If you have a child with autism please complete this 15 minute survey and/or if you know anyone who is a parent of a child with autism please pass the following link along. I am a graduate student doing important research on the views of parents of children with autism and would appreciate your help. It is confidential.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/attributionandhope

Thank you!

to Alan re: michael moore and cuba: in sicko he was being absurd when comparing cuba to us, same w/ guantanamo detainee's health care. extreme anecdotes help make his case, but the facts are the facts: people in cuba get (their version) of health care paid for, and 30M here DO NOT

There is a very good chance that certian people would hurt the credibility of "vaccines cause autism". Esp. if those certain people have been to Cuba and praised a tyrant and a dictator and their health care system (which they took him to the very best place"

"vaccines cause autism" at this point needs credibility - or it will be another 30 years and 1 out of 10 number.

Frontline also interviewed Dr. Rashid Buttar from Huntersville, NC, for 3 hours, met with 3 of his patient families and interviewed them as well - spent 7 hours in his clinic and included not one second of footage from the Dr. or the families that he has helped. How fair or balanced is that?!

Hey PBS why didn't you ask these questions to Paul Offitt:
1. If vaccines are so safe, then why did the rotovirus vaccine that you created kill some children?
2. So you think vaccines are safe, even when they kill some children? Explain that.
3. You state that babies can receive up to 10,000 vaccines at one time. Alright, Paul, roll up your sleeve and take this vaccine cocktail equal to 10,000 shots at one time. Prove it!
4. Is it true that you have never treated anyone who has autism? How, then, can you claim to be an expert on autism?
5. Please explain how making millions of dollars on vaccine patents makes you an ideal, unbiased commentator on vaccine safety?

Re Post by Zed: "The only way our views will ever be fairly stated is to make our own production on whatever venue will accept it without pharmaceutically-biased intervention. Perhaps a documentary that airs on Free Speech TV would be a possibility. They have no sponsors to interfere, and the creative minds of AoA, NAA and Generation Rescue could tell a story that America would never forget."

YES YES YES!!! This is exactly what I was thinking the entire time I was watching this PBS program online. The autism community has to produce it's own documentary with one expert after the other testifying to the same fact: Vaccines Cause Autism.

Where to get the funding for production and promotion---Michael Moore of the controversial "Sicko"??? He did a great job on that documentary. If not him there has to be someone out there who will take this on and has the money to not only produce this, but to market it so that the public really gets exposed to this information.

As for the rest of us who are limited in our capacity to contribute to the cause, we need T-shirts, posters, and signs for our front yard that all say the same thing: "Vaccines Cause Autism". We need well designed flyers so that when people ask us "Why are you wearing that shirt?" or when they knock on our front door because they really want to know why "Vaccines Cause Autism" we will have information that will send them looking in the right direction to Generation Rescue, TACA, NVIC, etc.

This is absolutely a way that we all can contribute to getting this urgent message out there. This way it is obviously a grass roots movement that can involve millions of parents if promoted well, and can't be written off as simply the "ravings of a Playboy Bunny". (Sorry Jenny, we all know the truth but the idiots who say this are influencing alot of people who don't know any better)

Let's all unite with the same message that Jenny started with Warrior Moms. Warrior Moms can wear these Tshirts when they go out shopping etc., put the signs in their yards and posters in their businesses...hand out flyers everywhere.

Speaking of Warrior Moms---why would so many thousands of WOMEN be so impressed with a "former playboy bunny"??? Now some Dads might be tempted to go hear Jenny speak because yes that woman is definitely gorgeous and sexy. But all these Warrior MOMS? Obviously "Sexy" has nothing to do with it.

PBS made a big mistake when they associated Jenny's influence to her previous life. That was THEN and this is NOW. According to PBS, we all fell for Jenny because she is just so damn sexy. HAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!

The long-standing problem is the unwillingness to let go of secular dogma. A vaccine is an act of alternative faith.

The public isn't having any parent who lacks the self-respect to state they will never support the vaccine theory especially after having eye-witnessed their own child's regression. You may think you are scoring points by maintaining perception of secular piety, but to the public...

If you read comments coming from the general public they overwhelmingly rejected Swine Flu vaccines. 138,000,000 rejected vaccines just here in America. Times that times millions and millions more worldwide.

As a pro-vaccine parent you just need to shut up and accept that your child is an ultimate sacrifice on the secular alter. Your child's life is nothing more than the price humans must pay for the cost of keeping the world safe from killer Measles and Mumps.

Until there's a change of heart about vaccines you can forget ever approaching public acceptance.

Vaccines are not rooted in science, but rather developed as an act of faith. You fear becoming an infidel or a heretic in a secular world ruled by academia.

Perhaps this will lift the scales from some eyes?

PBS Frontline and the vaccine manufacturing drug companies followed the well-established framework of radicalism.

The rules of radicalism from wikipedia:

Rule 1: Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have. If your organization is small, hide your numbers in the dark and raise a din that will make everyone think you have many more people than you do.

Rule 2: Never go outside the experience of your people. The result is confusion, fear, and retreat.

Rule 3: Whenever possible, go outside the experience of an opponent. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.

Rule 4: Make opponents live up to their own book of rules. “You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”

Rule 5: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It’s hard to counterattack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.

Rule 6: A good tactic is one your people enjoy. “If your people aren’t having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.”

Rule 7: A tactic that drags on for too long becomes a drag. Commitment may become ritualistic as people turn to other issues.

Rule 8: Keep the pressure on. Use different tactics and actions and use all events of the period for your purpose. “The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this that will cause the opposition to react to your advantage.”

Rule 9: The threat is more terrifying than the thing itself. When Alinsky leaked word that large numbers of poor people were going to tie up the washrooms of O’Hare Airport, Chicago city authorities quickly agreed to act on a longstanding commitment to a ghetto organization. They imagined the mayhem as thousands of passengers poured off airplanes to discover every washroom occupied. Then they imagined the international embarrassment and the damage to the city’s reputation.

Rule 10: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. Avoid being trapped by an opponent or an interviewer who says, “Okay, what would you do?”

Rule 11: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, polarize it. Don’t try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies. Identify a responsible individual. Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame.

The main job of the organizer is to bait an opponent into reacting. “The enemy properly goaded and guided in his reaction will be your major strength.

I attach below the comment I tried to post over at NPR before the show. It did not appear, perhaps simply because it exceeded their 400 word limit.

I will add here that I was initially very skeptical of any potential vaccine link to health problems, but was led to investigate further in part due to the infamous NYT article by Gardiner Harris pitting parents vs science. It was the very clear spin/bias of that article that made me start looking a lot more carefully at all sides of this issue. So, it seems likely to me that this very biased Frontline show may motivate a lot of other people to start looking more carefully at the whole issue of vaccine safety.

I have said before that Jenny McCarthy is like the little boy in the story The Emperor's New Clothes. Unlike folks with science backgrounds, she is not fettered by a need to completely understand the whole topic, or fears of looking foolish by stating her view without strong scientific evidence to back up her position. She is just calling it like she sees it.

The "skepticos" and unfortunately NPR are trying to keep folks believing in the whole vaccine mirage by repeatedly chanting words similar to those of the charlatan tailors: "only intelligent, trained scientists are capable of observing, gathering data, understanding, interpreting, evaluating, or perceiving" the "truth." and those who question vaccines are heretics, uneducated, crazy, unintelligent, etc., just "don't know that "correlation doesn't equal causation," that "ethylmercury is different from methylmercury;" they don't know that "the dose makes the poison;" they don't understand that complex-sounding science, "epidemiology;" they don't know the difference between "peer-reviewed science and anecdotal evidence."

Apparently there are folks in places of power that think that if they repeat these talking points enough times then they will convince everyone that anyone who "is really knowledgeable" about the issue can "see the truth of vaccine safety" and the "dangers of 'ignorant' questioning" (i.e. the emperor's clothes).

I almost suspect that Jenny was "allowed" to speak up on this issue so prominently, just so they would have a figurehead for the controversy that fit their desired "picture" of a vaccine infidel, all the better to cast doubt on all questioners of vaccine safety or efficacy.

Problem is (for them), the more they try to suppress the questions, instead of actually answering them, and the more they paint all questioners as ignorant (when that is very clearly not the case), the more people are going to start doubting their dogma, and instead start believing their own eyes, brains, knowledge, and common sense. The "experts" doth protest too much, methinks.

Anyway, here is my slightly edited comment which I sent to NPR prior to the show, but which as far as I can tell was never posted, fwiw:

I have listened to several PBS broadcasts about the "vaccine war" over the past several years. I have NEVER once heard an honest, investigative report on both sides of the controversy aired on PBS. So I will be shocked if this show doesn't follow the already established pattern.

There is no existing scientific study comparing the health and development of fully vaccinated versus never vaccinated children--so quite frankly there is NO scientific answer to the question of whether vaccinated children are better off, in the short or long term, than never vaccinated children--in the U.S. or anywhere else.

Anyone who is halfway knowledgeable about scientific methods, and who takes time to read and evaluate the "science" put forward to show that certain vaccines are not associated with increases in autism, or that thimerosal is "safe" will eventually discover that good science is totally lacking, and much of that referred to by doctors, the CDC, and various vaccine defenders as their primary "evidence" of safety varies from, at best, weak and extremely poorly done, to, at worst, fraudulently done or fraudulently interpreted.

Sadly, the problems potentially caused by vaccines are not limited to autism. I greatly worry that NO ONE really has any idea of the full effects, short-term or long-term, of our massive vaccination programs.

Vaccines were invented when we understood far less than we know today about microbes, or our immune system. Scientists have come a long way from the day when all microbes were considered "germs" that we had to fight against. We now know that many microbes are beneficial, even vital, to our health. In addition, no honest immunologist can claim that anyone fully understands how our immune systems work, even today.

Use of vaccines may be lessening our species' natural methods of fighting disease; for example, it is already known that (in contrast to women who had measles disease), women who were vaccinated for measles do not pass on any measles immunity to their children. Hence, succeeding generations are actually more vulnerable to this disease than historically, due to our use of vaccines.

Similarly, the "immunity" conferred by vaccines is not "life-long" as was once presumed; instead we are learning that most, if not all, vaccinations must be repeated at intervals throughout life to maintain the desired immune response to the targeted microbe. Adults can suffer much more severely from contracting diseases that they "missed" as children due to vaccinations that made them (only temporarily) resistant to that disease.

Then there is the problem of certain vaccines (eg the pneumococcal vaccine) possibly causing changes in microbe populations, so that once rare microbe strains become more abundant/dominant and these once rare strains are sometimes more virulent/or problematic than the microbes originally targeted by the vaccine. Thus widespread vaccine use can sometimes lead to more serious problems than were initially faced, (and if one continues to subscribe to the same approach to disease--the need for more vaccines, or newer vaccines with more antigens). (See http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=human-microbiome-change and http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/638238.html
for more information on this.)

This might be all great if your business is developing and selling vaccines (the market just keeps expanding), but not so great if your primary goal is just staying healthy (or keeping your kids healthy) and/or minimizing health costs.

I think that when it comes to the use of vaccines, no one truly understands, or knows, what all we are really doing to ourselves and our future. This is not a conclusion I have come to lightly, or without great sadness and disillusionment.

And for those (commenting on the NPR site) who say if you can't trust the doctors' or CDC's word on vaccines, then how can you trust them in regards to anything else--the agonizing conclusion I have reached is that you very likely can't--and sadly, I don't!

Each Frontline episode is only as good as its producer(s). I wonder whether the vaccine segment producer was specifically chosen because he supposedly "debunked" facilitated communication in a previous piece.

What a slap in the face for those parents who believe they've reached their children through FC, to have a handful of critics held up as the last word on the subject.

And what a sense of deja vu as that sonorous announcer intoned at that segment's end: "One day, the mysterious condition of autism will be understood and researchers may find a cure. Until then, as the evidence against facilitated communication accumulates, a painful question remains, whether parents and those who care deeply about autistic individuals are choosing to see them as they would like them to be, rather than respecting them for who they are."

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/programs/transcripts/1202.html

Ok, so what's this then???
http://www.paul-offit.com/?gclid=CJbD3rfBtKECFV195Qod9hR-_A
www.paul-offit.com
Gee, I don't have a www.rileys-mom.com...yet.

Appreciate the photo--my favorite part might be the minstrel song "Sir Robin bravely turned tail and fled," or words to that effect.

I don't know if the program's investigators began with the idea of getting a broad-based, put-up-all-sides-for-viewers-to-make-up-their-own-minds documentary (probably not), but if they did, they probably felt certain that any doctor promoting the position of the "anti-vaccine movement" would be easily discreditable.

It is probably to the credit of Dr. Gordon, Dr. Sears, and Dr. Buttar (and to where the truth actually lies on this issue) that they couldn't find 30 seconds of material they wanted put on screen.

They put most of Dr. Sears' interview online for those who felt concerned or interested enough to look further, and they can point to that as evidence of thoroughly investigating, but I think they are counting on the vast majority of viewers to not look into the issue with that much depth.

It would have been nice if Frontline had done three minutes on Simpsonwood, explained that the vaccine industry is totally liability free, and showed a simple chart with the 10 vaccines in 1986, compared to the 36 vaccines now.

I think in a few weeks, Frontline will be telling everyone that everything is fine on Wall Street, and to please start sending more money to New York City.

Frontline reduces the concerns of parents regarding their children with autism to a bunch of crazed misinformed youtube junkies using facebook to wield a smashing blow to the vaccine good guys!

Why didn't they do the real journalism and expose the scientific work being done at Kennedy Krieger Institute, nothing like electroconvulsive therapy to tune up the mind of an autistic. Do you ever feel like you’re in the Twilight Zone?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20298732

Dear Mr. Michael Getler,

I was imagining how it would be if Frontline produced a similar story on the uncontrolled accelerations problem in some cars today. This is what I came up with:

There are unconfirmed rumors that Frontline’s next show will be about the recently publicized reports of cars accelerating out of control. The exact cause of this remains a Mystery, but apparently all of the well credentialed Experts around the world are united in their opinion that there is nothing wrong with these cars, but that the drivers have a genetic defect affecting their feet, which causes the right foot to press uncontrollably on the accelerator while the left foot becomes paralyzed and unable to push on the brake.

Of course, this genetic condition has always existed, but these days it is noticed more often because of increased awareness. In the past (even just a few years ago) nobody was aware enough to notice cars accelerating out of control and crashing.

Certain car models appear to be involved more often in these accidents, but this is just a coincidence and not statistically significant. There was one study that seemed to show statistical significance, until a whole lot more crashes were added to the stats. Now the original statistics have been lost.

In this hard-hitting piece of investigative journalism, Frontline will interview a group of women who no longer drive their cars because they are worried about sudden acceleration. These women say that their overall health and fitness has improved since they started walking more instead of driving. Then some Experts will explain how dangerous it is to not drive because in the event of an emergency you can’t get anywhere soon enough. They will talk about how hard life used to be 200 years ago before cars were invented, and how people in some parts of Africa suffer greatly because they don’t have cars. They will interview some people who were stranded in the middle of a desert and almost died of thirst because they did not have a car. Yes indeed cars are important, so how can anyone be against them?

(At some point a little boy asked, “But what does all this have to do with the acceleration problem and figuring out what is causing it and how to fix it?” But that part of the videotape has been cut and is lying on the floor, soon to be swept up and discarded, along with the interviews of several auto mechanics who actually examined some of the cars in question, and doctors who examined some of the drivers who survived.)

Then some more Experts will explain that most people don’t understand how cars work, and don’t understand genetic foot disorders, and shouldn’t even try to understand, and shouldn’t read anything on the internet, but that the Experts are figuring everything out for us (thank goodness!!) and even though it is still a Mystery with No Cause and No Cure nobody should worry because the reports of acceleration are anecdotal and probably didn’t even happen. The consensus of all those who Really Know (the Experts) is that there is nothing wrong with any cars, so move along and go watch some mindless TV shows or go for a drive - and stay OFF that computer!!

All the viewers will breathe a sigh of relief after watching this very reassuring program, which confirms that there is absolutely nothing to worry about.

Hard-hitting investigative journalism – courageous, brilliant, leaving no stone unturned. Brought to you by PublicBS TV, with funding from the generous car manufacturers themselves.

[Lest there be any confusion -- this is imaginary - satire - not a real show.]

I wrote three emails to the PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler. At the risk of boring everyone to tears I will post them all here too.

Dear Mr. Michael Getler,
In response to some of the points you raised regarding “The Vaccine War”.

“Clearly, the film would have been richer if we’d been able to fully engage Dr. Sears’ views, but we felt it also opened up a number of important journalistic questions about what’s known (and not known) about the potential harms of the various vaccine schedules — and this, unfortunately, fell outside the scope of this film.”
Mr. Getler, Frontline already did open up these important journalistic questions, when Offit et al declared that there is no link between vaccines & autism and that the CDC’s vaccine schedule should be followed. This is the big question – vaccine injuries. How could this possibly “fall outside of the scope” of a story on “The Vaccine War”?!?

“In short, we believe we repeatedly raised — and allowed others to raise — concerns about the bloated vaccine schedule (up to 35 inoculations) on a tiny infant.” Yes, these questions were raised by parents such as JB Handley, Jenny McCarthy, and Barbara Loe Fisher. And you also listed links to web sites such as Generation Rescue. Thank you for that. This is actually a step forward, compared with the days when these subjects were completely taboo on the news. However, you (Frontline) did NOT show any of the science on the side of those with vaccine concerns. You did NOT show interviews with any of the doctors or scientists who have vaccine safety concerns and/or believe that vaccines do sometimes cause autism. You gave the impression that ALL science and medicine are on one side and there are only parents on the other side. This is false!!!

“And we did this despite the fact that established science has found that the number of antigens is negligible compared to the germs that a baby is naturally exposed to.”
Dr. Paul Offit did a mathematical calculation which he says shows that baby’s can safely receive either 10,000 or 100,000 vaccines at once. This is not science. This is absolutely absurd, insane, and irresponsible, and flies in the face of the thousands of reports of adverse reactions after multiple vaccines. For example, there were high rates of adverse reactions to the vaccine ProQuad (a vaccine against measles, mumps, rubella, & varicela) including seizures and autism – higher than to either MMR or varicela vaccine by itself. My own daughter had a febrile seizure after receiving the MMR and varicella vaccines at one time.

And, natural exposures to antigens via skin, air, and food are much different than injection. As this 1913 Nobel prize winner said, “We are so constituted that we can never receive other proteins into the blood than those that have been modified by digestive juices. Every time alien protein penetrates by effraction, the organism suffers and becomes resistant. This resistance lies in increased sensitivity, a sort of revolt against the second parenteral injection...”
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1913/richet-lecture.html

And vaccines include many substances besides antigens, including aluminum as an adjuvant to increase the reaction from the immune system, and formaldehyde which is known to cause inflammation. Is it any wonder that this generation of children, who have received a number of vaccines unprecedented in human history, have a much higher rate of immune system disorders including severe allergies, asthma, type 1 diabetes - and autism which a growing body of peer reviewed published scientific studies link with neuroinflammation and immune system dysfunction?

As far as Jenny McCarthy, to refer to her only as a former playboy playmate, and not even mention that she is an actress and an author of multiple best-selling books, is simply slanted spin. And if the N.Y. Times and NPR did the same that does not make it any better; they have been equally dismissive and prejudiced against the vaccine-autism link as well as biomedical treatments for autism.

Yes I wrote to the PBS ombudsman a second time when I realized that Dr. Buttar was also left on the cutting room floor. This makes it very clear that there was a concerted effort to provide no counter argument from doctors. I think the fact that Dr. Buttar has a son who recovered from autism, who spoke in front of congress would have been hard to dismiss. So it was determined to not let his opinion be heard at all.
http://www.drbuttar.com/blog/?p=1110

I was so angry with the show. I usually like Frontline but the bias was incredible it was such a turn off.

I wish they would have focused on alternative vaccine schedules as well. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Drs are damaging the well being of communities by refusing to hold intelligent converesations about parental concerns and finding solutions that respect a parental concerns

AnaB,

Yes, the threat of being publicly blamed for the rise in any disease would disuade any producer.

Add to that the threat to their job security and the fact it might piss off the major funders of the show and you have accomplished complete control over even the best intended producer.

If my memory serves me, I believe Dan Rather interivewed someone on the vaccine issue (Probably Barbara Loe Fischer) shortly before he was "let go".

He gave the guest an honest interview but behind the scenes he was very upset about what actually got aired, and he let his producers know about it. Shortly after that he was gone, but the reason was officially tied to, I believe, the outing of the CIA agent (by Rove and Cheney it turned out). I may have to track down more info on this to be most accurate, but that is the way I remebered it.

The official reasoning did not add up to me. I have always believed it was his open mind on the vaccine issue.

Bad soldiers will not be tolerated.
Gutless producers will be rewarded.

That is the take away from the Fronline show.

The biggest fallacy presented by the pro vaccine forces is the idea that the "science is in", "the science is settled, there is no link". That is a lie.

Science is evolving. It is anything but settled. As long as there are researchers looking into the actions and reactions of the human body when confronted with an assault on the immune system such as a disease, or a pseudo disease in the form of a vaccine, the science will continue to evolve.

Just as Offit often claims, "vaccine science has gotten better (read evolved)", so has our understanding of the human body and our understanding of the assaults we are perpetrating on it in the form of vaccines. We still have a very long way to go in this journey.

By their very nature, vaccines cannot be exonerated in finding an explanation for the explosion in neurological disorders including autism in recent generations.

To ignore, disavow, and deny the damages done by vaccines is no longer a matter of science it is about money and politics.

It is naive to think that PBS's intention was ever to honestly "inform" their public supporters about either the danger of today's vaccine schedule or its connection to autism. As a member of a profession whose mission is antithetical to mainstream medicine's, I have watched the intentional and malevolent smear of all things non-medical for almost 60 years. If any healthcare solution promotes practices other than drugs and surgery, it is portrayed as "an unscientific cult", which the public is strongly encouraged to ignore in favor of their specious interventions.
Make no mistake. PBS, despite our efforts to "inform" them of their oversight, is fully aware of what they've done. Their singular intent is to extend support to those "health experts" who are now responsible for promoting practices that may account for the largest number of preventable deaths in our country today--drug intervention and subsequent, often-fatal error. Vaccines are only ONE area they attempt to defend.
The only way our views will ever be fairly stated is to make our own production on whatever venue will accept it without pharmaceutically-biased intervention. Perhaps a documentary that airs on Free Speech TV would be a possibility. They have no sponsors to interfere, and the creative minds of AoA, NAA and Generation Rescue could tell a story that America would never forget.

"The answer is yes, they found them two of them." Three actually - Dr Buttar got cut too.

Yes, the media has fallen comfortably right back into their 'there isn't a sane, respected doctor or scientist on the planet who thinks there could be a link between autism and vaccines' pretense. The same old chit btw that I think most of the public is smart enough to have stopped buying into ages ago. At least I hope and pray..

The program was roughly seventy percent propaganda, and thirty percent blatant lies. Like for instance the lie that the symptoms of mercury poisoning are nothing like the symptoms of autism. I believe that one was Frombonne's. And didn't somebody try to make the claim that the Special Vaccine Court was Barbara Loe Fisher's idea? Wtf. I had no idea..