Update Jenny McCarthy & Co. Hit Back Against Autism Ruling
| Fri Feb. 5, 2010 5:39 PM PST
Earlier this week, we and dozens of other news organizations around the world reported that the esteemed British medical journal Lancet had retracted in its entirety the foundational article of the anti-vax movement, which purported to show a link between the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine and autism. Not only has Dr. Andrew Wakefield, the British physician who wrote the paper and spearheaded the movement been roundly condemned for his theory and the barbaric research that produced it, no other scientist in a decade of well-funded research has been able to reproduce his results. Not one. Ever. Not even close.
Yet, thanks to his fear-mongering, hundreds of thousands of children in developed countries once thought free of diseases like measles and mumps have been sickened after their parents (or their playmates parents, or their neighbors' parents) refused the vaccine. This week alone, there were 99 cases of the mumps reported in New York. That's nearly a quarter of all the mumps cases reported in the entire country in 2008. And because both diseases are highly contagious (in the case of mumps, even vaccinated children are at risk if disease prevalence is high enough) and both flourish in the spring, those numbers are only going to skyrocket.
After all of this, who comes to Dr. Wakefield's side? Who defends his research to the American public? Celebrity parents Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey of course, who, bless their hearts, have the combined medical expertise of naught. Who, despite its eminent availability at their beloved University of Google, have never apparently heard of the hundreds of thousands of children under five who die of the measles every year or the innumerable studies showing no evidence of a link between vaccination and autism.
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Yet, the family has issued this lovely statement calling the British General Medical Council a "kangaroo court" and claiming that all the other scientists who ever failed to reproduce Wakefield's results were shills for Big Pharma. McCarthy and Carrey go on to describe a study (also performed by Wakefield--whom the court accused of callous disregard for his subjects' pain) on monkeys put through a variation of the American vaccination schedule for children, which also purports to show harm. It's tempting to think, as McCarthy and Carrey claim, that expanding the list of vaccines children receive could be linked to the exponential growth of autism diagnoses in recent years--but there's no evidence. Saying Big Pharma covered it all up rings hollow too, since corporate and government-funded science has managed to show fairly conclusively that climate change is man-made and smoking will kill you. These discoveries were hardly profitable for corporate or even federal concerns, and yet they were reproduced hundreds of times over. Big Pharma may be powerful, but it's not nearly as powerful as coal or oil, and they've failed to silence good science so far. Hopefully one day soon, the good science that's been refuting this "debate" all along will be heard.
Comments
Jesus Christ, Sonja, are you
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Feb. 5, 2010 9:41 PM PST.
Jesus Christ, Sonja, are you drunk or just an idiot?
I come to Mother Jones for it's smart fearless reporting, but you can't even get Jim Carrey's name anywhere close to being correct?
Why should I read you at all. I know, I won't.
check it yourself
Submitted by ericf on Fri Feb. 5, 2010 11:18 PM PST.
You don't have to believe her. Check it out for yourself. Whether the celebrity's name was right or not, the connection between vaccines and autism has been debunked repeatedly, and people are dying because some people believe disprovable nonsense.
ericf, The question is not
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Feb. 6, 2010 11:51 AM PST.
ericf,
The question is not whether I believe in vaccine theory or not (I do), the question is whether I can rely on Mother Jones. I can't if all their reporters are as craptacular as Sonja Sharp.
Vax
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Feb. 27, 2010 7:29 AM PST.
Take it from someone working in early intervention home programming with Autistic children for the past decade, there is an undeniable connection. Vaccinations are a definite trigger in children with family histories of autoimmune disorders, metal allergies, group e strep and other underlying immuno depressors. While I don't believe vaccines themselves would trigger an otherwise healthy immune system, doctors often overlook these seemingly minute ailments and vaccinate anyway. Since environmental stressors (heavy metal exposures) have increased over the past decade I think new parents should look at the entire immuno picture when vaccinating their children and stop blanketed, heavy duty vaccines when the kids are in infancy - tiny immune systems need time to adjust.
Where's your intellectual curiosity??
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Feb. 6, 2010 12:21 AM PST.
Sonja:
How about a link to their statement, like, here: http://tiny.cc/TrueWake
Wakefield's study only did one thing: it said kids with regressive autism had bowel disease. His findings in this regard have been replicated many times, including just last month, here: http://www.la-press.com/article.php?article_id=1816
The monkey study that you ignorantly dismiss can be read here: http://fourteenstudies.org/pdf/primates_hep_b.pdf
If it's so bad, why was it just published in a prestigious journal?
You make so many false statements, it is clear you barely understand the issue. MoJo readers, actually READ the statement from Jim?Jenny and check out the links, use your mind. Vaccines are great, and they also have side effects. The prevent deadly disease, and damage brains of certain kids. It's a complex issue, trust no one who speaks so ignorantly and emphatically.
Spelling error corrected
Submitted by Sonja Sharp on Mon Feb. 8, 2010 9:37 AM PST.
Thanks for pointing it out. Perhaps now we can return the conversation to the facts at hand.
this article, if you can even
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Feb. 8, 2010 1:12 PM PST.
this article, if you can even call it that, reeks of something unnamed - is it rubbish?
what i find most provocative about the lancet retraction is the timing of it all. 12 long years after the article was published, only one year after james murdoch, of rupert murdoch fortune, takes over the helm of glaxosmithklein, a major purveyor of vaccines, only months after the utter failure of the powers' attempts at mass worldwide vaccination for the boogeyman H1N1. (i heard on the news this morning that kids should all get a 2nd H1N1 vaccine, mostly because there's a lot left of it!!! more is always better, right?)
people have wizened up to the vaccination propaganda, and now pharma powerhouses are trying to reverse course by attacking the largest and most outspoken group of anti-vaccine campaigns - that of autism's causes. note that no one's coming out to attack amish for not getting vaccines, or any other religious group. their issues is not that people don't want vaccines, but that those people who don't want vaccines are telling OTHERS not to get it. these "fringers" are messing with their market share!!!!
people, pharma realized a while ago that to keep profits up, they need to come up with a new game plan. not everyone likes to swallow pills. vaccines are the latest attempt to make paying customers out of scare tactics.
I have a child on the autism
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Feb. 8, 2010 3:45 PM PST.
I have a child on the autism spectrum. I also am inclined to believe actual scientists and not anti vax zealots, regardless of whether they have experienced what my family has. The MMR/thimerasol/autism link has been thoroughly debunked, but it has become an article of faith for some people, and is not even remotely a matter of evidence, proof, verifiability, etc. I feel zero remorse that I vaccinated my kid, because I know damn well that it had nothing to do with her diagnosis, and has kept her and her classmates safer.
I think pharma companies are as rapacious as any other corporations, but claiming that herd immunity is all about enriching their shareholders is BS. Face facts -- if the results of Wakefield's study were valid, they would be replicable. That's how science works. I don't know if he reached honest but abberant results, or whether he fudged his results. It doesn't change the fact that they have not been replicated in countless follow up studies. Also, if there really were a causal link between thimerasol and autism, one would expect the vast diminution in its use as a preservative in vaccines (if not its outright cessation) to result in diminshed frequency of autism diagnoses. Sadly, the reverse is true.
Nitpicking the spelling of a movie actor's name is no response to the substantive reporting here. The Lancet study was the sole support for the MMR/autism link in a serious scientific publication, and it has been retracted. The author of this article did not invent that fact.
Bottom line
Submitted by Viola C (not verified) on Wed Feb. 10, 2010 2:26 PM PST.
Interesting article. It isn't about fear tactics that we are really talking about here. We are dealing with the health of our children. I suggest that everyone read what your doctor doesn't tell you about vaccination. Dr. Stephanie Cave clearly states that even if your child does not show any significant signs of autism, there are still devistating effects on the immune and central nervous systems. Drug companies produce massive batches of these inoculations that have long shelf lives and I am not talking about thymerasol. I am talking about other heavy metals and hazerdous chemicals which make up these vaccinations so that drug companies can cut coasts in production while WE ALL PAY FOR IT!!!! WE all pay for it with our damaged immune systems. But who really cares about the big picture here, after all we can just sit on our buts and eat fast food and trust our doctors! Sounds great. I don't know about you but I like the idea of edjucating myself to make the best choice for my family. Like pure vaccine!
http://educateb4uvaccinate.multiply.com/journal
This is not fear mongering this is the life of your children.
Cut down the middle either way your taking a risk
That's life
Compromised immune
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Feb. 12, 2010 9:53 AM PST.
Compromised immune system?
Did you live past the age of 5?
Are you in an iron lung? On crutches because of Polio?
Is your biggest health problem due to too many lattes or fast food?
The generation who benefited most from vaccinations doesn't understand how bad it was with out them and blindly seeks to "save" their children from a longer, healthier life.
So, where are the parents of
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Feb. 12, 2010 9:48 AM PST.
So, where are the parents of children with autism who did not vaccinate?
As the correlation has been disproved, there should be many.
Or are they suffering the effects of preventable diseases and possibly dead?
It's pretty pathetic when
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Feb. 12, 2010 1:40 PM PST.
It's pretty pathetic when even CNN can debunk your facts:
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/08/mumps.outbreak.northeast/index....
Is anyone else tired of these catty & trite hit pieces on celebrities? Mother Jones is so much better than that.
The CNN article says that 77%
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Feb. 12, 2010 3:02 PM PST.
The CNN article says that 77% were vaccinated. It does not say what percentage had received both shots.
It is my understanding that it is risky for all vaccinated (fully or not) to be exposed to those who have not at all.
So how does this "debunk" the MoJo article?
Doctors Kill More People Than Guns and Traffic Accidents Combine
Submitted by Righteous Indignation (not verified) on Fri Feb. 19, 2010 11:53 PM PST.
By Don Harkins
The Idaho Observer - April, 1999
SANDPOINT -- Last St. Patrick's Day, Sandpoint Chiropractor Blaze Welch gave a lecture on how to get off of the disease scary-go-round at the Gardenia Center here. The purpose of the talk, which was sponsored by the North Idaho chapter of Vaccination Liberation, was to teach people that they are responsible for their own health. Dr. Welch also discussed figures from right out of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) which prove, through accurate interpretations of their own words, that in the last century we chose the wrong fork in the road with regard to our health care paradigm.
Most people have been conditioned to believe in what is called the germ theory of disease -- that germs cause disease. The truth is that germs (bacteria) are everywhere and they are attracted to and proliferate in dis-eased tissues. Bacteria decompose dead matter. That is their job. For instance, when a tree dies, bacteria come in and eat the tree and it eventually becomes soil. Bacteria do not eat a live, healthy tree. The same thing is true in people -- bacteria are attracted to dead matter.
Therefore, if you have dead matter in your body, bacteria will come in and get to work decomposing the dead tissue so that it may eventually become soil. In the mid 1800s, western medical science had the choice of going one of two ways. Bechamp's theory of disease maintained that every living thing has arisen from the microzyma (the fundamental unit of the corporate organism) and every living thing is reducible to the microzyma. Bechamp believed that microzymas secrete fermentative substances that aid in digestion in a healthy body and evolve into bacteria when they encounter dead or damaged cells.
Pasteur's germ theory of disease maintained that diseases come into our bodies and make germs that we must fight so that we may be rid of them. J.I. Rodale explained Pasteur's germ theory of disease by stating that germs live in the air, and every once in awhile get into a human body, multiply and cause illness. Nothing to it at all. All you have to do is kill germs and disease is licked.
Bechamp's theory placed all of the responsibility of disease prevention on the individual and his lifestyle. In a practical sense, there was no money in that and people would be empowered with the ability to resist dis-ease by taking care of themselves. Western medical science went with Pasteur's theory because it opened the door which created the world's medical and pharmaceutical industries. Since the 1850s, we have been developing new drugs to attack and kill the disease invaders and the result has been epidemics of cancers and sicknesses and diseases -- and a very rich and powerful pharmaceutical industry.
Last year, commented Dr. Welch, the pharmaceutical industry did $182 billion in drug sales world wide. . . . Dr. Welch read off some statistics which should cause concern to anybody who sees an allopathic doctor, has medical insurance or may end up in the hospital someday. Again, the following admissions were taken from JAMA:
The top five causes of death in the United States, in order, are tobacco, alcohol, medical malpractice, traffic and firearms. According to JAMA, doctors kill more people than auto accidents and guns. With that in mind, one has to wonder why gun control is such a hot legislative issue when, perhaps, we should be more concerned about doctor control.
The number of people that doctors kill per day from medical malpractice is roughly equal to the amount of people that would die if every day, three jumbo jets crashed and killed everybody on board, commented Dr. Welch who added, in defense of his own profession, just imagine what headlines would result if a chiropractor or a naturopath accidentally killed just one patient?
Another JAMA statistic stated that 1/5 (20 percent) of all people who see an allopath will suffer a doctor-induced injury.
Again, according to JAMA, 16 percent of all people who die in the hospital are determined by autopsy to have died of something other than their admission diagnosis. In other words, the doctor had no idea what was really wrong with the patient and, therefore, the patient may have died for want of appropriate care that would have been subsequent to an accurate diagnosis.
Another trade publication, American Medical News, stated that 28 percent of people admitted to hospitals are there because they have suffered an adverse reaction to prescribed drugs.
We are miserably losing the battle against viruses and bacteria. Antibiotics do not work. We need to take a different tack because this is obviously not working, said Dr. Welch. Dr. Welch made numerous practical and logical observations throughout his lecture. One of them is so obvious that it deserves mention here. When there is an epidemic of, say, pertussis in a school and 14 of 200 kids get sick, who gets studied? he asked. The answer, of course, is that the sick kids get studied. They get studied by the county health district and the health district accumulates its data and then tells the newspapers about the epidemic of sickness and everybody then flocks down to the health district or goes to see their doctor to get vaccinated.
Would it not be more appropriate to study the 186 kids that did not get sick? I asked Dr. Welch. Dr. Welch also read a quote from the British Medical Journal which states that only one percent of all scientific research papers which explore medicine are scientifically sound.
So, if that is true, then not only are allopathic doctors incorrect in their understanding of the basic nature of disease, they are basing 99 percent of their conclusions, and therefore their diagnosis and treatment of people, on flawed science.
Vaccines and Autism
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Feb. 22, 2010 8:06 PM PST.
Sonja,
Remember bird flu? How about SARS? And what about swine flu? Do you realize that swine flu only killed about 1/3 of the people that are killed in an average flu season? It wasn't a pandemic at all, but instead a very mild flu.
Do you realize that there is little evidence that vaccines actually work? The only valid study to determine how well they work is to study vaccinated vs. unvaccinated populations. Do you know why drug companies won't do those studies? Because they would show that vaccines offer no protection in every case that I have ever come across.
And the drug companies try to obfuscate. They claim success when a person's immune system reacts to the vaccine. That is garbage.
I have seen long term charts which show that vaccines have little to do with diminishing disease trends. Have you looked these up for yourself?
Do you know that Amish populations which are almost 100% unvaccinated show no higher incidence of any vaccine-preventable-diseases vs. the rest of the population?
Did you know that of the 35,000 completely unvaccinated patients in Doctor Mayer Eisenstein's practice, not a single one has autism?
If you don't do your own research you really should stop writing about this subject.
vaccines & autism
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed Feb. 24, 2010 2:17 PM PST.
I don't understand why MotherJones published/posted this opinion piece. It does not have any sources to back up its argument. It is simply poorly written and can diminish its readership. Do some fact checking.
Amish and vaccination
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Feb. 25, 2010 5:18 PM PST.
Just wanted to address the comment a few posts above stating that the Amish don't vaccinate and have no autism in their community...
I am sure you got this "factoid" from "Dr." Mercola's site.
This is not true.
The Amish do vaccinate and there are Amish children with Autism as well.
PALLET RACKING
Submitted by pallet racking (not verified) on Fri Feb. 26, 2010 8:09 PM PST.
Even though
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Feb. 27, 2010 10:10 AM PST.
You say that the gov has determined that there is a climate change problem and that smoking is bad for you, as a sort of evidence that the vaccination fears are basically unfounded. But I'd like to point out that the government AND health communities know beyond doubt that drinking alcohol is bad for you, and often bad for those around you, causing fatalities, domestic abuse, bar fights etc., and yet they haven't made it illegal. They still allow advertising, and ads obviously DIRECTED at the young people.
So I would say that indicates that just because the gov and medical people KNOW something is killing people--it doesn't necessarily mean they would do anything about it.
Fascinating
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue Mar. 2, 2010 1:38 PM PST.
This is one of those interesting places where the comments are more fascinating and insightful than the actual article itself.
I'd like to see the vaccine debate explored more further than just the autism debate, but also extended into other sickness related to vaccines (such as asthma). Plus no one really seems to speak in these articles about the mercury content, which is found in vaccines and which is toxic.
Measles vs Autism
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue Mar. 2, 2010 7:02 PM PST.
Annual measles cases: 13,000
Annual measles deaths: <100
The death rate of measles dropped below 100 before vaccination was ever introduced. This is due to better sanitation standards and, of course, antibiotics and antipyretics (such as aspirin).
I don't hear parents worried about infectious disease -- I hear them worried about autism.
Currently, 1 in 58 boys has autism, 1 in 90 children.
My son is on the Autism
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Mar. 4, 2010 4:27 PM PST.
My son is on the Autism spectrum, and I did get him vaccinated when he was young. I doubt that the shots 'caused' his Autism, as his symptoms were manifesting on that track since birth. He wasn't diagnosed until after age 3. I wonder why no one ever raised the issue about vaccinations with me? I didn't know there was anything to be concerned about, so let him get them. Of course, one really doesn't have much choice but to get children vaccinated, if they are to attend public school. The shots can be delayed until the child is older, which perhaps would be better for them if there is cause for concern. I haven't yet made up my mind about the issue, though. There is a lot of good information out there with which on can become educated on the topic, but there is a lot of garbage as well. This is a complex issue, and I'm not so sure it really has been resolved as of yet. No one knows what is the cause of Autism, so how can they say it definitely is or isn't vaccines?
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Vaccines and Autism
Submitted by Kurtvb (not verified) on Sun Mar. 14, 2010 8:13 PM PDT.
This article is claptrap. Bobby Kennedy is a very a knowledgeable person and he has reports that there is a link to autism from vaccines. At the very least, it is not necessary for any vaccine to contain mercury. Further, it is not necessary for any child to receive more than one vaccine every six months. Infants to not have an established immune system. It is STUPID to attack that system with multiple vaccines at once.
Children used to receive vaccine in staggered fashion, until the pharmaceutical industry started to push these newer stacked drugs. Go back to the old ways. It will save lives.
This article is crap
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue Mar. 16, 2010 12:46 PM PDT.
Whatever the writer is trying to say, it ought not to be said in such an insolent and arrogant manner; perhaps the writer doesn't have kids; perhaps the writer is having a go about the people who opt against vaccination of any kind esp where there are increases in disease occurrence--fair-enough but really! I lived in the UK as an American at the height of the Triple Vac controversy being rammed thru the NHS. My wife and I opted to go from our home forty miles south to London and pay privately an amount we could barely AFFORD just to avoid the government mandate of the triple jab and to have the MMR singles. I don't give a damn what this writer says about those of us who engage in thoughtful if worried due process; we are invested in making the best decision in protecting our children. If we are mistrustful of Establishment it should come as NO SURPRISE when you consider how corrupt almost ALL ASPECTS of our system are--surely the write needs no proof but she can read The China Study for starters--from pay-to-play to well-intentioned but vacuous caviling to research micromethodology often tailored to the end goal--it's not the exception, it's the RULE. I am not wholly antivaccination but we are frickin stack-vac-happy and I think it's (combining vacs) totally irresponsible; no intelligent parent would do that to their offspring when it were possible to carry it out in a more sensible fashion i.e. singly...Remember, there's a staggering increase in autism right now and no one knows why--SHIELDS UP!
I work at a place for some of
Submitted by Lisa Bowers (not verified) on Tue Mar. 16, 2010 3:11 PM PDT.
I work at a place for some of the worst retards who can't wipe their own asses and if it was'nt for the money I'd never work with people like that, there are two Tarc workshops here in Topeka and I just happen to be at T.I.E.S . the one with the most aggressive ones, I ask all of you to either comment or keep your mouths shut and write your congress for a federal law that makes it a felony for an autistic person to go outside!
There are too many "Autistic"
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue Mar. 16, 2010 5:45 PM PDT.
There are too many "Autistic" kids these days. Granted they used to be just called "Retards" but still I see them all over even working. (where grocers can't hide illegals but don't want to pay a human wage, they just hire "Tistic" for a few months to use social services then trash 'em when it runs out...)
Myself, I'm not "Vaccine" paranoid, I'm "Genetics" paranoid. There was an article in WIRED a few years back that pointed out how Silicon Valley had way too many (by statistics) Autistic kids. They put out a hypothesis that so many "Geek" (high intelligence, minimal social interaction) people were finding each other and marrying. That same collection of traits that creates a genius might over-combine and create an Autistic. "Genius" is already at the edge of both "Madness" and a form of Autism.
Myself, I'm going to get an Indian (Indian Subcontinent) woman. Yeah, rave "Sex Trafficker", "Mail order Bride", etc. but I'm a nice guy, just sick of pretending I like baseball and hiding the Conan while the lady still reads Cosmo... Fell in love (chaste) with a college professor who was such. Very intelligent, but a completely different kind of intelligence, so hopefully the opposites will combine and make a true "Superman".
I think, for other reasons (monopoly, low regulation and oversight, disassociation with customers/doctors) there is reason to worry about vaccines. Not so much to the third world, but the mandatory forced regimin of vaccines. A captive audience that big corporations cater to is a recipie for short cuts that cause damage. Thalidomide, anyone? They are even putting that drug back on the market, just for other uses, not wanting to pay a researcher the crud wages they give them to make a new drug.
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