LATimes: Mercury in vaccines seems safe for kids

[Tesha]

Source: Los Angeles Times

A study of 1,047 children who received mercury-containing
vaccines as infants has concluded the mercury does not
cause learning difficulties or developmental delays.

The research released Wednesday said mercury exposure was
associated with very small changes on some measures of
attention, speech and motor control. But the changes varied
by gender and were mostly beneficial, leading scientists to
conclude they were the result of chance.

<snip>

The report published today in the New England Journal of
Medicine did not examine whether mercury causes autism,
as some scientists and advocacy groups have argued. Mercury
is a component of thimerosal, which until recently was used
as a preservative in virtually all childhood vaccines.

Although several large studies have found no causal link
between thimerosal (pronounced thih-MEHR'-uh-sawl) and autism,
the issue is contentious, and several thousand parents are
seeking legal compensation on behalf of children who developed
autism after receiving vaccinations.

Schuchat reiterated during a conference call that there was
no scientific support for the theory that thimerosal causes
autism. She said the CDC is conducting two large epidemiological
studies exploring the possible link. The latest study should
reassure parents that vaccines are safe and do not cause other
kinds of neuropsychological harm, she said.

<more>

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/09/27/MNBGSEMBH.DTL

[ananda]

1. Money gets false science.. again!

Mercury is NOT safe.. for anybody anytime anywhere.

Period.

[Karenina]

15. Who PAID for this "study?"

:shrug:

[mzmolly]

24. The CDC -

who's job it is to promote vaccination.

[AllyCat]

119. did you hear the BBC report last night on Hg in Uganda for gold mining?

They mentioned numerous studies that showed how toxic this was to people. So then if all this is true, why does the US Gov't still tell pregnant women and little kids not to eat Hg contaminated seafood? We know that it causes problems and the Hg contained in vaccines before the ban was found to far exceed the EPA recommended exposures.

So, I guess I agree with the first question: who paid for this? The drug companies want to be able to put this crap back in there along with their formadehyde and everything else. It's cheaper for them.

Follow the money. I won't even let my kid get the flu shot unless it's a thimerosol free vaccine (they do make them--you have to ask for it).

And most vaccines still have SOME Hg in them. It's just that below a certain level, they can report the level as "zero". Also consider the amount of Hg exposure in the environment from coal-fired power plants and contaminated fish, food, and water. We're exposed to a lot of it and it concentrates in kids' little bodies. It never leaves.

If they can make it without it now, they can just keep on doing it.

[Mnemosyne]

2. BS. n/t

[kestrel91316]

3. ".....no scientific support for the theory that thimerosal causes autism......"

This bears repeating ad infinitum to the hysterics. Though it may not do any good, since their minds are hermetically sealed.

Autism is a developmental problem that can be detected fairly early in infancy if the parents are paying attention and not living in denial.

Here's how we will find out the truth: if diagnoses of autism plummet precipitously in the next five years.....because
".....With the exception of the seasonal influenza vaccine, no childhood vaccines currently contain thimerosal......"

[Book Lover]

4. Viz the first two replies to this post (nm)

[xchrom]

5. for all the good it will do around here -- kicking your reply.

vaccines leading to autism has been debunked -- around the world -- many times.

[kestrel91316]

6. But you know EVERY ONE OF THOSE STUDIES is a LIE!!!1!!1!11

They got their funding from (insert name) so the research is fraudulent.

:sarcasm:

[xchrom]

8. i KNOW!!! -- P.S. -- i love you!

:applause: :loveya: :applause:

[earth mom]

163. Those studies are slanted to prove what the CDC & the pharma giants want them to.

The gullibility here on DU is unreal. :puke:

SO...would you like some mercury in your fish? Yeah, I thought not. :eyes:

[arikara]

7. You don't...

make a good case by hurling insults.

Many of us are not going to believe these fraudulent studies until they actually do some that are unbiased and unpaid for by the drug companies that are flogging this crap. For those of us with "hermetically sealed minds" ...a phrase which could equally apply to the rabid vaccinators by the way..., the last paragraph tells the story:

"CDC epidemiologist Thompson once worked for vaccinemaker Merck & Co. Four other researchers in the study have received fees from drug companies, and one has served as a consultant to a CDC committee on immunization."

[xchrom]

12. these studies have been done in denmark, finland and the uk --

it will never, ever matter to you -- because you won't have it.

what you believe is the same as phyllis schlafly and other flat earther right wingers.

[arikara]

14. Sticks and stones...

Nasty insults are not the way to win converts to your point of view, sweetie.

:spank:

[xchrom]

16. miss thing? did i sound like i was trying to win your point of view?

i'm sorry i gave you that impression.

facts are facts -- the earth is round and vaccines present no danger related to autism.

i find your ''point of view'' dangerous.

people get sick and die because of your ''point of view''.

but you can give our best to your best buddies over at eagle forum and phyllis schlafly and concerned women of america.

[arikara]

19. You have crossed the line with your rudeness and insults

So goodbye... you are now on ignore.

[mzmolly]

23. Again, you refer to Schlafly vs. Kennedy Jr. why?

Oh wait, I know why...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kirby/cdc-mercury-in-vaccines-_b_66007.html

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art33780.asp

[Name removed]

25. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

27. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TheMadMonk]

32. A lot of rambling. A list of terrorising symptoms & diseases...

...which are not Autism BTW.

You know what all that verbiage looks like to me. "TERRA! TERRA! TERRA"

Those articles, particularly the Huffington Post one, are not written to inform. They are written to terrify ignorant readers and nervous parents into falling into agreement with the predetermined conclusion that preservative mercury compounds in vaccines causes neurological disorders.


And strangely enough, the vast majority of "popular media" article on matters such as this: mercury in vaccines; ELF radiation from powelines; cellphone tumors; leukemia near Sellafield; and so forth, could have been penned by Karl Rove himself.

[mzmolly]

57. Autism was not studied in the latest white wash trash attempt to mislead.

Speaking of Rove, Rumsfeld and the Bushies - I assume you know that the Bush cabal is linked to the mercury vaccine cover up "thingy?"

http://zmagsite.zmag.org/May2004/levine0504.html
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/dec2002/vacc-d10.shtml

And, that Republicans attempted to absolve big pharma from liability even further in a fairly recent TERRA TERRA TERRA bill? http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Feb05/Pringle0207-2.htm

So the experts in the FDA and CDC definitely knew about the dangers. However, an article published on In These Times.com on Nov 11, 2003, raised an interesting question: “If the CDC and FDA seemed to acknowledge the risks of Thimerosal four years ago and the need to get mercury out of medical products, today the official stance is to circle the wagons against mounting public and scientific criticism about its handling of the Thimerosal issue.”

I have the answer. The turn of events can easily be explained by the fact that there had been a changing of the guard under Bush since 1999. Keep in mind that the stakes were high for the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly, a long time friend of the Bush gang, but also the company that invented Thimerosal.

And sure enough, evidence that Bush came through surfaced when the pharmaceutical industry was granted protection (albeit short-lived) from lawsuits from parents of children who developed autism after being vaccinated, by a provision sneakily tucked into the Homeland Security Act, at the very last minute, by Republicans who no doubt were acting under Bush's direction.

...

During the original final debates on the Homeland Security Bill, Senator Bill Frist (R-TN) had argued forcefully for granting liability protection to makers of mercury based vaccine preservatives and said such measures were needed to boost an industry essential for public health. He is the only physician in the Senate and one of his party's leaders on medical issues, the Tennessean reported on Jan 11, 2003.

"TERRA TERRA TERRA" indeed.

[TheMadMonk]

84. Why the fuck would they?

Any member of the Carlyle Cabal and it associates is going to have some connection to Big Pharma. That's the nature of the investment game. So effing what? Money goes to where there is money to be made.

I will even go so far as to acknowledge that "they" will do everything (and pretty much anything) they can to protect their investment from and threat, be it perceived and real.

However, I do not believe that they are aware of damning research that has been somehow kept from us about Thimerosal.

THERE IS NO MONEY IN VACCINES

There is money in bad hearts, bad livers, kidneys, and a myriad other diseases. Big money. And guess what? The CDC &/or FDA HAS busted Big Pharma's chops for knowingly putting profit ahead of patient safety.


Eli Lilly "invented" the compound in 1929. I think the patent might have expired by now. So there is no special exclusive profit to be had for it's inventors (or their shareholders).

And plucking a figure out of my arse, (based upon the cents per dose cost of many vaccines) I doubt that Thimerosal sales run as high as $100 million a year world wide. Thats sales BTW not the profit on those sales. Chump change to these people.

If even the hint of prior knowledge of a danger in Thimerosal were to come to light, (and eventually it must) the fine alone would consume every cent of profits on the product since its introduction and more. And the subsequent civil findings would see a lot of very pissed off investors and a very empty boardroom.

"These people" might be greedy, amoral, even out and out pure unmitigated evil. However, one thing they are not is suicidally stupid.

• There is no significant profit (exclusive or otherwise) in Thimerosal.
  
• It's inclusion in vaccines is of no actual benefit to the manufacturers of those vaccines.
  
• The 'benefit' it confers is to those who administer the vaccines, who, in many parts of the world, do not have access to reliable refrigeration.
  
• And to it's recipients, by maximising their chances of receiving a viable shot that will actually protect them.
  
• And to the general public who don't have to care for entire hospices full of polio victim, who don't have to pay for the care of Rubella Babies, who don't have to listen to the heartwrenching sounds of whooping babies; and who do not have to choose between cutting their own child's throat (Yes once upon a time mothers learnt how to perform emergency tracheotomies) or sucking the diphtheria laden mucus from their throats.

And yet you continue to claim a vast Machiavellian conspiracy even though said conspiracy can only possibly harm the alleged conspirators. And not just harm, but probably destroy utterly, since the "victims" are children. And which, even if every singles case of autism worldwide could be pinned to Thimerosal with a six inch nail and a lump hammer, would still prove an incalculable net benefit to society as a whole. That is not to say that an acceptable substitute should not be sought if that were the case. However, if such a substitute were not available, then the trade off would make it's continued use worthwhile.



O.K. you have just learnt that your child is an emotionless robot, who will never "love" you in the way a child is supposed to. You are angry, angry enough to want to wrap your hands around "God's" throat and squeeze. You need a reason for your child's dissociation from you their loving parent. You need someone to blame, because if someone else did not "cause" it, then the possibility exits that you did something. Was it the glass of wine at your sister's wedding? The cigarettes you could not put aside? Formula instead of breast? Lead paint perhaps from the 100 year old family heirloom rocking horse?

"What did I do to make my child like this?" is a near impossible question to ask oneself, even when the answer is usually "Not a blessed thing." Far far easier to cry out: "Who did this to my child?" and go looking for answers.


An impossible conspiracy which does not at all benefit the conspirators and which will almost certainly cause them massive harm when/if it is found out? Or desperate parents in search of answers to unanswerable questions?

[KamaAina]

88. Actually, I have just learnt that *I* am allegedly an "emotionless robot"

O.K. you have just learnt that your child is an emotionless robot

That may be the way that uninformed professionals* present a diagnosis of autism to parents, but it is far from the reality. Some people with autism spectrum conditions grow up to get college degrees, get married, even post on DU. (I've got the college and DU parts down...)

'Tis true, though, there are a hell of a lot more questions than answers out there. New parents (and I've met dozens) always seem to feel like they're the only people in the world to whom this is happening. Naturally they'll be searching for, and latching on to, any sure-fire answers* that appear to be out there. (The list of supplements that have been touted as the Cure of the Month is longer than O.J.'s rap sheet.)

edit: spelling

[TheMadMonk]

93. Actually I was using the Media version of Autism.

Vacant stare, disconnect from reality and all that. I am fully aware that an Aspie (as I believe they call themselves) is essentially indistinguishable from a "normal" person in non-emotive contexts. And I am aware that there is an entire spectrum to the what is collectively called "autism" from rocking in the corner all day long, to "Yes I am finished doing what I am doing. How can I help you?".

[mzmolly]

92. "THERE IS NO MONEY IN VACCINES." This is another LIE.

From the first link:

Money Magazine expose on Billion Dollar Vaccine Business
The Lethal Dangers of the Billion-Dollar Vaccine Business

http://www.vaccinationnews.com/DailyNews/May2001/MoneyMag.htm

More...

http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/vaccine-industry-regains-its-luster-for-investors/2006-04-17

http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/novartis-wins-220m-flu-vaccine-contract/2006-05-04

http://www.flixotidecopd.co.uk/investors/reps05/annual_review_2005/year_of_vaccine.htm

[TheMadMonk]

94. Billion dollars in the US, perhaps as much as 5 (being generous)...

...world wide.

A) that's revenue. Not profit. And B) that fucking small potatoes in a business worth hundreds of billions.

A billion dollar a year business is nothing in a world where trillions change hand.


Vaccines amount to perhaps one percent of Big Pharm's total income stream. One lousy percent which if these "allegations" are true, could very easily cause the other 99% of income to either completely disappear, or at least be significantly reduced.


The math just plain does not work.

[mzmolly]

95. Bullshit, vaccines make MONEY, which is why they are manufactured.

Period.

[TheMadMonk]

98. They make money which ammounts to a fraction of a percent...

...of the total revenue stream for big pharm.

And if what is claimed here is true, that not particularly lucrative <1% WILL (guaranteed) eventually affect the other 99+% in a massively negative fashion. So negatively, that there is no conceivable way that profits from the one will ever compensate for profits lost in punitive settlements.

Not even the lawyers who wrote up the risk assessment for the Ford Pinto, would make THAT call.

[mzmolly]

110. The lawyers for Pinto would have lept for joy if the Government picked up the tab on

lawsuits as WE do for vaccines.

http://www.lawyersandsettlements.com/articles/00087/vaccine-profit.html


In a perverse twist of fate, the vaccine program has evolved into a grand profiteering scheme, second only to the military industrial complex's war on terror fiasco. Instead of prevention, the program has resulted in an epidemic of serious health problems for an entire generation of children and at the same time, produced an infinite market expansion for the sale of other prescription drugs, for the scheme's developers.

The start of the epidemic can be traced to the late 1980s, when public health officials dramatically increased the number of vaccines, which contained the mercury-based preservative thimerosal, without taking into consideration the impact of the cumulative mercury load on developing brains of infants.

Once the mercury poisoning was discovered by the FDA in 1999, vaccine-makers claimed they were eliminating thimerosal from vaccines but they never recalled the vaccines already on the market and children continued to receive mercury in vaccines for several more years. Even today, the flu vaccine recommended for 6-month-old babies and pregnant women still contain a full dose of thimerosal.

Instead of ordering drug companies to get the preservative out of all vaccines, Congressional Republicans and President George W Bush spent much of the past 3 years working on strategies to give the pharmaceutical industry protection against lawsuits from vaccine injured children. A handful of shameless Congressional Republicans remained lurking around in the shadows for years, just waiting for the right moment to attach the protective provision to some "anti-terror" spending bill until they succeeded in December 2005.

Keep touting the lies if you wish however I intend to inform:

http://blog.nj.com/ledgerupdates/2007/04/merck_vaccine_sales_pace_profi.html

Categories: Business

Merck said the sales of its vaccines rose more than 233 percent during the first quarter compared with last year, helping to boost the drugmaker's first-quarter profit.

Gardasil generated $365 million in sales for the first quarter, the company said. Overall, vaccines generated $903 million for the quarter. The vaccines, which include RotaTeq and Zostavax, contributed $500 million.

Net income for the quarter reached $1.7 billion, or 78 cents per share, an increase of 12 percent compared with net income of $1.5 billion, or 69 cents, per share for the same period last year.

The drug maker, which has its headquarters in Whitehouse Station, said worldwide sales reached $5.8 billion, up 7 percent.

An interesting story from NPR, listen here:

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/07/27/vaccine_program_milked_for_profit/

Vaccination is a profit driven venture, don't kid yourself.

[TheMadMonk]

122. .I stiill do not think they would risk so much over so little gain.

I admit I have significantly underestimated what vaccines are worth. However, I do stand by my assertion that there is still too little return. The vaccines under scrutiny here are all old, generally in the public domain and manufactured and SOLD for pennies per dose. The return on the childhood vaccines allegedly implicated, still only ammounts to a paltry few tens of millions of dollars at most a year in worldwide sales. Sales not profit.

Patented vaccines are big business yes. Vaccines which can be sold at high prices in affluent first world countries. Not DPT, MMR et al. These amount to only a tiny fraction of total vaccine revenues.

If they had any solid suspicion that Thimerserol was a likely candidate in triggering autism they would have pulled the vaccines immediately. The financial risks would have been too high. And they in all probability could have achieved the same financial result simply by reporting any such finding to the FDA. Then "have" the FDA issue an immediate recall, while congress votes (these civic minded "corporate persons") a special ex gratia payment/tax break to compensate them for the recalled and destroyed batches. Great pro-active press for everyone involved. Would even go a long way to restoring public confidence after the Vioxx mess.


I am in no way advocating for the drug companies here. They have been caught out far too many times knowingly pushing shonky products or glossing over side effects. But those times they have, the risk vs return has always been far more favorable. This time around the issue is just too potentially explosive to deliberately increase their exposure.

One thing I AM ADVOCATING FOR is science. There has been just too much scrutiny on this particular subject. Over two hundred studies, covering on the order of a million children have investigated the possibility of a link between Thimerserol exposure and Autism Spectrum Disorders. No such link has been found.

A certain proportion/type of Autism Spectrum Disorder is demonstrably (albeit only after death) as physical in nature. More still can be attributed to Rubella. In both cases the "damage" is done long before the administration of vaccines. Genetics will probably explain still more cases, (or perhaps at least a missing slice of brain).

[mzmolly]

134. You're "little gain" assertion is crap once again.

Read the truth here since clicking on links appears to be too much?

http://www.thnhf.com/vaccinations_02.htm

Reuters, assessing the worldwide vaccine industry – called in Great Britain “the jabs business“ – found that the shots are outpacing synthetic drugs in terms of sales growth, and it quoted the world’s two largest makers of the same to make the point: GlaxoSmithKline PLC and Aventis Pasteur.

Both companies, noted Reuters, claim 24 percent shares of the $6.5-billion-a-year global vaccine market. The companies called shots for children “the infant sector“ and said it accounted for two-thirds of vaccine sales.

An alleged growing demand for flu shots among adults is also helping move along the vaccines “market dynamics,” said Reuters, and this is separate from the “new business in supplying vaccines against smallpox, following fears that the deadly virus might be used as a weapon.“

The news agency said drug industry spokesmen predict that global vaccine sales will rise to $8 billion by 2005 and $10 billion by 2010, with long-term trends showing tenfold increases for vaccines since 1980 while drug sales rose by five times.

I'm sorry but you don't have even a basic understanding of this issue, and have no business debating it.

Another assertion full of holes:

"If they had any solid suspicion that Thimerserol was a likely candidate in triggering autism they would have pulled the vaccines immediately. The financial risks would have been too high. And they in all probability could have achieved the same financial result simply by reporting any such finding to the FDA. Then "have" the FDA issue an immediate recall, while congress votes (these civic minded "corporate persons") a special ex gratia payment/tax break to compensate them for the recalled and destroyed batches. Great pro-active press for everyone involved. Would even go a long way to restoring public confidence after the Vioxx mess."

First of all, the government picks up the tab for vaccine injury, not Eli Lilly who makes Thimerosal and sells it in the US and abroad. Additionally, Vioxx proves that drugs known to harm and even KILL remain on the market for reasons of profit. And, given the public's blind faith in every vaccine ingredient imaginable, why on earth would they have to put people before profit?

I'm not interested in debating this issue with someone who doesn't have the backround, sorry.
:hi:

[northzax]

146. 24% of $8 billion

is roughly $2 billion (rounding up) GlaxoSmithKline had annual global sales of 18 billion Pounds, roughly $36 billion in 2005 http://www.gsk.com/investors/reps05/annual_review_2005/business_operating_review.htm) they sold more Advair (1.7 billion pounds) than all their vaccines combined. you think they are going to gamble their entire company on 1/18th of their revenue? less than 7 percent? and that every drug company in the world is going along with it, including the ones who don't actually make vaccines, or are seriously losing market share to Aventis Pasteur and GlaxoSmithKline? no way. it's either the greatest conspiracy EVER, or not one at all. you're telling me that Pfizer, wanting to enter the vaccine market enough to over pay for PowderMed last year, wouldn't simply release data showing that Glaxo and Aventis were poisoning their patients, clearing the way for Pfizer to enter the market? come on.

[mzmolly]

150. Again, someone attempting to argue without knowing the facts.

1. The http://www.hrsa.gov/vaccinecompensation/">Government/taxpayer picks up the tab for vaccine injury so they are not gambling jack. * The CDC has the job of promoting vaccination and ensuring safety - a conflict of interest.

2. The mass denial campaign ensures that no one is gambling because people believe "mercury is not linked to ...."

3. Pfizer would not have special access to the information you suggest they are burying.

4. Pfizer has used thimerosal in some of their own vaccines.

The issue of thimerosal is not limited to the companies you insinuate are soley responsible above.

Here's more info for those interested: http://www.momsagainstmercury.org/merck.htm

5. People here need to spend more than two minutes researching this issue before attempting to debate it.

[northzax]

155. what facts am I wrong on?

I used your number for the growth of the market, right? $8 billion? you said that. I used glaxoSmithKline's annual report to shareholders to get their gross revenue. are you arguing those numbers? how about Pfizer's?

right here, right now. link to a double blind, peer reviewed study that shows a conclusive link between thimerasol and autism. or is the entire scientific community in on the scam?

[mzmolly]

161. Sorry, the fact that you suggest that actual double blind studies exist,

indicates your ignorance on this issue, again.

[northzax]

172. Wait, so you concede

That there are no publishable studies linking thimerasol to autism? Double blind is the standard for medical studies, and you can't point to one that shows a linkage? Because i can show you ones that show no linkage. But hey, what is science?

[mzmolly]

174. No I "concede" that double blind studies would have to compare

non-vaccinated children to vaccinated children. And, unless one considers the http://www.infowars.com/articles/science/autism_none_for_unvaccinated_amish.htm">Amish comparisons which I'm certain you don't, the studies are lacking.

[earth mom]

164. You don't have a god damn clue.

First off if people would listen to the PARENTS of these kids, they would find out that these parents saw a distinct before and after occur with their children. Like before thimerosol and after. In addition, many of these babies-YES BABIES-were deathly ill after the shots, and when they recovered they were NOT the same baby! No smiles, No laughter, No words!

Jeezus, Why would anyone dispute evidence from thousands if not millions of parents who are witness to such a transformation?!!!! :wtf:

Your post simply doesn't hold water because the issue here is not whether there is profit in vaccinations. Who cares about their god damn profits? NO-The issue here is the MILLION OR BILLIONS of dollars that would have to be paid out if ever a real and impartial study is done-and paid for by the pharma giants-make NO mistake!

p.s. How would you like some Mercury with YOUR fish? Hmm? Yeah, I thought not! :eyes:

[Tesha]

39. Many of the skeptics are uncovertable by *ANY* data.

Many of the skeptics are uncovertable by *ANY* data.

It's been proven right here time and time again.

I understand, I really do. You probably are close to
someone who's affected by autism and you want an
explanation. So do we all. But for an explanation to
be of any real-world use, it has to supported by *DATA*.
And there is essentially *NO DATA* that supports the
idea that autism is caused by mercury-preserved vaccines.
And there's *A LOT* of data that opposes the idea. And
it's not all from "bought" scientists.

So it's really time to let this go and help search
for other hypotheses as to what causes autism, *EVEN
IF THE ANSWER TURNS OUT TO BE* that a big portion of
the cause is just genetic.

Tesha

[mzmolly]

58. Some people are good at regurgitating big pharma talking points.

Parents will not "let this go" nor should they.

mzmolly

[Tesha]

60. And some people need anti-paranoia meds. Know anyone like that? (NT)

[mzmolly]

70. Some people need a brain. One that clues them into the fact

that mercury is a neurotoxin.

[customerserviceguy]

75. Yes, and chlorine is a poison

but I'm still going to shake a bit of sodium chloride (table salt) on my ear of corn.

There are no people I've met who are more fanatic than the autism-cause crowd, that includes the few fundies I know. Even they will leave you alone if you tell them enough times that you are an atheist.

[mzmolly]

80. Chloride is not clorine. Mercury is mercury. So, sprinkle that salt on some mercury laden fish and

feed it to your small child.

When you do, you may have a point.

[mzmolly]

82. CHLORINE, not clorine.

Woops. ;)

[TheMadMonk]

96. Learn some ruddy chemistry will ya. Please.

Hell, just the basics of critical thinking would be a good start.

Why the fuck would anyone deliberately poison (which is what you are claiming) children for a minuscule return, when with a little clever marketing, they can sell mood altering drugs by the truckload AND have the parents willingly (if not eagerly) administer those drugs to their child every single day for ten, fifteen or more years.


Next to no profit and a huge risk of massive punitive retaliation, if/when the "secret" you are determined exits finally leaks? Or massive profit and an entire country full of frazzled parents clamouring for an opportunity to stuff still more dollars into your pockets?

If one must have a conspiracy, which one makes more sense?

[mzmolly]

111. Well now, this isn't about deliberate poisining or minimal return.

When YOU know the facts, it would be prudent to demand others think.

1. The mercury poisoning fiasco is like any other corporate "accident" and following cover up. It wasn't deliberate, but that does not mean that there is not good "financial" reason to cover up the facts.

2. I've proven your "there is no profit" BS to be BS above.

[TheMadMonk]

123. No more than a few tens of millions at the most.

CHUMP CHANGE in a multi-million dollar business. The vaccines we are discussing here are sold for pennies a dose. The "profit" numbers so fraudulently put forward are for recent vaccines, still under patent and sold for tens or hundreds of dollars a dose.

And shall I draw a bit of a time line? Once upon a time it was the measles vaccine. Then the "overwhelming" tripple hit of the MMR. Now it's the Thiomeserol. And three time now the exact same piece of evidence has been used to "Prove" the connection. And now it's an accident, rather than reckless indifference and a desire for profits. And I'm sure if I went looking I could find something else that was blamed before the measles vaccine. And not once has the data changed. Just the story as the previous one failed to pan out.

Your side (not that I am on the side of Big Pharm) has exactly one data point: "Autism manifests at much the same time as the vaccines are administered." However, it demonstrably manifests whether or not the vaccines are administered and no amount of looking has demonstrated that it happens any more often when those vaccines ARE given.

[mzmolly]

133. Sorry, it's not chump change. You buy the lies hook, line and sinker.

I've showed you proof that vaccine companies promote the notion that vaccines are big MONEY to their stock holders, I've demonstrated in various reports and articles that your assertions are incorrect yet you continue the false mantra.

Further, I'm sorry, you don't understand the issues. The MMR shot is about a environmental different catalyst toward developing autism, and the issue is still "an issue."

Perhaps if you could spell thimerosal you'd have a better understanding of the concerns?

However, it demonstrably manifests whether or not the vaccines are administered and no amount of looking has demonstrated that it happens any more often when those vaccines ARE given.

Another bullshit talking point which proves that the propagada campaign to blind the American public has been a success.

[earth mom]

165. How about some MERCURY with your fish? Hmm, yeah, I thought not.

:eyes:

[mzmolly]

21. You forgot David Kirby, Evelyn Pringle, RFK Jr. and other free thinkers.

One would think that you'd get tired of envoking Schafly every time you're desperate?

[TheMadMonk]

38. Could be difficult, since most people who support the mercury(insert your "polutant" here) causes...

...X, have pretty much cattagorically stated that they won't believe anything said by the only people actually qualified to perform such studies. You (and your ilk) having decided the experts are part of the "conspiracy", won't accept anything said experts say.


One thing you might note is that the usual direction of "travel" is from civil servant to private employee. It may be possible that Thompson was "placed" in the CDC to make sure the "fix" was in. However, it may be equally possible that he was unable to stomach what goes on in the private sector, and jumped ship to work where the science is "purer".


BTW having your nose rubbed in the absolute lack of merit in your argument (and/or argumentative methods) is not an insult.

"Many of us are not going to believe these fraudulent studies until they actually do some that are unbiased and unpaid for by the drug companies that are flogging this crap. For those of us with "hermetically sealed minds" ...a phrase which could equally apply to the rabid vaccinators by the way..., the last paragraph tells the story:"

There HAVE been numerous studies, in many different countries, and some of those studies looked directly at the negative case, (children immunised with vaccines that did not contain any mercury). The consensus conclusion is that mercury preservatives can not be linked to any known or suspected neurological disorders in children. The dissent conclusion can be generally summed up: "I don't give a fuck what the consensus is. I know what I know. And I don't need to know any more than that."

I'll add my own observation to the studies, if mercury is the cause of certain neurological disorders in children, then it is a sensitivity issue and environmental exposure alone is sufficient to trigger those disorders.

[Recursion]

77. Let me re-bold part of your last sentence to call attention to something

I'll add my own observation to the studies, if mercury is the cause of certain neurological disorders in children, then it is a sensitivity issue and environmental exposure alone is sufficient to trigger those disorders.

I don't know if the argument is that "mercury is the cause" of autism. What I see mostly is something like "mercury is one of many factors in the onset of" autism. "one of many factors" is very very difficult to test for when the number and nature of the other factors is unknown; some might be genetic, some environmental, some developmental, etc.

It's like, what "causes" leprosy? We would tend to say Mycobaterium leprae, but you have to also have a genetic predisposition and there are significant environmental and even seemingly developmental factors as well. That's why we still can't model its spread very accurately. There's not "the" cause of it, and there may not be "the" cause of autism, particularly given that there doesn't seem to be a viral or bacterial pathogen.

[TheMadMonk]

97. One known factor is a (measurable in autopsy) defect...

...in the physical structure of the brain. A defect which can only occur while said brain is developing in the womb.


The argument here has not been "Mercury, might be one of a number of factors in the development of autism spectrum disorders." It has been "Mercury causes... (AND THEY KNOW IT.)"


The counter argument is that there has been no credible link made between Thimerserol in vaccines and autism spectrum disorders, despite multiple attempts to identify such a link.

To which the counter-counter argument is "You're all in this together. I know what I know."

And from there it generally goes downhill.

[mzmolly]

112. No it hasn't been mercury causes." It's been mercury can lead to X to in some vulberable children.

Period. No one is ignorant enough to profess that everyone who has had a shot containing mercury is damaged.

[TheMadMonk]

124. Nor was I exactly making that claim either.

However, the point remains that a claim has been made, and that claim has been made despite a complete dearth of supporting evidence.

[mzmolly]

136. The point is that there is a death of supporting evidence and a dearth

of evidence supporting a coverup.

http://www.evidenceofharm.com/

[aquart]

11. Yes, that will likely settle it.

Nonetheless, I have no faith in any scientific report issued under this administration. None. The report may be truthful. But I have no reason to believe it.

[mzmolly]

20. Actually according to the article: "The report published today in the NEJM

"The report published today in the New England Journal of Medicine did not examine whether mercury causes autism,...

and -

"Dr. Anne Schuchat, an official with the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which paid for the $5.3 million study, said the agency was still trying to assess one finding: Boys with the greatest exposure to vaccines containing mercury had twice the risk of developing tics, compared with boys with the lowest mercury exposures."

One may wish to google stims and autism.

Here's another take from Huffpo...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kirby/cdc-mercury-in-vaccines-_b_66007.html

I also found this of interest:

"CDC epidemiologist Thompson once worked for vaccinemaker Merck & Co. Four other researchers in the study have received fees from drug companies, and one has served as a consultant to a CDC committee on immunization."

:hi:

[kath]

28. They took thimerosal out of vaccines in one of the Scandinavian countries, & autism rate continued

to INCREASE for decades after the elimination of thimerosal.

There is NO causal link between thimerosal and autism. Multiple PEER-REVIEWED scientific studies have shown this.

Too bad so many people don't believe in science :-(
"hermetically sealed minds", indeed.

[TheMadMonk]

43. Just to play devil's advocate. Where does atmospheric mercury ...

...generally end up and concentrate? f-fu-fu-flamin' cold places like Scandinavia.

Thus a causative link between mercury and Autism remains possible for the sake of this argument. However, I'm sure this particular angle has been investigated and proper allowances have been made.

Oh and that's pure devil's advocate BTW since I am also in possession of the following information. At least some forms of autism can be directly attributed (or at least solidly linked) to a specific type of developmental brain defect. A physical defect which manifests whilst the child is still developing in the womb. Pray tell how an injection administered twelve months later might possible cause such a defect to occur. Perhaps to be sure that Thimerosal does not have endo-chronic (reaching into the past) properties, we should look for this "defect" prior to administering the first vaccine and if we find it, with hold the vaccine.

Hell, such an experiment would really make a mess of a lot of scientific jeans since successfully fucking with causality is would pop a lot of academic rocks.


There are several arguments to be made against any causative connection. Scandanavians, Eskimos, Inuit, none demonstrate a demonstrably higher incidence of such neurological disorders when compared to people's who's exposure to environmental mercury is far lower.


As far as I cam see, there is only one credible way in which Thimerosal might lead to neurological disorder, and that is through a pre-existing sensitivity to mercury. And if that is the case, you might as well blame the cod and chips you fed your kid as the needle a doctor stuck in his arm.

[Recursion]

48. Well, since you're advocating...

t. A physical defect which manifests whilst the child is still developing in the womb. Pray tell how an injection administered twelve months later might possible cause such a defect to occur. Perhaps to be sure that Thimerosal does not have endo-chronic (reaching into the past) properties, we should look for this "defect" prior to administering the first vaccine and if we find it, with hold the vaccine.

While we're being a devil's advocate, it would in no way be endochronic if thimerosal aggravated the risk associated with the physical defect.

We engineers tend to be amused by how scientists never seem to "get" systems & control...

[TheMadMonk]

55. The physical defect is a whole "slice" of :"missing" brain tissue.

Just beneath the Hypothalamus IIRC. (It was in a Scientific American article a few years back.)

Said physical defect (and autism) manifest with and without the presence of (added) mercury.

As I've already said. If Thimerosal can do it, then so too can environmental mercury. And any evidence which might possibly implicate mercury, implicates it whatever the source.

To put it bluntly. If a child is predisposed to "Mercury induced Austsm" (if there is such a thing) then, by far, their biggest risk factor is "cod and chips" every Friday not a handful of injections.


Hell, why not toss Catholics into the study mix. If mercury can be implicated at all, then it should be possible to demonstrate some sort of continuum effect. ie. a lot of very "antisocial" Eskimos, Indifferent Italians and gregarious Zulu's.

[Recursion]

62. Continuing advocacy

if Thimerosal can do it, then so too can environmental mercury.

Depends; it's very possible that environmental mercury would be absorbed and processed identically to the mercury in injected thimerosal, but than again it might not. It's like the joke with those "Vitamin C" tablets that are really just ascorbic acid; but it's only a specific chirality of ascorbic acid that gets processed as vitamin C, and even then only in the presence of enough fats.

I'm not making that claim for mercury, just pointing out that things aren't always as simple as they sound.

[TheMadMonk]

103. True enough. But since I was playing advocate...

...I decided to "explain" why Scadinavian autism rates did not drop after the removal of Thimerserol from their vaccines. The do after all take a bigger hit of environmental mercury than most of the rest of the world.

And I should have said "might" not "can".

And indeed things are not always as simple as they sound. However, when given a choice between a simple explanation and a hugely complex one, the simple one usually wins out.

[w4rma]

44. There is no scientific support for the theory that thimerosal does not cause autism. (nt)

[Megahurtz]

9. Bullshit!

It's Poison!

Lying Sacks! :grr:

[sam sarrha]

18. the mercury doesnt show up in blood tests, because it is incorporated into the nervous system, the

brain is the greatest repository of nerves, the mercury is incorporated into the nerves in small children because they are building nerves.

[TheMadMonk]

34. Demonstrate please.

Blood tests are not the only tests there are. Ultimately there is always autopsy.

Show me that the mercury in vaccines IS incorporated into the body.

You (or more probably someone you have read) is making a false connection between neurotoxicity and neurospecificity.

I am as certain as I can be that experiments have been performed with radioisotopes tagged mercury preservatives to determine where (or even if) it is taken up by the recipient. The results of any such study must almost certainly have been definitively negative, since even inconclusive results are usually trumpeted as "Proof Positive".

[sam sarrha]

37. is if it isnt to protect to the corporations why is there total resistance to find the reason for th

cause of the epidemic of autism today

[TheMadMonk]

49. Perhaps because evidence suggests that it is caused a physical "defect"..

...which can only develop whilst the child is still in the womb.


One thing you people seem to overlook is that vaccines ARE NOT WHERE BIG PHARMA MAKES ITS MONEY. Vaccines are extremely low margin products. Very little research is done on developing new vaccines.

Thomersal was not used in vaccines because Big Pharma insisted that it be there. Big Pharma couldn't care less. They could save money simply by leaving it out, and even make more by marketing their product as mercury free.

It's presence did/does not benefit them. The beneficiaries are the humanitarian organisations which distribute the vaccines and the recipients who receive a guaranteed (as much as is possible) a viable dose.

So unless you want to posit a conspiracy which encompasses virtually every researcher in the world of imunotherapy, aid organisations, governments, and fuck knows who else, (oh and successfully inducts all graduate students) perhaps it might be easier to accept another far simpler premise: (or two)

Shit happens. (And I gotta blame someone, else I be forced to ask myself what I could have done differently. (Answer BTW: probably not a bloody thing that would have affected the outcome.)

[sam sarrha]

51. maybe MEDICINE should not be a for profit venture.. Pharma influence goes the way to who gets grants

and what the goals should be.. no cures allowed on maintenance profitable for live treatments.

and they dont use much of their own money on research that is propaganda, it is our tax money they are using to profit from us

[TheMadMonk]

54. Which is why there has been fuck all research on vaccines...

...that can't be marketed in first world countries.

Pharma does not do vaccines because there is money to be made there. They continue to do vaccines (most developed with public money) because if they don't someone might try to get a closer look at the books.

I don't dispute that Big Pharma is riddled with corruption. Hell we can find dozens of instances of their putting profit ahead of the client/patient.

So WHY THE FUCK are you so determined to "catch" them in an impossibly complex hyper-conspiracy, which makes no sense AND profits absolutely nobody?

Actually I think I know the answer: In this world it takes dead children to get people to pay attention. The Viox (or however u spell it) scandal certainly didn't do it. "Victims" are making a grab (which may well be justified) for "compensation" and everyone else remains far more interested in pissing and moaning about their mortgage, whilst ignoring the 150 cm (will you just look at my tonker) paycheck eating monstrosity on the wall. (Recent research has shown it is not rising mortgage costs breaking the bank, but frivolous big ticket items such as plasma TVs, secured by the tiny bit of equity the borrower possesses in his home.)

In the past the repo man came and took said TV. Today the bank says "Keep it the worthless thing and thanks for the house."

O.K. it's bad form to take advantage of the mentally incompetent, and I do decry those who set out to do so. However, there is a limit to the level of sympathy I have for idiots who contribute to their own destruction, since most such are not undone by the skill of those "skinning" them, but by their own, innate personal greed.

[sam sarrha]

91. i am not trying to catch anyone, i am saying that between certain ages Mercury is incorporated into

nerve tissue.. being tied up and isn't circulating in the blood, it is does not show up in blood tests.. the same with lead.. the child is retarded but has no lead in its system. and the lead in the nerve tissue can not be removed

i did research earlier in my life, i did the researach that reagan used to privitize the mental hospitals and i worked in pesticide research and i was responsible for removing Vapona from the market which was nothing but a nerve gas. i was hiding out in africa from that fiasco and learned to silversmith and left science and became a jeweler when i got back from the peace corps

i know how corporate research works.. i dont trust anything they do.

[TheMadMonk]

101. Is it? Can this be demonstrated?

I checked, admittedly quite shallowly, and while it seems some mercury compounds indeed head straight for the brain, Thimerserol is apparently not one of them.

Has radio-tagged Thimerserol (or the mercury it contains) been followed into the brain with a scanner? I doubt it, or we would not be having this conversation.

Have autopsies found atypical amounts of mercury in the brains autistic children? A typical (expected) concentration would only indicate that sensitivity to mercury can't be categorically ruled out.

Has the excretion of injected Thimerserol been quantified? What disparity, if any, is there between the amount injected and the amount excreted?


Three simple tests. Test which almost certainly have been done, and which if they have been done have returned negative results. (Or again we would not be having this conversation, and Thimerserol would most certainly be off the market.)


The question remains: Why would Big Pharma, (even if it were corrupt through and through, top to bottom and side to side) risk the whole kit and caboodle over what can not possibly amount to more than a few tens of millions of dollars (the net worth of the Thimerserol) out of tens of billions?

It just plain does not make sense to risk so much for so little gain.

[sam sarrha]

105. it is apparently a combination of factors, why would the auto makers decide it is cheaper to just

pay off individual cases of people and families being burned to death by bad gas tanks because it is cheaper in the long run than recalling all the cars...

[TheMadMonk]

115. That was what they thought.

So they were punished for putting a dollar value on human life and suffering.

What sort of spanking do you think might be handed out for knowingly doing harm to White American Children.

Like I've said. They derive minimal financial benefit from the Thiomerserol; It has essentially been the decision of the customer whether or not Thimerserol be used or not since the introduction of single dose ampoules; Its inclusion has always been for the perceived benefit of the customer/recipient. It just does not make sense to include Thimerserol with what could be perceived as malicious intent, or even as reckless indifference. The return is not worth the risk.

This I readily concede. Pharmaceutical companies have allowed in the past, and will at times in the future allow, profit and loss to influence their assessment of the risks a new drug might present. The operative word here being profit. The potential financial gain has to be matched against the likely penalty if or when found out. And I'm sure they operate on the assumption that eventually they will be.

One thing I won't concede is that they would run the same (and greater, because of the children aspect) risks for pocket change profits on a public domain product. Viox at least was primarily for old people.

[Recursion]

76. I confess

(oh and successfully inducts all graduate students)

You nailed us...

Seriously, though, the thimerosal story is a pretty darn good example of the dangers of assuming the inertness of an ingredient. I think the canonical one is how they figured out to use glycerine for heart attacks; they kept trying different things and had identical positive results, finally they realized the glycerine they had been stabilizing the candidates in was doing it.

[TheMadMonk]

102. Is there resistance to finding the reason for Autism?

Perhaps that resistance comes from the food industry. It is becoming clearer and clearer that at least some food additives (vitamins red, yellow and green among others) are negatively neurologically active. It is even strongly suggestive that removing these additives from children's diets can have positive effects even in children who fall within accepted norms of behaviour and performance.

Thimerserol has been in use since the thirties. The autism "epidemic" of which you speak is a much more recent phenomenon. The greater number of vaccinations today might conceivably have something to do with it. However if this were so, there would be a fairly clear correlation between number of vaccinations and the incidence of autism, and this is very clearly not the case.

[mzmolly]

113. Your last statement is incorrect.

But again, you buy the white wash. There is epidemiological evidence that mercury declines in vaccination corelate with reduced rates of autism. This matter is among many being debated. It's not been "dismissed" or "solved" as you wish to promote.

[TheMadMonk]

125. So why did Scandanavian rates continue to rise?

The epidemiological evidence is that THERE IS NOT SUFFICIENT EVIDENCE to draw a positive conclusion. And the rules of epidemiological study make it very difficult to provide proof absolute for negative cases.

This DOES NOT MEAN that the "jury is out", or that either possibility is "equally likely" (or nearso). All that it means is that proving a negative case (that there is no significant link) is always an uphill battle. It does not mean that the positive case (there is a link) has been proved or demonstrated in any particular.

[mzmolly]

139. Again, you haven't done even minimal research.

Numerous animal, DNA, epidemiological, and other studies point to Thimerosal as a culprit in America's epidemic of neurological disorders. Autistic children have been shown to have higher mercury loads than nonautistics, and there have been reports of significant improvements in some brain-injured children by removing mercury from their brains. Most of the symptoms of autism are similar to the symptoms of mercury poisoning. Scientists have been able to induce autism-like symptoms in mice by exposing them to Thimerosal. A recent study by an FDA scientist, Dr. Jill James, found that many autistic children are genetically deficient in their capacity to produce glutathione, an antioxidant generated in the brain that helps remove mercury from the body.

Government health agencies who green-lighted Thimerosal have turned a blind eye to the hundreds of studies linking Thimerosal to a wide range of neurological disorders and joined the pharmaceutical industry to gin up a series of flawed European studies to exonerate Thimerosal. Those studies examined children exposed to a tiny fraction of the Thimerosal given to American kids and took advantage of the autism spike that resulted from deceptive data-gathering in Scandinavia to argue that autism rates are unrelated to Thimerosal use. ~ Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/07/01/autism_mercury_and_politics/">The Boston Globe

[northzax]

147. again, Robert Kennedy is a lawyer

and an activist. he is not a neurologist, he is not a immunologist. he is a lawyer. when dealing with scientific matters, I find it makes much more sense to listen to the scientists who work in the field.

[mzmolly]

151. A lawyer who deferred to scientists and neurolgists and data before

coming to the conclusion he did http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0616-31.htm">HERE

peace

[northzax]

157. he has no data

he has talked to two people who were at a conference where a preliminary study was discussed. What do you do after a preliminary study? more studies to try and replicate the results. hasn't been successfully done. once it is, we will talk.

[mzmolly]

160. Such garbage.

Apparently and unfortunately you remain uninformed.

Some "data" gathered by RFK can once again, be found here: http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0616-31.htm

[earth mom]

166. Yeah, and I'd listen to the likes of him before I'd ever listen to the likes of you!

:eyes:

[aquart]

10. Bush's CDC has so much credibility. As in NONE.

[semillama]

36. Really? I wasn't aware that Bush replaced every single scientist

at the CDC with "Big Pharma" shills. I bet that will come to as a surprise to the many hard working scientists who are trying to improve and protect your health.

[Stuckinthebush]

13. That is good to hear.

Nice study published in a high-end referred journal.

[Trillo]

17. Since there is no apparant link nor danger,

when can I expect to see the 1929 thimerosol formulation of Merthiolate, not the new reformulated Benzalkonium Chloride based product, back on retail drugstore shelves?

I mean, since there is absolutely no danger from it!

[Tesha]

40. As you well know, there is a worldwide push to minimize the total mercury load...

As you well know, there is a worldwide push to minimize the
total mercury load in the waste stream. It's for this reason
that mercury-laden products are rapidly becoming obsolete.

Nobody argues that mercury is a "good" thing. But that
doesn't mean that the very small amounts of mercury
preservatives that were used in vaccines are the causes
of autism.

Tesha

[Trillo]

59. I don't believe I have argued there is such a link,

it seems to be a projection of those claiming there absolutely is none. I also find that curious as well. As the saying goes, Me thinkest though doth protesteth too much.

The main point of my response, which you replied to, was to some others upthread that were looking at only one portion of what this article said in claiming it should finally settle the matter of vaccine mercury not causing autism or some such semantic permutation, while ignoring the fact the article also said that the study "did not examine whether mercury causes autism"!

That's some major cognitive dissonance, and I happen to believe these same folks are not dummies!

Rather than confront that character with a refutation through replying directly, and forcing them to confront their own selective reading, I preferred a less direct approach in the interest of relations. Sometimes, replying directly results in a day long argument that is time consuming and leads to bad feelings.

[mzmolly]

22. From Huffpo on this study:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kirby/cdc-mercury-in-vaccines-_b_66007.html

If you were informed that mercury in vaccines might double the risk of your son developing motor tics, increase his risk of "phonic tics" by nearly two-and-a-half times, and possibly cause speech, attention or behavioral problems in school, would you still allow him to be injected with the heavy metal -- which, by the way, is 100 times more neurotoxic than that lead coating on his Chinese toys?

And what if your government's most trusted public health agency, the CDC, announced it had funded a study that replicated the findings of a 2003 CDC analysis, which also detected an association between vaccine mercury and tics, and that researchers were now suggesting "the potential need for further studies" between thimerosal and the neurological disorder?

And what if the investigators also said they detected a small but statistically significant association between early thimerosal exposure and impaired "behavioral regulation" in boys?

Or what if they said that increased neonatal exposure (28 weeks or younger) was associated with "significantly lower scores in verbal IQ scores in girls," and "significantly poorer performance" in articulation tests among all children?

More at the link above.

[kskiska]

26. Anybody remember mercurochrome?

It was a household cure-all for childhood cuts and scrapes when I was growing up. It was bright red, and applied to an injury with a glass applicator attached to the bottle top.

I wasn't aware it's now banned, though:

Mercurochrome is the trade name of merbromin and (usually) of merbromin tinctures made of merbromin and alcohol or water (usually 2% merbromin to 98% alcohol or water).

Its antiseptic qualities were discovered by Johns Hopkins doctor Hugh H. Young in 1919. The chemical soon became popular among parents and doctors for everyday antiseptic uses and it was very commonly used for minor injuries in the schoolyard. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) removed it from the "generally recognized as safe" and into the 'untested' classification to effectively halt its distribution in the United States in 1998 over fears of potential mercury poisoning. It is readily available in most other countries.

[TheMadMonk]

104. I would think 79 years of safe and successful use would constitute...

...a fairly extensive and comprehensive, though informal test regime.

A billion skinned knees that survived to be skinned again can not be wrong.

[mzmolly]

154. How many years was mercury in fish before we deemed it a problem?

Amounts matter.

[skyblue]

29. I thought mercury was a carcinogen. Is it no longer? WTF!!!

[w4rma]

45. Mercury is a neurotoxin. (nt)

[xchrom]

30. there is no link between autism and vaccines

http://www.cfah.org/hbns/getDocument.cfm?documentID=1154

Demicheli and coauthors analyzed 139 studies of children up to age 15, eventually selecting 31 of the highest-quality reports for review. Ten of these focused on long-term adverse effects and ranged in size from several hundred participants to more than 500,000. They took place in the United States, United Kingdom, Denmark and Finland.
The review confirmed that the combined vaccine may cause expected short-term effects such as irritability, fever, rash and joint stiffness. Very rarely, more serious side effects such as bleeding disorders and seizures may occur. Nevertheless, “No credible evidence of an involvement of MMR with either autism or Crohn’s disease was found,” say the authors.

Although mercury has now been removed from pediatric vaccines, Yazbak remains convinced that current inoculation recommendations carry unwarranted risks.
Yazbak promotes what he calls “reasonable vaccination,” recommending that single vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella be available at no additional cost.
However, the U.S. National Immunization Program notes that giving the vaccinations at different times could leave people exposed to the diseases. For instance, if the rubella vaccine were delayed, says the agency’s Web site, some children could contract the disease and transmit it to pregnant women. “Ironically, infection of pregnant woman with ‘wild’ rubella virus is one of the few known causes of autism,” according to the site.

http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=autism19&date=20040519

WASHINGTON — The Institute of Medicine, an influential adviser of the government on scientific matters, said yesterday there is no credible evidence that either the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine or vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal cause autism.
The conclusion came in an 81-page report requested by two federal agencies to address the doubts raised about the safety of childhood vaccines.
The 14-person panel urged more research on autism, but said further pursuit of possible links between vaccines and the neurological disorder probably is not worth the money or effort.
Critics said the final proof may come if autism diagnoses drop now that thimerosal has been virtually eliminated in routine childhood vaccines.

Especially convincing were a Danish study showing no difference in the rate of autism between children who got thimerosal-containing vaccines and those who did not; and a British study showing no relationship between the introduction of MMR and autism rates, or between the timing of a vaccination and the onset of autism symptoms.

what no link even in pregnant women?!? -- and this the endowed chair of autism?
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-05/uom-sfn051007.php

"This study adds to the evidence that there is no casual association between thimerosal and childhood autism," said Judith Miles, who is the William S. Thomson Endowed Chair of Autism and professor of pediatrics and pathology in the MU School of Medicine. "We conclude that there is no indication that pregnancies resulting in children with autism were more likely to be complicated by Rh immune globulin/thimerosal exposure."

The study investigated thimerosal exposure during pregnancies that resulted in the birth of a child subsequently diagnosed with autism. Although experts anticipate that autism will be the first behavioral/psychiatric disorder for which major genes will be identified, there is still fierce debate that thimerosal, a preservative commonly used in vaccines and is almost 50 percent ethylmercury, is responsible for the rise in the disorder. Rh negative women are routinely treated with Rh immune globulin (RhIg) during the third trimester to prevent hemolytic disease, in which the mother’s immune system attacks fetal blood cells. Like many vaccines, RhIg manufactured in the United States contained thimerosal prior to 2001. Since young fetal brains are more susceptible to neurotoxic effects, researchers led by Miles, of the MU Thompson Center for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders, assessed Rh status and thimerosal exposure of mothers of children with autism.

The study included 214 mothers of 230 children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder. Rh status, RhIg with thimerosal exposure and Rh incompatibility (in which the mother’s Rh status is different than the fetus’s) were established by reviewing medical records. The results showed that in children with autism, Rh negative status was no higher in their mothers than in the general population, that exposure to RhIg (preserved with thimerosal) before birth was no higher and that pregnancies were not more likely to be Rh incompatible.

Miles said that few studies have focused on pregnancies of Rh negative mothers who received RhIg during pregnancy, probably because the thimerosal is diluted before reaching the fetus and has been assumed to be innocuous. Nevertheless, there is a concern that even very small doses delivered when the brain is especially sensitive can be toxic. Numerous Internet sites and one research study assert that RhIg causes autism and that a high percentage of mothers of children with autism are Rh negative, neither of which was shown to be true in the current study. In addition, a recent study hypothesized that Rh incompatibility itself could disrupt fetal neurodevelopment, thus playing a role in autism, but the current study found no increase in the proportion of Rh incompatibility in mothers of autistic children. In response to the claim that only certain groups of children are at risk, the authors also analyzed specific autism spectrum disorder subgroups and found that none had significant increases in either Rh negativity or thimerosal exposure during pregnancy.

this study goes back to 2002 -- just to show that multiple stufies have been done.
http://www.immunizationinfo.org/pressroom/release_detail.cfv?ID=15

A new study in the November 7th New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) concludes that there is no association between the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. The comprehensive study adds to the significant body of evidence showing that the MMR vaccine does not cause autism in children and makes any possible connection between the two extremely remote.

“This valuable study provides thoughtful and caring parents further assurance that vaccines, particularly MMR, not only save lives, but are safe,” said Dr. Louis Z. Cooper, Interim Director of the National Network for Immunization Information (NNii).

“Measles remains a serious threat worldwide—over one million deaths annually are caused by the virus.”  Dr. Cooper continued, “The evidence shows that a child’s chances of being harmed by measles is far greater than the chances of being harmed by the MMR vaccine. Immunizations are one of the most important ways that parents can protect their children from serious infectious diseases.”


the japanese have found link between vaccines and autism
http://www.medpagetoday.com/tbindex.cfm?tbid=669
Researchers from the Yokohama Rehabilitation Center in Japan and the Institute of Psychiatry in London evaluated children in Japan during a period when the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine was offered and when it was no longer used to assess any link between the vaccine and cases of autism. The research, published in Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, showed that on a population level there is no link.
The researchers tracked the records of 31,426 children born in one district of Yokohama between 1988 and 1996. Study results revealed that autism cases doubled even after the combined vaccine was withdrawn: there were 48 to 86 cases per 10,000 children prior to withdrawal of the vaccine and there were 97 to 161 cases per 10,000 children afterward. The triple vaccine was removed in Japan in 1993.

The study authors concluded that the MMR vaccine "cannot have caused autism in the many children with autism spectrum disorders in Japan who were born and grew up in the era when MMR was not available."


a danish study going back to 2005'
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/09/AR2005080900885_pf.html

Contrary to some fears, childhood vaccines do not appear to overwhelm the immune system and make youngsters prone to other infections, according to the largest study to examine the issue.

A Danish study found no increased risk for other infectious diseases among more than 800,000 children who received the standard set of vaccinations.

The findings, published in today's issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, should be reassuring to parents, the researchers said.

"There has been a lot of speculation about this hypothesis -- that if you have a lot of these vaccinations, this could perhaps overwhelm or weaken the child's immune system," said Anders Hviid of the Statens Serum Institute in Copenhagen. "We found no support for that hypothesis."



and here's some info for those who want to go back to the ''good old days''.

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/whatifstop.htm

[KamaAina]

89. The Danish study was looking at *weakness* of the immune system

"There has been a lot of speculation about this hypothesis -- that if you have a lot of these vaccinations, this could perhaps overwhelm or weaken the child's immune system,"

The mechanism by which vaccines work is by deliberately inducing an immune response. What if a number of such powerful immune responses, over a short period of time, produced an autoimmune response involving the nervous system?

[xchrom]

107. ok -- first weakness of the immune system was only part of the danish study.

second there human infants have -- like all humans have remarkable immune systems -- and vaccines do not create autoimmune responses.

http://www.immunize.org/catg.d/4038myth.htm
CONCERN: Vaccines "use up" the immune system.
Is it possible that all the vaccines given to children in the first few months of life use up the immune system? Certainly children build immunity to only a limited number of microorganisms (viruses, bacteria, fungi, or parasites). The question is, How many?

Probably the most sensible approach to answering this question was that formulated by Dr. Mel Cohn and Dr. Rodney Langman, immunologists working at the Developmental Biology Laboratory at the Salk Institute in San Diego. They theorized that the number or microorganisms to which a body can respond depends on the number of cells in blood that can make antibodies sufficient to recognize all the relevant parts of the microorganism.

Using their theory, it stood to reason that the number of microorganisms to which one responds depends on one's size. Cohn and Langman estimated that elephants can produce immunity to about a hundred times more microorganisms than humans, and that humans can build immunity to at least a hundred times more mircroorganisms than hummingbirds. Although this would mean that adult humans could make antibodies to more organisms than infants, the scientists estimated that even young infants could respond to about 100,000 different organisms at one time.

Therefore, the eleven vaccines required for all children will use up only about 0.01 percent of the immunity that is available.

and this from the same source.:

The largest study to examine the relationship between the MMR vaccine and autism was reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in November 2002. About 537,000 children in Denmark who either did or did not receive the MMR vaccine were examined for about six years. The incidence of autism was the same in children who did or did not receive the MMR vaccine.

[Corgigal]

31. Some attorney

must have been close to getting a judgment and the lobbyist of the big pharm needed some more backing. I'm sure that attorney, and their clients know who they are. Keep up the good work, whoever you are.

[Recursion]

33. Doubling risk of tics = "safe for kids"?

What a fascinating world we live in...

[Tesha]

41. Depends on the base risk, doesn't it?

If we doubled your risk of getting hit by a meteorite,
do you think it would have much of a practical effect
on your life?

Tesha

[Recursion]

47. That's the thing about public health

Even small base risks, while ignorable from most individuals' standpoints, can be problematic from a public health standpoint.

Now some people might say "aren't tics preferable to diptheria or mumps?" Well, sure, but the fact that there are tics mean there is a neurological change that we don't really know about yet. Are the small percentage of children that develop tics the extent of the problem? Or are they pointing to a larger problem we haven't connected the dots to? We don't know.

[Tesha]

50. Sadly, diptheria, pertussis, and measles...

Sadly, epidemics of diptheria, pertussis ("whooping
cough"), tetanus, measles, mumps, and rubella pose
far greater public health risks than the extremely
unlikely link between mercury-in-vaccines and autism.

Research will doubtless continue, but the jury really
is in on this particular trade-off.

Tesha

[Recursion]

53. *shrug*

Vaccination is an important arm of public health, but if I had to choose between living in a city with modern sanitation and living in a city with universal vaccination, I'd choose the former. But anyways...

My point is that since we don't know all the neurological effects of "inert" ingredients in vaccines it's not really meaningful to compare risks. It's entirely possible that doubling the increase of tics is the only effect; our experience with neurology suggests otherwise, but it's possible. It's also possible they'll all drop dead at age 50 (or whatever). The doubling of tics means it has a neurological effect -- is it minor (is there such a thing as a "minor" change to the nervous system?) or is it pointing to a larger problem? If you say you know the answer to that you're lying, because nobody does. So don't use risk management language when you don't have risk management info. You're assuming the the public health benefit of the MMR vaccine outweighs the public health costs of an MMR vaccine. Don't feel bad, I do too; I just had to get my MMR again because DOD lost my immunization records and I'm going back to school. But I don't claim I base that decision on science; it's based on assumption and unwillingness to buck the flow. If we just kind of mumble and wave our hands and say "we're pretty sure it's not causing problems", that's not risk management any more.

[Tesha]

56. It's also possible that we'll all change to reptiles overnight...

You offered up a long, entirely-unsupported list of
"It's possible thats". It's also possible that in a
strange Metamorphosis, we'll all change to
reptiles overnight, but the odds are sufficiently
small as to not spend any time worrying about this
dreaded outcome.

The same is true for your list of "Its possibles".

Unless you can suggest a plausible mechanism by
which any of these things might occur, there's no
reason to give your argument any credence at all.

Tesha

[Recursion]

61. "Plausible" is easy

Vaccines are stabilized and preserved with substances containing heavy metals

Heavy metals cause well-established psychotropic and neurological reactions, and the full catalog of these reactions in combination is unknown.

It is certainly "plausible", then, that injection of substances containing heavy metals could lead to any given neurological reaction.

Upthread we have a study showing a doubling of the risk of the onset of tics. That's one example. Something with a long delay from toxicity to onset of symptoms would be very very difficult to track, particularly if it only occurs in combination with other risk factors.

Like I mentioned earlier, I'm an engineer, and this is kind of the core of our difference with scientists: some problems in complex systems simply aren't amenable to isolation. To do a proper scientific experiment often requires abstractions that render the original point moot.

To go off on a tangent by way of example, I remember a study from around 2000 in NEJM looking for a link between sugar and hyperactivity. The engineering (ie, largely heuristic) answer is yes: give a kid a twinkie, he's bouncing off the walls. The scientific answer in that study was "no", because "sugar" was taken as unrefined glucose (rather than, say, sucrose or dextrose), and the criteria for "hyperactivity" was the clinical presentation for AD/HD.

But back from the vortex of anecdote, I see no reason at all to believe that causes of neurological effects are orthogonal -- in fact, if they are, then the nervous system is unique among complex systems (and not, in fact, a "complex system" in terms of system control theory....). My only dog in this fight is to stop demonization-based evangelism by pro- or anti-innoculation people. The human body is a system far more complex than either side seems to acknowledge.

[Tesha]

63. If you're an engineer, then you understand the concept of dosage.

You also understand that there are far more potent
sources of mercury in the environment than the
dose from a few vaccinations.

Tesha

[Recursion]

66. Definitely

But I'm not a chemist and I don't know the behavior of mercury in different compounds, nor the body's reaction to those compounds. Some compounds might get filtered out quite easily by the renal system and others not; certainly some chemicals behave that way.

It's like iron: if I eat X grams of dietary iron, I'll be healthy and strong; if I inject X grams of ferrite into me, I'll probably die.

[AngryAmish]

35. Why did you post this?

You've let the nutters out.

[Tesha]

42. It's always good to keep the nutters identified.

> Why did you post this?
> You've let the nutters out.

One, it's good news.

Two, it's always good to keep the nutters identified.

Tesha

[AngryAmish]

46. Fair enough

Cheers!

[mzmolly]

71. RFK Jr. is apparently a "nutter."

Thanks for your corporate driven open mindedness.

[AngryAmish]

109. On this issue, RFK jr is a nutter

I have read some of his ascientific nonsense on this issue.

[mzmolly]

140. He's not a nutter on this or any other issue.

He's a man who was a skeptic and dare to open his mind to the evidence.

[northzax]

148. he's also, just a reminder

a man who opposed the Cape Wind Project because it would damage the views of people like him who own houses on Nantucket Sound. so don'tgo thinking he is perfect, he may be right on a lot of things, but he was wrong on that, and he's wrong on this.

[mzmolly]

149. No, he's not wrong on this.

As for Cape Wind, I'll take that subject up in a thread on 'Cape Wind.'

[northzax]

156. so you say

the science says different. are you a scientist? a neurologist or immunologist? where did you get your PhD/MD from? can you show me a single double blind, peer reviewed study that backs your point up?

[mzmolly]

162. I'm sorry "the science" differs depending upon the "scientist" but you didn't

know that, right?

[earth mom]

167. Can you prove your view with an UNBIASED study?

No you can't.

So, hey BTW, would you like some Mercury in your fish?

Yeah, I thought not. :eyes:

[Javaman]

52. And in other news...

arsenic is all the rage for banishing the evil spirits from you thoughts!

[NoodleyAppendage]

64. Why expose kids to a NEUROTOXIN if you have an alternative? Results, aside.

Mercury and its derivatives are KNOWN NEUROTOXINS, so my contention has always been one of "why even expose kids in the first place, if you don't need to?" I'm sure that giving children minue amounts of alcohol in their formula probably won't show up on neuropsychological assessment measures, but why bother in the first place?

This whole issue boils down to corporations who want to save money over the general well-being of our children. Period.

j

[mzmolly]

141. Uhm, because Eli Lilly has a patent?

;) This whole issue boils down to corporations who want to save money over the general well-being of our children. Period.

Indeed it does, and most liberals don't question corporations are in "it" for the money, UNLESS it comes to vaccination. Bizarre, frankly.

[Recursion]

65. Brandon Keim at Wired sums up my reaction best

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2007/09/thimerosal-ques.html

One, and I′m going to read the quote, and then just tell me your answer, “this suggest” – the first statement is “this suggests the possible adverse association between neonatal exposure to mercury and language development coming on top of two-and-a-half times risk for phonic TICs. And when I looked up phonic TICs they are more serious than they might sound.

But anyway, that conflicts with your conclusion which reads “our study does not support a causal association between early exposure to mercury from thimerosal containing vaccines and deficits in neuropsychological functioning in the age of seven to 10 years.” In other words, you are suggesting a possible adverse association but then conclusion your studies of not support a causal association. And I′m just wondering how you reconcile what appears to me, and I could be wrong, seems to be conflicting statements.

[mzmolly]

74. It's par for the course. The attempt is to mislead and judging by the response here

I'd say it's been a sucessful campaign?

:hi:

[StarryNite]

67. Since part of the studies

included comparing children who were immunized with vaccines not containing mercury, then why don't they just only use immunizations not containing mercury for everybody. Quit using the damn mercury altogether and call it a day.

[Recursion]

68. They don't make new vaccines with mercury in them

The stocks of vaccines with mercury still in them are dwindling (IIRC 2-3 more years' worth)

So it's a question of throwing out 2-3 years' worth of vaccines and that associated cost vs. the possibility of risk of side effects.

Once the vaccine manufacturers were granted protection against lawsuits, that question became a no-brainer for them.

[StarryNite]

69. Then give people the choice

For instance, all the people on here who believe the ones with mercury are safe can have that kind given to their children. But the ones who are in doubt can choose the kind without mercury.

[Recursion]

72. Mercury is chosen by the anti-vaccine people because it's pretty hard to argue with...

...but the issue goes a lot deeper than that. A lot of the same people who talk loudest about mercury also wouldn't vaccinate if the vaccines were free of it.

My own position is that the importance of vaccines is often overstated (compared to sanitation and other public health issues) but vaccines in themselves are not doing much harm, and doing a good deal of good. But I don't like how they get put forward as the one and only answer to communicable diseases, when in fact they're just one "leg of the stool", as it were; but they're the only leg that makes people a profit, so they get all the attention. Putting a good sewer system in Lagos would save more lives than giving everybody an MMR, for instance, but how do you make a billion dollars doing that?

And I'll reiterate, if I had to choose between giving up modern sanitation and giving up modern vaccination, I'd keep sanitation in a heartbeat. This is kind of a non-issue for the developed world, but the developing world faces that choice quite literally: spend money on medicines, or on sewage and water treatment systems.

[Tesha]

79. I firmly believe that's true.

> ...but the issue goes a lot deeper than that. A lot
> of the same people who talk loudest about mercury also
> wouldn't vaccinate if the vaccines were free of it.

I firmly believe that's true.

I also agree with your point about sanitation vs.
vaccination but here in the civilized world, we
used to be able to have both. :(

Tesha

[StarryNite]

73. It would be interesting to see

how many of the people who feel the vaccines with mercury are safe would actually choose that type for their children if given the choice.

[Tesha]

78. Well, that would depend on the price difference, of course.

Because the mercury-free but highly-perishable
vaccine would be quite a bit more expensive
(or, perhaps, its efficacy might be in doubt
due to it having "expired").

Tesha

[Recursion]

81. It's a constant problem with technology transfer

They need some sort of preservative because they have to be shipped from the industrialized country where they are made to the target country. It would be easier if they were made on location (and good for the local economy there), but then the big companies lose control of the IP and the profit.

A lot of this problem would go away if we cut the Goridan knot of IP. We're already paying for most of the research pharma is doing; why not require that R&D tax credits come with the cost of opening up all results with no proprietary interest?

[xchrom]

83. rubella in pregnant women will cause autism.

from my extensive post above -- which everyone has conveniently ignored.

Although mercury has now been removed from pediatric vaccines, Yazbak remains convinced that current inoculation recommendations carry unwarranted risks.
Yazbak promotes what he calls “reasonable vaccination,” recommending that single vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella be available at no additional cost.
However, the U.S. National Immunization Program notes that giving the vaccinations at different times could leave people exposed to the diseases. For instance, if the rubella vaccine were delayed, says the agency’s Web site, some children could contract the disease and transmit it to pregnant women. “Ironically, infection of pregnant woman with ‘wild’ rubella virus is one of the few known causes of autism,” according to the site.


the anti-vaccine people are quite simply dangerous.

studies on the connection between vaccines and autism have been all over the world -- all over the world -- many thousands of people have been studied.

there. is. no. link. -- no matter how hard you try to think a link -- there is none -- none.

[Recursion]

85. That one (the rubella connection) is actually very interesting

Fombone (citing, it seems, Chess, which all of them seem to) notes that there is a significant difference between autism rates of congenital rubella children of vaccinated but still rubella-receptive women and non-vaccinated women. If my college had a Springer subscription I'd read more about it...

the anti-vaccine people are quite simply dangerous.

Yes, yes, and Duesberg should go to jail too, I know. But calling a researcher "dangerous" bugs me and seems unscientific. While I don't know if Duesberg or Yazbak fall into this category, there's an extent to which the perceived value of consensus and unity of message in public health is beginning to outweigh the perceived value of scientific debate.

[xchrom]

86. and you are aware the the governments of ireland and the uk

have issued official warnings regarding the anti-vaccine folk?

i guess my point is this -- there is no -- none -- not one iota of credible research that supports what the anti-vaccine folk are saying.

yet what they say and pass off as fact spreads -- spreads as ''truth'' and people don't get their vaccines.

bringing you around to the rubella connection.

measles in pregnant women is very dangerous.

pertussis in small children is devastating.

what we have here is the flaw in free speech -- not all good speech counter-acts bad speech.
and this particular crossroad will, can and does have very debilitating effects for society.

on edit -- someone up-thread -- an anti-vaccine person -- is entirely unaware of the fact that he/she can request thimerasol free vaccines are available on request -- that is info that's been around for several years now.
just underlining what it is i'm talking about.

[Recursion]

87. I'm still not sure who "anti-vaccine folks" are, by your definition

Am I one because I think money would be better spent in the developing world on sanitation, clean water, and nutrition than on vaccination?

Am I because I actually write letters advocating that rather than just thinking it?

Am I because I think vaccines in the industrialized world do some amount of harm X, even though I think it's less than the amount of benefit Y?

Is it anti-vaccine to think there probably are side effects from preservatives and stabilizers that we haven't found, and which may be too wrapped up in other cofactors to ever isolate definitively?

[xchrom]

90. yes -- indeed you are one. lol -- i mean wouldn't you say so?

you have it masked to a degree -- but it's all the same nonsense.

sanitation will not counter act the the things that plague us that vaccines prevent.

children have to go to school in groups -- cities -- well you can decipher that -- and so on.
humans are a herd species.

more -- there is no amount of evidence that can be presented to you and the others that will change your mind.

my grandmother never believed that god would let man land on the moon.
even when she stayed up all night and watched the first moon walk -- she could not believe it.

that's what this is like to me -- but with very bad consequences.

people who should -- don't even understand how vaccines work -- very disturbing.

[AllyCat]

120. And now they just ship them to third world countries.

Besides, most vaccines still contain some mercury. They do not have a to report a level below a certain value (not sure what that is, but there is a lower limit). these levels are well below the EPA recommended exposure levels. The old vaccines were not.

I'm glad to see the stuff out of vaccines and which they would start with some other compounds too.

[Recursion]

130. Hey! We're all not supposed to mention that

My "beef" with vaccines, incidentally, is their use in the developing world:

A) they eat up a lot of money that would be better spent on clean water, nutrition, and education ("better" in the sense of more lives saved)
B) as you mentioned, there's a tendency of "throw the garbage over there" because the safety and even efficacy requirements are a lot lower
C) there have been some very, very shady, unethical, and unscientific tests done, particularly on HIV vaccines, in the developing world, essentially on the theory "oh they're going to all die soon anyways"

[kutastha]

99. Two questions...

Can any of the autism/thimerosal advocates explain why autism continues to be prevalent even though thimerosal is no longer a preservative in childhood vaccines? Indeed Pediarix has contained less than one microgram of mercury per dose, but was eliminated in the beginning of this year.

Because of this, are the autism/thimerosal advocates convinced that autism will drastically decline in the next decade? If it doesn't, why?

[skids]

100. I wouldn't hold my breath for "closure" to the screaming on that...

...because there's already been arguments both ways on the autism rate data as of 2006, and what doesn't help is that of the two databases I've seen mention of, one was influenced by the publicity surrounding the issue -- more people looking to get diagnosis -- and the other, well, wouldn't you know it, the methodologies changed just at the wrong time.

So on the one hand, it'll have to be long enough for people to be convinced that all the vaccines with it are long ago out of the supply lines, and on the other hand any downward trend would have to be very long and pronounced and not simply due to our suck-ass health care system failing to diagnose more uninsured children.

I suppose maybe rates from Great Britain might make a better case whichever way, given their system actually treats people.

[ovidsen]

106. F in biochemistry

Just because vaccines used to contain thimerosal, a chemical compound containing mercury, is no reason to indict mercury in thimerosal for autism.

For one thing, the medical definition of autism has broadend so much over the past decades that a comparison of autism cases per year is meaningless. 30 years ago, only a child with severe communication and socialialization skills would be diagnosed with autism. Not any more. If "Johnny" or "Ann" are slow in class and have relatively few friends, they're stuck with the "autism" label even though their symptoms have nothing to do with autism. This leaves the door open for wide mistreatment.

Secondly, compounds can act drastically different than the elements they contain. Take sodium chloride (NaCl). It contains sodium, a metal so unstable it ignites in water, and chlorine, the gas that (along with methane) nakes our solar system's planetary giants (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune) considered impossible to support life as we know it.

But combine Na with Cl and you get.... salt!!! A simple compound considered essential for multi-celled organisms, including humans, on Earth.

Nope, it's gonna take a lot more studies to convince me that the lawsuit happy parents of kids that have (at worst) borderline autism are victims of the thimerosal that used to be present in childhood vaccines.

[xchrom]

108. you are like a breath of fresh air -- thank you.

[TheWatcher]

131. "I beleive Everything that man sad, because it's exactly what I wanted to hear."

[mzmolly]

114. Some vaccines used in children still contain mercury.

Next.

[xchrom]

116. and there is no link between autism and vaccines.

next.

except for the followers of phylis schlafly and the eagle forum and concerned women of america -- and believers in the tooth fairy.

[mzmolly]

117. Geeze, get a new line huh?

There is a link, and it's been covered up by the Bush cabal and their concerned corporate profiteers.

[xchrom]

118. stop pedaling fantasy as fact. -- and doing the work

right wing fanatics.

there's a new line for ya.

[mzmolly]

121. Stop insinuating that legitimate concerns surrounding vaccination are

limited to "right wing fanatics." It's a cop out, which is no different from your first inaccurate assertion. Afterall, you might learn something if you actually debate on the merits?

[TheMadMonk]

127. You are not being accused of being. Simply of doing their work.

Your entire argument still remains that the negative argument can not been proved, therefore the positive must be considered.

Granted. IT HOWEVER DOES NOT DESERVE ANY SPECIAL PROMINENCE. It simply occupies a hole and is necessary to get all probabilities to add up to 1.0, because negative arguments can very rarely be proven/demonstrated absolutely.

Every time an individual or group takes a wrong headed stance against a given non-existent (and often senseless) conspiracy, they seriously weaken the argument against the many real conspiracies that are out there.

And even if this particular conspiracy were true in each and every particular, (not proven at all) the actual nett damage it does to society as a whole (quantifiable) is so small that absent definitive proof it is simply not worth pursuing, no matter the grief it might bring to individual families. Somewhat callous I know, but true nonetheless. Far better to expend the effort elsewhere where it can be effective.

Effective action is just that. Effective. And if there is dirt to be found in one corner them odd are you'll find some in another.

Bad arguments for good causes, remain bad arguments nonetheless and their use weakens any good arguments you might have. You give your opponent the opportunity to be the aggrieved party and he gets to be the one demonstrating a "pattern of persecution".

Thus you do his work, even whilst you oppose him at every turn.



There may indeed be legitimate concerns surrounding vaccines. There have been in the past. However, that evidence which is available, which has been collecting for nearly seventy years even if only studied for a third of that, suggests that Thimerserol is among the least of those concerns. A shitload of shattered false hopes from the cervical cancer vaccines might well turn out to be the next one.

[xchrom]

129. well thought out and well said. n/t

[mzmolly]

137. You are accused of doing the work of Merck, Lilly and the Bush family.

http://www.infowars.net/articles/july2007/200707Mercury.htm

And even if this particular conspiracy were true in each and every particular, (not proven at all) the actual nett damage it does to society as a whole (quantifiable) is so small that absent definitive proof it is simply not worth pursuing, no matter the grief it might bring to individual families. Somewhat callous I know, but true nonetheless. Far better to expend the effort elsewhere where it can be effective.

So glad you feel at liberty to speak for the parents of children who have been injured or killed via vaccination. However, I'm going to defer to the parents and professionals who have actually researched the matter, not you.

There may indeed be legitimate concerns surrounding vaccines. There have been in the past. However, that evidence which is available, which has been collecting for nearly seventy years even if only studied for a third of that, suggests that Thimerserol is among the least of those concerns. A shitload of shattered false hopes from the cervical cancer vaccines might well turn out to be the next one.

Tell me how one goes about researching 70 years of "evidence" if they can't spell the word in question? For the record, >>> THIMEROSAL.

Come back and we'll debate once you have actually done some research on your own.

[xchrom]

145. your information is COOKED information and it's the same as advocating violence. n/t

[mzmolly]

152. LOL

LOL LOL and LOL.

[xchrom]

128. you can not debate a lie

and an obsessive delusional.

you can only call it like it is -- what you present is dangerous to public health.

it's mostly dangerous to women and children -- which fits perfectly with the religious right wing desire to control women and their bodies.
and to do further harm to the poor.

there is no link between autism and vaccines -- what you present is dangerous to people, two governments have officially said so --
so at the end you have to want to see people suffer and die to fit some nightmare of yours -- what ever that might be.

[mzmolly]

132. Oh gawd, here we go again. Telling the truth is a danger to public health.

Even the CDC doesn't go as far as you in your desire to cover up the truth.

[xchrom]

143. you are not telling the truth -- what you do is

present a very real danger to public vis a vis cooked, purposely misinterpreted, and out right fabrications about vaccines.

make no mistake -- you are a danger to public health and you are an extension of the assault on science.

and it's a mistake and a dangerous one that du allows this to happen.

it is not different from advocating violence.

[mzmolly]

153. Yes, I'm such a danger that we have the highest vaccine compliance rate in the history of the US.

Mercury is safe, up is down, black is white, the truth is dangerous.

Clue for ya buddy, autism is violent, death from vaccine injury is violent, brain damage is violent, tics are violent, neurological damage leads to violence...

I'll tell the truth when ever I can. And DU is doing the right thing by allowing an open disucssion/debate on this important subject.

[TheMadMonk]

126. Get a new line yourself.

This conspiracy theory has been floating around since long before Bush. And it blamed the actual vaccines themselves, both singly and in combination before someone cottoned onto the fact that the vaccines contained "nasty mercury" and changed the tune yet again.

Mercury has been in vaccines for nearly 80 years. I strongly suspect that the quantities administered in the early years were far, far higher than the amounts used today. Enough so that I suspect very strongly the "lots more shots today" argument is baseless, and that total modern dosages are less than total historical dosage.

Over that time (and in particular the past 20-30 years) the diagnostic criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorders have changed significantly.


Likely actual exposure down, diagnoses up on the tail of softening diagnostic criteria. Hmmm?

What happens if we apply 1950's diagnostic criteria to today's children?


I really would suggest looking elsewhere to lay any blame that might be due to outside influences.

Food additives for example are demonstrably, implicated in at least some Attention Deficit Disorders. Also demonstrable is that they in all likelihood have negative mood altering effects even in "normal" children, since their removal from the diet has been shown to improve both attention span and behaviour right across the board in all subjects.

Another so called anti-child conspiracy: Childhood leukemia and power lines: How about the benzene, a perfect molecular circular saw (consider its structure), in unleaded petrols? It might be possible that power lines somehow concentrate, buggered if I know how, but they don't CAUSE.

Far more likely that schools got built on top of cheap badly reclaimed land that also happened to have power lines, than the power lines themselves are the sole cause.

[mzmolly]

138. I'm sorry my necessary absence has emboldened someone with so little knowledge on this issue.

Mercury has been in vaccines for nearly 80 years. I strongly suspect that the quantities administered in the early years were far, far higher than the amounts used today. Enough so that I suspect very strongly the "lots more shots today" argument is baseless, and that total modern dosages are less than total historical dosage.

You would be wrong. The amount of mercury in vaccines in TOTAL has increased greatly. But, your lack of a clue on this is not surprising. Do me a favor, and don't "suspect" in the future.

Over that time (and in particular the past 20-30 years) the diagnostic criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorders have changed significantly.

Regardless > http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/news/mindepi_study.html

Food additives for example are demonstrably, implicated in at least some Attention Deficit Disorders. Also demonstrable is that they in all likelihood have negative mood altering effects even in "normal" children, since their removal from the diet has been shown to improve both attention span and behaviour right across the board in all subjects.

We'll talk about additives in a thread on that subject.

Another so called anti-child conspiracy: Childhood leukemia and power lines: How about the benzene, a perfect molecular circular saw (consider its structure), in unleaded petrols? It might be possible that power lines somehow concentrate, buggered if I know how, but they don't CAUSE.

Again, we'll discuss issues surrounding power lines and leukemia in threads about such things.

[KamaAina]

135. Johnny and Ann are not necessarily slow in class

If "Johnny" or "Ann" are slow in class and have relatively few friends, they're stuck with the "autism" label

I'll cop to the "relatively few friends" part, but I graduated high school a year early, and eventually obtained a cum laude degree from Yale, which is more than George W. Bush '68 can say (literally).

Resaerchers are starting to refer to "the autisms" to distinguish between the disparate ends of the autism spectrum.

[hayu_lol]

142. There are just a few points of light in this entire thread...

Lets see if I can't put this all into a more reasonable perspective.

Most of you are not old enough to remember the world of children who died due to lack of immunization. As a child in the '30s, we had smallpox vaccinations. Smallpox then was still very much alive and well. I almsot died of whooping cough before I was 6 months old. There was no vaccine available then to prevent it. Large numbers of babies did die from this particular pest. A pest that is still alive and well in the world around us.

How many of you remember visiting with sick friends through the windows of their rooms: where they were quaranteened for weeks/months in some cases? How many of you grew up knowing people who were living their lives in an iron lung? Those who didn't just die from polio in the first place at least.

All the dreaded chilcren's diseases were alive and well then. Most of us experienced most of them. Recovery was very slow and many kids died. There were no antibiotics then either. You could die from infection if you just broke your arm. Most medical treatments were ineffective.

You, who have grown up in a world were most children are immune to these diseases, are safe from infections because of antibiotics, and live long enough to complain about a small amount of mercury ought to rethink your position. Would you prefer to be dead? Would you want to see your child suffer the way many kids of my generation suffered?

Thats the other side of the coin isn't it? Kids died or were severely damaged by many of those terrible diseases prevalent then. We don't have those deaths anymore.

Those diseases are still with us. Those who choose to avoid immunization tend to forget that. Perhaps the lessons to be learned will not the the harsh ones of the pre-immunization eras.

[xchrom]

144. they purposely spread this information -- KNOWING it's bad.

anti-science -- it's like a fuckin virus out here.

the web is positvely crowded with the kind of misinformation about science, medicine, big pharma, vaccines -- it's staggering and the reason why ireland and england have taken steps to warn about it.

i'm guessing at some point the government here will do the same.

like you - i remember people suffering from polio -- and grew up with people in my family with legs that didn't work and i clearly remember the sound of braces on the floor.

this stuff is very dangerous and could get any number of people seriously seriously hurt.

[earth mom]

168. No wonder you got an F in science.

:freak:

[barb162]

158. It may not be the mercury but the vaccine itself.

I know too many people who have gotten violently sick after getting flu shots, vaccines, etc. I suspect the way the various vaccines affect the immune systems in some kids, adults and pets and results in real problems, including ER visits, chronic illnesses and death. There's just too much anecdotal and other evidence of severe vaccine reactions.

[xchrom]

159. click on this link -- LOOK at these pictures -- this is what the anti-vaccine people

want to bring more of -- in abundance.

http://www.vaccineinformation.org/photos/

the anti-vaccine people want to do violence to you -- make no mistake -- somewhere inside of them is a desire for suffering and disease in OTHER people.

[earth mom]

169. You should be totally ashamed of yourself.

:puke:

[mzmolly]

170. Here are some photo's for you to consider.

Is this what YOU wish to "do to people?"




The boy in this photo, was a "violent" casualty of vaccination.
He died as a result of his "violent injury."

http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/smallpox/vaccineimages.asp

http://www.sjsupport.org/htmldata/reactionphoto_1.html

"There is a great deal of evidence to prove that immunization of children does more harm than good." ~ Dr. J. Anthony Morris, former Chief Vaccine Control Officer and research virologist, U.S. FDA.

[Name removed]

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[Name removed]

173. Deleted message

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