Posted by sowhysosad on September 30, 2009, at 19:32:19
In reply to Re: Swine flue vaccine UTube sent to me a must see » bleauberry, posted by Larry Hoover on September 30, 2009, at 8:33:27
Here in the UK there's been a deluge of pseudoscience in the media attempting to link the MMR jab to autism, even long after the original study was thoroughly discredited.
Ben Goldacre is a British scientist who is dedicated to debunking "bad science". Here's his take on the MMR/autism scare:
http://www.badscience.net/2008/08/the-medias-mmr-hoax/
> > A problem with the mercury preservative in flu shots is that when Autistic mothers have their children undergo a provoked urine test, their mercury levels are extremely elevated. Those children have not been alive long enough to accumulate that much mercury from the environment. These accounts are numerous. Where did the mercury come from if not the shots?
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> Doesn't that entire argument presuppose that mercury is the causative agent? I can't recall which Nordic country it is, but there was a recent country-wide statistical analysis of exposure to thimerosal vs. autism. A few years ago, they banned thimerosal from vaccines, on the precautionary principle, i.e. why take the risk. They have complete health records on every person, so they could compare the incidence of autism before the ban on thimerosal to after the ban. What they found was that the incidence of autism has continued to rise unabated, despite the absence of thimerosal exposure. There wasn't so much as a blip in the incidence statistic.
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> If there is no correlation between thimerosal exposure and autism incidence, there cannot be causation.
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> Flat out, I am NOT defending thimerosal's presence in vaccines. If all vaccines were packaged in individual doses, the problem would disappear altogether. Unfortunately, supply is so limited, that we cannot practically accomplish this, yet.
>
> There are other variables in vaccination itself. I'm trying to keep an open mind about possible associations between vaccination and autism. However, a recent study of that issue found that unvaccinated children had nearly twice the incidence of autism as those vaccinated. That was one study, of one vaccine, but I just want to say we're looking for the root cause. I see no evidence that we've yet identified it.
poster:sowhysosad
thread:918589
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090921/msgs/919182.html