FW: Court Orders B.C. Govt. to Compensate for Aut. Treat./ Drug Cos. Ignore FDA

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Court Orders B.C. Govt. to Compensate for Aut. Treat./ Drug

Cos. Ignore FDA

FEAT DAILY NEWSLETTER Sacramento, California http://www.feat.org

" Healing Autism: No Finer a Cause on the Planet "

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February 9, 2001 Search www.feat.org/search/news.asp

Also: * U.S. Request on Vaccines Ignored by Drug Firms

* Flutie Foundation Awards Grants

Court Orders B.C. Govt. to Give Compensation for Autism Treatment

[by Terri Theodore.]

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Vancouver (CP) - A judge has ruled the B.C. government must pay for

intensive, early therapy for autistic children, but the ruling stopped short

of ordering the specific treatment some parents were demanding.

Parents of four autistic children wanted the court to pay for Lovaas

therapy, an intense treatment regime of one-on-one therapy for children aged

up to six years old. The treatment costs up to $60,000 a year. The parents

in the case have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the therapy and

also wanted compensation from the court.

Instead, Justice n Allan gave each of the four families $20,000,

an amount she acknowledged in her ruling Wednesday that is just symbolic.

" A symbolic award provides partial, albeit minimal, compensation to

the petitioners and acknowledges the intransigence of government in

responding to the long-standing requests and demands for autism treatment, "

she wrote.

But Freeman, with the group Families for Early Autism

Treatment, said she doesn't trust the government to fulfil its obligations

as set down by Allan.

" Everything the judge has ordered is good. The problem is how do we

make the government do what the judge has ordered properly, " she said.

" I've been trying to convince the government to do the right thing for

the past five years and they've shown me time and time again that they're

working in bad faith. "

Finance Minister Ramsey said the government " has no intent to do

anything other than comply with this ruling. "

The decision is an extension of a ruling Allan made last year that found the

government's refusal to provide early autism treatment was a violation of

the children's Charter rights guaranteeing equal treatment.

The province is appealing that decision.

On Wednesday, Allan ordered the government to provide treatment.

" The government is obliged to provide effective treatment to

accommodate the disadvantaged position of autistic children, " Allan wrote.

" It cannot deny or delay implementation of early (treatment) on the

basis of cost. "

The judge noted that Lovaas therapy is demonstrably effective. One autistic

child among the four whose parents launched the legal action is now six

years old and doing well in school after years of the intensive therapy.

But Allan wrote that it's not up to judges to create public policy.

" The judiciary cannot dictate what treatment programs should or should

not be implemented, nor can it dictate how limited financial resources

should be allocated. "

Just before Allan's first ruling on the issue, the government began the

Provincial Centre for Autism and Related Disorders for autistic children

aged between two and six.

However, the program doesn't have a Lovass treatment component and the

parents involved in the court case criticized it as too little, too late,

too restrictive and without proof of its effectiveness.

Freeman said the program is not based on science.

" How can we use these children as guinea pigs to see if this is going

to work or not and then in three years, go in front of a judge and have a

judge say that they haven't been working in good faith?

" You've just lost another generation of children. I find that morally

reprehensible. "

Freeman said she must tell the parents of children newly diagnosed with

autism that they will have to pay themselves for the most effective

treatment.

The parents of one of the children involved in the court case

estimated they have spent approximately $240,000 on Lovaas treatment since

1992.

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* * *

U.S. Request on Vaccines Ignored by Drug Firms

[From the Healthmall.com.]

http://www.healthmall.com/newsletter.cfm?type=article & id=1477 & a=

For eight years, the Food and Drug Administration has repeatedly asked

pharmaceutical companies not to use materials from cattle raised in

countries where there is a risk of mad cow disease.

But regulators discovered last year that five companies, including

some of the world's largest drug concerns, were still using ingredients from

those countries to make nine widely used vaccines.

Some of the companies say they found the agency's request unclear and

do not believe they did anything wrong. Others say they could not keep up

with the government's expanding list of countries where cattle could be

infected. One, however, acknowledged that it could have moved more quickly.

The nine vaccines include some regularly given to millions of American

children, including common vaccines to prevent polio, diphtheria and

tetanus. They also include the anthrax vaccine, which the government

requires for soldiers serving in the Gulf.

Federal health officials stress that the vaccines are still considered

safe. They calculate that the odds of these vaccines passing on the disease,

in the worst eventualities, are between one in 40 million and one in 40

billion doses.

The officials say that the very slight chance that someone could be

infected is far outweighed by the benefits that these vaccines bring in

fighting disease and preventing death.

Indeed, it is now only a scientific theory that a vaccine could infect

someone with the human form of mad cow disease - called new variant

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. No one is known to have contracted the disease

this way.

" Any risk is very remote, " said Dr. Midthune, director of the

agency's Office of Vaccine Research and Review. " But if we have the ability

to bring this remote risk to zero, that is something we want to do. "

Nonetheless, the fact that these suspect materials slipped into the

country's vaccine supply - and that the agency did not discover it for seven

years - raises questions about the agency's ability to ensure that all

medicines are free of the infectious proteins that can cause mad cow

disease.

The Food and Drug Administration so far has only investigated the

vaccine makers and has not looked to see whether other medicine is free of

possible mad cow contaminants.

Some experts say they worry more about dietary supplements. Unlike

drugs, supplements are largely unregulated.

" It's just insane not to have greater safeguards " for supplements,

said Dr. Brown, chairman of the agency's advisory committee on mad cow

disease. " The potential exists for abuse. "

The five vaccine makers are GlaxoKline, Aventis, American Home

Products, Bioport and North American Vaccines (which was acquired by Baxter

International last year).

The five vaccine makers have now agreed to stop using the suspect

materials, which include blood, fetal calf serum and meat broth.

But it will take a year or more to replace existing supplies with

reformulated products because it can take months to grow cultures used in

making vaccines. Both the companies and the agency say the current products

are safe.

They point out that the suspect ingredients, for the most part, are

used only in the early stages of manufacturing, when cultures are grown.

Blood, for instance, may be used to feed the bacteria and viruses in these

cultures. The cultures are then significantly diluted in the final vaccine.

The Food and Drug Administration first asked the vaccine makers in

1993 to stop using materials from cattle raised in Britain and other

countries where there was a threat of mad cow disease. Italian agricultural

and tourist associations organized free beef barbecues Thursday in

restaurants and piazzas in Florence to protest new mad cow restrictions

imposed by the European Union, The Associated Press reported from Florence.

About 250 kilograms (550 pounds) of fiorentina, a T-bone steak that is

Tuscany's culinary pride, were prepared to be cooked up in a central piazza

in Florence, said Gilberto Bacci, a spokesman for Confesercenti, an

association of restaurants, hotels and other tourist services.

At least 40 restaurants around Florence said they would also offer a

free taste of the steak.

Elsewhere in Europe on Thursday, German officials said the country

would create a government agency for food safety.

In Dublin, Irish officials said banned nerve tissues had been found in

a shipment of beef from Germany.

The officials said they were raising the discovery " as a matter of

urgency " with German officials.

* * *

Flutie Foundation Awards $20,025 NH Birchtree Center

The Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism, one of the most

prestigious foundations for autism in the country, awarded a grant of

$20,025 for the development of the Birchtree Center for Children.

Birchtree Center for Children, founded in September 2000, is raising

funds to establish a center that will provide specialized educational

services for children with autism and related disorders.

In addition, the Center will offer education, training, and support to

families with children with autism. The diagnosed incidence of autism has

skyrocketed in the last decade—once affecting 1 in 2,500 individuals, 1 in

500 are now diagnosed with this neurological disorder according to the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The Flutie Foundation was established by Doug Flutie, quarterback for

the NFL’s Buffalo Bills, and his wife in honor of their son, Doug Jr., who

was diagnosed with autism five years ago.

“It is extremely rewarding to know that we are able to help families

of autistic children get the care and services they so desperately need,”

Flutie stated.

In addition to the $20,025 grant from the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation

for Autism, the Saul O. Sidore Memorial Foundation, a New Hampshire-based

foundation, awarded a $2,500 grant to the Birchtree Center. Ralph Sidore,

Treasurer of the Foundation, stated, “We are very pleased to be able to help

support [this] organizations efforts…[in providing] the appropriate services

to the children in need in [the New Hampshire seacoast] region.”

The Birchtree Center for Children has also raised $5,000 in donations

from individuals invested in the development of this much-needed program.

For more information about the Birchtree Center for Children or to make

donations towards the development of the Center, contact Dr. Barbara

el, founder of the Center and President of the Board of Directors, at

.

* * *

Flutie Foundation Grants $50,000 to NAAR for Research

NAAR is thrilled to announce that it has received a very generous

grant of $50,000 from The Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism, part of

The Giving Back Fund. This is the third consecutive year that the Doug

Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism has been a " NAAR Research Partner " ,

funding important biomedical research through NAAR. We are most grateful to

Laurie and Doug Flutie for their continuing and generous support and

congratulate them on their philanthropic efforts in Massachusetts and

elsewhere strengthening research and services for the autism community.

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