absurd in his claims is not longer an option. AND YOUR BULLYING DOES NOT WORK ANY MORE, because people care more about children than they do about being in your stupid faux science club!

Have you not noticed how your world/fans/meetings/book sales are getting smaller and smaller, as ours are getting bigger and bigger?

You have stepped into the end of a dying paradigm. Best career move you could make now is to go write another book about baseball or move on to an in-depth exploration of the evolution of classic American Blues into Rap in the information age.

Or go ahead and stick around until the party is completely over. Just make sure you turn out the lights when you leave.

Stop what you are doing and feast your eyes on the Magnificance of my beatiful and talkative and excited and happy and funny and engaged boy! Remember that when we started all that "Quackery" he was only able to say "Uh Oh" and "All done" and could not even call me Mommy, look me in the eye or answer to his name.

Two weeks ago I took him to the Maine Republican Convention.

On the 30 minute wait online to get into the Augusta Civic Center, Chandler
invents a new way to hold hands with Mommy. He calls is "Backpack Mode"
and stays there for almost the entire wait. Mommy is pleased.

If you read any of the coverage, you know that it was a barn burner, and that it was two ten hour days of alternating fighting and boredom. At the end of BOTH days, I had people come up to me and say, "I just have to tell you, I have been watching your boys all day and I am really impressed with how well behaved they are." You can imagine their surprise when I told them that one of them has "autism." "It's true" I say... "We have found some wonderful medical interventions for him...." And so the conversation begins again and yet another person becomes "immune" to the inane "anti-science" rants of Mnookin and co. Because my son is awesome for ANY boy, much less a boy with "autism."

Please tell me that eight years of biomed was DANGEROUS for him and what a big mistake we made doing the same things that that stupid HO Jenny McCarthy did for her son. Tell me how I should have left him rocking in a corner and accepted him. Tell me there is no evidence that biomed makes children better. Tell me I am a bad parent for the way I have raised Chandler.

Say it Seth... I fucking DARE you!

(Angry autism mom is Angry!)

And to Ed and Teri Arranga, and Bernie Rimland before them, and all who have made my son so happy... you have all of my love and gratitude. See you all on Wednesday, at Autism One in Chicago.

Update: Not only does the legendary cowardice of Seth Mnookin continue in full force in his failure to respond to my comments to him... HE CLOSED THE COMMENTS. http://blogs.plos.org/thepanicvirus/2012/05/17/sun-times-endorsement-of-autism-quackfest-remains-online-even-after-editor-claims-it-was-incorrect/

Just want to point out the double irony of this, as his initial post included complaints against a publisher for not responding to his criticism. Hypocrisy, thy name in Mnookin.

Can't handle your critics, even when they are the actual stakeholders making legitimate points about how egregious your "journalism" is? Erroneously declare them "disruptive" and have them removed from the building. Ignore them and shut down your comments section.

Seth you are a coward and a child and your shallow, crap "reporting" on the autism epidemic just adds to the damage that your predecessors have piled up. Find a new hobby.

Romney Campaign Shenanigans at the Maine GOP Convention

2012-05-05T21:04:00.001-04:00

The whole story, including the answer to the question, "Who is Charlie Cheater?"

The long version:

The short version:

Original Post:

We interrupt our regular reporting on the corruption in the autism epidemic, to report on the corruption in the Romney for President Campaign.

So this was my day:

I think that the guy is an actual Romney campaign guy. After the video was finished, I saw him outside the venue and confronted him. He had changed his shirt as to become stealthy I guess? Not working.

I asked him who he was and he would not tell me. Where he got the slate and he said he didn't know. Why he put me on the slate and he said he didn't know.

Back in the convention hall I asked him again for his name, and no go. He was not wearing any credentials, which I am pretty sure is verboten.

I am sure we will find out who our friend is who thinks so highly of me that he wanted me to go to Tampa.

I really hate corruption. Seriously. It bothers me.

UPDATE:

So Sunday at the convention Mr. Redshirt had a name badge on. I am told it was a volunteer badge, the first name was Charlie, and that the paper was folded or something so you could not see the last name.

As an aside, I did run as an alternate delegate on the Paul slate on Sunday, and was elected. So I will be going to Tampa.

The interesting thing is that the list of people running as alternates on Sunday, had not been released on Saturday, and yet several of the people, including me, who were on the fake slate on Saturday, where the ones who would be running as alternates on Sunday. So did the Romney campaign get the Paul alternate slate the day before it was released by the Paul campaign?

Update:

Romney campaign had their top lawyer there, Benjamin Ginsberg, one of Bush's laywers during Bush v. Gore. NO WONDER the convention was so delayed! I heard Romney's lawyers were arguing every point, I didn't know they had this level of commitment to ramming Romney through in Maine. News report on the event, and Romney's fight for Maine. Good information, but most importantly it contains footage of me in better lighting. ;)

And frankly, if Ginsberg is in Maine to fight like hell for our piddly little four electoral votes, you know Romney co is seriously afraid of the fact that Ron Paul is picking up so much steam.

Update:

I am told that the man at the mic who was nominating all the people on the fake ballot (not shown on the footage) was David Sorensen (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/david-sorensen/29/939/2a7), policy aid for the Maine House of Representatives. His picture certainly looks like the man I approached at the mic to ask why he nominated me. I would feel more comfortable if we had video confirmation though. Anyone have footage of him nominating people?

Reading Sorensen's twitter feed, it seems likely that he is the guy. He clearly has the requisite contempt for Ron Paul supporters needed to try to sabotage their delegates.

It really bothers me that people in Maine government feel so comfortable speaking so poorly of a significant percentage of his fellow Mainers and his own political party (Didn't Paul garner a third of the votes at the Maine Republican Caucuses? Romney 39% and Paul with 34%.) I want grown ups running my government and setting policy, not contemptuous frat boys who look down their nose at the unwashed masses.

I also wanted to comment on the reception that the delegation got from Charlie Webster following the convention. Afterward, the elected delegation met outside with Webster and I was expecting it to be a bit stressful. I was pleasantly surprised at how congenial he was. He was very cheerful, said he knew that there would be a challenge to the delegation, but "that doesn't have anything to do with me," and "I will fight for this group." He said we should go ahead and start making plans to elect a chair for our delegation and make plans to go to Tampa.

I was very encouraged by this, and taking him at his word. I hope that this is a sign that the current Maine GOP leadership may warm to the idea that the Paul camp is here to stay, and hope that this will be the beginning of a better relationship between the groups. We will see! (another update: Charlie says the same thing on camera, and calls the convention, "Exciting" http://www.wabi.tv/news/29907/republican-chair-charlie-webster-answers-critics. "The way I look at this an election was held. We're going to fight to get our delegates seated in Tampa, that's our position. That's what we're ready to do.")

However it is pretty clear that the RNC has already chosen Romney, in violation of their own rules, and that they are likely going to work with Romney's lawyers to prevent the Maine delegation from being seated in Tampa.

Little ole' Maine is now the tipping point on the new guard/old guard fight. What the RNC does next is going to make or break the Republican party. They can either come to terms with the fact that The Ron Paul movement (because this is not completely about Paul or Romney) is growing exponentially and is now breaking through the barriers that the establishment politicos and media have constructed, and welcome them into the fold as equal members and partners, or the party will have to go to war with itself.

If they do the former, it WILL engender good faith and engender trust in the Republican party. It will tell the American people that they are ready do deal with the ugly and messy problems that they had a hand in creating.

If they do the latter, they will decimate the party.

Your move RNC.

UPDATE:

I have received requests for more videos on this. I have two other pieces that are support items for this story. I was going to put them in the initial video, but was trying to keep it short and get it uploaded quickly. Testimony from two other delegates to what was happening on Saturday afternoon:

Took a closer look at this slate. Turns out it looked like a Paul slate, but had Romney's nominees on it.

Update: Confirmation that it was David Sorensen that nominated the fake slate. From Chris Dixon:

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?375411-Maine-GOP-sabotage-Maine-House-Policy-Aide-involved

David Sorensen, a Policy Aide for the Maine House of Representatives, is confirmed as one of the Romney operatives. He took the floor to push a false delegate slate of Paul supporters in effort to divide our vote.

Two Paul supporters pressed Mr. Sorensen at different times. The first one did so outside of a County Convention room and asked him why he was pushing the slate. The response was that it was a tactic to divide the Ron Paul vote and that our people did it, too. This is false. A Paul slate was introduced to kick off nominations and that was the ONLY peep out of Paul supporters on the floor next to refusing nominations that Sorensen made. When this point was made, Sorensen kept repeating this point.

Mr. Sorensen then, upon being pressed, confessed to the division tactic, as well as the tactic to stall the convention to waste time.

Another Paul supporter had pressed David Sorensen on it, asking if he had created the false delegate slates. He denied it.

Mr. Sorensen is a Policy Aide with the Maine House Republican Office, thus having a direct connection to the Maine Republican Party. Because these two discussions happened one-on-one, there is no conclusive way to prove these words. But the proof is on the books, before the entire convention, that Mr. Sorensen did advance the slates forth.

The issue was raised by State GOP chairman Charlie Webster on the second day that if we run over 6pm, the party will be on the hook for $10,000 per hour. In the end, we were there until after 8pm.

As 6pm rolled around, it became clear that we wouldn't make it. District 2 convention was still in progress and the votes from District 1, which had run all day, were still in progress. The day was also behind schedule because GOP Platform and National Committeepeople votes were scheduled to happen on the first day, but was prevented because of multiple recounts on Convention Secretary and a highly-contested Convention Chair seat.

Representative Aaron Libby promptly took the floor and urged Paul supporters to donate money on behalf to cover the fees. Because he was a different district, he was correctly asked to leave the floor. Representative Jeff Timberlake then took over and made urged people to donate a little each.

The fact still remains however:

There is question that an individual, directly associated with the Maine Republican Party, deliberately engaged in stall tactics that not only propelled the convention into chaos, but put the Republican Party on the hook for $20,000.

...but Ron Paul people are the bad guys? You be the judge.

Update (Tuesday morning):

Got a note this morning with more info on Charlie. He does work for the Mitt Romney campaign according to Conor O'Brian, who lives only one town over from me:

Ginger I have posted regarding your video with the fake slate guy that indeed 'Charlie' was a Romney person. I was a volunteer Ron Paul vote counter from Bath and that dude was one of the Romney observers. I was in the counting room on every count as was he. On the last recount I (Conor O'Brien is my name), sat across from a Ron Paul observer named John Hawk Cry (or something like that) and to my left was Charlie. By this time I knew he was a fiend but wanted to dig a little bit for info. He was originally from California but now lives in the Boston area.

Update (Wed afternoon):

Apparently the RNC Parliamentarian that was working with Brent Tweed to run the meeting said that everything was done by the book, which makes the Romney challenge to seating the Maine Delegation at the RNC a bit more difficult. And as that particular parliamentarian was an editor on the book on Roberts Rules, I am guessing he has some street cred on that issue.

Update:

Safe to say that "Charlie" is employed by the Romney Campaign. This was posted to the Daily Paul today http://www.dailypaul.com/232160/charlie-the-maine-fake-slate-guy:

Charlie, the Maine fake slate guy
Submitted by ph pearse on Wed, 05/09/2012 - 18:25
in
Ron Paul 2012
Maine

I just googled Benjamin Ginsberg, Romney's lawyer....I was one of a few counters left at the end of the day on Sunday. Mr. Ginsberg came over and said goodbye to our friend Charlie and even commented on him getting back to Boston. This all took place with in two feet of me. The cheating is being orchestrated by Romney's/Bush's top lawyer. Beware states yet to hold your convention, the sore losers will be coming to a theatre near you!

Fire Tom Insel

2012-04-13T09:21:00.004-04:00

Chandler woke up at 3am and cried because it was not 6am. After I finally got him back to sleep, all I could do was lay in bed and stew about what a corrupt and horrible man Tom Insel is for working so hard to keep our kids trapped in autism land, and to fill our ranks with new families that have their children poisoned every day, that I had to get out of bed and get the bad thoughts out of my brain.

So this.

Kim Stagliano Sues The Bus Company That Allowed The Abuse Of Her Bella

2012-04-06T10:16:00.000-04:00

Mother sues bus company over daughter's treatment

This story is so hard for me. Because of who Kim is and because who Bella is.

First they are my friends, and I am horrified that this happened to them.

Second Kim is a nationally known autism activist and author, and if someone feels bold enough to abuse her daughter, then none of our children are safe.

Lastly, and most importantly, if you have ever met Bella, you know she is a complete angel. She is so interested in people, and wants to engage them, but can only say, "Hello" and "Momma" and is just... well a total angel. When she met Chandler, she was taken by him, but silly boy apparently not at the point where he noticed cute girls yet.

When someone can be so monstrous to do this to a little girl as sweet and precious as Bella, for literally no reason, even taunting her mother after she leaves the bus... to say that this is a difficult story for me is an understatement.

Once upon a time I thought, "gosh... if people would just work out their differences and stop suing each other...." Now I understand that when it comes to protecting our vulnerable kids, they are necessary. I understand that on many occasions the only reason that my son is being treated appropriately is because those that came before me sued the pants off of (insert entity here) and forced them to take the rights of disabled children seriously.

Go get 'um Kim. So that for years providers will point to this case and say to their employees, "Yes I know reviewing hours of video tape is boring, but if we miss something and a child is being hurt, we could loose our shirts and have to shut down." Because for too many people, the idea of loosing lots of money will motivate is a way that the thought of an abused child on their watch never will.

BRIDGEPORT -- The mother of a 9-year-old Trumbull girl with autism, who police said was abused by an aide on her school bus while the aide's mother was busy texting while driving the bus, is suing the bus company.
Kimberly Stagliano claims, in her lawsuit filed Thursday in Superior Court, that First Student Inc. breached its responsibility to provide her daughter, Isabella, with safe transportation to and from school.
"As a direct result of the conduct of First Student Inc. and its employees, the minor child suffered permanent personal injuries and damages," said Stagliano's lawyer, Michael Meehan. "In particular, the conduct of First Student Inc.'s employee has had an emotional and educational impact on Miss Stagliano."
Officials of First Student, of Cincinnati, did not immediately return calls for comment.
Last April, 24-year-old Jennifer Davila, a school bus aide for First Student, was given a suspended sentence after pleading guilty to second-degree reckless endangerment based on allegations that she abused the girl. Her mother, Evelyn Guzman, a school bus driver, received accelerated rehabilitation, a program for first-time nonviolent offenders.
According to police, on at least three occasions in April and May 2010, Davila, a monitor on a bus for special needs children for First Student, abused the little girl. Police said there could have been more incidents but only three were captured on the bus's video surveillance camera.
Police said the girl's parents were trying to figure out how their nonverbal daughter kept getting bruises and sprained fingers on her right hand when on May 19 they received a call from the nurse at Frenchtown Elementary School that their daughter had arrived at school that morning crying hysterically. The parents then demanded to see the video from their daughter's school bus.
That video, which also had audio, showed Davila grabbing the girl's hands and the girl then crying out in pain.
Police said they then obtained DVD copies of the bus videos for April 27, April 29 and May 19, 2010. On April 27 and May 19, the driver of the bus is Davila's mother.
Police said the April 27 video shows Davila putting her hands in the area of the girl's hands during the bus ride from the school to the girl's home. With each movement, the girl's cries get louder.
On the April 29 video, Davila is heard telling a substitute driver to stop at the girl's home first after they leave the school. "Because she (the girl) will (obscenity) her pants," she explains. Within minutes of leaving the school, the video shows Davila again reaching toward the girl's hands, and the girl is heard crying.
On May 19, the girl is seen on the video boarding the bus with her mother, who assists her to her seat. When the mother leaves the bus, Davila is heard saying, "Goodbye mom." She then touches the girl's head twice and then grabs the girl's right hand and begins to manipulate it as the girl whimpers.
Police said Guzman had been captured on the bus's video camera texting more than 1,000 times as she drove a bus load of special needs children between April and May 2010.
dtepfer@ctpost.com; 203-330-6308; http:// twitter.com/dantepfer

Hepatitis B Vaccine Causes Mitochondrial Disorders and Cell Death

2012-04-06T09:22:00.000-04:00

Apoptosis. 2012 Jan 17. [Epub ahead of print]

Hepatitis B vaccine induces apoptotic death in Hepa1-6 cells.

Hamza H, Cao J, Li X, Li C, Zhu M, Zhao S.

Source

Key Lab of Agricultural Animal Genetics, Breeding, and Reproduction of Ministry of Education, College of Animal Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, People's Republic of China, Heyam68_hamza@yahoo.com.

Abstract

Vaccines can have adverse side-effects, and these are predominantly associated with the inclusion of chemical additives such as aluminum hydroxide adjuvant. The objective of this study was to establish an in vitro model system amenable to mechanistic investigations of cytotoxicity induced by hepatitis B vaccine, and to investigate the mechanisms of vaccine-induced cell death. The mouse liver hepatoma cell line Hepa1-6 was treated with two doses of adjuvanted (aluminium hydroxide) hepatitis B vaccine (0.5 and 1 μg protein per ml) and cell integrity was measured after 24, 48 and 72 h. Hepatitis B vaccine exposure increased cell apoptosis as detected by flow cytometry and TUNEL assay. Vaccine exposure was accompanied by significant increases in the levels of activated caspase 3, a key effector caspase in the apoptosis cascade. Early transcriptional events were detected by qRT-PCR. We report that hepatitis B vaccine exposure resulted in significant upregulation of the key genes encoding caspase 7, caspase 9, Inhibitor caspase-activated DNase (ICAD), Rho-associated coiled-coil containing protein kinase 1 (ROCK-1), and Apoptotic protease activating factor 1 (Apaf-1). Upregulation of cleaved caspase 3,7 were detected by western blot in addition to Apaf-1 and caspase 9 expressions argues that cell death takes place via the intrinsic apoptotic pathway in which release of cytochrome c from the mitochondria triggers the assembly of a caspase activation complex. We conclude that exposure of Hepa1-6 cells to a low dose of adjuvanted hepatitis B vaccine leads to loss of mitochondrial integrity, apoptosis induction, and cell death, apoptosis effect was observed also in C2C12 mouse myoblast cell line after treated with low dose of vaccine (0.3, 0.1, 0.05 μg/ml). In addition In vivo apoptotic effect of hepatitis B vaccine was observed in mouse liver.

Tom Insel's Lame Attempt to Save His Job

2012-04-04T14:58:00.000-04:00

Monday our community called for the unceremonious firing of The man who has spent the last six years perpetuating the autism epidemic by sabotaging the natural progress of research and inquiry. IACC chief Tom Insel (brother to a vaccine maker) has directed research from this environmentally caused epidemic to genetics... wasting millions of dollars and lives.

So about ten minutes ago, Insel sends out a link to a new blog he has written entitled:

The New Genetics of Autism – Why Environment Matters

So my immediate thought is... "Well apparently we have gotten his attention, and he is going to now have to tip his had to environmental causes to stay in the game. Let's see what he has to say."

Well he certainly starts out asking the right questions:

Increasing prevalence suggests environmental factors like chemicals and microbes changing over the past decade, whereas genes change over generations. Why is anyone looking for genetic causes when there is such a rapid increase in prevalence? Shouldn’t every research dollar be invested in finding the environmental culprit rather than searching for rare gene variants?

Imagine my shock when he then fails to answer those burning questions and, who would have guessed it, he spent the whole piece promoting GENETICS! The thing actually should have been entitled, "The New Genetics of Autism - Why Genes Matter - Seriously They Do - Please Don't Fire Me - I'm Really Smart."

Un-freaking-believable!

He flat out says that at most 20% of cases are "genetic," and that seems to be his justification for not answering "Hell, YES!" to that last question on shouldn't research dollars be going to environmental causes!

He does say of course the obligatory, "environment plays a role," but even freely admits that genetic research will NOT find environmental causes! But hey... lets keep pouring our time, money and children down that bottomless pit called 'Genetic Research on Autism.'

This what I see when I read this horrid essay:

Hi. I'm Tom Insel.

I have been entrusted with finding the causes and cures of autism for the last six years, but instead, autism rates have more than doubled on my watch. I freely admit that more than 80% of autism is environmental, and less than 20% can be attributed to genetic causes, but I have decided to ignore the environmental factors in autism that could, if found and quickly addressed to prevent exposures, could end the autism epidemic in the next two or three birth cohorts.

Instead, I am going to continue to pour hundreds of millions of tax payer dollars into genetic studies that have not yet prevented one case of autism, nor lead to one medical treatment for autism, into this dead end, just in case we find something really cool that might help us call some kinds of autism one thing and some kinds of autism something else. They still won't tell us what we can do to prevent autism in kids of parents who have these genes, and it might even be that the genes are not even the parents genes, but genes that get broken in the sperm cells cause they are poisoned or microwaved or whatever in daddy's drawers before conception, but still... how cool is it to find different genes and stuff!

My earnest hope has been that you wouldn't notice that I have already wasted 700 million dollars doing nothing and issuing reports that say nothing except, "send me more money to figure this out, I am totally gonna fix this, I swear... but it is just so hard!", but as a hundred thousand or so of you in the autism community have just called for me to be fired, I am guessing that is out the door. So now I am really just hoping that I can get away with using the word "environmental" in a title on my blog and you will be fooled into thinking I am taking the autism epidemic seriously.

Failing that, I can only hope that you have decided that I am an ineffectual douchbag who does not have the competence to figure this out, because if that does not fly, it will be super apparent to anyone to takes a hard look at me that I am a corrupt bastard trying to preserve my brother Dick's interest and those of the Administrations big donors. Also HHS... please don't notice that we are actually a vaccine maker too, and get cash payments from the people you THINK are making the vaccines, like Merck, cause we hold patents on the shots that we recommend you buy from them. (Have you heard about my brother Dick? Yyou see he brought a vaccine to market, sold the company to Wyeth, then went to work trying to cure diabetes. See what he did there... make a product that causes autoimmune disorders, then make a bundle treating autoimmune disorders! Money coming and going... genius really. He is the smarter brother, I will give him that.)

Also about HHS... please don't notice that we are actually a vaccine maker too, and get cash payments from the people you THINK are making the vaccines, like Merck, cause we hold patents on the shots that we recommend you buy from them. Yes I work for NIH and yes NIH holds the Gardasil patent, and yes NIH gets a check for every Gardasil shot you buy, and no we never disclose that, but I swear... vaccines are not a problem. It genes. Really.

In closing, please notice what a pleasant smile I have. Autism parents are good people.

Full text of the blog piece:

Director’s Blog
April 04, 2012
The New Genetics of Autism – Why Environment Matters
Thomas Insel
Last week’s autism news was about prevalence. The CDC reported a 78 percent increase in autism prevalence since 2002. This week’s autism news is about genetics—three papers in Nature describe new genes associated with autism. For many people, these two stories seem contradictory or, at best, unrelated. Increasing prevalence suggests environmental factors like chemicals and microbes changing over the past decade, whereas genes change over generations. Why is anyone looking for genetic causes when there is such a rapid increase in prevalence? Shouldn’t every research dollar be invested in finding the environmental culprit rather than searching for rare gene variants?
The simple answer is that some autism is genetic. Autism, like schizophrenia and mood disorders, includes many syndromes. Indeed, we should probably speak of the “autisms.” Some of these autisms are single gene disorders, such as Fragile X, tuberous sclerosis, and Rett syndrome. While these rare genetic disorders account for less than 5 percent of children within the autism spectrum, children with any of these disorders are at high risk for autism, roughly a 30-fold higher risk than the general population and higher than any of the other known risk factors. Recent genomics research has discovered that many children diagnosed within the autism spectrum have other genetic mutations that have not yet been designated as named syndromes. Each of these mutations is rare, but in aggregate they may account for 10 - 20 percent or more of what we have been calling the autisms.¹
The new papers published today in Nature use an approach called whole exome sequencing, mapping every base of DNA across the exome—the 1.5 percent of the genome known to code for protein. The three research groups are members of the Autism Sequencing Consortium (ASC), an international team of autism genetics researchers. All three look for de novo or spontaneous mutations, changes in DNA sequence that are not found in either parent. Recent sequencing studies in the general population have demonstrated that each of us diverges genomically from our parents — the process of reproduction introduces variation even beyond the random mixture of the genomes we inherit from mom and dad. People with autism and schizophrenia are far more likely to have large de novo copy number variants, sometimes a million bases of DNA that are abnormally duplicated or deleted and not found in either parent.
These new papers go beyond the previous discovery of de novo copy number variants to identify de novo single base changes associated with autism. This is tough sailing because there are so many of these changes in all of us and most of these single base changes have no impact. These studies tried to improve the odds of success by focusing on individuals from families with no one else affected (these are called “simplex” families), and sometimes comparing the individual with autism to a sibling without autism. The results are intriguing.
There is no breakthrough or single gene that is a major new cause of autism. But the role of genetics becomes even more evident when these single base changes are considered. For instance, an individual with autism is nearly 6-fold more likely to have a functional variant in genes expressed in the brain. Sanders et al. estimate as many as 14 percent of affected individuals have such a risk variant.² This 14 percent is in addition to the 10–20 percent with a large copy number variant or identified genetic syndrome. O’Roak et al. find that 39 percent of these variants are related to a specific biochemical pathway, important for brain signaling.³ And Neale et al., while cautioning that the net effect of all of these changes still leave much of the risk for autism unexplained, note the roles of a few specific genes as genuine risk factors.⁴
Stepping back from this flood of genomic information, what is most important? First, these reports along with previous publications confirm that genetic risk is both complex and substantial. While individual genes appear to confer limited risk, the aggregate effect of spontaneous coding mutations across the genome is now estimated to increase the risk of autism by 5–20-fold.⁴ Complex genetics does not mean modest effects.
Second, the kinds of small and large genetic changes associated with autism are common in everyone. Risk is conferred not by the size of the mutation or the number of mutations (we all have many) but by the location. Increasingly, we see that interference with the genes involved in development of synapses confer risk; a similar change upstream or downstream does not.
A third point takes us back to the questions we started with. It is important to understand that de novo mutations may represent environmental effects. In other words, environmental factors can cause changes in our DNA that can raise the risk for autism and other disorders. One of these papers reports that spontaneous changes are four times more likely to show up in paternally inherited DNA and are correlated with paternal age.² The father’s germline, his sperm cells, turn over throughout the lifespan. Presumably, with advancing paternal age, there are a greater number of spontaneous mutations and a greater likelihood that some of these will affect risk genes. Environmental factors and exposures can cause sperm cells to develop mutations that are not found in the father’s somatic, or body cell, DNA, but these new, spontaneous mutations can be passed to the next generation, raising the risk for developing autism. In the initial report of the relationship between autism and paternal age, boys with autism were 6-fold more likely to have a father in his 40s vs his 20s. In girls with autism, this difference went up to 17-fold.⁵ Paternal age has, of course, increased in the past few decades. This does not explain the increasing prevalence of autism, but it may contribute.
Is autism genetic or environmental? These new studies suggest it can be both. Genetics will not identify the environmental factors, but it may reveal some of the many syndromes within the autism spectrum (as in other neurodevelopmental disorders), it can define risk (as in other medical disorders), and it should yield clues to the biology of autism (revealing potential targets for new treatments). These three new papers on spontaneous mutations are an important milestone in a long journey. In parallel we need to find environmental factors, recognizing that there will be many causes for the autisms and many roads to find them.
Finally, an unavoidable insight from these new papers is that autism even when genetic may be spontaneous and not inherited in the sense that one or both parents carry some reduced form of the syndrome. Perhaps this insight will finally reduce the “blame the parents” legacy perpetuated for too long in the absence of scientific evidence.
References
¹Geschwind DH. Genetics of autism spectrum disorders. Trends Cogn Sci. 2011 Sep;15(9):409-16. Epub 2011 Aug 18. PubMed PMID: 21855394.1
²Sanders SJ, Murtha MT, Gupta AR, Murdoch JD, Raubeson MJ, Willsey AJ, Ercan-Sencicek AG, DiLullo NM, Parikshak NN, Stein JL, Walker MF, Ober GT, Teran NA, Song Y, El-Fishawy P, Murtha RC, Choi M, Overton JD, Bjornson RD, Carriero NJ, Meyer KA, Bilguvar K, Mane SM, Sestan N, Lifton RP, Günel M, Roeder K, Geschwind DH, Devlin B, State MW. De novo mutations revealed by whole-exome sequencing are strongly associated with autism. April 5, 2012. Nature.
³O’Roak BJ, Vives L, Girirajan S, Karakoc E, Krumm N, Coe BP, Levy R, Ko A, Lee C, Smith JD, Turner EH, Stanaway IB, Vernot B, Malig M, Baker C, Reilly B, Akey JM, Borenstein E, Rieder MJ, Nickerson DA, Bernier R, Shendure J, Eichler EE. Sporadic autism exomes reveal a highly interconnected protein network of de novo mutations. Nature. April 5, 2012.
⁴Neale BM, Kou Y, Liu L, Ma’ayan A, Samocha KE, Sabo A, Lin CF, Stevens C, Wang LS, Makarov V, Polak P, Yoon S, Maguire J, Crawford EL, Campbell NG, Geller ET, Valladares O, Schafer C, Liu H, Zhao T, Cai G, Lihm J, Dannenfelser R, Jabado O, Peralta Z, Nagaswamy U, Muzny D, Reid JG, Newsham I, Wu Y, Lewis L, Han Y, Voight BF, Lim E, Rossin E, Kirby A, Flannick J, Fromer M, Shair K, Fennell T, Garimella K, Banks E, Poplin R, Gabriel S, DePristo M, Wimbish JR, Boone BE, Levy SE, Betancur C, Sunyaev S, Boerwinkle E, Buxbaum JD, Cook EH, Devlin B, Gibbs RA, Roeder K, Schellenberg GD, Sutcliffe JS, Daly MJ. Patterns and rates of exonic de novo mutations in autism spectrum disorders. Nature. April 5, 2012.
⁵Reichenberg A, Gross R, Weiser M, Bresnahan M, Silverman J, Harlap S, Rabinowitz J, Shulman C, Malaspina D, Lubin G, Knobler HY, Davidson M, Susser E. Advancing paternal age and autism. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2006 Sep;63(9):1026-32. PubMed PMID: 16953005.
Learn more about: Autism, Children and Adolescents, Genetics. View all posts about: Autism, Children and Adolescents,Genetics.

Dr. Walter Zahorodny Believes Vaccines Cause Autism. And Geri Dawson???

2012-04-03T12:47:00.000-04:00

From a Radio Listener in NYC:

I was listening this AM to WNYC – Kurt Andersen, of all hostile people, did a segment on the ADDM numbers with Walter Zahorodny, assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark. Zahorodny was the lead researcher on the New Jersey portion of the study.

Kurt Andersen (Seth Mnookin's friend): “I guess we know what they (the causes of autism) aren’t, for instance childhood vaccines. Right?”

Dr. Zahorodny: “Vaccines don’t play a significant role in autism increasing. Some small number of children probably do have autism because of an adverse vaccine reaction, but they don’t make for the overall rise.”

D'oh!

What's that you say Dr. Z? Vaccines don't cause most autism, but they do cause some autism?? You don't say?!

When the brainwashed "science media" can't even get those involved in the research to hold the "vaccines do not cause autism" line any more... we can be assured that the Hungry Lie is falling apart in earnest and the end of the vaccine age is near.

If anyone can confirm or has audio, would love to hear it.

UPDATE:

Confirmation. Starts at 13:20:

It is CRAZY how blase he is about this. Like he is reporting a light rain moving in from the west in the late afternoon. Drops a bomb and strolls on by.

Worth listening to the whole interview as it counters many of the media talking points.

His thoughts are that:

NJ high rate is because they have a better reporting system and they looked at both educational and medical records, where other states only looked at medical records, so other states are likely as high as NJ
The increase is real
The NJ 2002 rate and this number is a real increase because the reporting system was designed to measure that exactly
Fluctuations due to 1994 DSM4 changes would have been settled in the first years and would not impact rates now
Most cases they found were serious autism, not a load of high functioning cases that would have been mised before
DSM5 will "muddy the waters" on autism tracking

UPDATE:

So is Geri Dawson joining Dr. Zahorodny? Looks that way to me!

Only a year ago, Autism Speaks science director Geri Dawson said we are not allowed to talk about vaccines any more. But now she says this...

Tom Ashbrook interviewed her on NPR:

Ashbrook: "Dr. Dawson, here's a question online from Melrose, has the link between MMR vaccine and autism been completely discredited. I notice that the word 'vaccine' has not even come up so far in this hour. Is that...for some years that had a lot of attention, is that off the table now, Dr. Dawson?"

Dr. Dawson: "There is no evidence that the increase in prevalence that we're seeing in Autism Spectrum Disorder is linked to the MMR vaccine. You know, if vaccines play a role, and there has not been any evidence thus far to show that it has, it would be a very small minority of individuals who have an underlying medical condition where the vaccine may have triggered an onset of symptoms for an already existing condition or vulnerability. So we do not believe that vaccines are an explanation of the increase and we strongly encourage parents to get their children vaccinated."

So again... thrown the softball and didn't take it!

Ashbrook, like Andersen, took the initiative of bringing the vaccine question into the interview, and in both cases it was merely an invitation to declare the vaccine hypothesis DOA. And neither Zahorodny or Dawson took the opportunity to do so!

They BOTH could have said, "Correct." And just moved on. But they didn't!

They both contradicted their interviewers presumptive statements, and said a version of, "Incorrect, vaccines do cause autism in some children, and it is a smaller number of cases than people think, but I don't see that vaccine induced autism could be playing a major factor in the increase."

IMHO... no way in h-e-double hockey sticks that these two didn't know exactly what they were doing. They had every chance to run from vaccine causation and they didn't. They confirmed it. Then they minimized it.

We have just witnessed the very quiet pushing of the envelope. Dr. Geri Dawson and Dr. Walter Zahorodny have just joined you and me and all our friends in taking our position that vaccines cause some cases of autism, just not all the cases of autism. Now we are only separated by the degree in which we believe the vaccine induced autism is a factor in the skyrocketing autism numbers.

Geri said something very interesting... and true...

"You know, if vaccines play a role [in rising autism prevalence], and there has not been any evidence thus far to show that it has."

...if by "evidence" of course, she means "scientific research" because there is plenty of data to show that vaccines cause autism, but none that I know of to show how often vaccines cause autism. Remember... we are all still pretending that it doesn't happen at all. So can you imagine the research funding proposal that would read, "It has been established that vaccines are one of the causes of autism, this team endeavors to discover how much of the rise in autism cases are due to vaccine induced autism." HA! Betcha Autism Speaks and CDC would just THROW money at that ask!

Which brings us back to the statement that David Bowman of HRSA issued three years ago:

"The government has never compensated, nor has it ever been ordered to compensate, any case based on a determination that autism was actually caused by vaccines. We have compensated cases in which children exhibited an encephalopathy, or general brain disease. Encephalopathy may be accompanied by a medical progression of an array of symptoms including autistic behavior, autism, or seizures.
Some children who have been compensated for vaccine injuries may have shown signs of autism before the decision to compensate, or may ultimately end up with autism or autistic symptoms, but we do not track cases on this basis."

Not even the government keeps track of their own cases of vaccine induced autism!

So do vaccines cause autism? YES! Now we just need to know how often that happens!

I Want To Punch Autism Celebration Day In The Damn Throat

2012-04-02T05:45:00.000-04:00

Light it up blue!

So how * many years are we going to do this?

Hey America! 1 in 88 of your children is disabled for life (up 23% from two years ago, but no worries, just better diagnosing!)... they will cost a few million each to raise and care for, few will marry or have fulfilling careers, they will be bullied by peers, neglected by school systems, abused by caregivers and sexually assaulted by predators when you turn your back. Many will die from seizures, anaphylaxis, drownings, accidents, negligent homicides and be murdered long before their time, and at best, they still won't be able to fully communicate with you, the parent, who longs to have a close relationship with your baby.

They will struggle every day in ways I never will.

Most of this is, of course, entirely preventable, as CDC, AAP, HHS, AS et. al. knows * full well that this is an environmentally caused epidemic, as autism didn't even exist in the medical literature before the 1940s, but instead of actually facing that there is a society altering problem... a course of history altering problem...

Lets * Celebrate * Autism Day And Make Things * Blue!

('Cause Autism Speaks needs some more cash for their * Park Avenue offices... the economy has been rough on them you know... Geri Dawson had her * salary cut from $640,000 to $435,000 for her super intense job of looking very busy and important while NOT * curing autism.)

So * sick of this garbage. Off to celebrate this * day at a * IEP. Pretty sure that everyone in the room will be wearing party hats and telling me how thrilled they are that my child has autism, what with autism being something to celebrate and all...

* feel free to mentally reinsert the curse words that I removed before publishing. I am angry.

Just reposing my column from last year:

World Autism Awareness Day: Autism Exists, Let's Celebrate? Even Though It's Killing our Children?

April 2, 2011

My regular readers already know how I feel about Autism Awarness Day/Month. Everyone is aware already, how about actually doing something about it? No... instead let's just wear blue and do nothing. Except, of course, give money to Autism Speaks. Their party budget is getting low and Geri Dawson has horses to feed.*

Anne Dachel makes the case yet again this year:

I have a hard time each year with AUTISM AWARENESS DAY/MONTH. This is the Fourth Annual International Autism Awareness Day. How long are we going to pretend that all this autism is normal and acceptable? Seriously, how bad do the numbers have to get?

A number of stories out in the news calling for the public to "celebrate" the day. Today is World Autism Awareness Day by Kristina Chew "Today, April 2, is the fourth annual World Autism Awareness Day, during which 'autism organizations around the world celebrate the day with unique fundraising and awareness-raising events.' "

Pueblo Chieftain: Blue balloons raise autism awareness, "The baby blue balloons that Jonah and his classmates at Beulah Heights Elementary School released were to celebrate the beginning of National Autism Awareness Month. The event is celebrated each April, while the World Autism Awareness Day is today."

Sioux Falls Argus Leader: 5 questions: Shedding light on autism, "The falls will be colored blue by lights in support of the Autism Speaks' global Light It Up Blue campaign to celebrate World Autism Awareness Day and Autism Awareness Month."

Lufkin Daily News: Peavy students working to raise autism awareness, "Because of the prominence of the disorder in boys, blue is the official color for autism awareness and the reason the entire Peavy campus was encouraged to don the color Friday to celebrate Autism Awareness Month."

Berkshires.com: Diversity Takes Center Stage in the Berkshires, "'We have so many people supporting this committee right now,' said MaryLee Daniels, director of the Berkshire office of the Department of Developmental Services, and committee member.

"BFAIR, BCArc, the list goes on as to how many organizations support this initiative. We especially want people to join us in celebrating three different months of diversity. Of course, last month was Black History month. This month is Developmental Disabilities month and next month is Autism Awareness month. We have so much to celebrate here."

What is there to celebrate?

Lots of stories are about lighting things up in blue for autism awareness. Lots of them talk about autism being a developmental disorder affecting one percent of children whose cause is unknown. This is done without any alarm or demand for answers. We have been conditioned to accept autism as the perpetual mystery.

As the parent of a son in his 20’s with autism, I’ve had several decades of experts knowing nothing about this disorder. Is this to be the epidemic without a cause?

Looming in the background is the reality of what autism is doing to us. As I listen to the dire predictions about the hard economic times we're in and the need for austerity, I have to ask how in the world we're going to address the needs of the generation of children with autism about to descend on America as adults.

Dr. Thomas Insel is the wet blanket in all this celebration, acceptance, and awareness of autism.

He's the head of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee created by Congress to deal with with the disorder and he says that 80 percent of Americans with autism are under the age of 18. He's warned us we have to prepare for a million dependent adults "who may be in need of significant services." The IACC now calls autism "a national health emergency."

Maybe a better name for April 2 is World Autism Emergency Day.

Anne Dachel
Media editor: Age of Autism

Anne is right. And I gotta wonder, exactly how long this PR BS is going to continue.

And the biomed community isn't even being remotely polite about this any more. These are the two images that are being passed around on facebook today:

Last year I began a new blog. Lives Lost to Autism. I got more than a little bit sick of the blatant fear mongering of death by diseases that are NOT killing Americans, like measles, while the deaths of our children caused by their autism go unlamented and ignored by health authorities.

Last year 10 children died of Pertussis and the response was a national campaign to get people vaccinated (both adults and children), new state vaccine mandates are being pushed through, and the press on it has been everywhere. Last year at least 27 children and adults died as a direct result of autism, and unless you are in the autism community, or one of these deaths happened in your town, you probably never knew it. Even then, it is always an isolated incident, yes? (There were 41 reported deaths following the pertussis vaccine last year, but that is a whole other story.)

And those 27 autism deaths are only the ones who came across my google alerts for "autism deaths" or "autism died" or "autism drowning." The test I use on how to include them is basically, "would this have happened to this this person was neurotypical?" Who knows how many more went unreported or didn't get picked up by google. I would love to quote an actual statistic on how often autism kills, or how their incidence of premature death compares to the general population, but no public health agency cares enough to track this.

But insurance companies, whose bottom lines are effected by deaths and actually need to know if autism is deadly, won't sell life insurance policies on children with autism younger than 10, because it is not a good risk for them. See the problem there?

Our precious ones drowned, were murdered by caretakers and loved ones, were shot by police, suffocated while being restrained, were hit by cars, burned to death in fires, died from neglect and were killed by seizures. A few of them even killed others during their own melt downs.

Bryan Nevins, age 20, died because, on a hot day, he could not simply open the door of a van and get out. His institutional caretaker was on her cell phone and forgot about him for five hours. She is in jail now.

Autism kills and our government could not give less of a damn.

Autism Speaks doesn't seem to want to make that point that autism kills more than whooping cough, because then the public might actually begin to see this as a public health emergency and demand results... and then were would AS be? The party financing would dry up. Better for them to let autism linger and keep sucking up cash from suckers as they pretend to do something about it. Autism Speaks has found quite the cash cow.

(Speaking of... Guidestar finally posted AS's 2009 tax returns... they took in 45.5 million, and less than a quarter of it went to grants to do what the purported purpose of the org is, "Autism Speaks (AS) funds research into the causes, prevention, treatment and cure for autism. AS raises public awareness about autism and its effects on individuals, families, and society. AS aims to bring the autism community together to urge government and the provate sector to take action to address this urgent global health crisis." Of the whole list, "autism awareness" is the only thing that I think they actually have accomplished since their inception.)

And HHS's admissions that yes, vaccines CAN AND DO CAUSE AUTISM would mean that HHS has been able to do something about this FOR YEARS and has not done it. It means that those vaccine cases can be avoided by screening for mitochondrial disorders, autoimmunity and toxicity, and treated early on if doctors were actually taught that "vaccine induced encephalopathy" exists and if recognized and treated immediately that it may minimize or even prevent many cases of autism from developing.

And that might also mean that the people who have been sitting on this information for years, and decades, might suffer some consequences.

But AS has decided to ignore HHS's own claims of vaccine autism causation and openly declared that everyone should stop talking about the vaccine autism link.

Better that we just "wear blue" because dealing with all that ugliness would just be too ugly.

This is my post on "Autism Awareness" from 2008 entitled, "Insensitive Jerk Makes a Good Point". Nick sees all the signs that tell him that Autism is everywhere, but tells him nothing about what to do about it. And this was three years ago. I should try to track Nick down and see if he has figured out what he can do about it yet.

HAPPY PHONY, BS, ARCHAIC, DESCRIPTION OF BEHAVIORS DIAGNOSIS THAT TELLS US NOTHING ABOUT WHAT IS GOING ON MEDICALLY SO WE CAN KEEP IGNORING THE TOXIC CAUSES OF WHATEVER THE HELL IT REALLY IS WHILE IT CONTINUES TO KILL PEOPLE CELEBRATION DAY!

Make sure you wear blue, write a check to AS, vaccinate your baby, give him a dose of Tylenol, feed him GMO's and then go back to sleep. They experts are handling it for you.

Insensitive Jerk Makes a Good Point
By Ginger Taylor, Adventures In Autism
APRIL 13, 2008

Last week Nick Jameson, college smart ass, wrote a piece on his reaction to the autism awareness campaign currently under way. One currently struggling with autism might be put off by his callousness until one remembers that he is only 22 and that we were all pretty much insensitive smart asses at 22.

I would encourage all to allow Nick a chance to grow and check back with him in 10 years or so when he is expecting his first child and see if maturity has tempered his stance.

But what is useful from Nick, random college punk, is this reaction:

For example, what is the purpose of putting up a billboard that is telling me a child is born with autism every 20 minutes? What can I possibly do other than sit in my car and mutter to myself, “Well that sucks.” Maybe if there was a cure or even ways to help prevent autism, it might make more sense to have a billboard. Then it would reinforce concepts in people’s head that they could apply later like “only you could prevent forest fires” or “don’t eat cheese before noon.” But frankly, all this billboard is really saying is, “Beware, autistic people are everywhere,” and I’m sure that isn’t the message they want to get across. We already know autism exists; give us something we can work with. If the autism front wants to put us through a year of sappy ads and TV specials, than at least make it worth the time and money and headache. Teach us something. I was on my way to New York City this weekend and every toll booth was littered with autism propaganda. Did I learn anything? No. There are more intelligent ways to get out a message to the public.

Does Nick know that there are successful treatments available? Does Nick know that there are some kids who are completely recover from autism? Does Nick know that there are things that he can do to prevent his own children (should he ever become soft hearted enough for a woman to agree to marry and/or procreate with him) from slipping in to autism?

Apparently not. And that is the fault of the media who won't report the whole story.

So our young Nick has made a great point. One that parents like me have been trying to make for years now. "Autism Exists" is a message that everyone got a few years back now. But the important message, "Autism is Treatable and Preventable" is one that the media will not share with him.

What is it going to take for them to tell the whole story?

In ten years, when Nick is expecting, will he have heard this message from the media? Or, like us, will he hear it from another parent on the playground after Nick Jr. is diagnosed with autism?

Addendum: Autism Speaks had a huge chance this month to get the treatment message out and yet again, they are screwing children by with holding the important message. They certainly have the cash to do it.

/End 2008 article

*Ok... I actually have no idea if Geri Dawson has horses, but I do know she lives on a ranch or a farm or something, so horses... not out of the question really.

Conflicts of Interest in Vaccine Safety Research

2012-03-21T15:45:00.003-04:00

Conflicts of Interest in Vaccine Safety Research

Accountability in Research. 19:65-88. 2012

Gayle DeLong, Department of Economics and Finance, Baruch College, New York,
New York, USA

Conflicts of interest (COls) cloud vaccine safety research. Sponsors of research have competing interests that may impede the objective study of vaccine side effects. Vaccine manufacturers, health officials, and medical journals may have financial and bureaucratic reasons for not wanting to acknowledge the risks of vaccines. Conversely, some advocacy groups may have legislative and financial reasons to sponsor research that finds risks in vaccines. Using the vaccine-autism debate as an illustration, this article details the conflicts of interest each of these groups faces, outlines the current state of vaccine safety research, and suggests remedies to address COls. Minimizing COls in vaccine safety research could reduce research bias and restore greater trust in the vaccine program.

Hyperbaric oxygen treatment for inflammatory bowel disease: a systematic review and analysis

2012-03-15T14:06:00.003-04:00

Hyperbaric oxygen treatment for inflammatory bowel disease: a systematic review and analysis

Daniel A Rossignol

Correspondence: Daniel A Rossignol rossignolmd@gmail.com

Medical Gas Research 2012, 2:6 doi:10.1186/2045-9912-2-6

Published: 15 March 2012

Abstract (provisional)

Background

Traditionally, hyperbaric oxygen treatment (HBOT) has been used to treat a limited repertoire of disease, including decompression sickness and healing of problem wounds. However, some investigators have used HBOT to treat inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), including Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis.

Methods

Comprehensive searches were conducted in 8 scientific databases through 2011 to identify publications using HBOT in IBD. Human studies and animal models were collated separately.

Results

Thirteen studies of HBOT in Crohn's disease and 6 studies in ulcerative colitis were identified. In all studies, participants had severe disease refractory to standard medical treatments, including corticosteroids, immunomodulators and anti-inflammatory medications. In patients with Crohn's disease, 31/40 (78%) had clinical improvements with HBOT, while all 39 patients with ulcerative colitis improved. One study in Crohn's disease reported a significant decrease in proinflammatory cytokines (IL-1, IL-6 and TNF-alpha) and one study in ulcerative colitis reported a decrease in IL-6 with HBOT. Adverse events were minimal. Twelve publications reported using HBOT in animal models of experimentally-induced IBD, including several studies reporting decreased markers of inflammation or immune dysregulation, including TNF-alpha (3 studies), IL-1beta (2 studies), neopterin (1 study) and myeloperoxidase activity (5 studies). HBOT also decreased oxidative stress markers including malondialdehyde (3 studies) and plasma carbonyl content (2 studies), except for one study that reported increased plasma carbonyl content. Several studies reported HBOT lowered nitric oxide (3 studies) and nitric oxide synthase (3 studies) and one study reported a decrease in prostaglandin E2 levels. Four animal studies reported decreased edema or colonic tissue weight with HBOT, and 8 studies reported microscopic improvements on histopathological examination. Although most publications reported improvements with HBOT, some studies suffered from limitations, including possible publication and referral biases, the lack of a control group, the retrospective nature and a small number of participants.

Conclusions

HBOT lowered markers of inflammation and oxidative stress and ameliorated IBD in both human and animal studies. Most treated patients were refractory to standard medical treatments. Additional studies are warranted to investigate the effects of HBOT on biomarkers of oxidative stress and inflammation as well as clinical outcomes in individuals with IBD.

Administration of thimerosal to infant rats increases overflow of glutamate and aspartate in the prefrontal cortex: protective role of dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate

2012-03-13T14:23:00.000-04:00

Neurochem Res. 2012 Feb;37(2):436-47. Epub 2011 Oct 21.

Administration of thimerosal to infant rats increases overflow of glutamate and aspartate in the prefrontal cortex: protective role of dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate.

Duszczyk-Budhathoki M, Olczak M, Lehner M, Majewska MD.

Source

Marie Curie Chairs Program, Department of Pharmacology and Physiology of Nervous System, Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology, 02-957, Warsaw, Poland.

Abstract

Thimerosal, a mercury-containing vaccine preservative, is a suspected factor in the etiology of neurodevelopmental disorders. We previously showed that its administration to infant rats causes behavioral, neurochemical and neuropathological abnormalities similar to those present in autism. Here we examined, using microdialysis, the effect of thimerosal on extracellular levels of neuroactive amino acids in the rat prefrontal cortex (PFC). Thimerosal administration (4 injections, i.m., 240 μg Hg/kg on postnatal days 7, 9, 11, 15) induced lasting changes in amino acid overflow: an increase of glutamate and aspartate accompanied by a decrease of glycine and alanine; measured 10-14 weeks after the injections. Four injections of thimerosal at a dose of 12.5 μg Hg/kg did not alter glutamate and aspartate concentrations at microdialysis time (but based on thimerosal pharmacokinetics, could have been effective soon after its injection). Application of thimerosal to the PFC in perfusion fluid evoked a rapid increase of glutamate overflow. Coadministration of the neurosteroid, dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS; 80 mg/kg; i.p.) prevented the thimerosal effect on glutamate and aspartate; the steroid alone had no influence on these amino acids. Coapplication of DHEAS with thimerosal in perfusion fluid also blocked the acute action of thimerosal on glutamate. In contrast, DHEAS alone reduced overflow of glycine and alanine, somewhat potentiating the thimerosal effect on these amino acids. Since excessive accumulation of extracellular glutamate is linked with excitotoxicity, our data imply that neonatal exposure to thimerosal-containing vaccines might induce excitotoxic brain injuries, leading to neurodevelopmental disorders. DHEAS may partially protect against mercurials-induced neurotoxicity.

PMID:: 22015977; [PubMed - in process]
PMCID:: PMC3264864

Free PMC Article

I Know Why the Caged Bird Screams

2012-03-11T14:56:00.000-04:00

by LJ Goes

It's a scream like no other. You know something is wrong. You search for the cause. No teeth coming in, no picky fabric irritating her skin, nothing to be afraid of. In fact you say that over and over again. "It's okay peanut, it's okay, there's nothing to be afraid of." Your friends and family comfort you. "He's probably just colicky. Gassy." You pat and pat and pat that tiny little back. You coo and bounce, gently. Nothing seems to stop the screaming.

The screams eventually haunt your sleep. They chip away at your sense of self. Your family's sense of safety dissipates. You question your sanity.

During a presentation at a local school my friend (Blaze) heard these screams again - thanks to all her hard work, those days are long gone for her and her son P. The memories came flooding back. She barely made it to the parking lot in time to vomit.

While out for a run, my friend (Mama Mac) recalls encountering a mom with her screaming baby and shouting "Don't vaccinate that baby!" as she jogged passed them.

It's that powerful - that terrifying - for those of us who know what caused it.

"Mrs. Goes, today you will get 4 kicks to the stomach. Looks like just below the ribs to the right. 3 blows to the left cheek. Only 2 bites on your upper arms. 17 slaps in undetermined locations. One bloodied lip. You'll be fine, but the iPad screen...looks like you're out another 250.00."

"Good Morning Mrs. Goes. Today you will receive two upper cuts to your lower right jaw. Four head butts. 9 slaps to your calves and thighs. One glass Pellegrino water bottle hurled at your face. You'll be fine, but cleaning up the glass will be time consuming. In the meantime, clean folded laundry will be thrown, your youngest will be slapped, and the Epsom salt will be tossed around your bathroom until the tile is no longer visible. Only one direct hit to your stomach. 6 bites."

I'd accept either daily scenario readily and repeatedly if it meant an end to the screaming.

The screaming puts the burden on me. Is it the mito? The yeast? Did he get some food he's not supposed to have? His eyes are dilated, he's tearing at his stomach and ripping off his clothes. Is it the PANDAS? Which one of the many systems that don't work is presently causing him the most discomfort? It's up to me to figure it out. It's up to me to take away the pain. I'm mom.

The hitting, the violence...I'm just the recipient in that deal. No responsibility on my end. Plus, I've gotten used to it. I haven't gotten used to the screaming.

I will never, ever get used to the screaming.

The doctors say, "Ignore that behavior Mrs. Goes. If you pay any attention to him you are just re-enforcing it." I immediately imagine a child pinned under a car. I can see his body flailing and there's blood everywhere.

Just ignore it.

"That's just how it is with some kids. They scream for no reason. The spectrum." More wisdom from the white coats. They mumble something esoteric and irrelevant that does not apply to my child. It's hard for them to understand that all kids are not the same. They absolutely positively must believe all kids are the same. This is how current "preventative" medical science works. Someone who weights 5 lbs is the same as someone who weighs 230. Someone raised in the inner city is the same as someone raised in rural Kansas. Someone with a history of allergies, asthma and auto-immune disease is the same as someone without. Same. No testing required. Just shoot 'em up. We'll find out if there's going to be a reaction soon enough. And then we'll pretend it didn't happen.

I would scream too.

Our kids dwell in cages and the people who caused their imprisonment refuse to acknowledge they still exist. They live in bodies that are rebelling against them every second of the day. My friends and I are running around them with a box full of band-aids. One for the intestinal dysbiois, one for the mitochondrial disease, one for the auto-immune damage, one for the methylation failure, one for the macrophagic myofasciitis sydrome, one for the metabolic dysfunction, one for the central nervous system damage.

We can't seem to properly apply all the bandages through the bars of the cage, though. Some stick. Some fall off. A lot of our little birds end up bleeding out, innocent little victims of iatrogenic illness. I've never heard of a person being burned alive who just silently sat back and allowed it to happen. My son actually has a condition that at times causes his feet to feel like they are burning. He's deficient in malic acid and B2. No doctor told me. My friends with master's degrees and sick kids...they told me. Granny Smith apple full of the stuff really helps. But then there's the cerebral folate deficiency...he can't handle phenols. Don't get me started on the damage to his Krebb's Cycle!

Let me stop you right here and ask...do I sound like an idiot to you? Because, anytime my friends and I are given a platform to speak about our screaming children we are told we are passionate. Emotional. Understandably connected to the issue. This really bothers me because, well, an overwhelming body of scientific evidence indicates our kids have every reason to scream. They are medically ill. Profoundly, medically ill. And their illness was caused by their physicians. Physicians who say we should ignore their screams, like they ignore their pain.

You'll have to excuse me. Now I have to go scream. Because some days when I put it all together like I did for you here, just now, it's too much to for me to take. SOMEBODY HAS TO DO SOMETHING TO STOP THE MINDLESS IATROGENIC DESTRUCTION OF CHILDREN NOW!! Do something. If your child is one of the 54% of chronically ill kids that inhabit this country, it is YOUR DUTY to educate yourself. Go to http://thinkingmomsrevolution.com/ to learn more.

Much Respect, The Rev (LJ Goes)

Science: The GFCF Diet Works

2012-03-01T08:54:00.000-05:00

Effectiveness of the gluten-free, casein-free diet for children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder: Based on parental report

Authors: Pennesi Christine M.; Klein Laura Cousino

Source: Nutritional Neuroscience

Abstract:

Objectives: Studies on the gluten-free and/or casein-free (GFCF) dietary intervention for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) suggest that some children may positively respond to implementation of the dietary intervention. Other research suggests that children diagnosed with ASD can be classified into subpopulations based on various factors, including gastrointestinal (GI) abnormalities and immune function.

Methods: This study analyzes parental report data collected using a 90-item online questionnaire from 387 parents or primary caregivers of children diagnosed with ASD on the efficacy of the GFCF diet. Parents reported on their child's GI symptoms, food allergy diagnoses, and suspected food sensitivities, as well as the degree and length of their diet implementation.

Results: Overall, diet efficacy among children whose parents reported the presence of GI symptoms, food allergy diagnoses, and suspected food sensitivities included greater improvement in ASD behaviors, physiological symptoms, and social behaviors compared with children whose parents reported none of these symptoms, diagnoses, or sensitivities (P < 0.05). Parental report of strict diet implementation, indicated by complete gluten/casein elimination and infrequent diet errors during and outside of parental care, also corresponded to improvement in ASD behaviors, physiological symptoms, and social behaviors (P < 0.05).

Discussion: These findings suggest that various intricacies related to diet implementation and GI and immune factors may play a role in differentiating diet responders from diet non-responders and substantiate the importance of further investigations into the various, nuanced factors that influence efficacy of the intervention among children with ASDs.

Keywords: Casein; Parental report; Autism spectrum disorder (ASD); GFCF diet; Gluten

Document Type:

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/1476830512Y.0000000003

You Do Not Know Them

2012-02-08T14:05:00.001-05:00

by LJ Goes

I just put my son Noah to bed. His brother and sister went into his room and showered him with kisses. Then I tucked him in. It went like this.

Me: Good Night Buddy, I love you.

Noah: Staring at me. Parts lips, exerting air, but, no speech comes out.

Me: Love you love you love (shower face with kisses)

Noah: Staring at my eyes, parts lips. Trying to talk, just a squeak comes out. Rests his head on his pillow frustrated.

Me: Its' okay. I know it's in there. Don't worry. We'll get it out. I know you love me. I know. And you know I love you big man. I am very proud of you today.

Noah: Lips open again. Has not yet broken eye contact. Now he does, looks down, and sighs (defeat).

Maybe tomorrow will be the day he says, "nightie night mom, love you too." It happened once. It will happen again.

Dear Pharma and DSM Team,

You know NOTHING about autism. You made up a word for behaviors you didn't like. Behaviors you are too busy and profit-minded to investigate. No one, and I mean NO ONE, likes petulant children. You know this. Let's manage them. Get them to go with the flow. Process them out.

The one thing about autism everyone can agree on is that it consumes everything. Our time, our money, our patience, our families. But, parents, parents like me? We know about the lies you've told. If you think for one minute my son prefers the company of the iPad to interacting with me, you are sorely mistaken. He wants to be with his family. With his siblings. He wants to eat normal food, go on family outings, go to restaurants and parties like normal kids. He wants to do all those things because he is adventurous and smart and funny and loves to laugh.

But, you took all those things away from him when you destroyed his auto-immune function, his bowels and his central nervous system. I will forgive you for those things. Yes, you heard me right. I will forgive you. I will even sign a piece of paper saying I forgive you and you don't have to pay me a penny. But, I will never ever tolerate you saying he does not desire social interaction, that he does not possess empathy or sympathy or that he is incapable of understanding complex human emotions.

Those descriptors belong TO YOU. Your narrow focus and short-sighted children killing science is evidence of that. DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT, assign these attributes to my child and his friends. Because YOU DO NOT KNOW THEM. We know who are children were before you took them from us. And we are getting them back. So, keep your absurd observations and descriptions to yourself. My friends and I will fix the damage you've done, and our kids will rise up, prove your worthlessness and remove your power. It's how it works. The oppressed always rise to power eventually. But, the people in power are rarely fond of history lessons. No matter. IT. WILL. BE. Count on it.

Sweet, sweet dreams, NOAH's mom

Admitting That Vaccine Injured Children Are Acceptable Losses

2012-01-31T20:15:00.000-05:00

by Ginger Taylor

I have actually found something new on the internet. In seven years of blogging, I have never seen someone actually be honest about their belief that vaccine injured children are "acceptable losses." I am a little bit stunned.

Now we all know this is true. Every parent of a vaccine injured child clues in pretty fast that their child is one of the discarded. As soon as their doc stops actually trying to heal them after their vaccine injury, stops being interested in medical symptoms you report, stops treating the family like a valued customer... you start to get it. But everyone keeps up the pretense that your kid is still worth something, if only in lip service, while they are given the shaft.

Then along comes Rick Jones at CFO magazine to say what we all know to be fact, in an article entitled, "The Value of Life: Why an ethically complicated calculation can help determine the value of your company’s risk reduction programs." That vaccine injured children are acceptable losses.

"The lives saved and dollar benefits from vaccines are hard to calculate, but it’s safe to say that these and other immunizations have greatly improved the quantity and quality of life for millions of people -- at the tragic, yet accepted cost of a few. "

Leave it to a heartless financial rag to have the balls to say what Offit and Mnookin and Gorski are to cowardly to say.

"I don't give a shit about your child, I only care about the bottom line, my agenda and 'The Program'." (what ever their particular program is)

I can't remember the last time I read something that felt so freeing! You don't care about my children! Thank you Mr. Jones! Thank you for admitting that you don't give a damn about my children!

I know you expect me to rail on the morally bankrupt Mr. Jones, but I am not going to do that. In fact, I sincerely praise the man for speaking the truth.

Because I would rather deal with Voldemort than Delores Umbridge. You know that Tom Riddle's alter ego is all about his own program and is happy to step over your dead children on the way to his vision of the perfect society, you reject him outright, and are not manipulated one bit into signing onto his value system. But Umbridge, smiling so pleasantly in her pretty pink dress, pretending to care about your child... she is the true monster in the story, is she not? She does what He Who Shall Not Be Named could never do... get a naive and trusting public to sign on to the mutilation and death of the innocent in the name of 'order' and 'the greater good'.

So I say this with out an ounce of irony to Mr. Jones:

Thank you Rick for admitting that you don't care that my son was given severe brain damage from the DTaP vaccine. You might be a bastard, but you are an honest bastard, which makes you a better man than most of the people defending and working in the vaccine program in my book.

Of course, this is with the caveat that I whole heatedly reject your value system and hope you will take a hard look at yourself and see if you still have a soul left to salvage... happy to talk with you any time about how destructive this world view is if you are looking to rebuild your humanity.

BUT...

If the bottom line continues to be how you judge what is good and what is bad, you might take a second look at the vaccine program again and really check and see if your cost benefit analysis is actually based on fact. 'Cause if you do your own survey of your own vaccinated v. unvaccinated workers/family members, you might find that the vaccinated are costing you way more due to life long, chronic conditions than even the occasional hospital stay for a child who has the complications from the measles would. You do know that NO ONE keeps track of vaccine adverse reaction rates or costs, right? That they are not factored into any risk analysis or cost/benefit ratio in existence anywhere? That HRSA that runs the vaccine program has released a statement saying that vaccines cause:

"encephalopathy [that] may be accompanied by a medical progression of an array of symptoms including autistic behavior, autism, or seizures. Some children who have been compensated for vaccine injuries may have shown signs of autism before the decision to compensate, or may ultimately end up with autism or autistic symptoms, but we do not track cases on this basis."

And that there is absolutely no data to back up the claim that the current vaccine program is doing more good than harm? Your wrote that, "There is no doubt that vaccines have the potential to do harm to a very small portion of the population." Pediatrics reports that 54% of American kids are chronically ill, developmentally disabled and obese, with no research on how such an aggressive program might be exacerbating this horrid epidemic of sick children... so how do you know that only a "very small" portion of the population is harmed by vaccines? Did you ask for proof of that claim by those who make it before you wrote this article? That is what a good CFO does, right? Checks the facts so risk analysis is accurate as possible?

Either way... feel free to call me and I will be at your disposal.

My comment on his post for CFO.com:

I am the mother of a vaccine injured child (not compensated by the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, which is largely corrupt and uses every excuse, valid and invalid, to actually prevent from recognizing and compensating vaccine injury), and as shocking as this might be to hear, I am happy to see this article published.
To actually see in black and white, what parents of vaccine injured children know is true, that our children are not valued by society and are considered "acceptable losses" for the gain you have gotten from the vaccine program, is a refreshing change from the lies usually told surrounding vaccine injury... either that vaccine injury does not exist, or that those who are vaccine injured are valued, while only given feigned compassion and lip service rather than the help they need and deserve.
To know that you don't care what happens to the minority (including my precious son) as long as it works out for the fortunate is of course, absolutely morally repugnant... but the fact that you will admit, out loud, that killing children and giving them brain damage is acceptable to you, actually gives people fair warning that this is what they are getting involved in when they choose to participate in the current vaccine program. It is a huge wake up call that their child is merely a commodity to the world, and the vaccine program, and when they suffer adverse reactions, they will be simply thrown away.
Please take this statement at face value, because I don't mean this sarcastically at all. Thank you for being honest in your devaluation of my son and of those vulnerable to vaccine injury. It is going to save the lives and health of a lot of children whose parents will see what the world really thinks of their kids, and prevent them from becoming used for cannon fodder by being drafted into public health's "war on communicable disease".
I wish more people were as honest, so that parents could truly have informed consent before their kids get hurt.

And just because WAY too many things are disappearing from the internet, a copy of the full article here:

| January 31, 2012 | CFO.com | US
The Value of Life, Statistically Speaking
Why an ethically complicated calculation can help determine the value of your company’s risk reduction programs.
Rick Jones
How much are you worth? I’m not asking about your money or property but your ultimate physical asset -- you. At the individual level, life is valued as priceless. But at a societal or business level, our lives and safety do have price tags. This is the reality associated with having finite resources to reduce risk. So the real cost-benefit question is how much can a society or a company afford to do to save lives and reduce injuries? The statistical value of life is a term developed from answering this question.
Here’s an example how the value of a statistical life can be computed. Suppose a state government decides to reduce the speed limit on its roads. The general correlation between highway speed limits and auto deaths is well known; highway safety statisticians estimate that if the maximum speed limit is reduced to 50 miles per hour, 20 lives would be saved each year. However, in order to enforce the new law, additional resources will be required, costing the state $120 million per year. So it costs the state $120 million each year to save 20 lives or $6 million per life. This is the value of a statistical life related to this highway risk reduction program.
Statistical life values can be useful tools to help measure the value of your risk reduction programs either through direct calculations or by comparing your calculations with other industry estimates. The comparison can provide a valuable benchmark with various situations that you can use to judge and perhaps justify programs to others in senior management and the board.
The methodologies used to compute these cost-benefit statistics vary, but they all stem from two basic components: the estimated lives saved and the costs associated with the programs. The calculations are a blend of science and statistics that often require detailed research and analysis, and they can also be interpreted and applied differently depending on the activities involved. For example, in a 2010 report relating to engine emissions, the Environmental Protection Agency applied a mean value of a statistical life at $9.1 million. The Food and Drug Administration works with a figure around $8 million, and other government agencies use numbers around $6 million.
The fact that these numbers differ makes sense. Not all risk reduction programs are equally efficient at reducing risk and, of course, the calculations contain statistical uncertainty. Yet in addition to these sources of variation there can be ethical issues that have the potential to transform the technical analyses into philosophical debates.
Are all lives saved worth the same amount? Is saving the lives of children equivalent to saving senior citizens? Is it worth saving or extending the life of a person for a period of years if that person requires ongoing and intensive medical care? In dealing with saving lives, the “type” of life being saved and the quality of remaining life may be variables in the analysis. The point is, depending on the situation, ethical judgments can be included in the analyses that in effect, answer these questions.
While making these decisions on the surface may sound unfair or elitist, they are made one way or another when only finite resources are available to reduce risk. And since this is always the case, virtually every health, safety, or other risk management program contains decisions related to these ethical issues.
For example, either as a parent or a child, most likely you have been exposed to programs that contain some of these issues. Inoculating children to prevent infectious disease transmission is good for society from both health and financial perspectives, but some initially healthy children may suffer adverse reactions, injury, or even death. For vaccines, the enormous societal benefits trump the tragedies of the few. And in order to keep the vaccine costs affordable, the U.S. government administrates and pays all vaccine compensation claims through its Vaccine Lawsuit Injury Compensation program. Inoculation requirements and the accepted reasons to opt out vary by state. In 2011, the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program received over 1,000 new claims and awarded 250 plaintiffs more than $228 million for injuries and deaths from the vaccines administered to both adults and children.
There is no doubt that vaccines have the potential to do harm to a very small portion of the population. But just look at what vaccines have done for us. Polio is no longer a threat in most of the world. Measles, chicken pox, pertussis (whooping cough), and of course smallpox, the former serial killer, have been virtually eliminated. The lives saved and dollar benefits from vaccines are hard to calculate, but it’s safe to say that these and other immunizations have greatly improved the quantity and quality of life for millions of people -- at the tragic, yet accepted cost of a few.
Value of statistical life and also statistical injury calculations provide metrics you can compare with other industry or government produced calculations. Together these results can help you answer the question “Are we doing ‘enough’ to reduce risk with our available resources?” And perhaps more importantly answer the question: “Should we do more?”
Rick Jones has spent the past 30 years applying risk analysis and management techniques to industrial and business problems. He has presented at several conferences and is the author of numerous articles and technical research papers. His third book, 20% Chance of Rain: Exploring the Concept of Risk, was recently published.

Found Man, Lost Country

2012-01-31T17:27:00.000-05:00

By LJ Goes

Richard Catlett, a missing adult with autism from Naperville, Illinois, has been found.

As I write this, I watch from the window in my study as a young woman walks with seven disabled adults around the pond behind my house. I can tell three of them have the false diagnosis of autism. As I read the story, I am thrilled to see Richard has been found. I actually became very excited at the idea of him being a good runner, that he was about to begin a job in food service. Of course, I hold in my heart the hope of a full recovery for my Noah. But, I can't help but wonder if the moms of these adults walking around our pond, thought the very same thing.

I also, cannot help but feel great despair at the idiocy of the closing comment on the attached report. "...Richard Catlett has “no other underlying medical condition that we are aware of other than autism."

"Autism" is not technically a medical condition. It is a made up word for several severe medical illnesses that cause (which means RESULTS IN) profound neurological damage. Autism is a disease that has at it's cellular core, greed and destruction. It is a man made illness that is taking our children's health. The same greed that created autism also creates asthma, allergies, adhd, arthritis, and diabetes--daily. The big dogs like nagalese and mycoplasma I'll save for another day--unless you live in our world--the world of non-pharma funded research--these very real and very sad medical conditions could terrify you. I don't want that. If you're scared you can't help me. And I need your help. People like Richard need your help. We cannot do this alone.

I wonder, how many of those adults that just passed my window will have access to the services they are getting right now, due to the changes in the DSM? I wonder if this walk, probably the only break their aged parents get in a day, will be taken from them? While other countries are battling autism and winning, America is still trying to figure out what to call it. America is still trying to hide the real numbers. Creating the illusion of a "spectrum". Kids are healthy or sick. If they are on maintenance medications to stay healthy, they are not healthy. They are sick. The spectrum, instead of provoking medical and research professionals to enthusiastically study causation, has done nothing but create a bunch of parents who are fighting to get their kid to the top of the food chain, "high functioning." Then they get there and realize their still sick kid, because he looks less sick than the others, doesn't get any help for his illness because he is better at disguising it.

They are on their second lap. An incredibly handsome african american man with very smart glasses and a pea coat with animal hair all over it folds his hands in front of his face as he walks. He is staring at his fingers. "Nice hands." I mumble. He is trying to control his temper. My son Noah does the exact same thing. He is 5.
No one wonders why. They just sit around in ivory towers spending all your money trying to figure out what to call it. Your country. Our children. Aren't you the least bit curious?

My Yearly Birthday Donation Drive

2012-01-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

by Ginger Taylor

Happy Birthday to me. Another year older, wiser and infinitely hotter. ;)

If Adventures In Autism has been of service to you this past year, I hope you will consider putting a little birthday gift in the tip jar.

Thank you for being my community and my support.

Girls Night Out

2012-01-29T12:48:00.001-05:00

By: LJ Goes

"Hey, get together tonight!" My friend reminded me. I could barely hear her over my son's screaming.

Ugh, I thought. I hadn't showered all day. We just started a new regimen to help with our son's complex adrenal dysfunction and he'd been off all day. By "off" I mean he hit me a total of 27 times (mostly open hand slaps with a sprinkling of fist poundings, always aiming for the face), we could not successfully redirect him from walking on the counters and touching the stove, and his general disposition was surly. So, along with a paid helper, I'd spent my day thus far preparing his special food, trying to keep him from launching himself out the kitchen window, burning his toes and landing a left hook to my jaw.

"Uhm...yeah...I don't think it's gonna happen." I mumbled over his piercing screams. My husband looked at me quizzically. I explained I had a meeting he didn't have to worry, I wasn't going to actually go. A gesture of mercy ensued and he told me I needed to go. I had to get out even if it was just for a couple hours. This is why I love this man. Pure selflessness. Autism (and a nation folding in on itself) teaches you this, if you let it.

After rushing through a shower I scooted out the door. On the way my mother phoned to tell me her best friend of 68 years died after her first in a series of several chemo treatments scheduled to treat her liver cancer. Broken words through sobs, "so unexpected...her poor grandbaby...she was going to fly in for a visit in June..." We shared a good cry and I sat in silence the rest of the way. Even when dense with sadness I've grown to appreciate silence like breath.

Upon arrival I was warmly welcomed along with several others toting wine and snacks. Like veterans heading to the VFW for a fish fry there is no nervous anticipation, no anxiety, just the comfortable acceptance expected when one weathered soldier greets another.

I know, my friend. I know. It did happen. Come in and rest awhile.

Unlike most girls nights, ours spans culture, socioeconomic status, race and religion. The discussion is cerebral but folksy. We are at ease with one another and there is no small talk. All of it, every word, is big and meaningful and the right combination may save a child's life. I know I'm supposed to drink wine and relax but I always bring a notebook and a pen. I don't want to miss anything.

No talk of Ashton's abandonment of Demi during her stint in rehab or rejuv or whatever it's called when celebrities can't cope with disappointment. No yammering on about who wore what to the last big awards show.

Hey, can you help me with this porphryin test? What's the latest on your son's cerebral folate test? What did the muscle biopsy reveal? Do you think it's mitochondrial dysfunction that's causing the cerebral folate deficiency or is CFD a condition of mito disease in idiopathic autism? Hey, did anyone read Eric London's chapter on the biopsychosocial model for autism treatment? Groundbreaking! How about that study on inflammatory cytokines compromising the integrity of the blood brain barrier? Did anyone happen to bring a hard copy of the Kennedy Kreiger paper?

When the libations really start flowing we talk about doctors. Mostly, their incompetence. We talk about how we all saw our children decline, many of us saw a correlation to their vaccinations, and most of our physicians said we saw nothing. They told us changing their diet was useless and that after months and months of prodding on our part, an evaluation by a government funded institution known as "early intervention" could point us in the right direction. Of course, early intervention is where most of us get our first autism diagnosis disguised as "developmental delay". A bunch of therapists come in and tell you they can't really tell you anything at all, except, your kid is delayed across the board in all categories and he needs therapy. The doctors echo this sentiment. Our mainstream pediatricians and our government's evaluation facilities partner in the proliferation of the greatest ponzi scheme of our time, the ridiculous theory of Better Diagnosis. While they pat themselves on the back for "catching it early" us moms saw the damage a year ago but kept right on listening and vaccinating; thereby exacerbating our children's mitochondrial disease and wasting precious time that could have been spent treating all the metabolic and methylation issues our children's raped and weakened immune systems could not remedy on their own.

When one of my friends discovered her son exhibited several characteristics of the bowel disease that Andy Wakefield lost his license for discovering, she was told by her physician that she was mistaken. How can a mother be mistaken about bowel obstructions, bowel disease, infected excrement and the resultant neurological illness she observes in her child? Not only does she live it, but she's flown all over the country seeing the only research physicians capable of diagnosing it. She has study after study test after test to PROVE his illness. Her mainstream pediatrician and his remarkable ego told her she needed to "go to church" to figure out her problem. She did. She went to the church of higher thinking, the church of research physicians who listen to parents and treat real medical symptoms. Then she came back to enlighten her doctor so he might help her child and countless other patients that suffer as her son does. It was an act of good will on her part.

Go to church, he says.

We all have a good laugh at the expense of my friend's doctor and his "scientist friends". Their remarkable egos. Their thoughtless comments. They are--well, they're idiots. Puppets. Fools. Every last one of them. And, criminals, really--when you think about it. Every single doctor who refuses to listen to a parent after that parent reports a reaction to a vaccine needs to be held accountable. It is my belief this will soon happen. The thing about my mom friends and I is, we are very smart. Our families, our babies, have been harmed. Our precious innocent children. We are not going away. We are women. We talk...and talk, and talk and talk. But, we don't talk about Jenny, Andy Wakefield, or even mercury anymore. We talk about macrophages, auto-immune-mediated tissue damage, IgG, IgA and IgM immunoglobulins in neuroglial cells. We talk about disturbances in the homeostasis of the human body. We talk about chronic illness in our children and it's iatrogenic causes.

We are amused by Nancy Snyderman, Marc Seigel, Paul Offit, Seth Mnookin and their tragic confederates who will be studied by Macolm Gladwell. They'll soon take their place in history along side executors of Christians and Holocaust denialists. Once hailed as heroes, they will be mocked and disgraced for their arrogance and ignorance. It's not that we haven't tried! Lord knows, we have tried! Representatives of the highest casts in autism research have done everything in their power to educate our doctors, our congress, the public. Their sage tutelage falls on the deaf but powerful and extravagantly perfumed ears of the Sadducees. If their science is too compelling, their case too strong, they are destroyed. Merck and their buddies descend upon our learned and honest researchers like a pack of wolves. They take away licenses, destroy reputations, disembowel practices. We, the moms, laugh. Do you really think that is going to stop the truth? Do you really think we don't see? I tried explaining to my son that Dr. Wakefield's paper was fraudulent but it didn't stop his violent diarrhea and painful bowel disease as I'd hoped. I also ordered him to stop having vaccine encephalopathy when my doctor said it couldn't happen because it was so "rare". Gosh darn if his little head didn't swell even bigger.

Sometimes ya just can't teach stupid no matter how hard you try. No matter. The moms have arrived. We are in every neighborhood. And WE. are. taking. OVER.

The Beginning. lj goes

Welcome LJ Goes to Adventures In Autism

2012-01-29T01:57:00.000-05:00

This blog was supposed to be a log of my journey in being an autism mother. It was... and as my journey traveled through the corruption that made my son sick, and kept him from healing, it transformed into medical corruption blog. Because that is where I am on this adventure.

But as you may have noticed, over the past year I kept posting pieces by Lisa Goes, that really resonated with me. They communicated all of the frustration and anger and pain and chaos that we lived through in Chandler's early years, and they did it with a transparency that I consider brave. Because it is brave to expose that much of yourself and your pain to the world.

So as I have become a professional activist and my son is so much better (he is a happy, happy child) I wanted to bring some of that former light and energy back to this space. I am pleased to announce that LJ has come on board to share her experiences with my audience. She is someone I have affection and respect for, and who loves and defends our children passionately.

Join me in welcoming LJ Goes.

OSHA Supports Health Care Workers Rights To Decline The Flu Shot

2012-01-26T12:11:00.000-05:00

Statement from OSHA:

OSHA's Official Position on Flu Vaccination of Healthcare Workers
"The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is strongly supportive of efforts to increase influenza vaccination rates among healthcare workers in accordance with the Healthy People 2020 goals. However, at this time, OSHA believes there is insufficient scientific evidence for the federal government to promote mandatory influenza vaccination programs that do not have an option for the HCP to decline for medical, religious and/or personal philosophical reasons.
While we are supportive of the Healthy People 2020 goal of a 90% vaccination rate, we have seen no evidence that demonstrates that such a high rate is in fact necessary. Furthermore, the current influenza vaccine is no magic bullet. The current state of influenza vaccine technology requires annual reformulation and revaccination and the efficacy is quite variable. Every year there are numerous circulating strains of influenza that are not included in the vaccine. In years where the antigenic match is good, the vaccine only provides protection against the 3 strains in the formulation. In years when the antigenic match is poor, the vaccine may provide no protection at all. The limits of current influenza vaccine technology are especially problematic in the context of a mandatory influenza vaccination program that results in job loss. Lastly, reliance on a mandatory influenza vaccination policy may provide healthcare workers, health care facility management and patients with an unwarranted sense of security and result in poor adherence to other infection control practices that prevent all types of infections, not just influenza. Influenza vaccination has always been just one part of a comprehensive multi-layered infection control program.
While OSHA does not believe that there is sufficient evidence to meet the bar necessary to support mandatory vaccination programs, we nonetheless are convinced that influenza vaccination is generally beneficial and are supportive of efforts to promote vaccination. Influenza vaccination exemptions should be for HCP with valid medical contraindications to vaccinations, or religious and/or personal objections and a signed declination statement that indicates the HCP has been educated regarding influenza, is aware of the risk and benefits of influenza vaccination, has been given the opportunity to be vaccinated with the influenza vaccine at no charge, and can receive the influenza vaccine in the future at no charge to the HCP."

HT: NVIC

Offit Teaches Physicians How to Talk To The Public About Vaccines: Contemptuously Lecture, Stonewall, Bully and Throw Them Out

2012-01-20T10:46:00.001-05:00

Reading Jake Crosby's piece today on being thrown out of yet another Paul Offit speech, I am struck by the ironic pattern in these speaking engagements.

Paul Offit (and Seth Mnookin) have been holding events at prestigious institutions to tell medical professionals and academics how to handle the public on the vaccine controversy. Yet I think that it is completely lost on them that they are not just giving a speech on how to handle people who question the current vaccine program, they are actually holding a lab, will full scale demonstrations, on how to handle people who question the current vaccine program.

Because people don't really pay as much attention to what you say as they do to what you do. (Ask any parent trying to teach a child NOT to do something that they do themselves. "Don't smoke kids. Now pass mommy her cigarettes.") And what Offit and Mnookin have done, is offer a bunch of words that will likely have little impact, but then actually demonstrate how to treat doubters of their message, which has a huge impact.

So here is the take away that event goers are getting when attending an Offit/Mnookin event:

1. Offit gives a lecture at NIH entitled “Communicating Vaccine Safety Science to the Public,” says a bunch of words, then demonstrates how to communicate "vaccine safety science" to someone who is a steakholder in the issue (Jake Crosby, who may be vaccine injured) by falsely accusing him of being a stalker, by not letting him ask a question (although he is behaving completely appropriately) and by throwing him off the premises.

Take away: To communicate with the public, talk AT them. If they have questions that you don't want to answer, make them your adversary and have them removed from the property.

It is OK, and even preferable, to demonize vaccine safety skeptics, and treat them very poorly.

Bully them.

2. Offit gives a lecture at Yale entitled “Hard Knocks: Communicating Science to the Public,” says a bunch of words, then demonstrates how to communicate "science" to someone who is a steakholder in the issue (Jake Crosby, who may be vaccine injured) by falsely accusing him of being a stalker, by yelling at him, by not letting him ask a question (although he is behaving completely appropriately) and by throwing him off the premises.

Take away: To communicate with the public, talk AT them. If they have questions that you don't want to answer, make them your adversary and have them removed from the property. Offit has also inferring that the "Hard Knocks" do not refer to the medical professional being "knocked" when trying to talk to communicate to the public, but actually to the vaccine safety skeptic who was actually "knocked" trying to communicate with the medical professional. "When engaging the public, it is OK to give them 'hard knocks'."

It is OK, and even preferable, to demonize vaccine safety skeptics, and treat them very poorly.

Bully them.

3. Mnookin gives a lecture at American University's School of Communication entitled "How to Communicate with Anti-Vaccine Parents," says a bunch of words, then demonstrates how to communicate "science" to someone who wants to make their own vaccine decisions, by telling the audience that you are offended and repulsed by such parents, and that you think they are "Total Assholes."

Take away: To communicate with the public, hold them in contempt. Even when they are parents earnestly working in the best interests of their vulnerable children.

It is OK, and even preferable, to demonize vaccine skeptics, even as you admit that vaccines may not even work for their child.

Bully them.

4. Mnookin appears at the “Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research” event, says a bunch of words, then demonstrates public responsibility in vaccine discussion by falsely accusing a stakeholder in the issue (Jake Crosby, who may be vaccine injured) of being disruptive at events, by not letting him ask a question (although he is behaving completely appropriately) and by throwing him off the premises .

Take away: It is responsible, when dealing with vaccine safety skeptics, to talk AT them while only allowing them to sit quietly and listen. If they have questions that you don't want to answer, make them your adversary and have them removed from the property.

It is OK, and even preferable, to demonize vaccine safety skeptics, and treat them very poorly.

Bully them.

Do you see the pattern here?

Mnookin and Offit ARE teaching the medical world how to treat those who have questions about vaccine safety. They are to be treated very poorly. They are to be held in contempt and bullied. They are to be removed from the premises.

But of course the problem for medical professionals in taking this advice, is that when they try it in their offices, they loose the argument, the loose the patient, and they loose their reputation in the community. Taking Offit's advice is akin to shooting oneself in the foot for anyone whose job actually requires them to have a conversation with a member of the public.

And the Offiteers have lost at least A QUARTER of the public to the conclusion that vaccinating according to CDC recommendations is a greater risk to their child than adhering to their recommendations.

So I will echo Mary Holland's most salient question to Paul Offit in this last exchange:

"Would you be willing to engage in a public debate about the vaccine issue?”

And we see that the answer is, and always will be, the one that Offit gives:

“There is no need to debate the science; the science is in.”

Their answer is "No."

So as Offit (who has become the Bagdad Bob of vaccination) and friends lock the doors to the ivory tower from the inside, to protect themselves from vicious graduate students in epidemiology at that hotbed of anti-science anarchy, George Washington University; but what they don't seem to have noticed is that all they have done is locked themselves in a broom closet, away from the real vaccine discussion that matters. Their tiny mutual admiration society is having little impact in the direction of vaccine uptake rates, because they are not engaging with the vaccine decision makers. You know... their customers. The discussions that are changing vaccine uptake are happening at coffee tables, at bus stops and over back fences.

I have them on a weekly basis, I don't accuse people who question me of being disruptive or being stalkers, I don't treat them with contempt, i don't call them "Total Assholes," I don't shout them down when they try to ask questions, I don't throw them off the premises and I DO engage them for as long as they want to talk about the issue.

I can show a mother that the claim that "The science is in and vaccines don't cause autism" (and apparently now encephalopathy) is a complete load of horse shit in 2 minutes on my cell phone from our health officials own words documents and web sites. Not only is Offit not there to defend his stupid claim, local pediatricians are completely ill equipped to win back moms who have been educated at the coffee table, because the only thing they have been taught to do with these moms are:

1. Hold them in contempt.

2. Talk AT them.

3. Don't allow them to ask questions.

4. If they challenge your stance, throw them out.

And then of course, the next time they are at coffee, it's all, "OMG... you were totally right. They don't know anything about vaccine injury! He couldn't answer the questions and just tried to bully me! What is the name of your pediatrician who is cool with your vaccine choices?"

So by all means, keep it up you two... keep it up. Nothing proves my points more to all the women I talk to than the way you behave.

Hepatitis B Vaccine Can Cause Mitochondrial Disorders and Cell Death

2012-01-19T08:44:00.000-05:00

Apoptosis. 2012 Jan 17. [Epub ahead of print]

Hepatitis B vaccine induces apoptotic death in Hepa1-6 cells.

Hamza H, Cao J, Li X, Li C, Zhu M, Zhao S.

Source

Abstract

PMID:: 22249285; [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

AMA Proposes Forcing People to Participate In Vaccine Trials

2012-01-18T20:05:00.001-05:00

You read that right. The American Medical Association has published a piece in the Policy Forum entitled:

Should Participation in Vaccine Clinical Trials be Mandated?

I am absolutely apoplectic.

The article, written by Suzanne Sheehy and Joel Meyer begins its argument for forced participation in vaccine trials with a quote from ~~Highly Esteemed and Eminent Physician~~ Ethically Challenged College Dropout Bill Gates. Because he is truly who you should be going to for medical advice. Cause... you know... he's rich.

Few would argue with Bill Gates when he describes vaccination as “the most effective and cost effective health tool ever invented”

So on the basis of this non doctor's, non-medical opinion (we do know that he owns a vaccine company, right), with no proof of the validity of this statement necessary mind you (because after all, "few would argue with him" and consensus equals truth) we are not only now going to vaccinate everyone, we are going to force people into vaccine trials.

And the medical establishment is completely baffled why people don't trust them any more and won't take their vaccine advice?

If I just stopped here, the fact that they just published this suggestion, should be enough to perhaps get mainstream med to ask themselves whether or not they really have jumped the shark on vaccine policy. But then again, that should have happened a long time ago. But apparently not yet. Let's go on to the arguments they make including the ideas that:

"Given the often unquantifiable risks to the recipients of vaccines in early stages of development" clinical trials rely on volunteers, which is unsustainable and unethical.
Volunteerism in vaccine trials is on the decline.
It doesn't pay well enough which tells participants that they are undervalued.
Most participants are "poor and vulnerable" which is unethical since the approved vaccines "benefit the whole population."
If we pay them more, then they will be seduced by the money and might not be practicing "informed consent"
Progress on new vaccines must be uneffected by people not wanting to be in vaccine trial, therefore they should consider new strategies
Forcing people to be involved is one such strategy, and it "is not as outlandish as it might seem on first consideration"
Many societies already mandate things that are for The Greater Good, like jury duty, opt-out organ donation and the draft.

And I just want to give you this whole quote, so you really see clearly that when we say that our children have been drafted into their war on communicable disease, it is not really an analogy as much as it is... well... fact:

"In both conscription and obligatory trial participation, individuals have little or no choice regarding involvement and face inherent risks over which they have no control, all for the greater good of society."

[emphasis mine]

In his chapter in our book, Vaccine Epidemic: How Corporate Greed, Biased Science, and Coercive Government Threaten Our Human Rights, Our Health, and Our Children, Allen Tate makes the point that if one is going to make a greater good argument (that one unsavory thing must be undertaken to get something more important for more people) one must first ACTUALLY PROVE THAT SUCH A THING WILL BRING ABOUT A GREATER GOOD. He then evaluates the greater good argument made for the current vaccine program (which does not include forced vaccine trial participation) and finds that it does not even meet the standard of a "greater good".

But no problem with that here for Sheehy and Meyer, because as they point out, it is vaccine maker Bill Gates' opinion (who is very rich btw), and few would argue with him... so... it must be the best thing for everyone.

It is at this point that I have to offer Leslie Manookin high praise for so aptly naming her vaccine documentary, "The Greater Good". Let's pause here for a moment to see what this "greater good" program is doing to the vulnerable in our society:

And that is from APPROVED vaccines.

They truly see us and our children as functionaries in their system. Medicine does not exist to make you, the individual, better; You, the individual, exist to make Medicine better. You are theirs to "conscript". They can draft you into their service as an actual "lab rat." (And no that is not an exaggeration as the third sentence in this article reads, "The lack of animal models that can reliably predict vaccine efficacy means that development still unavoidably relies on testing of novel vaccines in healthy individuals.")

See? Not about your and your rights and your health. Your rights are not even factored into their arguements. Check this:

"As ever, then, the debate boils down to a consideration of the “greater good” or the “lesser evil.” A key consideration is the risk benefit ratio—risk to the individual volunteer balanced against the benefit to society. "

"As ever..." as in the only thing they are taking into account. The deciding factor.

Then the article truly falls into Orwellian doublespeak. They authors acknowledge that forcing people to participate in vaccine trials, will violate respect for peoples rights, violate the Universial Declaration of Human Rights, and destroy trust in the vaccine program. Their solution?

"A more palatable and realistic option is a policy of “mandated choice.” In this case individuals would be required by law to state in advance their willingness to participate in vaccine trials [15]. The advantage of this system is that it could identify a large cohort of willing volunteers from which participants could be recruited rapidly without jeopardizing individual autonomy. It would encourage an open, noncoercive philosophy for tackling societal challenges without compromising individual freedom or public trust in the health care system."

Mandated choice? MANDATED CHOICE?!!

UP IS DOWN!
BLACK IS WHITE!
WAR IS PEACE!
VIOLENCE IS LOVE!
MANDATE IS CHOICE!!!!!

So the law REQUIRING YOU to say you will participate before hand, then holding you to it later, is choice! It is not coercive, does not violate your right to informed consent, and will not destroy trust in the vaccine program or in medicine or government in general!

Welcome to 1984!! The law will require you to commit you to volunteer your body to science! The law does not even do that now for DEAD PEOPLE!

And to skip back a bit, follow this logic... paying people lots of money to participate in trials sabatoges "informed consent", but legally forcing them to consent, is "informed consent." Coercing with money = immoral. Coercing with a gun = moral!

Then we get to the kernel of the issue. That people just don't value vaccines enough, so the law must now force them to be valued. And no such article should go with out a shot at Wakefield and our community:

"But perhaps most importantly, as a society we need to evaluate our perception of vaccination. Any successful vaccine program by its very nature takes a once-feared illness out of the public eye. This means that the benefits of immunization become forgotten while side effects in small numbers of individuals fill the headlines. It is all too easy for sensationalist and unfounded stories such as that claiming a link between the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine and autism [16] to instead take root in society’s collective psyche. Ultimately such a crucial public health intervention as vaccine development may become devalued—and only revalued once a drop in vaccination rates leads to resurgence of severe disease."

"But perhaps more importantly..." Because more important than honoring the human rights of actual humans, is a valuable perception of vaccination.

Seriously... these people can go to hell. Or just visit Auschwitz, where medical progress was much more important than allowing people to say to NO to forced experimentation.

So to the publishers of this article:

AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, MEET THE FREE MARKET!

Your product line called "vaccine" is not as valuable as you think it is. (In business this is called a "bubble".) People are buying less of it. You have reached a saturation point. Time to wake up and smell the informed consent. The public has been informed... AND THEY DON'T CONSENT!

You will put experimental vaccines into the bodies of my family over my dead body.

And to Sheehy and Meyer:

I cannot find words that will express my outrage and contempt for what you have done here. This is absolutely an abomination to the whole point of medicine, and to logic itself. I hope that you are despised in your communities for floating a balloon like this. It is nothing short of evil.

I do take solace in the fact that the logic in this article is such utter bullshit (MANDATED CHOICE... I still can't believe you wrote this with a straight face) that anyone with half a brain will see that you are attempting to bring back the good old days of Doctor Mengele and will flush this article down the toilet where it belongs.

So if this was some sort of ironic "A Modest Proposal" type article to point out that we have gone a bit overboard on the vaccine push, then now is the time to speak up on that.

If not... as I proposed earlier, which might not be as outlandish as it might seem on first consideration... go to hell.

Mechanisms of Aluminum Adjuvant Toxicity and Autoimmunity in Pediatric Populations

2012-01-13T09:16:00.001-05:00

Mechanisms of aluminum adjuvant toxicity and autoimmunity in pediatric populations

Lupus (2012) 21, 223–230.

L Tomljenovic1 and CA Shaw2
1Neural Dynamics Research Group, Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC,
Canada and 2Departments of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences and Experimental Medicine and the Graduate Program in Neuroscience,
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Immune challenges during early development, including those vaccine-induced, can lead to
permanent detrimental alterations of the brain and immune function. Experimental evidence
also shows that simultaneous administration of as little as two to three immune adjuvants can
overcome genetic resistance to autoimmunity. In some developed countries, by the time children
are 4 to 6 years old, they will have received a total of 126 antigenic compounds along with
high amounts of aluminum (Al) adjuvants through routine vaccinations. According to the US
Food and Drug Administration, safety assessments for vaccines have often not included
appropriate toxicity studies because vaccines have not been viewed as inherently toxic.
Taken together, these observations raise plausible concerns about the overall safety of current
childhood vaccination programs. When assessing adjuvant toxicity in children, several key
points ought to be considered: (i) infants and children should not be viewed as ‘‘small adults’’
with regard to toxicological risk as their unique physiology makes them much more vulnerable
to toxic insults; (ii) in adult humans Al vaccine adjuvants have been linked to a variety of
serious autoimmune and inflammatory conditions (i.e., ‘‘ASIA’’), yet children are regularly
exposed to much higher amounts of Al from vaccines than adults; (iii) it is often assumed that
peripheral immune responses do not affect brain function. However, it is now clearly established
that there is a bidirectional neuro-immune cross-talk that plays crucial roles in immunoregulation
as well as brain function. In turn, perturbations of the neuro-immune axis have
been demonstrated in many autoimmune diseases encompassed in ‘‘ASIA’’ and are thought to
be driven by a hyperactive immune response; and (iv) the same components of the neuroimmune
axis that play key roles in brain development and immune function are heavily targeted
by Al adjuvants. In summary, research evidence shows that increasing concerns about
current vaccination practices may indeed be warranted. Because children may be most at risk
of vaccine-induced complications, a rigorous evaluation of the vaccine-related adverse health
impacts in the pediatric population is urgently needed.

[ed note: emphasis mine]

Offit/Crosby

2011-12-27T17:19:00.001-05:00

So strange.

Jake Crosby has been dissecting autism research, writing about vaccine injury and exposing corruption and conflicts of interests in vaccine apologists for what, four years now? And suddenly, in the course of three weeks, he has been branded so dangerous that he must be physically removed from not one, but two separate lectures by vaccine industry defenders... after merely asking a legitimate questions, both about Andrew Wakefield?

First Seth Mnookin said he was a heckler, but now wont answer questions or offer details about said heckling. Now Paul Offit has upped the ante and announced that Jake was his stalker.

So as with Mnookin, I have written to Dr. Offit and asked him for details of Jake's problematic behavior. You may recognize much of the letter, as I merely modified the letter I sent to Mnookin a few weeks ago, as this is practically the identical scenario that happened a few weeks ago.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Jake Crosby
Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 18:40:00 -0500
From: Ginger Taylor
To: Paul Offit

Dr. Offit,

I read Jake Crosby's story on being ejected from your most recent event after asking a question during the question and answer period.

From his telling of the story, what you did seems to me be very heavy handed and inappropriate at the least, and some pretty ugly censorship and slander on your part at most.

As you have been untruthful about offenses that were never committed by your opponents in the past, (I reference JB Handley's successful libel lawsuit against you and the Orange County Register's retraction of your charges against a CBS reporter when you were unable to back them up), I tend to believe Jake's story on its face, but I want to allow for the fact that Jake did not report the incident accurately, thus my reason for contacting you with a few questions.

1. Did he accurately report the incident, and that he has only been in contact with you once before, two years ago, via email?

2. If so, do you not believe that an apology to him is in order?

3. If he did not report the incident accurately, what did he get wrong?

4. If not, what was the "stalking" incident or incidents that you referred that previously took place and why did it preclude him from asking a non-stalking question at this event? When and where did it take place, what was said, what administrative or security action was taken, and are there recordings of any such events?

5. Is Jake precluded from asking you questions in the future? Is he precluded from attending any of your speaking engagements in the future? Have you given him any notice to stay away, or a cease and desist or has any form of restraining order been issued?

6. Like Jake, I have been very critical of your writing in my own blogging. Am I allowed to attend your events and ask you questions? If so what are the parameters for asking you questions and do they differ from someone who might agree with you on your vaccine stance?

7. Is there anyone else from the autism, vaccine injury, vaccine safety or anti-vaccine communities, or from the medical community that is skeptical of the safety and efficacy claims made about the current vaccine program, that are not allowed to attend your events or ask you questions?

8. Finally, (and with brutal frankness) If Mr. Crosby's story is accurate, and he has been appropriate in his interactions with you, and your own desire to silence your challengers is at the heart of why you had him removed from the room, is this a pattern you intend to continue? Can anyone asking you a question which you believe you will not not be able to answer well, or which might make you look bad in front of the audience, expect to be slandered and escorted from the room?

9. As Seth Mnookin made similar charges against Jake earlier this month, have you been communicating with him about Jake, and is this a coordinated effort to slander him?

I want to get this cleared up as people have expressed in increasing interest in attending your speaking events and challenging your assertions, many of which (myself included) believe are grossly inaccurate and/or irresponsible. We certainly want to know up front if you intend on misrepresenting any of us as you seem to have done with Jake or if it is Jake who is misrepresenting you.

Your prompt response is appreciated.

--

Ginger Taylor
Adventures In Autism
Facebook
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Vaccine Epidemic
818-402-9672

Subject:	Jake Crosby
Date:	Tue, 27 Dec 2011 18:40:00 -0500
From:	Ginger Taylor
To:	Paul Offit