Dr. Tom Insel's Snail's Pace Approach to the Autism Epidemic
By Anne Dachel
Sept 23, 2104, Thomas Insel on autism (IACC)..............a surreal look.....
"...We're at a very, very early stage here. It's as if autism, if you wanted an analogy, was like fever and everybody's trying to figure out what causes fever. And some kids have Ebola and some kids have strep throat and some kids have something very different, and the only thing they share is the elevated temperature. And that ranges from 101 to 105.
"So I think we have a real problem at this very early stage of this field. And it is early. This is a field that has been deeply invested in biomedical research for only a couple of decades.
"There are very few parts of the NIH that are that young in terms of how far they have been expected to go. I can't help but say though that part of frustration in the committee is continued misunderstanding of what we can do. What our authority is. What our resources are.
"We have no money. We have no ability to fund anybody to do anything. We are a bully pulpit and the best we can do is to try and inspire some of the funders around the room, the NIH, CDC, Autism Speaks, the Simons Foundation and others, Autism Science Foundation, to make appropriate investments in the issues that are in the Strategic Plan. But there is no real mandate to do that either.
"We have no recourse if someone doesn't. ...I'm not sure that the public fully understands and I can tell from some of the written comments that there is a clear misunderstanding about what our actually authority is in terms of what we can accomplish. We can have these very honest exchange of views. I think it is useful to try to align the community which is now very polarized. ....This is a multi-faceted problem with people having very different experiences."
I've never seen anyone so eager to plead incompetence and ignorance--over and over as Thomas Insel is when it comes to doing ANYTHING to address what autism is doing to our children.
The numbers don't alarm him.
The mounting research pointing to an out-of-control vaccine schedule isn't cause for concern.
The absence of a comparable rate among adults, the revelation in 2008 that HHS conceded the vaccine injury case of Hannah Poling, a girl in Georgia who regressed into autism after receiving nine vaccines in a single day, and the announcement in 2011 that the federal government had pay off 83 vaccine injury cases involving autism--NONE OF IT got Insel's attention.
In 2008, former head of NIH, Dr. Bernadine Healy, said that no one has ever studied the kids who were perfectly healthy and suddenly and inexplicably regressed into autism, but Insel didn't care to look into it.
AND the recent news that a scientist at the CDC says that they falsified the study results to cover up an association between the MMR and autism in African American boys meant nothing to Dr. Insel who can only throw up his hands anf ask us what we expect him to do about autism.
It seems his job is to look concerned, hold meetings, come to no conclusion and ignore the suffering of a generation of children.
In June, 2014, Laura Bono, board member of SafeMinds, wrote this "Open letter to Tom Insel, Director of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC)."
Dear Tom,
It's been a while. I used to come and plead at the microphone for help for autistic children and families. Up until a couple of years ago, I submitted public comments under my name or with organizations for nearly every IACC meeting - going all the way to back when you took over the National Institute of Mental Health in 2002. Gosh, I've met with you in person more than a half a dozen times to talk about the science, what conditions we were seeing in kids on the spectrum, and the research that was needed to find the answers to help. But not anymore. I realize now that I was wasting my time. You haven't listened to anything I - or the thousands of other heartbroken parents - have been telling you. ...
Anne Dachel is Media Editor for Age of Autism and author of The Big Autism Cover-Up: How and Why the Media Is Lying to the American Public, which goes on sale this Fall from Skyhorse Publishing.
"We have no money. We have no ability to fund anybody to do anything. We are a bully pulpit and the best we can do is to try and inspire some of the funders around the room, the NIH, CDC, Autism Speaks, the Simons Foundation and others, Autism Science Foundation, to make appropriate investments in the issues that are in the Strategic Plan. But there is no real mandate to do that either. "
Autism Speaks is a f(#@%ing ADVOCACY ORGANIZATION.
Tom Insel is the Director of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC), "a Federal advisory committee, composed of Federal and public members, that coordinates all efforts within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) concerning autism spectrum disorder (ASD)."
Coordinates ALL efforts.
So he's saying that Autism Speaks has more power than the IACC? They can accomplish more with HHS concerning autism than the IACC?
What exactly IS he saying here?
Posted by: Taximom5 | September 30, 2014 at 01:10 PM
Dear Mr. Insel,
We are by no means at the early stages of the Autism Epidemic, not by any stretch of the imagination. Your fever analogy is ridiculous. "Everybody" hasn't been trying to figure out what's causing "Autism," quite the opposite. "Everybody", most especially you and other government buffoons, has been looking anywhere and everywhere except where the evidence points and except where hundreds of thousands (probably more like millions) of parents have told you to look...at VACCINES! The few times our government employees have looked at the vaccine-autism connection, they have FOUND it, then LIED (e.g. Brick Township, NJ; the Verstraeten study; the DeStefano-Thompson studies; the Poul Thorsen studies; to name but a few).
I have lost count now of how many fraudulent vaccine studies have come to light, how many government cover-ups of vaccine harm and inefficacy have been revealed, and how many despicable men and women like yourself we parents have had to endure.
Mr. Insel, it is my hope that you will meet with swift earthly legal judgment and I leave your eternal judgment in God's capable hands. You have a number of options open to you to start being a part of the solution instead of being a huge part of the problem as you currently are...the #1 option would be for you to resign immediately. The Autism Epidemic has continued to rage and ravage under your "leadership," and you are in large part responsible. Don't think for a single minute that you aren't.
Posted by: Laura Hayes | September 25, 2014 at 09:04 PM
Eileen,
I believe you ARE making a difference. My daughter is in college now, but someday may want a family. I am storing your information, along with the valuable information of so many here, in hopes of avoiding autism (and other chronic health issues) in my future grandchildren. I have two on the spectrum, and 1 NT. This upcoming generation of NT siblings knows what has happened to their brothers and sisters. I'm sure they won't be so willing to offer up their babies to this overly aggressive, ever-expanding vaccine schedule.
Posted by: Anne J. | September 25, 2014 at 08:36 PM
Linda1, thank you for your comments. We all are thorns in their sides. Only Lyn continues to discuss the issues brought up in the public comments. She was outstanding on Tuesday.
I am glad that the public comments, oral and written, are now being posted online. The next thing needed is some back and forth conversations with stakeholders. Focus groups were mentioned, and that would be a good idea, and might even be conducted online.
A few years ago one member of the committee insisted, “It’s time to change the conversation” referring to the vaccine controversy. How nasty. No, conversation is what we need more of.
I will continue to push for a focus on the brain, and how it might be injured by ever-increasing standard perinatal interventions.
Posted by: Eileen Nicole Simon | September 25, 2014 at 08:16 PM
Severe, disabling mental illness has dramatically increased in the Untied States. Marcia Angell, in her 2011 New York Review of Books piece, summarizes: “The tally of those who are so disabled by mental disorders that they qualify for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) increased nearly two and a half times between 1987 and 2007—from 1 in 184 Americans to 1 in 76. For children, the rise is even more startling—a thirty-five-fold increase in the same two decades.”
Angell also reports that a large survey of adults conducted between 2001 and 2003 sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health found that at some point in their lives, 46% of Americans met the criteria established by the American Psychiatric Association for at least one mental illness.
Almost half of American has or had a mental illness under the watch of Tom Insel - and it is his fault. We told them that the vaccines are a problem.
Posted by: Benedetta | September 25, 2014 at 07:46 PM
@For Patricia
:"This fellow is wise enough to play the fool" Methinks.
Shakespeare.
Posted by: patricia | September 25, 2014 at 10:31 AM
I seems that they met to discuss how to go forward - how to deal with the mess and stay on the course they've laid out to maintain the status quo, to protect the bureaucracy and their corporate masters, and this is the political strategy that they came up with. Play dumb, it isn't my job, we have a narrow role, the age of autism is just beginning - therefore we can't be expected to have any answers.
Posted by: Linda1 | September 25, 2014 at 10:20 AM
Eileen,
"Is what I keep trying to say too difficult to comprehend???"
No, you are as clear as a bell. They aren't listening. But you are a thorn in their side. You are showing them to be intentionally deaf. Many others hear you and understand what you are saying and that the policy makers aren't listening. It may seem to you that you are a small tiny unheard voice, but you are making a difference.
Posted by: Linda1 | September 25, 2014 at 10:07 AM
Patricia
"Befuddled and honest": smoke and mirrors, surely?
Posted by: For Patricia | September 25, 2014 at 10:03 AM
At least this poor befuddled man is honest as far as he is able to be.
He doesn't understand anything.
He doesn't know what the problem is
He has no money
He has no proper information (??)
He has no clout to do anything
or say anything.
Why is he where he is? Where exactly is he? Who or what is he?
Talk about Alice and a looking glass....
Posted by: patricia | September 25, 2014 at 09:24 AM
One key to the success of the polio vaccine was that they did not spend...twenty years... looking for the "polio gene."
After twenty years of study, Dr. Insel states were are still in the very early stages of Autism research...
He needs to be removed from the IACC.
Posted by: cmo | September 25, 2014 at 08:55 AM
Dr Insel- suggest you revisit these webpages to (re)assess whether your agency is properly using what meager funds you do have.
I noted that HIV/AIDS & mental health projects in the Future Directions pages account for nearly half the proposed directions. Autism research in NIMH, ~$8M external for FY 2014, focused on improving access to services in diverse populations. IMHO, the issues related to HIV & mental health are trivial relative to autism/ASD/etc and reflect a significant disconnect from identifying appropriate priorities.
Further, why & when did HIV infection become such a mental health focus, especially since CDC has identified HIV as an infection _Not_ of public health significance (see link below)? Because HIV=AIDS became so stigmatized & HIV-infectees became traumatized and passing HIV on was, perhaps inappropriately, criminalized?
Anyway, for NIMH there seems to be an inordinate focus on genomics research and identifying things like drug targets in/on nucleic acids rather than underlying (potentially diverse) causes or drivers. I don't think that the autistic community, or taxpayers for that matter, is particularly well-served by these limited approaches. The other group looking at autism/toxicant exposure is NIEH, another NIH sub group, but they are only funding ~$10M/yr. For comparative purposes, neurological disorder costs to the EU was estimated at $1T/yr; one could safely extrapolate that to the US, given similar population sizes (I think).
So, I would argue that there's enough of a problem globally and enough money to conduct appropriate research, just not enough folks wearing their 'big boy pants or big girl skirts' to step up & make some constructive decisions about allocating funding or research thrusts.
NIMH Strategic Research Priorities
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/research-priorities/strategic-objectives/index.shtml
NIMH Future Directions
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/research-priorities/inside-nimh/2014-autumn-inside-nimh.shtml#nimh-future-research-directions
CDC reclassification of HIV
Removal of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) Infection from Definition of Communicable Disease of Public Health Significance (HIV Final Rule) (http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2009-11-02/pdf/E9-26337.pdf).
Posted by: flahute | September 25, 2014 at 08:32 AM
The brain impairment caused by all of the myriad causes of autism might have been recognized more than 50 years ago. Nuclei in the brainstem auditory pathway have higher blood flow and aerobic metabolism than any other region of the brain. Why wasn’t damage in the auditory pathway caused by asphyxia at birth recognized long ago as a likely cause of developmental language disorder???
Every trip I take to NIMH is a painful memory for me. NIMH funded my graduate studies and dissertation research at the Boston University School of Medicine. I was in the class one year ahead of Tom Insel. I regret terribly that I did not somehow pursue a career in research. My grant applications for research on perinatal brain injury were rejected. I had two autistic children and a third baby. I returned to my previous career of software engineering. I continued to try to stay connected by writing, but everything I submit has had to be reduced to a letter-to-the-editor.
The brain must be the focus of autism research. Neurotoxicity of vaccines and medications like valproic acid, tylenol, antibiotics, and more should be investigated. More than enough epidemiology has been done, and it continues to show nothing.
I am a small tiny unheard voice in the wilderness, but I will keep trying. Is what I keep trying to say too difficult to comprehend???
Posted by: Eileen Nicole Simon | September 25, 2014 at 08:15 AM
Insel says: "So I think we have a real problem at this very early stage of this field. And it is early. This is a field that has been deeply invested in biomedical research for only a couple of decades."
Frigging un-believable! "Early"! "Only a couple of decades"! Orwell couldn't even make this up, this Creature Insel.
When a crystal-clear national problem/disaster is met with honest effort, HONEST engineers and scientists got our astronauts landing on the moon in six years! Creature Insel is the epitome of our nation's totally out of control so-called health system with their creature-leaders' utter inability to honestly reappraise their dogma.
Indeed, the human race has new mutants, Creature Insel and his IOM and NIH and CDC buddies risen from the ooze of modern Pharma.
Posted by: david m burd | September 25, 2014 at 07:43 AM