How many studies have been done to prove that there is no link between autism and vaccines. It has to be a lot. All of them have been statistical. All of them reach the conclusion that there is no link between autism and vaccines. The truly amazing thing is that the first requirement for such a statistical study is a control group. There has never been a published study that includes the one control group that is needed, the group of unvaccinated children. This is symptomatic of a mindset which is:
We know that there is no link between vaccines and autism. Now let's prove it.
This mindset does two things, it listens to anything that supports the argument that there is no connection between autism and vaccines and it ignores anything that says that there might be a connection between autism and vaccines. Because of that mindset, the following are given specious arguments:
The lack of any control group (unvaccinated children) measurement
The change in the rate of autism
The numerous documented pre (normal) and post (autistic) vaccine cases
The lack of any control group measurement is a valid criticism. I have heard that it is too hard. It would not be ethical. I have heard mockery. I have heard that the Japanese MMR study had the control group (they only kept their control group free of the MMR vaccine (which only says that the unique ingredients of the MMR are not responsible for the autism rate). All of the arguments I have heard for not doing a measurement of the control group are specious.
The change in the rate of autism is said to be because of a change in diagnostics. I suppose that if you have nothing to fill the void that vaccines so naturally fills, this is just as good as any other explanation. But I was there when the autism bow wave hit. My son was at the front of it. If you want to say that I am not qualified to make that judgement, okay. Then perhaps you should accept the word of Michael Chez. In his book, Autism and Its Medical Management, he recounts a meeting of Pediatric Neurologists where a question was asked. "How many of you were treating autism 20 years ago." You can guess the rest. If the autism rate had been the same back then they would have known it. Autism represents a big change to pediatric practice. The argument that autism has always been around at the same rate that it exists today is specious. The change in the autism rate is real.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc. It is the identification of a logic error that says that just because two things happen one right after the other does not mean that one causes the other. True. But the pro-vax side takes this as proof that there is no relationship between autism and vaccines. It is just as much of a mistake to conclude that it means that there is no relationship as to conclude that there is. But when there are as many cases of autism following vaccination, post hoc ergo propter hoc sounds flippant. The relationship between vaccines and autism deserves more than simply pointing out the logic error and calling it wrong (logically it is not wrong, it is inconclusive). It deserves the measurement of the control group.
In a previous post, Finally, a small break, I referenced the work of Dr Rosemary Waring that showed that the ability of autistics to process tylenol through the system was far less than the norm. The mechanism for processing tylenol also handles a long list of other toxins for processing through the kidneys. If this list includes any of the vaccine ingredients do you think that this thread would be pulled? No, vaccines have to be protected.
There have been numerous studies that show leakage across the blood gut barrier. Does it not make sense that if something causes leakage across the blood gut barrier there may also be leakage across the blood brain barrier. That possibility was pointed out by Andrew Wakefield. When Andrew Wakefield dry lab'ed his data he lost any credibility and leakage across the blood gut and blood brain barriers became wrong. Nobody can touch it any more whether he was right about leakage or not.
The problem with autism research is that it is not scientific. It never has been. It is political. Our children will pay dearly for this.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Autism holocaust denial
For me, the denial that there is an autism epidemic is the medical equivalent of denial of the holocaust. In the spirit of protecting the vaccine industry from any linkage to autism, the pro-vax side not only denies that vaccines may be linked to autism but denies that there even is an autism epidemic. What a wonderful country. If there is no autism epidemic then vaccines don't cause autism. Case closed. March on with impugnity.
But the denial is even more important than that. The pro-vax side has no explanation for an autism epidemic. They have no way to explain the countless number of children who have changed with the sickness brought on by the childhood vaccines from normal and healthy to autistic other than to say that it is a coincidence. They have no way to explain why the autism rate which was so low when I grew up in the 60's to 1/160 now. So, it has always been that way. Problem solved.
I have always kept this tidbit in the same place as the denial of the actual autism rate which the CDC did up until February 2007 when they finally admitted that the autism rate is not 1/2500. My son was in elementary school from 1992 to 1998. At the time in a school of 250 children there were 3 autistic children. The odds agains that happening with the autism rate being 1/2500 are absurd. If it were a statistical test, it would be well beyond significant. (And I should blindly believe what the medical community tells me about vaccines and autism?)
The denial has always fallen into that category. I was thirty years old when I witnessed my first example of autism on sixty minutes. Now if I want to find an autistic person besides my son, I simply look down the street. Just as with the CDC's autism rate, simple observation belies the autism epidemic denier's claim. Still, there are those who try to convince me that the autism rate has never changed. They have always been there. We have always had children change as toddlers from normal progress to autism.
Now the University of California has come out with a study that shows that the autism epidemic is not a matter of diagnostics. It is real. http://journals.lww.com/epidem/pages/articleviewer.aspx?year=2009&issue=01000&article=00016&type=abstract But the autism epidemic deniers will attack it because it is so important that there is no link between autism and vaccines.
This is what happens when you start with the conclusion and look only for the evidence to support it.
But the denial is even more important than that. The pro-vax side has no explanation for an autism epidemic. They have no way to explain the countless number of children who have changed with the sickness brought on by the childhood vaccines from normal and healthy to autistic other than to say that it is a coincidence. They have no way to explain why the autism rate which was so low when I grew up in the 60's to 1/160 now. So, it has always been that way. Problem solved.
I have always kept this tidbit in the same place as the denial of the actual autism rate which the CDC did up until February 2007 when they finally admitted that the autism rate is not 1/2500. My son was in elementary school from 1992 to 1998. At the time in a school of 250 children there were 3 autistic children. The odds agains that happening with the autism rate being 1/2500 are absurd. If it were a statistical test, it would be well beyond significant. (And I should blindly believe what the medical community tells me about vaccines and autism?)
The denial has always fallen into that category. I was thirty years old when I witnessed my first example of autism on sixty minutes. Now if I want to find an autistic person besides my son, I simply look down the street. Just as with the CDC's autism rate, simple observation belies the autism epidemic denier's claim. Still, there are those who try to convince me that the autism rate has never changed. They have always been there. We have always had children change as toddlers from normal progress to autism.
Now the University of California has come out with a study that shows that the autism epidemic is not a matter of diagnostics. It is real. http://journals.lww.com/epidem/pages/articleviewer.aspx?year=2009&issue=01000&article=00016&type=abstract But the autism epidemic deniers will attack it because it is so important that there is no link between autism and vaccines.
This is what happens when you start with the conclusion and look only for the evidence to support it.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Losing the ability to hold a pencil
At the end of fourth grade, David suffered another setback. He lost the ability to hold a pencil. Prior to this, and on his IEP, we insisted that David write in cursive script because he could. His handwriting, while not beautiful, was legible.
I cannot say how David felt about this since he was not verbal enough to express his dismay. I was ready to cry. I felt like what was David was being stripped away piece by piece by some unknown assailant. While I held my tongue, inwardly I was seething. I had nothing I could do about it. There was no known cause. I had nothing to go after. I was ready to cry in dispair.
It is an interesting side note that David had had the Hepatitis B shot just prior to losing the ability to hold a pencil. I did not know this until later when I examined his shot records. I can only conclude that there is a temporal relationship between the Hep-B vaccine and David's loss of the ability to hold a pencil. I cannot conclude that there is a causal relationship but contrary to what the medical community would have me believe, I cannot conclude that there is no relationship.
On the one hand:
David had had shots before without any apparent side effects.
David had lost abilities before without any shots.
On the other hand:
The loss of ability to hold a pencil occurred within days of having the Hep-B shot.
The medical community has made a dog's dinner of their proof that there is no relationship between vaccines and autism by not taking any measure of the control group, i.e. the people who have never been vaccinated.
In desparation, I started giving David glutathione again. I cannot say that the glutathione is what did it, but by the fall when David returned to fifth grade, David was able to hold a pencil again. His ability to hold the pencil did not compare to what he was able to do before just as the return of his ability to add and subtract did not return to his previous level. Nevertheless, I was grateful for any improvement.
Would David have had any recovery without the glutathione? I concede that this is possible, but I have to say that it is not likely. Glutathione brought about another major change in David at the end of seventh grade. The change was so profound that only a fool would ignore it.
I cannot say how David felt about this since he was not verbal enough to express his dismay. I was ready to cry. I felt like what was David was being stripped away piece by piece by some unknown assailant. While I held my tongue, inwardly I was seething. I had nothing I could do about it. There was no known cause. I had nothing to go after. I was ready to cry in dispair.
It is an interesting side note that David had had the Hepatitis B shot just prior to losing the ability to hold a pencil. I did not know this until later when I examined his shot records. I can only conclude that there is a temporal relationship between the Hep-B vaccine and David's loss of the ability to hold a pencil. I cannot conclude that there is a causal relationship but contrary to what the medical community would have me believe, I cannot conclude that there is no relationship.
On the one hand:
David had had shots before without any apparent side effects.
David had lost abilities before without any shots.
On the other hand:
The loss of ability to hold a pencil occurred within days of having the Hep-B shot.
The medical community has made a dog's dinner of their proof that there is no relationship between vaccines and autism by not taking any measure of the control group, i.e. the people who have never been vaccinated.
In desparation, I started giving David glutathione again. I cannot say that the glutathione is what did it, but by the fall when David returned to fifth grade, David was able to hold a pencil again. His ability to hold the pencil did not compare to what he was able to do before just as the return of his ability to add and subtract did not return to his previous level. Nevertheless, I was grateful for any improvement.
Would David have had any recovery without the glutathione? I concede that this is possible, but I have to say that it is not likely. Glutathione brought about another major change in David at the end of seventh grade. The change was so profound that only a fool would ignore it.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Finally, a small break
My hat is off to Dr Rosemary Waring. She was the first I saw who identified something different about autistic children. I am not saying that she was the first to do so, only that she was the first one whom I saw who showed that there really is something medically different about autistic children. She showed that autistic children are statistical outliers when it comes to processing tylenol through the system. It is this discovery and my desparation that led me to try glutathione.
I was, and to a huge extent still am woefully ignorant when it comes to anything medical. When I tried glutathione, I tried it with glutamine. I had read that glutamine helped retarded children so I thought it might help David. I also read that autistic children had low levels of glutathione. My thought at the time was that the reason for slow processing of tylenol through the system was that autistic children have low levels of glutathione. So I gave him glutathione at the same time. This was done after researching the toxicity of each of these. They are not toxic. I figured that I did not really have a chance of any of this working, but I also knew that none of this would cause any harm.
And yet David started to do arithmetic. He was actually adding and subtracting numbers. He was slow. But slow is a huge jump from not able at all. I will not even say that he was as far as he was in the first grade. He wasn't. At the time, I figured that it must be the glutamine. After all, that was what was supposed to help retarded children. I stopped giving David glutathione and continued with glutamine. It was wonderful. David did not stop adding and subtracting. I was hopefult that the glutamine was doing something. It was not much of a change. David still needed constant supervision to do his homework. David still needed ritalin to stay under control in class. David still was no bright star in class. He still had trouble associating with other children. He was still my "W'appen boy". But he could finally add and subtract. What a change.
Before any reflexive detractors start, let me beat you to it. It is entirely possible, maybe even likely that David would have started adding and subtracting without glutamine and glutathione. Of course. I was not convinced that anything I gave David did anything for him. Now, though, I have reason to think that the glutathione might have helped.
I was, and to a huge extent still am woefully ignorant when it comes to anything medical. When I tried glutathione, I tried it with glutamine. I had read that glutamine helped retarded children so I thought it might help David. I also read that autistic children had low levels of glutathione. My thought at the time was that the reason for slow processing of tylenol through the system was that autistic children have low levels of glutathione. So I gave him glutathione at the same time. This was done after researching the toxicity of each of these. They are not toxic. I figured that I did not really have a chance of any of this working, but I also knew that none of this would cause any harm.
And yet David started to do arithmetic. He was actually adding and subtracting numbers. He was slow. But slow is a huge jump from not able at all. I will not even say that he was as far as he was in the first grade. He wasn't. At the time, I figured that it must be the glutamine. After all, that was what was supposed to help retarded children. I stopped giving David glutathione and continued with glutamine. It was wonderful. David did not stop adding and subtracting. I was hopefult that the glutamine was doing something. It was not much of a change. David still needed constant supervision to do his homework. David still needed ritalin to stay under control in class. David still was no bright star in class. He still had trouble associating with other children. He was still my "W'appen boy". But he could finally add and subtract. What a change.
Before any reflexive detractors start, let me beat you to it. It is entirely possible, maybe even likely that David would have started adding and subtracting without glutamine and glutathione. Of course. I was not convinced that anything I gave David did anything for him. Now, though, I have reason to think that the glutathione might have helped.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
The decision to look for something more
Before I begin talking about my decision to look for something more, I should talk about David's state of being when he started fourth grade. There were a number of different aspects to this and they can only be enumerated:
1. David still could not do math. He could not add past 5 consistently without counting on his fingers.
2. David had lost his prodigious spelling ability. Being able to look at a word and remember how to spell it was gone. His spelling, while one of the high points in the Individualized Education Program (IEP), was only mediocre. It was a struggle for him to learn new words.
3. David required ritalin to attend in class. Without it, David would be disruptive. David did not like ritalin. I didn't either. When he got home, we did not give any further doses. He would start to crash at about 5 o'clock which was when I got home from work. From 5 to 7 o'clock was kept free of anything except for dinner. Homework began at seven when the ritalin crash was over.
4. David perseverated when he got upset. He became the "W'appen" boy. Each time he got upset, and homework upset him a lot, there would be a long string of "What happens if" questions. Once that started, it was difficult to steer him away from them and get him back on task.
What happens if I don't do it?
You don't get that choice.
What happens if I get that choice and I don't do it?
You have to do it anyway.
What happens if I can't?
I will teach you so you can.
I am not sure just how long David could have kept this up. I only know that it was longer than I could. It was a daily struggle to keep him away from perseveration and on task when he was doing his homework.
5. It was every bit as painful for David to maintain eye contact with his homework as it was to give eye contact with me. I often had to cradle him in my arms and hold his finger in place to point at the homework. Still, he would drift off task and I would have to bring him back on. His homework typically took 2 to 3 hours each night to get through.
6. David's reading and writing were dismal. He could not maintain any coherence to his thoughts. He could not stay on task long enough to allow him to read more than a paragraph at a time. He could not stay on task long enough to write more than 3 sentences at a time even with me there to help him through. Each year when the other children were progressing David remained back at first grade abilities.
7. After two years of trying, I could not say that David made any significant progress in his math abilities since he suffered his skill losses at the beginning of second grade.
I would be lying if I said that there was never any time when I was ready to give up. All of this repetitive work, all of the disruptions David would create, the time away from the rest of my family were hard. In that time I came to a few conclusions.
1. ABA and other behavior methods were extremely time consuming. They required more time than I or the school could rightly devote.
2. The efficacy of ABA and other behavior methods depends on the receptiveness of the child's brain.
3. That receptiveness is a medical issue.
4. While ABA and other behavior methods have given us a tool these methods are not the final answer.
5. The next breakthrough in autism has to be medical.
6. The medical community only has their psychiatric drugs to manage the behavior of autistic children and adults. Each of these drugs has a long list of side effects. These side effects can be serious including suicide, addiction and seizures.
I could see the day when David would no longer be manageable at home, when my wife and I would be too old to care for him, when he would be too disruptive for his brother or sister to take him in, when he still could not handle life well enough to care for himself. I wanted more for him. The place to look could only be in medicine.
The medical community research has been dismal, with the largest block of research time dedicated to proving that autism and vaccines are not related. I realize that this is almost slanderous since starting with the conclusion and working backward is not how research should ever be done. If you start with the conclusion that 1=2 then you can find proof of it. The most damning thing about modern medicine's autism research is that in the 20 years since my son's diagnosis there has been no medical progress. I have done enough medical research to know that there are medical differences between autistics and the rest of the population. With medical differences there should be medical tests that can be run to diagnose autism. I know of no such test.
There it was. If I wanted to see a breakthrough with David it had to be medical. Back then, I concluded that I would not get any such breakthrough out of the medical community. To date, the medical community has done nothing to prove that conclusion wrong. If David was to have any medical change it would have to be through my own effort. I reluctantly decided to start looking. It was an insane decision. I knew less about medicine than I knew about Arabic script. I felt like I was looking for gold in the Himilayas without knowing what color it was. Still, I ran across other clueless prospectors searching for something more. I also ran across medicine men who felt like, while they had no more than their psychiatric drugs to offer, I had no business trying anything that was not approved by the medical community. Medicine men may sound derogatory, but that was and still is the level of medicine for autistic issues.
If you are a doctor or a medical researcher and you sneer at this decision, know this: You have nothing to offer besides your psychiatric drugs and I am not looking for a management tool. You deride anyone who says that there could be a link between autism and vaccines, yet you can offer no other explanation for autism. You can't even come up with a diagnostic test for autism. Explicitly or implicitly stated, your answer is for us to live with it. I chose to reject that answer and even if David had made no progress I would have no regrets for that decision.
1. David still could not do math. He could not add past 5 consistently without counting on his fingers.
2. David had lost his prodigious spelling ability. Being able to look at a word and remember how to spell it was gone. His spelling, while one of the high points in the Individualized Education Program (IEP), was only mediocre. It was a struggle for him to learn new words.
3. David required ritalin to attend in class. Without it, David would be disruptive. David did not like ritalin. I didn't either. When he got home, we did not give any further doses. He would start to crash at about 5 o'clock which was when I got home from work. From 5 to 7 o'clock was kept free of anything except for dinner. Homework began at seven when the ritalin crash was over.
4. David perseverated when he got upset. He became the "W'appen" boy. Each time he got upset, and homework upset him a lot, there would be a long string of "What happens if" questions. Once that started, it was difficult to steer him away from them and get him back on task.
What happens if I don't do it?
You don't get that choice.
What happens if I get that choice and I don't do it?
You have to do it anyway.
What happens if I can't?
I will teach you so you can.
I am not sure just how long David could have kept this up. I only know that it was longer than I could. It was a daily struggle to keep him away from perseveration and on task when he was doing his homework.
5. It was every bit as painful for David to maintain eye contact with his homework as it was to give eye contact with me. I often had to cradle him in my arms and hold his finger in place to point at the homework. Still, he would drift off task and I would have to bring him back on. His homework typically took 2 to 3 hours each night to get through.
6. David's reading and writing were dismal. He could not maintain any coherence to his thoughts. He could not stay on task long enough to allow him to read more than a paragraph at a time. He could not stay on task long enough to write more than 3 sentences at a time even with me there to help him through. Each year when the other children were progressing David remained back at first grade abilities.
7. After two years of trying, I could not say that David made any significant progress in his math abilities since he suffered his skill losses at the beginning of second grade.
I would be lying if I said that there was never any time when I was ready to give up. All of this repetitive work, all of the disruptions David would create, the time away from the rest of my family were hard. In that time I came to a few conclusions.
1. ABA and other behavior methods were extremely time consuming. They required more time than I or the school could rightly devote.
2. The efficacy of ABA and other behavior methods depends on the receptiveness of the child's brain.
3. That receptiveness is a medical issue.
4. While ABA and other behavior methods have given us a tool these methods are not the final answer.
5. The next breakthrough in autism has to be medical.
6. The medical community only has their psychiatric drugs to manage the behavior of autistic children and adults. Each of these drugs has a long list of side effects. These side effects can be serious including suicide, addiction and seizures.
I could see the day when David would no longer be manageable at home, when my wife and I would be too old to care for him, when he would be too disruptive for his brother or sister to take him in, when he still could not handle life well enough to care for himself. I wanted more for him. The place to look could only be in medicine.
The medical community research has been dismal, with the largest block of research time dedicated to proving that autism and vaccines are not related. I realize that this is almost slanderous since starting with the conclusion and working backward is not how research should ever be done. If you start with the conclusion that 1=2 then you can find proof of it. The most damning thing about modern medicine's autism research is that in the 20 years since my son's diagnosis there has been no medical progress. I have done enough medical research to know that there are medical differences between autistics and the rest of the population. With medical differences there should be medical tests that can be run to diagnose autism. I know of no such test.
There it was. If I wanted to see a breakthrough with David it had to be medical. Back then, I concluded that I would not get any such breakthrough out of the medical community. To date, the medical community has done nothing to prove that conclusion wrong. If David was to have any medical change it would have to be through my own effort. I reluctantly decided to start looking. It was an insane decision. I knew less about medicine than I knew about Arabic script. I felt like I was looking for gold in the Himilayas without knowing what color it was. Still, I ran across other clueless prospectors searching for something more. I also ran across medicine men who felt like, while they had no more than their psychiatric drugs to offer, I had no business trying anything that was not approved by the medical community. Medicine men may sound derogatory, but that was and still is the level of medicine for autistic issues.
If you are a doctor or a medical researcher and you sneer at this decision, know this: You have nothing to offer besides your psychiatric drugs and I am not looking for a management tool. You deride anyone who says that there could be a link between autism and vaccines, yet you can offer no other explanation for autism. You can't even come up with a diagnostic test for autism. Explicitly or implicitly stated, your answer is for us to live with it. I chose to reject that answer and even if David had made no progress I would have no regrets for that decision.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Criticism from the right, correct and knowledgeable
Back in the Dark Ages, the earth was the center of the universe and it was heresy to say otherwise. The mathematicians of the day managed to predict star positions using this theory with accuracy of 2%. Using such a theory it would be possible to navigate by the stars and get from Barcelona to Rome. If Galileo had gone to navigator and told him that his theory was all wrong but he could not tell the navigator how to get from Barcelona to Rome, the navigator's response would be for Galileo to come back when he had a better answer. While Galileo knew that the earth was not the center of the universe, he also knew that the earth and other planets revolved around the sun. That was something on which the world could build. Later with Galileo's knowledge, we could navigate by the stars from Barcelona to Rome.
I wish the medical community had that much to offer the autism community. To date, they can only tell us that it is not vaccines, it is not metals. When I hear ideas that a potent neurotoxin that is routinely added as a preservative to infant vaccinations might be to blame, that idea ranks as plausible though unproven. The medical community and the "scientists" called the idea absurd from the start. Why? It threatened one of the pillars of the medical arts, vaccinations. On the other hand, I have heard other ideas such as:
There is no epidemic. It is all in the diagnostics. Can you imagine how the medical community would react if someone were to say that there is no AIDS epidemic. The AIDS epidemic does not threaten the vaccination program so I expect that any such statement would get a vociferous response.
Apoptotic cell death. Apoptotic cell death is programmed cell death. The same doctor I heard come up with this one decried the possibility that vaccines could be related to autism as impossible. I rank this one with spontaneous combustion.
My message to the medical community is two fold. First while chelation, HBO, GF-CF diets may not work, the best way to sweep them out of the public's mind is to come up with something that works. And no, your psychiatric drugs only make the autistic person more manageable. They do not make them better. Second, I have my own ideas about what autism is and while I acknowledge that they can be just as wrong the geocentric theory of the Dark Ages, my son had figuratively navigated from Barcelona to Rome after being stuck on a sand bar for several years. Is there any among the scientists and medical community who would claim that he/she could have done as well?
I don't hold out much hope for the medical research community. The work of Dr Rosemary Waring ties autism back to the trans-sulfation processes. It is too easy to tie the trans-sulfation processes back to the mercury, the aluminum, the formaldehyde used in vaccinations. It is a thread that I predict will not be pulled. The medical community is unequivocal, dogmatic, and obstreperous about the lack of a link between autism and vaccinations.
In fourth grade, David had not made any progress since he had his skill losses. ABA and other behavioral therapies are a godsend to the autism community. They work. But they only work to the extent that the autistic brain is receptive to them. Like so many other parents, I had to seek out something more than behavioral therapy. Unlike the "scientists", I do not blame parents for going to vitamin therapy, chelation, HBO, GF-CF or other therapies even though I know that their efficacy is questionable. I have been in these parents' shoes.
David is still autistic. But he is functional. He drives. He can socialize. He is studying electrical engineering in college and doing well. I do not claim that what I did with him would work for any other autistic child. Still, there are going to be those among you who after reading this history will say that what I did with him had nothing to do with his progress. I expect that because while in no way does it prove a link between autism and vaccines, it comes too close to that implication. Have a ball and trash my son's history if you must. But understand this. In fourth grade, David was not functional. Now he is. Some of the transitions were miraculous. No amount of trashing will take that away. I accept that I may be navigating following the stars with a geocentric theory. It does not matter. David and I got where we needed to go. So while I explain the history you can say what you want, secure in the knowledge that I can only be wrong. I am secure in the knowledge that with nothing to offer you could not have done better.
I wish the medical community had that much to offer the autism community. To date, they can only tell us that it is not vaccines, it is not metals. When I hear ideas that a potent neurotoxin that is routinely added as a preservative to infant vaccinations might be to blame, that idea ranks as plausible though unproven. The medical community and the "scientists" called the idea absurd from the start. Why? It threatened one of the pillars of the medical arts, vaccinations. On the other hand, I have heard other ideas such as:
There is no epidemic. It is all in the diagnostics. Can you imagine how the medical community would react if someone were to say that there is no AIDS epidemic. The AIDS epidemic does not threaten the vaccination program so I expect that any such statement would get a vociferous response.
Apoptotic cell death. Apoptotic cell death is programmed cell death. The same doctor I heard come up with this one decried the possibility that vaccines could be related to autism as impossible. I rank this one with spontaneous combustion.
My message to the medical community is two fold. First while chelation, HBO, GF-CF diets may not work, the best way to sweep them out of the public's mind is to come up with something that works. And no, your psychiatric drugs only make the autistic person more manageable. They do not make them better. Second, I have my own ideas about what autism is and while I acknowledge that they can be just as wrong the geocentric theory of the Dark Ages, my son had figuratively navigated from Barcelona to Rome after being stuck on a sand bar for several years. Is there any among the scientists and medical community who would claim that he/she could have done as well?
I don't hold out much hope for the medical research community. The work of Dr Rosemary Waring ties autism back to the trans-sulfation processes. It is too easy to tie the trans-sulfation processes back to the mercury, the aluminum, the formaldehyde used in vaccinations. It is a thread that I predict will not be pulled. The medical community is unequivocal, dogmatic, and obstreperous about the lack of a link between autism and vaccinations.
In fourth grade, David had not made any progress since he had his skill losses. ABA and other behavioral therapies are a godsend to the autism community. They work. But they only work to the extent that the autistic brain is receptive to them. Like so many other parents, I had to seek out something more than behavioral therapy. Unlike the "scientists", I do not blame parents for going to vitamin therapy, chelation, HBO, GF-CF or other therapies even though I know that their efficacy is questionable. I have been in these parents' shoes.
David is still autistic. But he is functional. He drives. He can socialize. He is studying electrical engineering in college and doing well. I do not claim that what I did with him would work for any other autistic child. Still, there are going to be those among you who after reading this history will say that what I did with him had nothing to do with his progress. I expect that because while in no way does it prove a link between autism and vaccines, it comes too close to that implication. Have a ball and trash my son's history if you must. But understand this. In fourth grade, David was not functional. Now he is. Some of the transitions were miraculous. No amount of trashing will take that away. I accept that I may be navigating following the stars with a geocentric theory. It does not matter. David and I got where we needed to go. So while I explain the history you can say what you want, secure in the knowledge that I can only be wrong. I am secure in the knowledge that with nothing to offer you could not have done better.
Friday, September 4, 2009
It is all in the statistics
The medical community and a host of others claim that the proof is out there if we would only look. There is no connection between autism and vaccines. For those of us who have looked and for those of us who have not looked, the proof offered is statistical. As an engineer, I have learned about statistics and about the design of statistical experiments. So if I were looking to see if there is a relationship between autism and vaccines, (note I said relationship, not causal relationship) I would do the obvious experiment. I would compare the rate of autism among those the vaccinated population and the unvaccinated population. We already know the autism rate in the general population, at least to an approximation at 1 out of 160 children are autistic. With the rate of unvaccinated children being so low, the autism rate among the vaccinated children will be similar to what they are in the general population. (This assumes that the reader is willing to say that the autism rate does not increase with decreasing vaccinations.) What is missing are the statistics among unvaccinated children.
I am always amazed at the reaction among the pro-vax community when I say that we should take statistics on the autism rate among unvaccinated children. Among the reactions are:
1. Nothing we say is going to convince you... At this point that is true. I will not be convinced that anything has been proven statistically when no data has been collected from the control group. This is fundamental statistics and I do not feel that it is unreasonable to require a sample of the unvaccinated population.
2. Leave science to the scientists, You know nothing, ... If you want to say that I do not know medicine, not a problem. I am an engineer, not a doctor. But I know what a control group is and I know what its purpose is. I know that it is fundamental in the statistical search for the truth. I know that the "scientists" have never taken a sample of the unvaccinated autism rate and published it. What puzzles me is why not. No, I am not a conspiracy nut. I believe in the addage "Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by ignorance or stupidity." Missing this fundamental piece in the thesis that says that there is no connection between autism and vaccines is for me - really stupid.
3. It would be unethical .... No. It would not be. There are many parents who refuse to vaccinate their children. There are whole groups who do not vaccinate their children. This is being done without any coersion. Coersion would be unethical. (Though there are some who believe that all children should be vaccinated and that there should be laws enforcing this. That, of course is coersion.) Samples of unvaccinate children can be gotten without coersion. If the unvaccinated children showed a lower autism rate, would publishing that information be unethical? I don't think so, but I would not be surprised to find people who think that way.
4. Mockery .... You really think I am stupid for wanting to know the autism rate among the control group, the unvaccinated population?
5. This was measured in the Japanese MMR study.... No it was not. The unvaccinated in the Japanese study were not vaccinated with the MMR. They were still vaccinated with other vaccines. That disqualifies that population from the control group.
6. It is way too hard.... I think it is too hard to get past the committees. It is hard to get the pro-vax community to take this simple step. It is hard to get the pro-vax community to see the obvious value of such a survey. It can be done and it is worth the effort.
7. It would be biased toward the poor, who can't get vaccines, who can't afford the wonders of modern medicine...... Since when is autism biased toward the very poor, or the very rich for that matter? The poor in this country are vaccinated. You can't exclude children from school because they can't afford the vaccines that are mandatory for participation for public schools and therefore there are programs everywhere to make sure it happens.
Hey you scientists, the ones I should leave this debate to, the ones who are smarter than I am, I am calling you. You understand - control group, science, they go together. Do you understand that the autism rates among the unvaccinated should have been collected at the beginning of the debate? Do you understand that control group measurements are scientific? Do you understand that any argument to the contrary is specious?
The statistics are out there if we would only look. The first place to look is before vaccines. Before the great vaccine push, the CDC was saying that the autism rate was 4/10000. Now it is 1/160. The correct inference from this is that there is a chronological relationship between autism and vaccines. Note that this is not a causal relationship. You can show a chronological relationship between autism and electronics. The inference that electronics causes autism can't be drawn either. But then there are the Somalis in Minnesota. When they came to the US they had no word for autism. They do now. This is a group that went from no vaccines to the US rate of vaccines and from no autism to the US rate of autism. It is hard to explain away but there are a lot of spokesmen for the pro-vax side who try.
Some would say that I should have faith in the medical community and the vaccination program. Our children are hurt by being wrong saying that vaccines cause autism when it does not or by saying that vaccines do not cause autism when it does. There is too much at stake. I will not back off from saying that the autism rate among the unvaccinated should be scientifically measured.
I am always amazed at the reaction among the pro-vax community when I say that we should take statistics on the autism rate among unvaccinated children. Among the reactions are:
1. Nothing we say is going to convince you... At this point that is true. I will not be convinced that anything has been proven statistically when no data has been collected from the control group. This is fundamental statistics and I do not feel that it is unreasonable to require a sample of the unvaccinated population.
2. Leave science to the scientists, You know nothing, ... If you want to say that I do not know medicine, not a problem. I am an engineer, not a doctor. But I know what a control group is and I know what its purpose is. I know that it is fundamental in the statistical search for the truth. I know that the "scientists" have never taken a sample of the unvaccinated autism rate and published it. What puzzles me is why not. No, I am not a conspiracy nut. I believe in the addage "Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by ignorance or stupidity." Missing this fundamental piece in the thesis that says that there is no connection between autism and vaccines is for me - really stupid.
3. It would be unethical .... No. It would not be. There are many parents who refuse to vaccinate their children. There are whole groups who do not vaccinate their children. This is being done without any coersion. Coersion would be unethical. (Though there are some who believe that all children should be vaccinated and that there should be laws enforcing this. That, of course is coersion.) Samples of unvaccinate children can be gotten without coersion. If the unvaccinated children showed a lower autism rate, would publishing that information be unethical? I don't think so, but I would not be surprised to find people who think that way.
4. Mockery .... You really think I am stupid for wanting to know the autism rate among the control group, the unvaccinated population?
5. This was measured in the Japanese MMR study.... No it was not. The unvaccinated in the Japanese study were not vaccinated with the MMR. They were still vaccinated with other vaccines. That disqualifies that population from the control group.
6. It is way too hard.... I think it is too hard to get past the committees. It is hard to get the pro-vax community to take this simple step. It is hard to get the pro-vax community to see the obvious value of such a survey. It can be done and it is worth the effort.
7. It would be biased toward the poor, who can't get vaccines, who can't afford the wonders of modern medicine...... Since when is autism biased toward the very poor, or the very rich for that matter? The poor in this country are vaccinated. You can't exclude children from school because they can't afford the vaccines that are mandatory for participation for public schools and therefore there are programs everywhere to make sure it happens.
Hey you scientists, the ones I should leave this debate to, the ones who are smarter than I am, I am calling you. You understand - control group, science, they go together. Do you understand that the autism rates among the unvaccinated should have been collected at the beginning of the debate? Do you understand that control group measurements are scientific? Do you understand that any argument to the contrary is specious?
The statistics are out there if we would only look. The first place to look is before vaccines. Before the great vaccine push, the CDC was saying that the autism rate was 4/10000. Now it is 1/160. The correct inference from this is that there is a chronological relationship between autism and vaccines. Note that this is not a causal relationship. You can show a chronological relationship between autism and electronics. The inference that electronics causes autism can't be drawn either. But then there are the Somalis in Minnesota. When they came to the US they had no word for autism. They do now. This is a group that went from no vaccines to the US rate of vaccines and from no autism to the US rate of autism. It is hard to explain away but there are a lot of spokesmen for the pro-vax side who try.
Some would say that I should have faith in the medical community and the vaccination program. Our children are hurt by being wrong saying that vaccines cause autism when it does not or by saying that vaccines do not cause autism when it does. There is too much at stake. I will not back off from saying that the autism rate among the unvaccinated should be scientifically measured.
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