Andrew Wakefield

The most recent update on the Andrew Wakefield "controversy".

I have met Wakefield a couple of times, once at a biomedical conference and once at a rally in DC. In person he is nice and takes time to talk to all the parents who besiege him with questions and requests for autographs.

I find it hard to believe that because he paid five pounds (less than $8) to some kids for blood samples and failed to disclose a potential conflict of interest before a study was published that ipso facto his research is garbage.

Before you pull out the line that "new studies have proven there is no link between autism and vaccinations", show me the exact study. The ones from the CDC? Oh, the ones that said a link could neither be confirmed or denied and that further studies needed done. Or the ones partially researched by a psychiatrist who ran off with millions in research money? (more on that below) And the further studies just happened to say "vaccines are safe". Or the genetic studies that prove autism is strictly a genetic problem? Maybe, say, like being more susceptible to have autism, even if an environmental trigger needs to set the autism gene in motion?

Why do people who are not adversely affected by vaccines assume they are 100% risk free? "It didn't happen to me or my kids!" Ah, that proves it.

It reminds me of a conversation I had in high school with a friend. I said Jimi Hendrix was one of the most famous musicians and guitarists of all time. My friend's response: He must not be very famous. I never heard of him.

And what about this guy, Dr. Paul Thorsen? Now, he didn't pay kids pocket change for blood samples, so I can see why we would believe him. He just absconded with millions of dollars, said he'd "kill" to make his way, and, his research helped "prove" the CDC's statement that they couldn't find a connection between autism and vaccines. I wonder if he's been publicly harrassed, had his house burned down and lost his medical license? His specialty is psychiatry, so why he would be picked to head up this research is odd. Here's another story about him.
Wakefield was a pediatric gastroenterologist. He became interested in autism after treating numerous patients with autism who had odd yeast overgrowth in their intestines, symptoms of leaky gut syndrome, and live measles virus in their intestines (although the children had never had measles- only the MMR vaccine exposure to measles).
Also, if the other doctors originally involved with Wakefield were doing their due dilligence they should have found any conflicts of interest before the report was ever published in a prestigious, peer reviewed journal like The Lancet. Why did it take The Lancet so long to retract the report? Did they drop the ball on vetting the study and report or did they get flack for publishing something that might dare mess with the "herd immunity" (and annual profits for vaccine manufacturers and patent holders).
And Dr. Paul Offit, the biggest vaccine proponent around, certainly has a conflict of interest as he is a patent hold for a rotavirus vaccine. If he honestly isn't in it for the money, maybe he can donate all the profits from his book, Autism's False Prophets, to the vaccine injury compensation fund or to the CDC to study vaccine safety and efficacy. Or maybe he can join up with Amanda Peet and start up a fund to send all of us non-vaccinated or under-vaccinate "parasites" to a big island where we'll die off not only from lack of vaccination, but also because of our "faulty" genetics that cause us to be weak and susceptible to neurotoxins. Give natural selection a little nudge, if you will.

Ohio Revised Code

http://www.10tv.com/live/content/health/stories/2010/05/20/story-columbus-public-health-vaccinations-schools.html?sid=102

For some reason these stories never bother to mention that exemptions exist. I'm not saying that no one should get the vaccines, but in Ohio parents have the right to refuse or delay vaccination. It's written in Ohio Revised Code, but that's been conveniently left out in every story I've seen as well as the letters I get from the school every few years. I just write a polite note with my reason for declining the vaccine for my children. So far, all of the school nurses have been very understanding and nice about it.

People in general, however, tend to get more heated. If your child had seizures, broke out in yeast rashes all over their body for months, had putrid smelling diarrhea for months, became paralyzed, or died as a direct cause of vaccination, you might hesitate to get more vaccinations or vaccinate your other children. However, parents and family of kids who had no reaction to vaccines seem to feel that our tiny percentage of kids who suffer years or a lifetime of vaccine side effect consequences are a fair trade off for "herd immunity" to be maintained.

I don't want little Suzie to get that itchy chicken pox! Oh, yeah, I forgot, almost all kids still get chicken pox even with the vaccine. Despite what you may take away from this, I'm not anti-vaccine. I'm just pro-vaccine choice. Some of us who are "unfortunate" enough to have lost out on the genetic lottery and are sensitive to vaccine side effects have a right (well, in most states) to decline or delay vaccines. What should be taking place is testing that will determine who is most likely to have a severe reaction, then we can vaccinate accordingly. Just like tesing new borns for PKU is now routine, even though it affects a minority of infants, it saves lives. Vaccine adverse effects that can be narrowed down to certain genes could save lives and prevent severely debilitating disabilities.

Whether its the diseases themselves or something used as a preservative, if we could narrow down the possibility of adverse events the vaccination rate would climb.
Instead we vilify families who choose not to vaccinate or who "put their baby at risk" while they allow his or her immune system to mature before exposing it to numerous diseases and known neurotoxins.

If lead were a preservative in vaccines would you brush it off as nothing? I doubt it, since we don't allow it in paint. But aluminum? Ah, that's a neurotoxin just like lead. Mercury, oh that's okay, so long as its "trace amounts".
Traditional medicine says not to take colloidal silver, which has "trace amounts" of silver. They quit using silver in many medicines, such as nasal drops. It is still used as an anti-microbial, and it is safe most of the time. But why do they suggest we avoid silver in foods, supplements and meds? They have a good reason: argyria.
It just turns your body, inside and out, greyish-blue. And turns your nails brittle. And other such tiny problems.

Why is it that some known neurotoxins are okay and others aren't? Maybe because most people tolerate some well, while others are bad for enough people that they aren't deemed a necessary risk.

I don't know about you, but I don't like to think that my children or family members should be a necessary risk so that others might potentially not get a disease that in most cases isn't fatal.
Oh, and don't worry, it's usually people who have compromised immune systems (i.e. bad genes) who die from things like pertussis and mumps. You know, those who are a necessary risk. Just let evolution weed us out with disease. ; )
(yes, I'm being facetitious...)

Dentist Appointment

Celest's dentist appointment to fix her two upper front teeth is tomorrow at 9 am. I am not looking forward to it. I have to keep her from eating until we get there, which she won't like. Also, I have to take Lotus with me because tomorrow is a teacher day (or whatever they call it- teachers go to school but the kids don't).
Bah! I hope she doesn't get mad at me like Lotus did when she had her teeth worked on. I think she would hardly look at me and wouldn't let me sit next to her for three days afterwords.