Olmsted In Spectrum Magazine: Demon Barbers of Mercury Street

Managing Editor's Note: Are you reading Spectrum Magazine? May we suggest you do? Click HERE.  Dan Olmsted writes for Spectrum. Here's a slice of his latest. (Dan, thanks for a chance to Google Johnny Depp.)   

Demon Barbers of Mercury Street: Most of us have a lock of our baby hair somewhere-mine is in a box in the garage. My older sister gave me my first haircut and eliminated my curls, something my mother was not happy about at the time.

This tradition now offers confirmation of a troubling truth: Kids with autism have far more difficulty getting rid of mercury than their neurotypical peers. A new study of first baby haircuts contains this cut-to-the-chase sentence (remember that Hg is the chemical designation of mercury): "These data are consistent with reports of high Hg body mercury in children with autism during fetal/infant development ... and thus early exposure to Hg appears to be involved in the etiology of autism."

Read Dan Olmsted's full article in Spectrum Magazine HERE. 

Comments

[Gatogorra]

We all deserve to sue
Tell you who, Dr. Offit, tell you who...

I love the film analogy. There's no question-- our kids are clinically mercury toxic and there's no question that carefully supplemented chelation has made a difference. More stories of children recovering from chelation alone seem to be surfacing these days.

[Robin N.]

When my child was having developmental issues, over fifteen years ago now, I didn’t put two and two together with the vaccines at that time. But if anyone had asked me, at that time, what seemed to tip her over the edge, I would’ve said it was the antibiotics. At around age three she had a urinary tract infection and was given a ten day round of antibiotics and that didn’t clear her infection (or else she got a new infection), so she was given another ten days worth of oral antibiotics a couple of weeks later.

It was right at that point in time that her problems with withholding the bowel movements began. It was right at that time that her behavior got really wacked out. It was then that the typical signs of autism showed up—the echolalia, the withdrawal. She was hysterically afraid of somebody she called the ‘fireman’. Nobody knew who that was.

Another anecdote, for what it’s worth. My husband discovered a few years ago that he can’t use Tylenol or any pain medication with acetaminophen in it. If he does, his lips and his tongue get all red and blistered. I’m willing to bet something similar was happening all through his digestive tract when he took Tylenol. Of course now his digestive tract isn’t what it used to be, since he developed Crohns and/or colitis. I’m sure the flu shots he used to get contributed to the whole mess too.

I’m just really glad that when my kids were young I was always very reluctant to give them Tylenol for fever, or after receiving immunizations.

At any rate I’ve long suspected that the increase in antibiotic use might be a significant factor as well, if not as significant as the vaccines and the mercury.