AGE OF AUTISM

Sir Crispin Davis and James Murdoch No Longer on GSK Board

The Wall Street Journal reports that James Murdoch, son of beleaguered media mogul Rupert Murdoch, whose empire is embroiled in scandal, has stepped down  from the GlaxoSmithKline board. See WSJ online HERE.  In addition, Sir Crispin Davis, former Chief Executive of Reed Elsevier, which owns The Lancet, which published the paper that included Dr. Andrew Wakefield's MMR information,  is leaving the board after a nine year tenure.

The heir to Rupert Murdoch’s media empire has quit the board of Britain’s biggest drugs company in the wake of the phone hacking scandal.

James Murdoch joined  GlaxoSmithKline less than two years ago.

He has come under fire from MPs who have questioned him about signing off out-of-court settlements to hacking victims without a full picture of what had gone on at the News of the World.

He was forced to deny misleading Parliament over the extent of his knowledge.

Glaxo said Mr Murdoch’s decision to turn his back on the £98,000 role was entirely his own.

Chairman Chris Gent said: ‘James has taken this decision to focus on his current duties as non-executive chairman of BSkyB and following his decision to re-locate to the United States as chairman and chief executive, international, of News Corporation.’

John Stone has written about both Murdoch and Davis and their proximity to the Dr. Andrew Wakefield MMR Lancet Paper BMJ topic.

James Murdoch Still Supported by GlaxoSmithKline ran last July:

Lancet Boss Failed to Disclose Own Conflicts to Parliament While Denouncing Wakefield

Both posts run in full following the jump:

Tics and Toxins: Just Before Mystery Illnesses Hit Leroy NY, School Built New Playing Fields

By Dan Olmsted

LEROY, N.Y., January 30 -- New playing fields, including one for girls' softball, were completed the year before the outbreak of tics and other ailments began afflicting girls at Leroy Junior/Senior High School.

Aerial photographs compiled by the Genesee County assessments office clearly show the construction in progress in 2009, here:

The 2010 photo shows the completed fields, here:

 

The smaller field to the immediate left of the school is the girls' softball field, according to a former student at the school. All but one of the students affected so far are girls. There are unconfirmed reports that one boy was also stricken.

School officials said earlier this month that two reports they commissioned of indoor air quality and mold had ruled out any environmental cause. New York Health Department officials concurred and a spokesman told me last week, "The school is safe." Most of the girls were diagnosed at a Buffalo neurological clinic with "conversion disorder," in which psychological stress or trauma is supposedly converted into physical symptoms that clusters of people can display at the same time.

But parents and the girls themselves have rejected that diagnosis, and other theories have been advanced; school officials now say they are ordering another round of tests. I reported last week that the first testing did not include any outside areas of the school grounds, except for reviewing school pesticide logs. Because those logs were in order, environmental factors outside the school building were ruled out. State health officials also say no infectious agent was involved.

But in any investigation of a new illness, the question of what's new in the environment -- from medicines a person is taking, to places they have been, to changes in where and how they live -- needs to be ruled out first.

Building ballfields within the past two years certainly qualifies as new. That could hypothetically create new risks, either from stirring up toxins such as pesticides on the site, or importing materials such as fill or sod that was previously contaminated. New attention has been given to a railroad derailment several miles away in 1970 that spilled both cyanide and TCE, a highly toxic manufacturing agent. Environmental activist Erin Brockovich has suggested that the school site was contaminated by runoff from that incident, or that dirt from that area was used to construct the school in the early 2000s.

The Situation Room: Autism, Vaccines, and Agent Orange

Managing Editor's Note: We're proud to welcome Dan Burns as our newest Age of Autism Contributing Editor.  Dan has an adult son with autism named Ben, and his perspective and writing style are a great addition to our content. Welcome, Dan.

By Dan E. Burns 

Project Draft 13

 I will show you fear in a handful of dust

(T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land).

We stared at it, my Public Relations colleagues and I, perhaps a little too long. Projected on the wall of the Situation Room stood the Agent Orange distillation column, a 50-foot tall steel vessel reigning over a graveyard of oil drums labeled “Diamond Shamrock Corporation” and “Hazardous Waste.”

Agent Orange is not an ingredient in vaccines. But what happened – or didn’t happen – in the Situation Room has a lesson for us, the parents of vaccine-injured children.

In 1983, Vietnam vets from Operation Ranch Hand were suffering from neural and blood disorders, miscarriages, leukemia, and cancers of the prostate, lung, and liver. They were marching, waving signs, and pointing fingers. At us. Allegedly, the damage came not from Agent Orange per se, but from 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin, a contaminant produced during the “cooking” or fractionation process when the temperature in the tower rose a little too high for a little too long. As it did in the Diamond Shamrock Ironbound plant. If the EPA is right – the claim is disputed HERE – dioxin is one of the most potent carcinogens known to human kind.

Diamond Shamrock mounted a vigorous defense. “We can’t cure anyone’s cancer,” said the General Counsel. “What’s done is done. If we move one shovelful of dirt more than required, we open ourselves up to additional liability. That would just spread the mess.”

My colleagues in the Situation Room were decent, caring people. “Chipper,” to my right, recruited and went to bat for minorities. “Lou,” to my left, our one-man brain trust, played the blues guitar and wrote protest songs light with whimsy and humor. I was Executive Speechwriter, raising two college-bound children. After an underpaid career in academia, I needed this job.

Lou had researched the issue for years. “In jungle warfare,” he said, “G.I.s were exposed to a host of tropical pathogens, fungi, protozoa, unknown viruses, and biological agents coming at them through novel vectors on all sides. We don’t know what caused their chronic fatigue, birth defects, and cancers. Diamond Shamrock operated under mandate from the government, and our actions were safe, proper, and legal.”

‘That’s right,” chimed in the General Counsel. “We have a fiduciary responsibility to our shareholders. That’s why we’re here today.”

National Autism Association & AutismCollege.com To Offer Free Online Safety Conference

National Autism Association & AutismCollege.com To Offer Free Online Safety Conference

San Diego, CA – The National Autism Association and AutismCollege.com are teaming up in February to offer a free web conference for caregivers of those diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).  The web conference series entitled Autism Safety and Crisis Prevention will feature top autism experts covering sensitive safety topics that include sexual-abuse risk reduction, bullying prevention, suicide ideation, wandering prevention, and prevention of risks associated with restraint and seclusion.

Historically, medical literature has maintained that ASD does not affect life expectancy; however, a 2001 California study found elevated death rates in ASD related to several causes that included accidents such as suffocation and drowning. “Safety is a primary concern for those on the spectrum and their parents, yet there is very little practical information out there,” says Chantal Sicile-Kira, author and founder of Autism College. “Autism College is happy to partner with the National Autism Association to help empower parents with information they need to protect their children and teens.”

The Autism Safety and Crisis Prevention webinar will be available to caregivers through February. To register, visit www.autismcollege.com.

Webinar presenters will offer real-life strategies to address multiple safety topics, followed by a question-and-answer session. “Even those families who currently do not face safety challenges can learn valuable information through this free safety online conference,” says NAA President Wendy Fournier. “Being aware of the issues and armed with information is critical for all parents.”

Autism Safety and Crisis Prevention Webinar Schedule:

-        Saturday, February 11, 8:15am- 9:45am PST, Dr. Nora Baladerian, Ph.D. will present “How Can Parents Reduce the Risk of Sexual Abuse of Their Child or Young Adult?”

-        Saturday, February 11, 10:00am-11:30am PST, Dr. Lori Ernsperger will discuss “The 3 R's to Bullying Prevention for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders: Recognize, Respond, and Report.”

-        Wednesday, February 15, 6:00pm-7:30pm PST, Dr. Joshua Feder will discuss “The Problem of Depression and Suicidal Ideation in Autism and Related Disorders.”

-        Saturday, February 18, 8:15am-9:45am PST,  Wendy Fournier of the NAA will discuss Wandering Prevention and Response.

-        Saturday, February 18, 10:00am- 11:30am PST, Pat Amos, M.A. will discuss “Preventing and Eliminating the Use of Restraints and Seclusion.”

About AutismCollege.com:

AutismCollege.com provides practical information and training on autism.

About National Autism Association (NAA):

NAA is a parent-run nonprofit organization and the leading voice on issues related to autism safety and crisis prevention. The organization’s mission is to respond to the most urgent needs of the autism community, providing real help and hope so that all affected can reach their full potential. For more information, visit nationalautismassociation.org.

Your Life Narrated by Me, Your Mother

By Cathy Jameson

I noticed something the other day.  I talk a lot.  I talk more now than before.  It’s not all the time that I’m a Chatty Cathy, but when I’m with Ronan I don’t shut up.  I am still somewhat reserved when it comes to first-time meet and greets with new friends and with people I get to meet.  The inner geek in me will want to sit at the back of the group, out of sight nestled a corner or the back row.  But, when it comes to taking care of Ronan I don’t mind sticking my neck out to be seen.  Nor do I mind raising my voice to be heard. 

I realized how much I talk when I’m with Ronan when he and I started out last week to get to an appointment.  I caught myself non-stop talking while I was holding Ronan’s hand.  As we walked into the therapist’s waiting room I said, “Keep going, you’re almost there, step over the toys, careful…careful, sit down, hold on, stay with Mommy.  You did it!”  I stayed close to Ronan stroking his back as he sat in my lap while we waited for his name to be called.  The video playing on the television was a tad loud, as were the other patients and their siblings also in the waiting room.  I quietly spoke to Ronan, “You like this movie?  It’s called “Cars 2.”  Remember we saw it at the theatre with Daddy.  Oh, look!  That part made you laugh.  Hey, it’s your turn now.  Stand up, let’s go.  Come on, watch your step.  Down the hallway, here you go!  Okay, bye now, Buddy.  I’ll see you in a little bit.  Kiss.”  How many times have I done that--given a play-by-play of exactly who, what, where, when and why?

Did I really need to narrate the entire trip into the clinic and into the therapy room?  Did Ronan care that I was observing and noting all sorts of things as we went?  Did he see all of it as we went by?  Did he hear it?   Of course, he heard it.  But, I wonder.  Does Ronan tune me out like he seems to tune out many other things in his environment?  Why do I think I need to state every step and every action?  I guess part of it is because I’ve had to remind Ronan several times about the same thing (walk OVER the toy, not ON it).  Maybe I talk so much because I want a little bit of feedback that shows me Ronan has some sort of understanding of what’s going on in the world.  But, since Ronan is still just barely pre-verbal, the only reliable feedback I get is from me talking to myself. 

Who knows though; maybe with all this chit chat I do for Ronan will have him one day spontaneously respond, “Ma, cut it out.  Okay?  I can do it by myself now.  Watch me.”

Focus on America's Health: Western Regional Canary Party Conference

Registration for the Western Regional Conference in Sacramento is OPEN (register and learn more here.)
 
Canaries of California, Oregon, Washington and Nevada, come meet with us in Sacramento
 
You are cordially invited to attend the Canary Party Western Regional Meeting, February 10-12, 2012, at the Hyatt Place Roseville/Sacramento. Come meet other like-minded individuals to forge connections and work together to develop strategies for change in your state and nationally. Our Western Regional includes California, Oregon, Washington and Nevada.  Members from other states are always welcome.

We will also be discussing the recently passed California law allowing children as young as 12 to be vaccinated with the HPV and Hepatitis B vaccines with out parental knowledge or consent.
 
Friday, Feb. 10, Reception and Film Night
6:30pm Reception, Open Bar -- beer & wine and hors d'oeuvres.
8:30pm The Greater Good looks behind the fear, hype and politics that have polarized the vaccine debate in America today. The film re-frames the emotionally charged issue and offers, for the first time, the opportunity for a rational and scientific discussion on how to create a safer and more effective vaccine program.
 
Saturday, Feb. 11, Meeting and Luncheon
9:30am-5:00pm
 
Mark Blaxill, Chairman, will report on Party principles developed at the first annual Canary Party Convention held in July, 2011, in Minneapolis, followed by presentations and break-out groups to develop initiatives and state/national strategies.
7:00pm Cocktail Party
 
Sunday, Feb. 12, Moving Forward
9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.
 Participants to offer their input on how to best move forward in their respective states.

Harvard Neurologist Responds to NYT Article on DSM-5

Managing Editor's Note: Thank you to Dr. Martha Herbert for writing this letter to The New York Time:

Re “New Autism Rule Will Trim Many, a Study Suggests” (front page, Jan. 20): Narrowing the definition of autism is a bad idea and narrows the opportunities to make significant inroads in helping children affected by this condition, their families and our nation.

Autism still has many mysteries, but it is clear that early intervention makes a tremendous difference. A tighter definition means that parents, teachers and caregivers will wait longer to consider giving children specialized attention and care. It will mean less support for parents struggling to help their children communicate, adapt to social challenges and cope with a world that often feels overwhelming.

By addressing all these issues early, we have a chance to change the course of this condition, enabling people with autism to reach their full potential and requiring fewer publicly financed services for the rest of their lives.

As we learn that autism is not just from genes and brain but also from a child’s response to a challenging environment, why make that environment even more challenging?

MARTHA HERBERT
Cambridge, Mass., Jan. 20, 2012

The writer is a pediatric neurologist at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital and author of the forthcoming “The Autism Revolution.”

President Obama: "I will not back down from protecting our kids from mercury poisoning.."

"I will not back down from protecting our kids from mercury poisoning or making sure that our food is safe and our water is clean. I will not go back to the days when health insurance companies had unchecked power to cancel your policy, deny your coverage, or charge women differently from men." CNN President Obama's State of the Union   We applaud EPA efforts to protect kids from mercury poisoning in the air, the water and food sources , but please don't neglect  pharmaceutical applications like the flu vaccine. Mandated mercury doesn't seem to fit the "protection" theme, Mr. President.

Really?  HHS worked with PBS's Sid the Science Kid promoting the mercury laden flu vaccine to children: "If I don't get the virus I won't give it to you! Come everybody we're gettin' the shot! It might hurt a little bit but it's gonna help a lot!"

From FDA.gov: Fluvirin: For active immunization of persons 4 years of age and older against influenza disease caused by influenza virus subtypes A and type B contained in the vaccine. The 0.5-mL prefilled syringe presentation is formulated without preservative. However, thimerosal, a mercury derivative used during manufacturing, is removed by subsequent purification steps to a trace amount (≤ 1 mcg mercury per 0.5-mL dose). The 5-mL multidose vial formulation contains thimerosal, a mercury derivative, added as a preservative. Each 0.5-mL dose from the multidose vial contains 25 mcg mercury.

OSHA's Official Position on Flu Vaccination of Healthcare Workers

"The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is strongly supportive of efforts to increase influenza vaccination rates among healthcare workers in accordance with the Healthy People 2020 goals. However, at this time, OSHA believes there is insufficient scientific evidence for the federal government to promote mandatory influenza vaccination programs that do not have an option for the HCP to decline for medical, religious and/or personal philosophical reasons.                                                                                                      

While we are supportive of the Healthy People 2020 goal of a 90% vaccination rate, we have seen no evidence that demonstrates that such a high rate is in fact necessary. Furthermore, the current influenza vaccine is no magic bullet. The current state of influenza vaccine technology requires annual reformulation and revaccination and the efficacy is quite variable. Every year there are numerous circulating strains of influenza that are not included in the vaccine. In years where the antigenic match is good, the vaccine only provides protection against the 3 strains in the formulation. In years when the antigenic match is poor, the vaccine may provide no protection at all. The limits of current influenza vaccine technology are especially problematic in the context of a mandatory influenza vaccination program that results in job loss. Lastly, reliance on a mandatory influenza vaccination policy may provide healthcare workers, health care facility management and patients with an unwarranted sense of security and result in poor adherence to other infection control practices that prevent all types of infections, not just influenza. Influenza vaccination has always been just one part of a comprehensive multi-layered infection control program. 

While OSHA does not believe that there is sufficient evidence to meet the bar necessary to support mandatory vaccination programs, we nonetheless are convinced that influenza vaccination is generally beneficial and are supportive of efforts to promote vaccination. Influenza vaccination exemptions should be for HCP with valid medical contraindications to vaccinations, or religious and/or personal objections and a signed declination statement that indicates the HCP has been educated regarding influenza, is aware of the risk and benefits of influenza vaccination, has been given the opportunity to be vaccinated with the influenza vaccine at no charge, and can receive the influenza vaccine in the future at no charge to the HCP."

The Name Game

By Teresa Conrick

With tics and Tourette-like illness in the news so much right now due to the increasing number of students at LeRoy HS in NY exhibiting them, it is with irony that P.A.N.D.A.S.,  a possible medical diagnosis for what we are seeing in LeRoy, is again up for scrutiny and denial somewhere else.  Here on Age of Autism, we are keeping up with the dizzying news that is our epicenter of what we are all about here - that many children are suffering with PHYSIOLOGICAL illnesses yet being wrongly diagnosed with PSYCHIATRIC disorders.  What is unraveling in Leroy has been happening for YEARS and for those of us with children stricken by regression after vaccination or immune illnesses, like PANDAS, the question that needs to be asked by many professionals denying what we all have known is - why are there so many sick children with immune and autoimmune diseases?

A few weeks back,a study came out, which wasn't really a study but more of an analysis steering an opinion. The name,  "Moving from PANDAS to CANS,- unavailable for public access -"  was quite a surprise as another name had been decided that would encompass the growing bacterial and viral issues of this increasing, medical misery - PANS," Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome."  PANS would change the criteia from the sole and hated Streptococcus bacteria to other various bacteria and viral infections, showing that not only Strep could trigger neuropsychiatric symptoms.  Vickie Blavat, a mother of an affected child with PANDAS and a research marvel on the PANDAS website, did a very nice job analyzing, "Moving from PANDAS to CANS" as well as other good information on this page:

In 2010, the NIMH hosted a think tank of various doctors and researchers to discuss PANDAS and its future. At that meeting, it was determined that a name change was in order and we would experience a shift from PANDAS to a new name…PANS. PANS would stand for Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome. To date, the new name has been verbally used by Drs. Swedo, Cunningham and others at conferences, symposiums and in layperson articles. They explain how various bacteria and infections, not soley strep, can trigger neuropsychiatric symptoms. We still wait for official confirmation and documentation of the change, diagnostic criteria, and treatment plans. One thing is definite, it was voted on and the name is PANS.......Imagine the PANDAS community’s surprise when a new article surfaces from the often referred to “naysayers” of PANDAS. .......They deem it should be called CANS (Childhood Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Symptoms). Their CANS would be a very big umbrella for any person that has a sudden onset of neuropsychiatric symptoms, even if the cause is not infection triggered. Example, in addition to infection and autoimmune triggered events, if the cause for the sudden onset is drug induced (including illegal drugs like cocaine), psychogenic, metabolic, trauma, abuse, heavy metals, etc. the person can be diagnosed with CANS. The only prerequisite for a CANS diagnosis would be the sudden onset of symptoms. In other words, their CANS is a dump diagnosis.

So it sounds like the doctors who are listed on this paper,  Singer HS, Gilbert DL, Wolf DS, Mink JW, Kurlan R  are establishing some sort of new criteria that does not make sense moving forward in helping these ill children.  Is it possible that like Autism, there are some folks in the psychiatric world, like in the development of DSM-5, who want to keep fighting the reality of immune illness versus mental illness in our children?  They keep trying to prove that their methods are the only treatments and that kids will get better with them.  Yet their their big hitter medicines are proven ineffective for a big piece of both Autism and P.A.N.D.A.S.--- REPETITIVE behavior:

- A new multi-center study suggests the prescribed antidepressant  citalopram [ Celexa] is no more effective than placebo in altering obsessive features of autism

According to background information in the study, the use of antidepressants in children with autism spectrum disorder took off before there was strong scientific proof about its effectiveness.

In the last decade, its use has grown so that today more than 40 percent of autistic children swallow a daily dose of an antidepressant in an attempt to control spinning, rocking and repetitive behavior.

- These results showed that fluoxetine [PROZAC] was not effective for reducing repetitive behaviors in children and adolescents with Autistic Disorder.

Changes in DSM-5 Autism Definition Could Negatively Impact Millions

Autism organizations concerned that autism diagnostic changes will jeopardize services, impair tracking, and disrupt research around the globe.

WASHINGTON, DC – Proposed changes to the diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorders in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – 5 (DSM-5) will potentially disrupt appropriate and necessary services to hundreds of thousands of individuals in the US, hamper the ability to track the numbers of people with autism, and interfere with efforts to establish biological causes of autism.

“The proposed criteria make it significantly more difficult to qualify for an autism spectrum diagnosis and they completely eliminate the categories of PDD-NOS and Asperger’s Disorder,” stated Wendy Fournier, National Autism Association President. “In a well-intentioned desire to improve the specificity of an ASD diagnosis, the new criteria may, in fact, go too far and create unintended consequences. It is critically important that any diagnosis address all the symptoms of an individual and allow them the supports they need.”

The new criteria, rationale and previous criteria are available at: http://www.dsm5.org/ProposedRevisions/Pages/proposedrevision.aspx?rid=94

Currently, the federal government is spending millions of dollars to track prevalence of ASDs in 11 states; the 2000 birth cohort is due out this year. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires schools to report the number of students with autism annually. Both sets of data have shown dramatic increases in autism spectrum disorders. One in 110 children in the US is now affected by autism compared to one in 10,000 in the early 1980’s. By significantly changing the criteria for diagnosis, the new DSM-5 will impair the ability of public health officials to compare future rates of autism spectrum disorders to past rates, since the definition will have changed. Accurate projections of trends in autism rates are critical to planning educational interventions, Medicaid and adult services. "By analogy, if the medical community chose to only count melanoma in the future instead of all types of skin cancer, it would look like skin cancer rates had gone down, even though other types were still present and needed treatment,” said Ginger Taylor, Canary Party Executive Director.

Autism: The Disease of A Thousand Cuts

By Lisa Goes

This was a tragic week for children.  The poor families in LeRoy keep getting the same routine from their local doctors and health department.   They simply have stress and that stress has caused their "conversion disorder."   Now enough of these shenanigans.  Different doctors appear on the news to deflect questions.  They say nothing.  The families grow more outraged and the health department denies they have anything to be upset about.  Tics and seizures just happen.  Tics and seizures just happen.
 
A representative of the 7 year old girl who died last month following a flu shot contacted me
 Beyond the sadness of that event the representative explained that she hadn't contacted me sooner because her own son with a vaccine injury, now in his 20's, was quite ill as well.  He is nonverbal so they were guessing he had a bladder infection based on his behavior.  Doctors kept saying nothing was wrong.  Finally he was rushed to emergency where it was determined he had a collapsed lung. 
 
My friend Marcella Piper-Terry is working on a new billboard for Timmy.  You can meet Timmy and read about him HERE.

Timmy is failing to thrive after a reaction to his hepatitis B shot, which he received as a newborn.  Hepatitis B is primarily transmitted sexually. 
 
Earlier this week, my friend Cat Jameson wrote a phenomenal piece for Age of Autism about the vaccine controversy entitled "A World of Hurt".  She does a marvelous job of explaining the reality of this slanted debate.  Essentially we present sound non-pharma funded science over and over and over again.  Instead of reading it, our government and those in power tell us we are letting our children play in traffic.  Of course,  real scientists know the two scenarios have nothing to do with one another, but, we have no real scientists in Washington.  These "scientists" turned politicians and lobbyists, half-heartedly skim volumes and volumes of thoughtful research (hoping for pictures?) then look the presenter square in the eye and say, "I know you are but what am I?"  It would be comical I guess, if babies were not dying every single day, medical examiners were not looking away, and health departments didn't swoop down and give parents half answers like, "SIDS", "Cause Unknown," and "Encephalopathy, no known cause."  Oh and, this had nothing to do with their well baby visit the day before yesterday Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
 
For the babies who live,  like my son Noah, they navigate the world everyday with a thousand cuts.  The PANDAS that ravages his brain. The mitochondrial dysfunction brought on by vaccination.  The bowel disease.  The food sensitivities.  The sensitivities to light, sound, touch, fabric, play-doh, plastic, to...the world.  The viruses.  The chronic illness.  The inflammation. The pain.  The vision issues.  The central nervous system damage.  The apraxia.  The metabolic and methylation failure.  It all works together.  One cut on his cheek, one on his backside, his toe, his arm, his knee, his elbow...he could quite feasibly bleed to death because it is so much more convenient to label kids like him with "autism" instead of investigating the multi-system illnesses that ravage his body.  It's just easier this way, for everybody. Especially pharma and the government. 
 
When parents start piecing all this together it is going to be a revolution of biblical proportions.  But honestly, what parent is going to have the time,  money, patience, professional acumen and stamina to keep up with this when they get no support from the mainstream medical community?  No worries, pharma comforts itself.  Parents will try, they will...but soon the dark reality of autism with set in.  The sleepless nights.  The violence.  The constant bowel disease, the excrement on every surface.  The constant harm the child inflicts upon himself and everyone else.  Even the most dedicated parents will lose faith.  Then they will do what pharma says, get their children therapy, set them up with a lifetime psyche-med cocktails and eventually put them in institutions where they will very very slowly be medically lobotomized.  Remember the pharma mantra:  We don't want them dead and we don't want them healthy!  A slow lingering death is integral to maximize profits.
 
I read a truly horrific article yesterday, written by a dispassionate UK journalist making her case for "testing" for autism in the womb because as the title of her article says, "Why Can't We Face the Truth? Having a autistic child wrecks your life." 

Jackie Fletcher of UK Vaccine Safety Group JABS Writes to BMJ About Wakefield Libel Suit

Yesterday BMJ posted some of a letter that Jackie wrote to the journal but we thought AoA readers might like the opportunity to real the whole thing. We mark in bold the passages left out in BMJ on-line

RE: Wakefield sues BMJ over MMR articles

Starting in February there will be an appeal against the GMC ruling by Professor John Walker Smith at the High Court in London and then a US Court appearance for Mr Deer, BMJ Editor Dr Godlee and the BMJ representatives to defend a libel action brought by Dr Wakefield sometime later this year (or maybe next). I trust that all claims/counter claims can be thoroughly tested with all the appropriate evidence being heard and supported by witnesses. I hope that these legal proceedings will help to expose those responsible at the highest level for one of the biggest medical scandals in history and those fighting the rearguard action to defend the MMR vaccine will be found out. The hounding of the co-authors of The Lancet paper has been a very disturbing but clever diversion which, in my opinion, was designed to distract attention from the main issue, the MMR disaster.

I just wish Mr Deer had used his considerable talents to hound the committee responsible for introducing a vaccine, brands of which had already been withdrawn in other countries for causing neurological problems. I wish Mr Deer had used his time and energy to expose the people responsible for allowing the continued use of MMR vaccines when children were reported to have suffered problems in the opening weeks of the MMR campaign back in 1988. I wish he had used his efforts to expose the inadequacies of the Government's yellow card scheme which has been ineffective since it began. Mr Deer was informed of this and much more but for some reason chose to investigate the one team of doctors who had raised a flag over the MMR and possible side effects.

Neurologist Mechtler Blames Post 9/11 World for Leroy NY Sickness "We are going to see more."

Managing Editor's Note: Neurologist Laszlo Mechtler of the (Scratch and) Dent Neurology Clinic where the Leroy NY girls have been diagnosed with Conversion Disorder seems to blame the stress of the post 9/11 world in The Week, a UK publication. And he suggests there will be more of the same. My father grew up in the Depression, my Mom was little girl during WWII - can you imagine a more stressful time?  How long was it before Agent Orange was implicated in the sickness of Viet Nam vets?  By the way, Dr. Mechtler earned more than $175,000 as a paid speaker for Merck, GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer in 2009 and 2010 according to Pro Publica Dollars for Docs. We hope the sick teens in Leroy find answers to secure their health soon.

Why have 12 teenage schoolgirls come down with a baffling form of “conversion disorder”, once known to Freudians as “hysteria”? The doctor now treating them warns that the answer could be a portent for an increasingly stressed-out America which has been taught to “live in fear”.

“Ever since 9/11, Americans have been subjected to warnings of orange alert and red alert, and, unlike Israelis for instance, they are not culturally used to it,” says Mechtler. “What has happened to these girls is the result of Americans being made to live in fear. We are going to see more of these outbreaks.”

Read more: http://www.theweek.co.uk/health-science/44544/ny-schoolgirls-hysteria-doctor-blames-constant-terror-alerts#ixzz1kQfsaM20

AofA Science Summary: Mechanisms of aluminum adjuvant toxicity and autoimmunity in pediatric populations

Mechanisms of aluminum adjuvant toxicity and autoimmunity in pediatric populations

Mechanisms of aluminum adjuvant toxicity and autoimmunity
in pediatric populations  (HERE)

L Tomljenovic1 and CA Shaw2

1Neural Dynamics Research Group, Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC,

Canada and 2Departments of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences and Experimental Medicine and the Graduate Program in Neuroscience,

University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Immune challenges during early development, including those vaccine-induced, can lead to
permanent detrimental alterations of the brain and immune function. Experimental evidence
also shows that simultaneous administration of as little as two to three immune adjuvants can
overcome genetic resistance to autoimmunity. In some developed countries, by the time children
are 4 to 6 years old, they will have received a total of 126 antigenic compounds along with
high amounts of aluminum (Al) adjuvants through routine vaccinations. According to the US
Food and Drug Administration, safety assessments for vaccines have often not included
appropriate toxicity studies because vaccines have not been viewed as inherently toxic.

Taken together, these observations raise plausible concerns about the overall safety of current
childhood vaccination programs. When assessing adjuvant toxicity in children, several key
points ought to be considered: (i) infants and children should not be viewed as ‘‘small adults’’
with regard to toxicological risk as their unique physiology makes them much more vulnerable
to toxic insults; (ii) in adult humans Al vaccine adjuvants have been linked to a variety of
serious autoimmune and inflammatory conditions (i.e., ‘‘ASIA’’), yet children are regularly
exposed to much higher amounts of Al from vaccines than adults; (iii) it is often assumed that
peripheral immune responses do not affect brain function. However, it is now clearly established
that there is a bidirectional neuro-immune cross-talk that plays crucial roles in immunoregulation
as well as brain function. In turn, perturbations of the neuro-immune axis have
been demonstrated in many autoimmune diseases encompassed in ‘‘ASIA’’ and are thought to
be driven by a hyperactive immune response; and (iv) the same components of the neuroimmune
axis that play key roles in brain development and immune function are heavily targeted
by Al adjuvants.

In summary, research evidence shows that increasing concerns about
current vaccination practices may indeed be warranted. Because children may be most at risk
of vaccine-induced complications, a rigorous evaluation of the vaccine-related adverse health
impacts in the pediatric population is urgently needed. Lupus (2012) 21, 223–230.

Autism Today and Post DSM5

Managing Editor's Note: Couldn't resist. Color me retro. And visual.  Below the video clips are some of the comments I've been reading on websites and blogs from coast to coast on the prospect of DSM-5 changes from our neighbors, fellow school parents, maybe even family members.  The seeping anger toward the autism population is disconcerting to say the least.  The slow demonization of the population that costs money and requires services is troubling.  What are we headed for as a nation?

TODAY:

TOMORROW?

Asperger's has become nearly cult like and many with unusual behavior are misdiagnosed when in fact they have other treatable mental illnesses such as OCD, thought disorder, schizotypal personality disorder to name but a few.

As time marches on it seems that autism is just another label to justify behavior. I somehow believe that MOST of the problem is not the kids but the parents who aren't equipped to cope with kids. Every kid is different, every parent wants the perfect kid. Too much helecoptering and not enough interaction, training, manners and consequences. My observation.

I think this nation is becoming nothing more than a "disorder" society. If you're sad you have "Happiness Deficit Disorder". If you stub your toe you have "Hyper Skin Sensitivity with Temporary Tourettes Disorder". Many of the parents who claim their kids have "ADHD" seem like nothing more than parents who don't have the time to spend with their children and therefore don't recognize when a child is being a child. Limiting the amount of TV they watch, how much High Fructose Corn Syrup is in their diet and spending quality time with them is far better than drugging them. Flame on...but until you've tried it you really don't know what it's like not to be part of a society that needs their children to be sick so that pharmaceutical companies can make a profit.

To me it has gotten to be the in thing among the soccer mom set to have a child who is "Autistic, high functioning" implying he is smarter than other children in ways that can't be measured in the conventional education system in addition to behavioral problems which are to be expected with such genius children. When in reality they just have plain old ordinary child who does not want behave in or out of school.

Looking at autism again, the symptoms also happen to partially describe about every mental illness that there ever was...

I'm afraid the only thing that will change is that all the people diagnosed as having Asperger's and PPD-NOS will be rediagnosed as suffering from Severe Autism Specturm Disorder.
Some psychiatrists will cheerfully oblige the raving greedy parents, some parents will cheerfully bash their kid on the head a little harder or feed them a few more drugs before going to see the doctor, and everyone will still get their Social Security checks.

Tics and Toxins: Leroy School Site has History of Health, Water, Building Woes

By Dan Olmsted

The school where 12 girls developed tics attributed to "conversion disorder" has a history of water and structural problems, and an outbreak of rashes and sores occurred among students playing sports on land where the school is now sitting, according to a student who went there.

 "When we first started we couldn't go to gym class because the floor kept sinking and cracking," said the student, who attended the new LeRoy Junior/Senior High School in 2005, its first year of operation. She was one of several people who described the site as a "swamp." 

One year, students had to start a week late because of flooding inside the building, she said.

Before the current school -- which goes from eighth to twelfth grades -- was built, the site was used for student playing fields; the school itself was at another location. The new building sits directly atop those playing fields.

In the 1970s, students using those fields suffered from open sores that would not heal and rashes, said the former student, whose mother also went there and recalled the incident. The soil was tested, the cause was found, the students were treated and recovered. She did not know what the tests had shown.

This student expressed surprise that two consultant reports commissioned by the district, which found no problems with indoor air quality or toxins in the school building, stated: "No history of building water damage or site contamination was found."

She is not alone. On a Facebook site set up to support the students, one commenter wrote: "I read the environmental report and it seems like the testing wasn't very thorough. ... Correct me if I am wrong but wasn't the school partially underwater when it was first built? And how about soil testing. It seems like that would be included in thorough environmental testing? These girls deserve some answers. Praying for all of them and hoping we all get some answers soon."

Last week, I reported that except for checking a log of pesticide spraying, there is no evidence the consultants considered toxins in the schoolyard or on playing fields. Yet the symptoms occurred during mild weather when students would have been outside, and the school grounds are surrounded by intensively farmed land from which chemicals could conceivably have seeped or drifted.

The school is required to keep annual pesticide logs that were reviewed by the consulting firm, and therefore pesticides were ruled out. As best I could determine, that’s as far as it went.

The former student told me that some outside areas are used exclusively by girls, including a softball diamond.

Conversion disorder is a psychogenic diagnosis that means a psychological issue, such as stress or trauma, is converted unconsciously into physical symptoms. Several parents and affected students say they don’t accept that explanation. According to press reports, they have lost confidence in the Buffalo clinic that made the diagnosis and are now seeking other doctors to examine their children; the Buffalo clinic has reportedly now offered to conduct more tests.

One press report says the total number of students affected has reached 16 and includes one boy.

Neither the district nor the consulting firm it hired would talk to me about the issue.

On Friday, Jeffrey Hammond, a spokesman for the state Department of Health, told me, "The school is safe. The environment or an infection is not the cause of the students’ tics. There are many causes of tics-like symptoms. Stress can often worsen tic-like symptoms.

“All of the affected students have been evaluated and some have shown signs of improvement. Vaccines (Gardasil) have been ruled out."

--

Dan Olmsted is Editor of Age of Autism and co-author, with Mark Blaxill, of "The Age of Autism -- Mercury, Medicine, and a Man-Made Disorder." He has been an editor and reporter at USA Today and United Press International, where his investigation of severe side effects of an antimalaria drug given to U.S. soldiers won Best Wire Service Reporting from the National Mental Health Association.

Anne Dachel on DSM5 Changes in The Health Care Blog

Congrats to our own Anne Dachel who has been autism's town crier for years in an effort to ensure services, treatment and care for ALL of our loved ones facing the challenges of a spectrum disorder from the most severely affected autism to adults with Asperger's.

Please leave a comment in support of her work and about DSM5 at The Health Care blog HERE.  You can subscribe to her informative news feed site at AnneDachel.com

Dear DSM5 Team: Some Spontaneous Suggestions For You

Regarding DSM5 changes please read this action alert from NAA New York Metro.  Seems our kids can just spontaneously "get better." So relax you uptight Moms and Dads. Isn't that nifty? Let's talk about spontaneous.

This is a spontaneous kiss.

This is spontaneous combustion.

 

This is a spontaneous (and slightly annoying) song.



 This is "spontaneous" autism recovery. From a severely affected child to a boy who can perform. It took years of hard work, therapy, biomedical interventions.

 

Asking parents to trust your decisions, after decades of no answers, no ability to count or even confirm an epidemic, no cause, no treatments outside of drugs that cause weight gain to the point of obesity and side effects we would not impinge upon our pets would require one of these:



Regarding your changes to autism in the DSM? For the sake of our loved ones who need services and for whom services are tied to diagnosis - like EVERY disease/diagnosis in the country based on our miserable insurance providers and even our school systems.  You can't touch this.

DSM-5: You're Still Autistic. You're Just Weird. You We're Not Sure About. Call Us Tomorrow.

By Anne Dachel

It’s hard to imagine more chaos in the world of autism than what we see happening right now.  Autism is more and more in the public spotlight.  The numbers are huge and no one can explain them.  Since 2009 we’ve been told that one percent of children have autism.  Among boys alone, it’s almost two percent.  Mainstream medicine can’t explain the stunning increase in a once rare disorder.  For years health officials gave doctors credit for all the autism everywhere.  They said it was the result of “greater awareness” and “better diagnosing.”  Children who were mislabeled as something else were now correctly called autistic.  The criteria for diagnosing autism was laid out in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) and a child with symptoms would be placed somewhere on the autism spectrum, as it came to be known.  This included very high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome all the way over to the other end of the spectrum to those with severe intellectual impairment and all the signs of classic autism. 

Between 2007 and 2009 the autism rate went from one in 150 to one in every 110 children and even health officials had to admit there was more going on here than just better diagnosing.  It looked like lots more kids really did have autism.  To address this, groups like Autism Speaks poured millions of dollars into studies looking for the gene/genes that cause autism—with no conclusive results.  Studies did turn to the environment, since if the explosion in autism was real, genes alone couldn’t possibly explain it.  We were regularly told about studies linking autism to older dads, older moms, siblings too close together, lack of vitamin D, living too close to a freeway, low birth weight, and the list continues to this day.  The one thing that officials continually denied was any link to the ever-expanding vaccine schedule.  After seeming to study the possible connection in depth, the agency that runs the vaccine program gave their vaccines a clean bill of health.  (And after delivering the coup de grace to the vaccine-autism link, the last head of the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Julie Gerberding, became the head of the vaccine division at Merck.)

Meanwhile, autism became a real public health issue.  News stories about the number of affected children and the cost of educating and treating them were common.  Almost as an aside was the line, “Autism has no known cause.”  There was nothing doctors and health officials could actually tell us about autism except that we should look for signs of the disorder in babies and young children because early intervention led to the best outcome.  Officials didn’t seem concerned that no one was able to find a comparable rate of autism among adults.  Since many experts still adamantly claimed that there was no real increase, someone somewhere should have been eager to find the misdiagnosed/undiagnosed 40, 50, and 60 year olds out there with autism, especially those with classic autism whose symptoms are undeniable.  This was never done.

With more and more children being diagnosed with autism, more attention was given to the disorder.  Autism Speaks, the biggest advocacy group in the U.S., was started in 2005 and Congress set up the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee in 2006.  It appeared that whatever could be done about autism would be done, with millions of dollars thrown into the mix. 

The problem is that not much has been learned about this disorder in the last six or seven years, except that the numbers continue to grow and the controversial link to vaccines isn’t going away.  In fact, with growing concern over autism, more and more parents have stopped vaccinating.  Despite the endless promotion of vaccines as safe by people like Dr. Paul Offit, himself a vaccine developer, questions continue to be asked.  While the federal government has long claimed that the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program has never paid out for vaccine damage that included autism, last year it was revealed that dozens of children with autism have received millions of dollars in compensation.     This followed the news in 2008 that Health and Human Services had conceded the case of Hannah Poling, the young Georgia girl who regressed into autism after being vaccinated. 

HuffPo Mentions Changes to DSM5 -- Readers Weigh In

Huffington Post ran a brief intro to a NYT post on the DSM5 proposed changes to the autism as a diagnosis.  Click New Definition Of Autism May Exclude Many, Study Suggests.

AutismOne SoCal at Health Freedom Expo: The Exciting New Autism Event of Southern California

AutismOne is excited to team up with the leaders of the Health Freedom Expo community to present engaging and important speakers/lectures/panels. Dan Olmsted of Age of Autism will lecture and lead a rousing panel covering "Malfeasance in the Media"; Tim Bolen of The Bolen Report officiates the "Vaccine Politics" panel; and, of course, biomed lectures like Dr. Jerry Kartzinel's "Mending Autism: Comorbid Biological Conditions and Moving Toward Recovery" help parents move their children forward. AutismOne Chicago keynote Dr. David Lewis also joins us at the Health Freedom Expo in Long Beach with his stellar presentation "Institutional Research Misconduct: The Autism Researcher's Worst Nightmare." With 3 days of biomed, advocacy, and education lectures and panels, AutismOne SoCal at Health Freedom Expo brings together the leaders in the autism and health freedom movements, giving you the straight answers so that you can be the most effective advocate for your child. To register for March 2-4 in Long Beach: www.HealthFreedomExpo.com. To register for May 23-27 in Chicago: www.AutismOne.org.

Friday, March 2

Janet Levatin, MD -- The Changing Face of Pediatrics:  Autism and Chronic Disease

John Hicks, MD, and Betsy Hicks -- A Gut Feeling about Autism, Nutrition, and the Brain

Nancy Mullan, MD -- The Single Most Important Biochemical Molecule in Treating ASD

Panel -- Malfeasance in the Media (led by Dan Olmsted of Age of Autism)

Andrew Wakefield, MBBS -- Vaccine Wars. Exposing iatrogenic injury: Into the playoffs.

David Lewis, PhD -- Institutional Research Misconduct: The Autism Researcher's Worst Nightmare

Mary Holland, Esq. -- What’s Law Got to Do With It?: The U.S. Vaccine Program and the Autism Epidemic

 

Saturday, March 3

Jerry Kartzinel, MD -- Mending Autism: Comorbid Biological Conditions and Moving Toward Recovery

Shawn Centers, DO -- Healing the Whole Child: Osteopathy, Birth Trauma, Natural Medicines, and Autism

Dan Olmsted -- Malfeasance in the Media

Mary Jo Lang, PhD, RN -- How ASD Health Issues Affect Education/Behavioral Needs at School

Karen Kain -- Lorrin's World:  What You Need to Know about Vaccine Injury

Mark Geier, MD, PhD, and David Geier -- The Biological Basis of Autism: Causation and Treatment

 

Sunday, March 4

Cindy Griffin, DSH-P, DIHom -- Autism myths and realities: Health freedom hanging in the balance

Michael Montico, MD -- The Vicious Cycles of Autism: A Functional Approach

Panel -- Vaccine Politics (led by Tim Bolen of The Bolen Report)

Rev. Lisa Sykes -- Wesley’s Story:  Hurt and Healing after Mercury-containing Vaccines

Brian Hooker, PhD, PE -- How Free is FOIA?

 

 

 

Jo Ashline: A Story Behind Every Number

Managing Editor's Note: This post in the OC Register caught my eye.  We can relate to the feeling of shock, the grief and then rolling up the sleeves and getting to work and back to love. 

By Jo Ashline

There is a mommy-to-be out there somewhere rubbing her belly and stocking up on antacids because she’s eating for two (and maybe, sometimes, when no one’s looking, for three). She spends hours researching the best car seat and stroller systems, daydreaming while doing the dishes about long walks in the park and whether she will allow strangers a sneak peak at the most gorgeous baby ever to be born.

Her husband, a good man with a big heart, dutifully goes to work each day, socking away dollars and cents and nursing his own daydreams about teaching his son to play catch. He makes a silent promise to keep his cool when bragging to his co-workers about his boy’s natural talent on the field, his impeccable hand-eye-coordination and his speed and endurance. He does his best to try and stay in the present, but every once in a while, as he crunches the numbers and updates the spreadsheets, he stares off into the distance and pictures his son, a handsome fellow that looks remarkably like him.

A World of Hurt

By Cathy Jameson

Thank you, Dr. James Conway for the title for this post.  Conway is a pediatric disease specialist according to in this article.  You’ll hear more about him toward the end of my post.

I tried not to read the article early last week.  I hesitated to click on the link seeing a short intro for it on a news site.  I knew the topic was going to get me all riled up.  Since I already have enough on my plate I wanted to spare myself a few minutes of unnecessary aggravation.  I should have avoided the story, but I didn’t.  I peeked.  As much as I want to shield you from the content in the link you’ll have to open it and read the article, too. 

The opening sentence starts out fine.  The reporter shares that a growing trend of parents are not vaccinating their children.  I smiled and sent a virtual high five toward my computer screen.  Woot!  More parents are onto something!  They are making bold statements (and taking action) about the state of the current vaccine schedule. 

Then, my high-fived hand came down.  My smile turned into pursed lips, and I shook my head.  I stopped at the third sentence.  A pediatrician named Margaret Hennessey interviewed on a radio show said that parents should not skip vaccines.  Tsk. Tsk.  Why don’t you know?  When everyone is getting (vaccines) they work better! 

Really?

What Hennesey mentions is also known as herd immunity.  Guess what?  It doesn’t work.

The doctor now makes her own bold statement:  “There's no science that supports that it's worthwhile holding off on these vaccines.”  She goes on to say that vaccines can prevent infant death.  Her science is saying that vaccines are safe.  And effective.  And we should all get them.  Or babies will die.

What?!

This is where I started talking to my computer screen, “Vaccines are effective?!  For what?  I know what they are effective in doing—they’re effective in causing mitochondrial dysfunction.    They can cause cell death.   Vaccines can result in autism.  They can effectively change people’s lives negatively and possibly forever.  Vaccines even lead to death.  How’s that for the ultimate in effective?

I grumbled to myself, “Worthwhile, too?  Hmpf.  I’ll show you what’s worthwhile.  My child, his health and preventing a vaccine injury is worthwhile.  Assuming that by blinding jabbing anyone and everyone thinking that will make vaccines effective is ludicrous.”  My guess is Dr. Hennessy hasn’t read everything there is to read on vaccine safety.  She should know that some people can and have negative reactions to vaccines and what’s in them.  With just a few clicks of the mouse one can certainly find more than enough evidence that science does exist to support it being worthwhile to hold off on vaccines.  Just look at the massive list Talk About Curing Autism (TACA) and its contributors have compiled!

I started to regret opening the link to the news story.  Since I wasn’t finished with the article I sat back in my chair, refocused on the monitor and cringed.  I forced myself to continue to read. 

Enter Dr. James Conway.  Remember he’s that guy that gave me the idea for today’s post.  Wait for his little tidbit.  Conway says that not vaccinating children "is like putting your kids out in traffic."

I was now standing up yelling at my computer.  Conway continues.  He says, ‘…they might not get hit by a car, but if they do "that's a world of hurt."’

Are you kidding me?!?!

Tics and Toxins: LeRoy Officials Gave Little Attention to Schoolyard Before Ruling Out Environment

By Dan Olmsted

Health experts say they’ve eliminated every possible environmental and infectious cause for the “tics” afflicting 12 girls at LeRoy Junior/Senior High School in New York state. They’ve scoured the building for mold and carbon monoxide (nothing, they say), considered illnesses that might cause the symptom (none), even checked on vaccinations (not all girls had the same shot).

However thorough that workup may have been, it seems to have stopped at the schoolhouse Exit sign. Except for checking a log of pesticide spraying, there is no evidence they considered toxins in the schoolyard or on playing fields. Yet the symptoms occurred during mild weather when students would have been outside, and the school grounds are surrounded by intensively farmed land from which chemicals could conceivably have seeped or drifted.

The school is required to keep annual pesticide logs that were reviewed by a consulting firm looking into environmental factors, and therefore pesticides were ruled out. As best I can determine, that’s as far as it went.

That may not be far enough, given that parents and some of the students involved don’t accept the psychogenic diagnosis they have been given, and that a number of Web commentators familiar with the school have raised concerns about the grounds and how the relatively new building is sited.

Public health officials remain adamant that the case is closed.

"The LeRoy school is safe,” Jeffrey Hammond, a spokesman for the state Department of Health, replied Friday after I raised the issue in a telephone call. “The environment or an infection is not the cause of the students’ tics. There are many causes of tics-like symptoms. Stress can often worsen tic-like symptoms.

“All of the affected students have been evaluated and some have shown signs of improvement. Vaccines (Gardasil) have been ruled out."

While the department has been careful for privacy reasons to avoid naming the illness, a doctor treating the girls has now gone public, with their permission, by calling it “conversion disorder.” Known less gingerly as mass hysteria, the diagnosis is rooted in 19^th century Freudian psychology: Stress or trauma is subconsciously transformed into physical symptoms that can occur in several people at the same time. 

In part because the LeRoy diagnosis took months to emerge, and in part because many people – including parents and affected children – find conversion disorder a suspect explanation, multiple theories continue to arise. Those include concerns about the school building and grounds, expressed in online comments:

-- An environmental study “would be the first logical step, knowing that the school was built in a swamp and that a number of classrooms were underwater the first year as well as the gym you would think it would be the first thing the school would address- even if only to disprove it.”

-- “Girls started feeling sick in September, sounds like pesticide spraying At the end of summer before the fall to protect late crops.” (The girls’ symptoms began as early as September 10, according to published accounts.)

 -- “Have the doctors considered that the condition may be related to the school's having been built on swampy land? Water in the building continues to be a problem. A second story that should be pursued by the press and others is why this new school was built and why it was built on this particular piece of land.”

A quick look look at Google Earth (click the plus sign to see the school and grounds in detail)  shows the setting. The high school’s Web site  has an aerial photo that appears to show a large pool of standing water close to the school, with a rivulet coming even closer; it appears to be dry in the Google photo.

Farming, despite its idyllic image in American lore, is a highly chemical-intensive practice, and Western New York is no exception. For that and other reasons, it can be dangerous. In October, a few miles west of LeRoy in Genesee County, two people became ill when a pesticide being applied to a potato field wafted in their direction.  The substance was a toxic fumigant being injected into the soil in preparation for planting this year’s crop. Officials said humidity might have helped spread it.

Obviously, that incident had nothing to do with the LeRoy illnesses, but it does give a sense of time and place missing in accounts of the area, as well as suggesting weather is an unpredictable vector. 

But in such a scenario, why would only girls be affected? That's unclear, but there are a number of possibilities that environmental triggers could help explain. For instance, in some cases of mass illness in high schools, the victims were male football players and the problems were traced to toxins where they played. Being male was not a susceptibility factor, but it pointed to the exposure nonetheless. (In another case, marching band members suffered the same problem for the same reason.)

It is possible that more has been done to consider toxins outside the school building, but if so nothing has been done to communicate it to the national media.

In fact, opportunities continue to be missed. The two consultant reports and the school district’s official statement make no mention of looking for anything amiss outside the building itself ,except to note the water supply comes from neighboring Monroe County's public system. "No history of building water damage or site contamination was found," it states.

Neither the district nor the consulting firm it hired would talk to me Friday when I told them I was seeking information on whether risks outside the school building had been investigated.

--

Dan Olmsted is Editor of Age of Autism and co-author, with Mark Blaxill, of “The Age of Autism – Mercury, Medicine, and a Man-made Epidemic,” published by Thomas Dunne Books.

How to Diagnose Young Women with Inconvenient Neurological Sickness

If only this weren't on the mark....

Register for National Vaccine Advisory Committee Webinar (Flu Shots for Healthcare Workers on Agenda)

The Committee meets three times a year in Washington, DC. These meetings are open to the public. Time is allotted at every meeting for public response and comment.

Meeting details are posted in a Federal Register notice at least 15 days prior to each meeting. Details regarding comments will be listed in the Federal Register notice for each meeting.

NVAC Pre-registration is required for public attendance, webinar, and comments.

If you wish to provide written comments, please submit them at least five business days in advance to nvpo@hhs.gov.

Meeting Dates for 2012

National Vaccine Advisory Committee (NVAC) Meeting:

• Tuesday, February 7, 2012 - 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Reserve your Webinar seat now
• Wednesday, February 8, 2012 - 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Reserve your Webinar seat now
  
  
• June 5-6, 2012
• September 11-12, 2012

Hubert H. Humphrey Building - Room 800
200 Independence Avenue SW
Washington, DC 20201

You will need photo identification, such as your driver's license, for admission to the Humphrey Building. A sign-in area for meeting attendees will be located in the lobby behind the security desk. An NVPO staff member will be there to assist you. Please note that non-U.S. citizens must provide additional information to attend the public meetings; see the online registration form or contact NVPO for details.

National Vaccine Advisory Committee (NVAC) Meeting:

• Tuesday, February 7, 2012 - 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Reserve your Webinar seat now
• Wednesday, February 8, 2012 - 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Reserve your Webinar seat now
  
  
• June 5-6, 2012
• September 11-12, 2012

 

“The hell with balance!” - Paul Offit Throws Out Jake Crosby, Argues with NYU Research Scholar Mary Holland at Yale

By Jake Crosby

Millionaire vaccine industrialist Paul Offit lied about me again. Unlike at NIH, where Tara Palmore had me removed after I asked Paul Offit a question during Q&A, at Yale, Dr. Offit himself demanded I leave after he repeated his lie that I am a “stalker.” Fortunately, Vaccine Epidemic co-editor Mary Holland was also in the audience – and defended me after I left.

On January 13, 2012, Offit gave the Beaumont Lecture at Yale’s Sterling Hall of Medicine, sponsored by the Beaumont Medical Club. The title of his talk was “Hard Knocks: Communicating Science to the Public.” It contained many of the same talking points as his recent NIH “Clinical Grand Rounds – Great Teacher Lecture” titled “Communicating Vaccine Safety Science to the Public.” The Yale audience numbered around fifty to seventy-five people, comprised mostly of older physicians.

It was during Dr. Offit’s lecture when he first spotted me seated in the audience. At the end of his talk, he scowled at me. I was not intimidated.  Three questions into the Q&A discussion, the microphone was handed to me and I proceeded to ask my question:

"Hi Dr. Offit, I'm a student at GW School of Public Health. You said Dr. Wakefield "can't stop suing people"…

As I was about to ask my question, Offit began shouting me down:

"Stop right there! Stop right there!"

"Were you aware..."

"Stop right there! Jake, I am sick and tired of you following me to my events! Get out! Leave!"

"This is only the second event of yours I've been to."

He responded by saying I cannot criticize him in person, only online.

"You can write about me on your vindictive blog!"

In Memoriam Paul Foot: Private Eye in an Ethical Tangle Over MMR

By John Stone

The editor of the British satirical journal Private Eye, Ian Hislop, told the UK’s Leveson Inquiry into media ethics on Tuesday concerning the MMR controversy:

"Yes, we got it wrong. I was advised by our MD not to pursue it and I should have listened to him. The story went on too long. Mea Culpa."

Private Eye’s columnist ‘MD’, otherwise known as TV presenter, comedian and doctor, Phil Hammond has close pharmaceutical connections and has campaigned (with ultimate success) through Private Eye and British Medical Journal for the Merck/Sanofi HPV vaccine Gardasil  to be preferred in the UK to GlaxoSmithKline’s Cervarix. Although this may not be known to Private Eye readers Hammond has disclosed in BMJ that he “has been paid to speak at dinners by many drug companies (including GSK and Sanofi Pasteur).” Sanofi are also partners with Merck in Europe: Merck, GSK and Sanofi Pasteur are the three former defendants in the MMR litigation. He also presided over a grand industry award ceremony in 2007, in part sponsored by the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, in which the host journal, Scrip World Pharmaceutical News  - which caters for pharmaceutical industry executives - paid tribute to him in glowing terms:

“Those not up for an Award shared an enjoyable evening with the nominees, one that balanced business and pleasure for all concerned. Host Dr Phil Hammond, a writer, broadcaster and qualified GP, captured the mood with his light-hearted critique of the healthcare sector that the 750 guests enjoyed greatly. Dr Hammond is well known mainly in the UK, yet his often-provocative address successfully struck a chord with the Awards’ international audience. In particular, he sympathised with some of the difficulties facing the industry, especially in this era of reimbursement challenges. "I'm looking forward to the day when I can actually prescribe some of the drugs that win Awards," he told the audience. Julie Walters, CEO of MediaSpeak, and representative for shortlisted company Synosia, spoke for many when she said: “Our guests from the US loved the Awards, especially Dr Phil Hammond. Book that man for next year!””

Private Eye began to retreat from its support for MMR families after the death of its leading investigative reporter, Paul Foot, in 2004 and the no doubt increasing influence of Hammond. However, MD Hammond’s review of the science post GMC verdict in 2010 is less than convincing (Private Eye 5-18 February 2010). He cites four sources – including the notorious Madsen study - which do not tell a clear story either individually or collectively and which he does not appear to understand beyond the spin which has already been put on them.

Why the DSM-5 Should Concern Us All

By Mary Romaniec

On December 13, 2006, a four year old girl named Rebecca Riley died of an overdose of prescribed medication.  Her parents had given her a toxic combination of Seroquel, Clonodine and Depakote, along with an over-the-counter cold medication.  Their reasons for the medications were to calm a child who had been diagnosed with bipolar and ADHD when she was two years old.  Her parents were to eventually go on to face charges of murder after the autopsy confirmed that she had died from the mixture of these medications.  While her parents were convicted of all changes in 2010, the prescribing physician, Dr. Kiyoko Kifuji, faced a whole different scrutiny, and one that put the entire psychiatric community on notice.

This is where the problems with DSM-IV are on display.  In the diagnostic manual that was established in 1993 by a committee of leading psychiatrists, the wording for diagnosing bipolar and other disorders did not clarify at what age a person could receive said diagnosis.  In other words, what is considered abnormal at say twenty, would also be construed as abnormal in a two year old.  In Rebecca’s case, Dr. Kifuji, who worked at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, readily admitted that her diagnosis of Rebecca and her two siblings with mental illness at young ages was influenced by her working relationship with Dr. Joseph Biederman of Massachusetts General Hospital, considered the cult-like figure around the cause of early diagnosis of bipolar.

Dr. Biederman, chief of pediatric psychopharmacology and associated with Harvard University, believes that the moment a child is born is the time to begin looking for bipolar and other mental health disorders.  What was once diagnosed as a disease in young adulthood can now be diagnosed when a child is a mere toddler, meaning that the child can begin receiving antipsychotic medication for behavior that most would consider “the terrible twos.”    He considers his work to be breakthrough science on par with the first vaccinations of disease. Kifuji was one of his followers.