Fox5 Coverage of CDC Vax Safety Rally Misses the Mark
By Anne Dachel
The coverage of the protest at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday, Oct 14 from Fox5 in Atlanta is a textbook example of what’s wrong with the media.
While the headline read, “Protestors, parents differ over vaccine safety,” the story completely omitted what the event was about. It was either a willful cover-up of the truth or else just sloppy reporting.
ATLANTA - About 100 anti-vaccine protestors marched Friday morning just outside the gates of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Atlanta headquarters. Some were parents, some members of the Nation of Islam.
Marching in the crowd was Del Bigtree, the producers of “Vaxxed: From Cover-up to Catastrophe,” a new documentary that claims the CDC covered up a purported link between the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine and Autism.
In the video, labeled “Anti-vaxxers,” one of the news anchors said, “Vaccine protesters turned out in force this morning outside the CDC’s Atlanta headquarters. They claim the agency has covered up a link between childhood vaccines and autism.”
Next the other anchor made this stunning statement: “Several major studies have found connections between the two, and it seems the debate over vaccine safety isn’t going anywhere.”
“Several major studies”?
That was a serious charge. The public needed to hear more. Fox5 needed to give us details about the alleged cover-up and follow this up with the reaction from inside the agency in question.
The Fox5 reporter Beth Galvin didn’t do that. Instead she tried to downplay the rally by calling the participants “anti-vaccine protesters.” And while she acknowledged the claim of a CDC cover-up and interviewed Del Bigtree who said vaccine safety had to be taken away from the CDC, that was the end of it. Next Galvin included parents and a doctor at a local clinic all endorsing vaccines as a way to prevent disease. Finally the reporter said, “Several major studies have failed to find a link between vaccines and autism, but with the number of cases growing here in the U.S., so are the concerns.”
Did Fox5 really tell us “several major studies” HAVE and HAVE NOT found a link between vaccines and autism? I had to go back and listen to the video several times.
This kind of reporting tells us that the media is never going to seriously investigate the controversy.
Notice that the 20 seconds of Del Bigtree making serious charges of fraud in front of the country’s top health care agency left us all hanging.
Notice the African Americans marching in the video. It was more than a little disingenuous to omit any mention of the fact that a major part of the cover-up involved a study of the vulnerability of black boys.
Fox5 has no idea how to cover this issue. This isn’t real journalism. Giving viewers brief sound bites only adds to the confusion in the minds of parents. What was allegedly covered up at the CDC? We never get to hear about it. Did Fox5 ask Bigtree about the specific charges of fraud? Was it too controversial to include? Are TV stations unwilling to hold the CDC accountable when charges are made?
Mentioning “Vaxxed” and including Bigtree is the only reason this coverage wasn’t a complete failure.
Anne Dachel is Media Editor for Age of Autism.
Cia,
Here's an interesting article about polio. In 1955 only 1% of cases were analysed, and laboratory analyses associated only 56% of polio cases with poliovirus - see final graph.
http://www.wellwithin1.com/pol_all.htm
I'm sure that if there were a vaccine for autism, the vaccine makers and their epidemiologists would also make this epidemic disappear by changing the diagnostic criteria and removing aluminum and mercury from pediatric vaccines. Everyone would give credit to the vaccine and yet there would have been a lot more to it than that.
Posted by: ATSC | October 21, 2016 at 10:02 AM
David M Burd, Thank you for your comments on my posts. I notice I have commented on AoA several times since listening in on the IACC conference call on Question 3: What Caused this to Happen (Oct 12). What an affront to hear discussion on the "Elephant in the Room," whether (1) prevention should be a priority, or (2) prevention is not valid. I immediately submitted two more comments for the Public Record (in addition to 15 submitted earlier on brain damage, Wernicke's encephalopathy).
Neurodiversity advocates got the focus of the Combatting Autism Act changed (to Autism Cares) and seating 3 members on the IACC.
Anne, It's more than the CDC blocking progress. Something is totally rotten in the whole medical establishment. I wish there were more journalists like you pushing for more intelligent reporting on deliberate attempts to dismiss parents of autistic children as simplistic anti-vaxxers.
I too am an anti-vaxxer, as well as an anti-umbilical cord-clamper. An investigation of all medical practices must be undertaken. In my comments submitted to the IACC, I pointed out the diethyl-stilbestrol (DES) error that had to be stopped. I suggested that in lieu of individual awards to litigants, that the medical establishment be required to provide lifespan care for everyone diagnosed with autism in childhood.
Posted by: Patience (Eileen Nicole) Simon | October 21, 2016 at 09:24 AM
David,
I don't think it's fair to dismiss the immense suffering caused by the polio epidemics in the '40s and '50s. Even though clinical cases were relatively rare and paralysis and death were rarer still, it still added up to tens of thousands a year in the US being permanently crippled. That's a lot of children. The vaccine almost immediately stopped it. You can debate the damage done by the Cutter incident and the SV virus, and certainly it would have been good for parents to have known about the risks at the time, but I think most parents would still have chosen to give their children the vaccine. It seems to be the least dangerous of all the vaccines.
Posted by: ciaparker | October 20, 2016 at 06:51 PM
Patience (Eileen Nicole) Simon: PS
I meant to include my admiration for your immense efforts on condemning premature clamping of newborns' cords -- you are a true heroine (or hero, take your pick), along with other notables like Barbara Loe Fisher who founded NVIC (National Vaccine Information Center) here in suburban Washington, DC).
Posted by: david m burd | October 20, 2016 at 03:06 PM
Patience (Eileen Nocole( Simon,
With great respect for your sounding the alarm about brain damage caused by premature umbilical cord clamping (and I agree), your citing of a "serious epidemic since polio" understates the severity of vaccine-damage in all its manifestations that now affect at least 50% of America's children - growing at about two (2) million every year, year after year.
Conversely the "polio epidemic" so thoroughly discussed/examined here on AoA (and in their book) by Olmsted/Blaxill amounted to maybe 20,000 a year back in the 1950s, with virtually all recovering.
This Vaccination Holocaust now upon us dwarfs everything in history - it is unprecedented.
Posted by: david m burd | October 20, 2016 at 02:54 PM
@Narad, you're welcome.
I don't see (from a distance) any evidence that there is intent to limit/channel the message from those with a role in getting the CDC whistleblower story out there, though if there isn't on their part, that doesn't mean something you suggest couldn't happen.
The silent response (in the corporate media) to Thompson's outing suggested to me the timing or the entire event maybe caught the system off guard. Then the CDC (and media) seemed to go insane over Ebola and then suddenly measles was the huge threat a few months later and the most absolute mandate was brought to the California legislature with several more also ready throughout the nation. SB 277 rushed through only somewhat watered down, and most the rest fizzled out (so far). All the MMR failings are ignored in the measles & mumps outbreaks coverage, so it doesn't seem like they are anticipating being able to promote a new vaccine yet (though SB 277 might allow them to mandate experimental trials of such a vaccine in California schools--I don't know). To me it all felt a bit off guard, with responses maybe a little cobbled together, and mostly just brazen--brazen like the CDC's new self-proposed rule. My fears tended/sometimes still tend to conjure up images of an agenda to "reform" the CDC (or replace it) in a way that will be worse, but since the CDC seems to be headed someplace worse anyway...it kind of seems like any agenda is just that, out in the open, maybe with confidence that few will be aware or oppose it: the "Decade of Vaccines" now stepping up to take "care" of all remaining healthy people by 2020, or something like that.
In case you want to hear any of Dr. Hooker's 4 recorded conversations (there were several that weren't recorded) with Dr. William Thompson (the discussions range pretty widely over topics such as thimerosal and how to get it out of the schedule, SEED data potential for autism-vaccine research, the MMR data Brian Hooker re-analyzed, various autism & vaccine studies, some of Dr. Thompson's experiences/view of what it's like in the CDC/U.S. health agencies):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlxdWfTLHH0
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | October 18, 2016 at 02:38 AM
@ Mrs. Bishop
Thanks for the quotes. I was just suspicious that the whistleblower phenomenon could be a "limited hangout", but I admit that I don't know much about it.
I think if the CDC can get people scared of only one vaccine, then they have mitigated the situation.
If they can act like aluminum and mercury are not what cause vaccine reactions, then they have reduced their own culpability in people's minds.
These are just ideas. I don't claim to have an accurate representation of the whistleblower phenomenon, but I think people should nonetheless be on the lookout for these king of stunts.
Posted by: Narad | October 17, 2016 at 08:50 PM
I'm sorry, I don't have a good place to share this, but this interview is effective IMO in explaining a lot about autism in about 10 minutes and might be helpful if you know anyone who finds Italian a more persuasive language (the captions work well too):
"Interview with Dr Lesmo, Vaxxed"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9xIlniTkUo
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | October 17, 2016 at 06:02 PM
Jeannette Bishop,
Seeing as both parents were fathers to this child, it's likely that she was adopted and for them these were her first shots.
Posted by: ATSC | October 17, 2016 at 05:39 PM
Must have been 500 present in body and thousands present by mind at the demo well done . So far as William Thomson`s tests and the data they hold up as fact it was all rigged` bits in bits out all to make the vaccines plausible to the unsuspecting public and politician's rigged.
MMR RIP
Posted by: Angus Files | October 17, 2016 at 04:46 PM
On a second perusal, those "vaccinating" parents were getting their 7 week old daughter her "first shots?" You mean they skipped hep B at birth? Paul Offit, Senator Pan, and many others would call her UN-vaccinated...!!! Though it could be they might not know or just forgot about that one.
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | October 17, 2016 at 02:36 PM
About 100 protesters? I would have guessed at least 200 from limited video footage and I saw a comment on another report saying it was more like 500.
I thought the footage of two parents vaccinating their daughter, who just happened to drive by the protest on the way to the pediatrician and were motivated all the more by the protest to vaccinate her, was pretty interesting. Possibly more info on the parents would have been illuminating?
That though made the report feel like some measure of thought/planning had gone into covering the protest and how to do it. I'm not sure how much that has happened in the past.
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | October 17, 2016 at 02:16 PM
@Narad, it seemed like the risk for the Isolated Autism group for MMR on time was somewhat comparable to that thimerosal risk, but I can't find the value(s).
From William Thompson transcripts:
"You see the strongest association is with those without mental retardation. ...the effect is where you would think that it would happen. It is with the kids without other conditions, without the comorbid conditions. ...honestly, I looked at those results, ... I don't I have ever gone through them since 2004 and I came across them, and I'm like 'Oh my G-' and this is 0.97 to 16 and it's not statistically significant but odds ratio is 8 and if we would have added one more subject it probably would have been significant." (p. 36, Vaccine Whistleblower)
"Yeah. I actually think the most interesting results are the elevated ones or the isolated--ones that don't have other comorbid conditions...because those are the ones where the results would be more sensitive..." (p. 48-9 Vaccine Whistleblower)
In Vaxxed, Dr. Brian Hooker says some of the data runs showed (relative?) risks as high as 7-8 times.
I think there's a good chance that getting MMR on time also means higher likelihood of getting all or more vaccinations on schedule when compared to those getting MMR later. I don't think that other vaccine exposures are controlled for these studies.
And if I understand things correctly, none of these studies use a never-vaccinated control group.
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | October 17, 2016 at 01:47 PM
Hey Anne, Mark, Barbara Loe, Marcella, Kim, Andrew, Candyace, Dana, Wendy, Tim, Barry, Dell and those who have been fighting in the trenches…The next time there is to be a major rally at the CDC or California, Washington DC, Albany, Ga. or wherever.. Let's PREWRITE the news story before the event.. then maybe submit it and see if The Times or other news picks it up? We already know what the journalists are going to say so lets play them at their game? Who is in???
Posted by: Shelley Tzorfas | October 17, 2016 at 01:25 PM
http://thinkingmomsrevolution.com/vaccines-cause-autism-part-5-vaccines-immune-activation
All these steps have been supported by scientific evidence:
vaccination > febrile seizure > IL-6 > autism.
Aluminum is proven to cause chronic inflammation in the brain, including increased IL-6. Aluminum adjuvant can be transported into the brain. Aluminum from vaccines therefore likely causes chronic IL-6 elevation in the brain. Both acute and chronic IL-6 elevation have been demonstrated to cause autistic behavior and brain damage in animals.
Posted by: Hans Litten | October 17, 2016 at 01:10 PM
When all your instincts tell you something is a duck, because it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck and you think it is a duck, except the media tell you it is not a duck but fails to tell you what it is, then you can reckon this is not ignorant, ill informed or incompetent reporting this is deliberate mis-reporting. With the greatest respect in the world it is rock solidly implausible and after 70 years of the same, something of a record.
Tony Bateson, Oxford UK
Posted by: Tony Bateson | October 17, 2016 at 12:43 PM
It would be interesting to evaluate those children involved in the fraudulent Thompson study. I'm guessing they would be over 16 yrs old by now. They had kindergarten records in 2004, putting them in that "decade of brain injury" where few escaped without lifelong disabilities, where few boys can score high on SAT's and IQ's were clipped by several points. How did they turn out, those that weren't considered injured? It's easy to see that many boys today don't drive until they're 23, many haven't had their first girl friend at that age either, and these are those considered "neurotypical". Evaluating their health would be interesting, as well, heart disease, kidney disease, obesity, diabetes, asthma, an array of autoimmune disease just starting to surface as they become adults .
Posted by: barbaraj | October 17, 2016 at 12:35 PM
Thank you Anne, for keeping it real, honest and truthful as always. The #cdcTRUTH weekend in Atlanta was a weekend of unity, power, courage, bravery and beauty. The experience was humbling. And regardless of where one stands on the involvement of the NOI and their definite stand for justice, I thought you should all see that this happened:
https://www.noi.org/webcast1016/
Yours in Truth, Transparency and Freedom,
Michelle Ford
Posted by: Michelle Ford | October 17, 2016 at 10:41 AM
We can call them Vaxxxers, and throw them in with the 42nd Street crowd.
Posted by: Narad | October 17, 2016 at 10:14 AM
C'mom, Anne! WAKE UP! Fox news knows exactly - *EXACTLY* how to cover "Vaxxed", and the "protests", and the controversy, and all the rest of it. They lie, they distort, they omit, they pander, they confuse, etc.,etc.,etc.,. As you've shown above, they claim that there BOTH are, and are not, "studies" which either do, or do not show whatever they want to show. Or not. Whatever. Trump is correct about one thing: The election is rigged, the media is rigged, the system is rigged. It does us no good to continue to believe, or state, otherwise. *ALL* the major media is bought and paid for by the GREG B.'s. ~~ ""GREG B." = "Global Ruling Elites & Global Banksters"".... The GREG B.'s are the PUPPET MASTERS of BOTH Clinton & Trump.... And, if they're gonna call *us* "anti-vaxxers", shouldn't *we* call *them* "VAXXERS"....????.... Vaxxers are double-crossers, that's why it's spelled with 2 "x's".....
Posted by: Bill | October 17, 2016 at 09:43 AM
Anne, Thank you for following "investigations" by journalists. Can they do more than report on recent publications by medical researchers? Could they point out that how vaccines affect the brain needs to be the focus of research? Epidemiology is too simplistic, but this seems to be as far as CDC and other autism researchers care to go.
Autism is the result of brain damage. Language delay, repetitive movements, seizure disorder, and diminished level of awareness are clear neurological signs. Yet authorities on autism don't want to discuss brain damage. This became appallingly clear to me last week listening-in on the IACC conference call on Question 3: What Caused This to Happen?
Members of this IACC committee referred to "the elephant in the room" as the controversy over whether prevention should be a priority, or is prevention not valid. This because views of neurodiversity advocates appear more important than those of grieving parents who unexpectedly find themselves dealing with the most serious epidemic since polio.
Posted by: Patience (Eileen Nicole) Simon | October 17, 2016 at 09:19 AM
Well, I am not sure what the link between the MMR and autism was, but the original data of the Verstraeten study had a relative risk of 7.62. This is the correlation between thimerosal and autism.
This is the strongest correlation found to date, as far as I know, between autism and any one factor. I think there should be an entire movie made about the statistical fraud the CDC engaged in to cover-up this data. Instead, we get a movie about the MMR which has never contained thimerosal.
I haven't seen the movie so I could be getting things wrong. Perhaps they mentioned the Verstraeten Study in it.
http://www.safeminds.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/GenerationZeroPowerPoint.pdf
Posted by: Narad | October 17, 2016 at 09:04 AM