First off, I know what some people will say about the title
of this entry. “We’re not anti-vaccine!
Stop calling us that!” In that case,
please come up with another name for yourselves. Give yourselves a name that identifies your movement so that
when you are referred to, people will know who you are. If I called you the Precautionary Vaccine
Movement, few people would know who I’m talking about. So please, get a name and make it stick. Until then, I’ll refer to you as the
Anti-Vaccine Movement (AVM). I recognize
that it may not be literally accurate, but there will be no doubt about who you
are.
Here’s why I love the anti-vaccine movement. They are protecting everyone’s right to make
medical decisions for themselves and their children. They take down the façade of the demi-god
like authority of the medical system and the pharmaceutical industry and they
encourage people to do their own research.
The truth is that the people in
general are not fully informed of the choices they are making or even told that
they have a choice when it comes to risks and benefits of medical
interventions. This is especially true
when it comes to pharmaceutical products.
So I thank the AVM for raising our awareness, encouraging us to make our
own choices and making sure that we continue to have the right to make those
choices. When it comes to autism, those who are part of the AVM are also the
people who believe in helping the body heal .
They are the ones promoting therapies and nutritional supplements. They are the people that believe autism is an
environmentally induced condition as opposed to a genetic inevitability that
little can be done about. They are the
people who believe that autism is an epidemic that was almost non-existent in
previous generations, not just undiagnosed.
They are the people that believe autism is a health issue, not just a
learning disability. They are the people
that believe our children can heal and want to increase the accessibility to
medical intervention and therapies to do so. They are the people that have no tolerance for
another study on maternal age and autism.
So what’s not to love?
The difficulty I have with the AMV is the hyper-focus on vaccines. Specifically, a belief that if it weren’t for
vaccines there would be no autism epidemic.
Yes, vaccines are not completely risk-free. Parents should be fully informed of the risks
associated with the choices they are making for their children. A study comparing the health conditions of
vaccinated vs. unvaccinated children needs to be done. However, while we are hammering on the risks
of vaccines there are plenty of other things that could be and should be
investigated. While the AVM acknowledges
that other environmental factors could be contributing to the autism epidemic
there is little interest in researching them;
they think they have the answer. Many of them dismiss any study that is not
about vaccines. You can often see sweeping statements on AVM
blogs that are passed off without reference or question. Here is just a small sampling.
The rate of autism in
unvaccinated children is 1:10,000 – Really?
Weren’t you just complaining about the fact that there is no study of
unvaccinated kids and autism? If Paul
Offit or a member from the pro-vaccine movement said “Unvaccinated children get
autism at the same rate as the general population,” wouldn’t you be asking for
a specific reference? So why don’t you
ask that one be provided when a similarly sweeping statement is made by someone
on your side?
Autism levels have
increased at the same rate of increased vaccinations - Okay, not just similar but the exact same
rate? Haven’t more informed parents
been choosing not to vaccinate, yet autism rates are still rising? Hasn’t the sum total of thimerisol in
vaccines significantly decreased over the past few years, yet again, autism
rates continue to rise? How can you say the rates are the same?
Vaccinations are the
main cause for the increase in autism. This is, at best, a huge overstatement. Maybe,
there is some evidence that vaccinations may
contribute to autism is some cases,
but the conclusion that vaccines are the main cause of autism is blowing the
evidence –even the anecdotal evidence -way out of proportion.
Unvaccinated groups
like the Amish have autism only in cases of environmental mercury exposure: So every known case of autism among the Amish
have an unquestionable link to mercury exposure? Do you have a reference for that? Could there possibly be any other difference
between the lifestyles of the Amish and the modern American family other than
their vaccinations and mercury exposure?
Like food? Or the fact that they
don’t use electricity? Or the chemicals
and pesticides they may not be exposed to?
Between 98%- 99% of
cases of autism are due to vaccine injury -Of course, there’s no epidemiological
evidence for this one either. But if it
is true, can they explain what’s going on in Cuba for me? Cuba reports a rate
of autism at only 0.00168 percent while the U.S. rate stands at 1.13
percent. About 99 percent of Cuban
children are fully vaccinated versus about 85 percent of American
children. Both nations vaccinate for
similar diseases with very similar vaccination schedules. (The Cuban childhood vaccination schedule
includes protection against 13 diseases in 11 vaccines in a total of 34 doses
while the United States requires 11 vaccines in 36 doses.) I know what you’re thinking: we don’t know if
vaccines in both countries contain precisely the same ingredients and we don’t
know the precise definition of “autism” in Cuba. True enough, but we’re talking about a HUGE
difference in incidence! Rates of autism
are 298 times higher in the US than in Cuba.
You would have to show some significant differences in the ingredients
or diagnoses to account for that kind of disparity in statistical data. If the Cubans did not vaccinate their children
the AMV would be doubtlessly pointing to them as proof of the vaccine autism
link. When the shoe is on the other
foot, they are less impressed.
Vaccines do not cause
every case of autism, but they have indeed caused the autism epidemic – An
epidemic is defined as a certain disease in a given human population that substantially
exceeds the expected rates of incidence based on recent experience. So the increased numbers of autism are almost
entirely due to vaccines ? And the
number of autism cases that do not involve vaccine injury are about what we had
expected to occur? On top of the fact
that there is no evidence to back up this statement, it is extremely dismissive
of people whose cases do not fit a particular agenda.
There is a growing double standard for “evidence” or
“proof”. The validity of a study as
determined by the AVM is based more on whether people like the conclusions than
if the research was done well. Just the
title of a journal article is enough to have research dismissed. The study
entitled “Residential Proximity to Freeways and Autism” was quickly rejected by
many in the AVM based on the fact freeways have been around for so long and the
increase in autism numbers is relatively recent. There was no consideration
that the environment near or around a freeway now may be in some way, different
than in past decades. Like many studies before it, it was labeled a
distraction to obfuscate the real cause: Vaccines
Part of the
reason this vaccine emphasis bothers me so much is that I sense that the parents
of the AVM see their ‘vaccine injured’ children as different from other
children with neurological disabilities. Their children were poisoned; their children
were not supposed to be this way. God didn’t intend for this to happen to them.
I take this very personally because my
daughter was not vaccinated at the time of her diagnosis. Not surprisingly, many in the AVM don’t like
to hear about her case. First, it doesn’t support their cause and
second, it introduces the possibility that many of children they believe where
adversely affected by vaccines were not.
To some, the
fact that she has autism and has never been vaccinated has a simple answer. “Her case must be genetic.” This puts her in a different category. It excludes her from the autism epidemic that
is hitting this generation. As if she
were supposed to be autistic. As if looking for environmental factors wouldn’t
help her. There’s a sense that the vaccine injured are
more entitled to a better quality of life – Their condition is not genetic. Pinpointing
the cause primarily on something injected into a child at a specific time
during their growth and development fully supports this distinction. Without this single point of cause, the contrast
is fuzzier.
Regardless of the cause, we should never see one child as
more or less worthy of neurological well-being than another. All children are entitled to the potential for
a good life. The ‘vaccine injured’ are
no more or less deserving than any other child with autism. Nothing should be dismissed just because it
doesn’t fit with the prevailing theory. We need to keep searching.
Generation Rescue is a group that is generally supported by
the AVM. They conducted a phone survey
to determine the causal link between autism and vaccines. The study was not without its flaws but
there were some interesting conclusions.
According to GR’s results, vaccinated boys are 61% more likely to have
autism than unvaccinated boys.
Vaccinated girls are no more likely to have autism than unvaccinated
girls. If we assume that this study is
accurate, (and that is questionable) it still doesn’t find vaccines as the
primary cause of autism. In simple numbers, if there are 100 kids with
autism, 30 of the cases are likely related to vaccinations, 70 of them are not. Those 30 cases are
extremely important and we should continue to work to get answers for
them. The other 70 cases are just as
important. They shouldn’t be put up on a
shelf waiting for the pro and anti vaccine movements to hash it all out.
It appears that we are not getting anywhere arguing about
vaccines. Both sides are entrenched in
what they believe and the autism rates continue to rise. We could (and should) do more studies on
vaccinated vs. unvaccinated groups of people but it seems likely that either
side would dismiss results that do not fit their agenda. If
we’re not getting anywhere with vaccine research, how about looking at other
environmental causes? Fire retardants,
food preservatives, pesticides, herbicides, plastics, food processing, arsenic
in our rice, air pollution, GMOs, radiation, over-sterilizing, lyme disease,
endocrine disruptors, parasites, the
list goes on and on. The EPA and the FDA
have no idea exactly how many chemicals are used in consumer products, nor what
products they are used in. Shouldn’t we
require that their standards change? Don’t these things warrant some research? Couldn’t they be a huge piece of the autism
puzzle? The efforts in this area are
minimal at best and there should be a call for more efforts to find
environmental causes of autism.
Like a growing number of people, I believe that there are
several causes of autism. Vaccines most
certainly may be one of them, but if they are, that’s only one piece of the
puzzle. If the AVM dismisses people who don’t agree with them
100% or whose experiences do not reflect their own, they will be taken less
seriously and find themselves with diminishing support. This is already happening. The autism community needs to join forces
with people who will help our children achieve a greater quality of life,
recognize the seriousness of this condition and prevent autism rates from
continuing to rise. Sometimes that will
mean looking into vaccines. Sometimes
that means pursuing research in other areas. In the meantime, let’s all keep an open
mind. None of us has all the answers.
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