OLMSTED ON AUTISM: BILL GATES AND THE MORAL IMPERATIVE

By Dan Olmsted

You’ve probably seen that Bill Gates is leaving Microsoft to devote full time to the charity he and his wife, Melinda, has created. The foundation has done indisputably good works and – now that Gates pal Warren Buffett has chipped in his entire $50 billion fortune – intends to literally redouble its efforts.

One of those efforts is to create and promulgate vaccinations. This post is not about whether vaccinations are a good idea, the best way to fight diseases like malaria, the practicality of continuing to pour millions into the search for an AIDS vaccine – it’s not about any of that. The issue is: Given that the foundation sees mass vaccination as a direct route to better health outcomes for the world’s poor, the foundation (which now means Bill Gates himself) has an affirmative duty – a moral imperative – to make sure those vaccines are as safe as humanly possible.

To quote from a Reuters story on Thursday: “The 52-year-old, whose boyish looks seem at odds with his graying hair, will leave behind a life's work developing software to devote energy to finding new vaccines or to micro-finance projects in the developing world.”

I don’t need to know what kinds of vaccines they’re talking about – and how many will come in multi-dose vials preserved with thimerosal -- to know where the moral imperative is here: There are now so many questions about the safety of some vaccine and vaccine ingredients – particularly thimerosal, the fancy name for a big dollop of poisonous ethyl mercury  – that a group with the power and reach of the Gates Foundation needs to make sure it’s doing no harm in its laudable effort to do good.

As recently as three or four months ago, the foundation might have gotten away with simply reciting the mantra that all available studies show no connection between vaccines and autism, vaccines and asthma, vaccines and … whatever. But along came Hannah Poling and the government’s concession that vaccines triggered autistic regression; then came Bernadine Healy, the former head of the NIH, to state that the science simply hasn’t been done to exonerate vaccines; and just last week, David Kirby wrote about the CDC’s Julie Gerberding and her multiple concurrences with the complaint that the CDC’s central vaccine safety study is, well, worthless.

At the moment there is NO good science, in other words, to reassure the Gates Foundation that its quest to save the world via vaccination is as safe as it might have thought. Now comes Bill Gates, at an opportune moment indeed, to devote full time to the foundation that bears his name and (along with the PC) will be his legacy. He ought to order a comprehensive look at the risks as well as the benefits of vaccines, and it ought to be his first order of business.

Because, you see, it’s a moral imperative. It’s also imperative that Warren Buffett weigh in on this. You can’t give away $50 billion without taking at least some interest in whether it’s doing more harm than good; that, too, is a moral imperative.
--
Dan Olmsted is Editor of Age of Autism

Comments

[nora cervantes]

Hello , this message is for Mr,Bill Gates, my name is nora i have a child with autism , and i have him going to mexico for stem cell therapy which is working, i wanted to know if you have some kind of ficially ability to help mothers with with a child affected by this disease, my son has changed with therapy with i had to take 2 jobs to pay for his treatement.

[Kelli Ann Davis]

"But, frankly, I also think that if this was tenable theory health officials internationally would be latching on to it like crazy."

Touche' John. Hit the nail on the head.

[D's Advocate]

Also, the links I provided are not "short figures". They are included in the articles. I apologize if you do not have access, but most scientific journals require a subscription. Unfortunately, even in the information age, reliable sources of info are not free.

[John Stone]

D's Advocate

You seem to be short on actual figures. The figure given by the BBC (impeccable source!) which tallies with my previous memory indicates a rise in average paternal in the UK from 27.2 in 1971 to 30.1 years in 1999, or about 1 year a decade. I am not sure how this could have driven a ~7-fold rise in the autism rate in the years 1987-92.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/parenting/dads/olderdads.shtml

I don't know that we have any figures for the age of paternity in the US: I came across this which gave the average age for motherhood (presumably first time) as having risen from 21.4 years in 1971 to 25.1 in December 2003, (which is still much younger than the UK (29.1), so likely paternity rose by a roughly similar figure (3.7 years over a 32-33 year period).

http://scienceweek.com/2004/sa040820-5.htm

I could see how this could help to inflate figures (if the phenomenon was well accounted) but I cannot see how it could drive the wild increases we have seen.

Incidentally, I also do not see that this is necessarily an alternative theory to vaccines if paternal age increases genetic vulnerability.

But, frankly, I also think that if this was tenable theory health officials internationally would be latching on to it like crazy.

[D's Advocate]

This phenomenon applies to a number of fertility problems, as well as developmental abnormalities involving the children of older parents.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Health/Sex/Story?id=5322966&page=2

[D's Advocate]

"D's Advocate -
Although the average age of parents may have increased, as parents are not starting families at as young an age, in the old days before birth control people used to keep having babies until the wives reached menopause, yet they had very low rates of autism -- no reports of a lot of autistic last-borns."

If you look at the birth rates according to age, what you are saying is not accurate. The data speaks for itself and has been collected over decades. The number of births, in the U.S. and developed nations, has increased for older mothers relative to the population. This isn't a perception issue...these are numbers. We do not have the same number of births in the population in later years as we do now.

Mark, that isn't a "solitary piece of evidence". Other epidemiological studies have been performed that suggest the same relationship.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/n64073525w753846/
http://www.springerlink.com/content/m5814t073m776r12/
http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/63/9/1026

There are plenty more. Sorry to break it to you.

[John Stone]

Sophist FCD and Alek,

Most people here swallowed the benefits far outweigh the risks rhetoric, which is why they are here. Why should they doubt the evidence of their own eyes and ears before they doubt Bill Gates? And besides, we are simply asking to be listened to.

Let me give you an idea. In the UK the annual projected cost of autism was upgraded from two billion dollars in 2001 to fifty-six billion dollars in 2008. That is a lot of money (even for Bill and Melinda Gates or Warren Buffet), it is a lot of human misery, and it is a great burden for society (even that bit of it which it shoulders). And that is just in the UK, with a population on fifth the size of the US.

This is worth consideration, and even dialogue.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11708392?ordinalpos=3&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/pressAndInformationOffice/newsAndEvents/archives/2007/EconomicConsequencesAutism.htm

[Twyla]

D's Advocate -
Although the average age of parents may have increased, as parents are not starting families at as young an age, in the old days before birth control people used to keep having babies until the wives reached menopause, yet they had very low rates of autism -- no reports of a lot of autistic last-borns.

When I was pregnant with my last baby, my doctor said that there is an increased risk of genetic disorders involving the wrong number of chromosones -- where instead of a pair of each type of chromosone there is either one missing or one extra (trisomy). But she said that age does not generally cause an increased risk of other types of genetic disorders.

[Alek]

My oh my... How can you possibily insinuate that Bill Gates has SINISTER intentions. He is, without comparison, the biggest philanthropist the world has ever known. You are the sinister ones, trying to spread these lies about him which are 1) unprooked, 2) unwarranted, 3) unsupported, and 4) just plain outlandish conspiracy theories. What's wrong with you? Can you put forward ONE piece of solid evidence for your claims?

It goes without saying, of course, that vaccines are the most successful public health measure in history. Trying to convince people that they're somehow harmful is incredibly irresponsible.

[Sophist FCD]

You people are all missing a serious point. Even if it were to be accepted for the nonce that vaccines cause everything you claim they cause, the fact remains that these are the vaccines that are available now. A safe vaccine developed tomorrow does nothing for someone who died today. As we type, there are vaccines sitting around in warehouses that can save tens millions of lives in the time it would take to develop new ones. In this situation there are two, and only two, options available; either we can give people the vaccines you believe cause autism, or we can stand around and watch people die who could have been saved.

So go ahead, advocate for "better", "greener" vaccines if you must. But even if you are right and we are wrong about vaccines, advocating that we not use the vaccines we have *right now* to save people who are dying *right now* is nothing short of sociopathy.

[Lawrence]

So what happened in the 80s that could cause the 7-fold rise in autism?

Any theories about the rise in autism need to consider the fact that during the 80s the blind-leading-the-blind CDC was doing its best not to acknowledge the contagious neuroimmunological epidemic which was euphemistically called "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome." (Read Hillary Johnson's "Osler's Web" for the outrageous story.)

Is the rise in autism an epiphenomenon of the CFS epidemic and the epidemic of the virus linked to CFS, namely HHV-6?

If the frustrated autism activists sat down with some of the frustrated CFS activists, they would find out that they have a lot in common. A CDC that can not be trusted. An arrogant authoritarian medical establishment. A lazy self-satisfied press. And HHV-6.

[John Stone]

Mark

Thanks, and yes you are right - it is a serious distraction.

[Mark]

John, you're being far too nice to D's Advocate. You are absolutely correct in pointing out the weakness of the old dad study. As far as I know, the Israeli study is the SOLITARY piece of evidence being trotted out to support the claim that older (and presumably damaged) sperm is an autism risk. This is based, as you point out, on a handful of 40 year old former Israeli soldiers.

And the CNV work is way overblown as well: contradictory findings between the only published studies, results that are remarkably fragile upon close inspection (I encourage anyone so inclined to read the appendix of the much hyped NEJM article, you'll be surprised how weak the methods and findings are), and a research direction that suggest no intervention model OF ANY kind.

With something as dramatic as the autism epidemic, marginal changes like later marriage and random DNA damage (remember they haven't replicated any gene findings) are extremely unlikely to be the driving force. We need to stop being distracted by this kind of static and get focused on the likely environmental sources of the problem. Kudos to you John, for pointing that out.

[John Stone]

D's Advocate

I think you have misunderstood my point. It might be a significant risk for older fatherhood, but it could not be a driving force behind the rise in autism. I cannot find it now but I remember sending Lenny Schafer my calculation based on UK figures, which from memory suggested that average paternal age had drifted up by two years over a period of two decades (remarkably evenly). I don't know whether I got the calculation right but I thought about 90 years to double the autism rate by that mechanism, whereas we had experienced a perhaps 7-fold rise between 1987 and 1992. Even if I got it wrong I believe that it could only have had a marginal impact on the rate.

[D's Advocate]

John Stone: "...Additionally, any rise in the average paternal age would have to be quite drastic to have any impact at all, when we have seen rises of many times."

I don't see how you can make that conclusion (perhaps you could expand a bit more on this).

Trends like the incidence of Down's Syndrome are very tightly correlated with parental age: the likelihood of a chromosomal non-disjunction event increase over time, with environmental factors, such as x-rays, contributing to the likelihood. With the increased evidence indicating de novo mutations (primarily gene deletion and copy number variants) are a contributor, why would age be ruled out? Developed nations, such as the U.S. and Europe, are having children later in life (http://www.childtrendsdatabank.org/indicators/79BirthRates.cfm). This trend is clearly apparent looking at the birth rates through the 80's to today. GenXers are getting married later and having children later. Why wouldn't this be a possible result of an obvious trend in developed populations?

[Angela S.]

Dan-
I for one would love to see you do a piece on what trends educators are seeing. So often we here the epidemic being blamed on better diagnosis. Well if that were the case professionals with lengthy careers in education wouldn't be making comments like Lisa's.
Angela S.

[John Stone]

There seems to be quite a lot of comment here about parental age as a possible factor in autism. This perhaps derives from the Reichenberg study 'Advancing paternal age and autism', based on the Israeli draft board registry.

http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/63/9/1026

By far the most interesting aspect of this study is the incidental information that with very complete data for six annual birth cohorts from the 1980s (before the great vaccination), the overall autism rate was 8.4 cases per 10,000.

On the other hand, the usefulness of the data relating to paternal age was seriously compromised by the very small number of cases with a father over the age of 40. Additionally, any rise in the average paternal age would have to be quite drastic to have any impact at all, when we have seen rises of many times.

By the time the study was carried out all the subjects were over 17 and the study was submitted for publication in March 2005, so the six consecutive years, while not identified, could not really have extended beyond 1987, so the hard figure for an autism rate of 8.4 per 10,000 for children born in that epoch is fascinating.

http://www.autismuk.com/index1sub1.htm

[D's Advocate]

Wow! This article is quite the topic of discussion on the science blogs!

http://scienceblogs.com
/insolence/2008/07/
what_was_that_about_not_being_antivaccine.php#more

Even some of our comments here are discussed.

[Chris]

I truly don't understand Mr. Gates and Mr. Buffett. I would have thought that those two, in particular, would be able to look at the facts objectively. Even the CDC, FDA, and NIH are now looking into the autism/vaccine connection a bit more. I wish that Mr. Gates would comment on this subject. To see him so blindly adopt a mainstream belief like this makes me wonder if he doesn't have political aspirations. That's the only thing I can think of.

Has anyone here attempted to contact either of them about this subject?

Whether or not one believes that vaccines play a part in autism regression, it is hard to believe that anyone has a level of certainty, either way, where they wouldn't at least like to see more research done in certain areas. After what I've read I have a lot of questions about whether or not Hep-b and Tetanus, in the same body, with enough boosters, help the aluminum adjuvant cross the blood/brain barrier. I'm sure those who have commented here also have similar questions that they would like to see answered through more research.

Like this article states, how that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation ignore the recent developments?

Well, this may all have a very logical answer. Look at Windows. The problem is, no matter how well I remember(backup) the words and skills he has learned, he has lost them. Unfortunately, no matter how many times he goes to bed and wakes up (reboots), he still has autism in the morning. I still have high hopes for a service pack though.

[Sorsha]

"Clean water will not do anything for repiratory viruses or toxic bacterial by-products, such as Botulinum tetani. "

D's advocate:
Thanks for splitting hairs here - the point is and still is, people living in poverty without access to clean water, proper nutrition and without a waste disposal system have very little chance of being healthy no matter how many vaccines you pump into them.