update: this is melodys mum and i have been fighting for months i have been to sheffield hospital , even to newcastle and now i am waiting for an appointment to go to london.. no diagnoses at all and not a lot of help they just delaying things i dont no wat is rong with my daughter so how do i no i have time to delay things? i have contactedmy local m.p and he is contacting the doctors, its the only way. thanks to all for comments il be on again soon to update you all x

LAST, wonderful statement I found, and it truly says it all...could this autism come from families with HIGH inteliggence, which are often the very people with FRAGILE metabolics and immune systems?

On Tuesday, March 11, a conference call was held between vaccine safety officials at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, several leading experts in vaccine safety research, and executives from America’s Health Insurance Plans, (the HMO trade association) to discuss childhood mitochondrial dysfunction and its potential link to autism and vaccines.

It was a sobering event for all concerned, and it could soon become known as the Conference Call heard ’round the world.

The teleconference was scheduled by a little known CDC agency called the Clinical Immunization Safety Assessment (CISA) Network, a consortium of six research centers working on “immunization-associated health risks,” in conjunction with the CDC’s Immunization Safety Office and the health insurance lobby — whose companies cover some 200 million Americans.

The hot topic of the day was mitochondria - the little powerhouses within each cell that convert food and oxygen into energy for use by the body. Recent news events have implicated mitochondria in at least one case of regressive autism, following normal development.

Some researchers on the call reported that mitochondrial dysfunction is probably much more common than the current estimate of 1-in-4,000 people. The potential implications for autism, then, are staggering.

“We need to find out if there is credible evidence, theoretically, to support the idea that childhood mitochondrial dysfunction might regress into autism,” one of the callers reportedly told participants.

“THE CLOCK IS TICKING”

One person on the call (those interviewed for this article asked to remain anonymous) told me that, “the CDC people were informed, in no uncertain terms, that they need to look into this issue immediately, and do something about it.” The clock is ticking, they were told, and if they don’t respond, the information will be made public.

Still, the doctor said, he was enormously impressed by the “seriousness” with which CDC officials treated the possibility of a link between mitochondria, autism and possibly vaccines as well.

1-in-50 GENETIC RISK?

On the call, speculation on the prevalence of a genetic mutation that could confer mild mitochondrial dysfunction in the general population ranged from about 1-in-400, to a staggering 1-in-50, or 2% of all Americans.

There was talk about the urgent need to do mapping studies, and find the locus of this gene. Some of the researchers said they want to test all 30 children for the actual DNA mutation. There was some expectation that they might discover that the mutation goes back generations, so parents and grandparents might be tested as well.

One belief is that a particular mutated gene may have become prevalent over the centuries, because of selective advantage. Mild mitochondrial dysfunction reportedly has been associated with intelligence, because it can increase activity of the brain’s NMDA receptors. A large number of receptors can produce increased intelligence, but it can also increase risk of brain disease, one doctor explained to me. It’s possible that increased receptor activity acts in same way.

But not everyone agrees that mitochondrial dysfunction is a purely inherited affair. Some researchers believe that, while a susceptibility gene for mitochondrial problems certainly exists, some type of environmental trigger, or “adversity,” as one doctor put it, is needed to turn the mutation into a dysfunction.

The medical literature is replete with studies on mitochondrial health and the adverse impact of mercury, aluminum and other toxins. Even AIDS drugs like AZT and prenatal alcohol consumption can damage mitochondria and impact cellular energy.

The mercury-containing vaccine preservative, thimerosal, for example, “can definitely kill cells in vitro through the mitochondria,” one teleconference participant told me. “And some people are beginning to suspect that the dose of hepatitis B vaccine given at birth might be interfering with proper mitochondrial function in certain children.”

While the cause of mitochondrial dysfunction is up for the debate, so too is its potential effect on regressive autism.

One theory currently in circulation about what happened to Hannah and other children like her, is an apparent “triple domino effect.” According to this hypothesis, it takes three steps and two triggers to get to some types of autism, and it goes like this:

STEP ONE: Child is conceived and born healthy, but with an underlying nuclear DNA genetic susceptibility to mitochondrial dysfunction, inherited from dad.

TRIGGER ONE: An early environmental “adversity” occurs in the womb or during the neonatal period, perhaps caused by prenatal exposure to heavy metals, pollutants, pesticides and medicines. Or, it occurs in early infancy, through environmental toxins, thimerosal exposure, or even the Hepatitis B vaccine “birth dose.” This trigger results in:

STEP TWO: Child develops mild, usually asymptomatic mitochondrial dysfunction (though I wonder if the ear infections and eczema so common in these cases might also be symptoms of mito problems).

TRIGGER TWO: Child, now with an underlying mitochondrial dysfunction, suffers over-stimulation of the immune system beyond the capacity of his or her metabolic reserves. This stress is either via a viral febrile infection, or from multiple vaccinations, as in the Poling case. This trigger results in:

STEP THREE: Acute illness, seizures, encephalopathy, developmental regression, autism.

Such a scenario might help explain why autism has increased right along with the addition of more vaccines to the national schedule.

And it might help explain why autism rates are not plummeting now that thimerosal levels have been significantly reduced in most childhood vaccines.

It’s possible that exposures from the flu shot, and residual mercury left over in other vaccines — perhaps in synergistic effect with aluminum used as an “adjuvant” to boost the immune response - might “contribute to the toxic mix that causes childhood mitochondrial dysfunction in the first place,” one of the doctors said.

This unexpected discovery would clearly implicate nuclear DNA inheritance, and not mitochondrial DNA, which is inherited only through the mother.

Gerberding and others had previously insisted that Hannah and her mother, Teri Poling, both had the same single point mutation in their mitochondrial DNA. CDC officials asserted that Hannah had a pre-existing disease, a rare genetic glitch in her mitochondria, that may well have manifested as “features of autism” on its own, perhaps even without an environmental trigger.

“It’s not in the mitochondrial DNA, and it’s not rare,” one participant confirmed. In fact, he said, many people probably carry the nuclear DNA mutation that confers susceptibility to mitochondrial dysfunction, they just don’t know it.. Seems the CDC poses a greater threat than do any terrorist.

. “An observant parent’s evidence may be disproved but should never be ignored” —Lancet 1:688, 1951, Anonymous

Oh Boy,,,my son is 8 and he was fine until he got his mmr shot at 18 months. I have a video of him at his 1 year bday and he had a few words...now he is nonverbal, in pullups, with no social skills except with me and his family. After the shot he got the croup 2x, asthma and pneamonia and ear infections...i know in my heart that it is the vaccines..some children have a weakened immune and can not handle this. My daughter , on the other hand, is doing great and has no diagnoses..She is 7. So sorry for all of our children...i wish i knew then what i knew now..but we need to be procactive and not beat ourselves up....lets all fight the fight and win :)

Found this little tidbit...

A second cause of mitochondrial energy disorder is inflammation associated with the release of excess nitric oxide. The herb Ginkgo Biloba selectively increases the release of nitric oxide synthase, the enzyme that reacts with arginine to produce nitric oxide. It should be avoided in this instance. Excess nitric oxide can cause uncoupling of oxidative phosphorylation as well as inhibiting the Krebs cycle enzyme, aconitase. This will result in organic acidemias, and low mitochondrial energy production. Lactic acidosis and carnitine deficiency in autistic patients suggest excessive nitric acid production in mitochondria (Lombard, 1998, Chigani, et al, 1999), and mercury may be a participant. Methyl mercury accumulates in the mitochondria, where it inhibits several mitochondrial enzymes, reduces ATP production and Ca2+ (calcium) buffering capacity, and disrupts mitochondrial respiration and oxidative phosphorylation (Atchison & Hare, 1994; Rajanna and Hobson, 1985; Faro et al., 1998). The behavior associated with excess NO production in the autist is maniacal laughter.

Jen and Willie-
Jen, I think this is why I have been saying rather ferosiously on the list and to the twitter of some, that no vaccine is safe in kids (even greened vaccines-which is a misnomer)...who is to determine who can and can't (god can, but they act as god)...especially when we don't test, and know, and or bother, with the signs of mito, and or autoimmune problems or function of the imune system/detox system? Answer, we don't..and so in that environment, no vaccine, no green vaccine, no safe schedule is going to save this generation. I don't care how any one puts it, I have friends with four year olds, sinking into autism after a flu vaccine, chickenpox, etc. This is ridiculous thinking, to think vacines have ANY value. THey have not cured, alleviated, or amerliorated any disease, our immune systems job is to mount a response, and strenghten afterwards, period. Show me the science otherwise, and good luck with that. As much as they defend it, I can defend this position, probably even better.

To Willie, if I could lean through my computer and kiss your cheek I would. At last, someone with a brain on, who is saying it, who sees the medical profession for what it is...for the most part, a guessing game, not a science or art in any stretch of the imagination. Trial and error yes, but sometimes that is not always supplied. I actually think surgeons went into that profession because they saw the bullshit otherwise of general care...that is was an institution of non exact science. However, sometimes the rush to get an organ out or repair one, is because either the patient themselves made bad choices, and or the physician made bandaid approaches to the problem which furthered the damage. Accidents, of course, that's not applied here. For instance, we know for a fact, that some heart damage is due to infections/toxins, yet for the most part, do you hear that with the American Medical Association, Heart Association? Just give them some freaking tetracycline for cyring out loud? *(see UC San Diego Study on this). Chelate them? Nah, we can't say that, because it's too out there, yet say that to a heart patient, who has rampaged mouths of amalgams, and yearly flu shots?

And the environment you described, boy, did you nail it. It is in this environment, that this list (at least a handfull), would fashion to think that CDC and NIH and IOM and AAP, and all the lott have our vested interest at heart. I say, get your heads out of the clouds, and start funding independent research. Pledge support of ARI, or some other institution, that would seek to find these answers, not cover them up, hide them, smoosh them into the category of intrinsic minutua problems, but not THE universal problem of autism, aka, infections (viruses, pathogenic bacteria, fungi), toxins and metabolic poisons. (my list is infect_meta_toxic at yahoogroups.)

My kids have mito issues, I am sure, because of their vaccines. I would advocate this mother to look at SIGMA TAU pharmaceuticals, which makes a carnitor supplement. This has really helped my kids. Of course, Carnitor deficiency, helps mercury cling to neurons, so this is a no brainer. Although, the child sutained injury with MMR, I am sure, she had pre veccines before that time with mercury in it, Not to downply the very viruses either, because some supect, that MMR may not only have contaminants like mycoplasma, but retroviruses numerous, because they use chicken material in it, and the like, which may have some neutropic viral issue in the brain coupled with an autoimmune mimic thing going on. Some have questioned prions as well. I just think, vaccines should be avoided. IMHO. Especially in a generation of children sucking on liquid mercury candy like corn syrup, GMO foods with BT toxins in them, MSG, etc. This experiment, must stop.

Even for those of us who saw our children injured at younger ages, it's particularly horrifying to see older children struck down, when there's incontrovertible proof the child was fine prior to the shots. It just really brings it home. I'm so sorry that this happened to this child.

My twins began to sink after flu shots. We're not sure precisely what role the MMR played in their illness but, since they have leaky gut and can't have casein, gluten or soy (that is, if we like sleeping and a moment's peace they can't have these things), it's probable that the MMR at the age of 1 contributed to their conditions.

My cousin's wife, on the other hand, had an immediate reaction and almost died from the shot. She didn't take a religious exemption and got it for college, then spent the next year recovering. She used diet as well to bring herself back.

Since Dr. Wakefield is now doing studies on thimerosal and, at his clinic (where my twins are patients), the approach they're taking to my children's mito disorder is to treat heavy metals, I'm wondering if Ms. Ellis might consider having her daughter tested for mercury (UPPA, or Urinary Porphyrin Analyses, can be gotten without scrip through Laboratoire Philippe Auguste). It appears that some doctors are exploring the idea that heavy metals in combination with the assault from too many live viruses is doing some children in. I learned from a UK dad that the flu shots are pushed very heavily in Britain and that these shots have full thimerosal.

My heart goes out to this family and I hope to God they find some answers and some help and support.

These are not real doctors they are weak puppets doing and thinking what they are told to do and think. This is corporate government health care in action and there will be more from Obama because many of you asked for it, demanded it. These pharmaceutical companies are the worst of all drug pusher pimps. They pimp the government and weak weak people like pediatricians to push their drugs by saying that not only are they, the vaccines, safe but you need them and if you do not give them to your children your children will die and you will be a bad parent. Then when somebody says "hey these are not safe at all" they pimp the government officials that YOU elected to make you keep taking the vaccines. After that they refuse to do the proper test which they should have done BEFORE they started giving out the vaccines and when someone says "hey these should be tested better" they pimp the pediatricians, who question nothing demand no answers and simply follow directions even though they themselves have seen the results of the shots THEY THEMSELVES have administered say "We do not need anymore test the test have been done" and no one holds them responsible. These people have to be sued that is it. I am a surgeon and I am looking to sue my pediatrician and hospital right now and it is a daunting task because they have set up a corporate government legal strategy that discourages law suits but we have to find a way we owe it to our children. The first thing we should do is to repeal this legal thicket they have put before us discouraging them from being responsible. By the way that child probably never had a mitochondrial "disorder" her mitochondria were working just fine prior to her MMR evidenced by the fact that she was completely normal but that is how the viruses affected her by knocking out her susceptible cell organelles. Another classic strategy of guilty people is to blame the victim, this little girl is the victim, had she never been vaccinated we would have never heard of her, do not blame her or her mitochondria WE ARE TO BLAME FOR LETTING THIS BULLSHIT GO ON FOR SO LONG FROM THESE DRUG PUSHER PIMPS

Ms. Ellis,
My heart goes out to you! At 18 months, my son, Noah, lost most all skills - He lost all speech, eye contact, fine motor skills, a few gross motor skills, and much more.

He is now 4 and regaining skills all the time but he still has a lot of work ahead of him.

Mitochondrial disorder is what your child needs to be looked at for to get some answers. We have been trying to get out legislators to listen and test all children for the disorder before vaccinating them.

I will pray for you and your family and welcome to our family.

It makes me physically ill to see photographic evidence of what the MMR shot can do to a child. It is a crime that her doctors are in CYA mode and are not looking into what can be done to try to reverse the obvious vaccine damage. If you deny the cause, how can you possibly work toward a potential recovery? Of course, it may be that there is nothing that can be done to help this beautiful little girl. I wish her the best, and I plan to pray for her, too.

It sounds mitochondrial to me too. When your body is put through the ringers with any oxidative stressor or infection or toxin, it may bring on symptoms.

What the hell are we doing to our children?

"She is convinced the injection and Melody's illness are linked, though doctors say there's no evidence of this.

"Show me the evidence that it's not that and I might be all right, but they can't," Alicia said."

Yet another life down the tubes. Nice job doctors!! All of you.