Vaccines, Mercury, and Autism – Is There a Link? essay by Regenstein

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*Vaccines, Mercury, and Autism – Is There a Link?*

by Regenstein

May 22, 2008

http://www.lewrockwell.com/regenstein/regenstein12.html

In recent years, there has been an explosion of neurological disorders

among children, the most serious of which is the crippling syndrome

knows as autism.

The dramatic increase in the incidence of autism has accompanied the

more than tripling of the childhood vaccination schedule, and many

parents have described how their perfectly normal, alert, intelligent,

healthy infants suddenly regressed into an autistic state after

receiving vaccination shots.

Pediatricians and health officials have long ridiculed the claims of

parents of thousands of autistic children, that vaccines appear to have

played a role in their children’s regression. But these claims have been

corroborated by the recent admission of medical experts at the U.S.

Department of Health and Human Services who conceded, in a case before a

secretive special court, that childhood vaccinations contributed to

causing Hannah Poling, a child from Athens, Georgia to, in effect,

become autistic (contract a brain disorder " with features of autism

spectrum disorder " ).

What has been largely overlooked in this debate is the well known and

extreme toxicity of mercury, a preservative used in most childhood

vaccines and flu shots, known for hundreds of years to be toxic to nerve

cells, and especially harmful to the minds of developing children.

The routine flu vaccination now being recommended for almost all

Americans, including kids as young as six months and pregnant women,

contains about 25 micrograms of mercury, perhaps the most toxic

non-radioactive compound on earth. Thimerosal, a preservative, is about

half mercury, and was largely though not completely removed from

children's vaccines several years ago because of fears about its toxicity.

Federal health authorities routinely tell reporters, falsely, that

mercury was eliminated from childhood vaccines manufactured after 2001,

yet autism continued to increase. This misinformation has been widely

reported and repeatedly cited by the medical industry as evidence that

mercury is not linked to the ever-rising rate of autism.

However, some mercury is still present in the vaccines – except for the

MMR shot (measles, mumps, rubella) – at reduced levels that no one can

precisely quantify. Moreover, since the earlier vaccines were never

recalled, they probably remained in use for years after 2001.

Defenders of vaccines also repeatedly claim that scientific studies have

failed to establish a link between vaccines and autism. But dozens of

studies showing a link and going back decades can be found on such

websites as generationrescue.org, nationalautismassociation.org, and in

Kirby’s extensively documented, best-selling book, Evidence of

Harm. Two new studies show that Japanese children developed autism in

direct proportion to the numbers vaccinated; and vaccinated baby monkeys

developed autism-like neurological abnormalities.

It is baffling that mercury is still allowed to be injected into the

bodies of youngsters and women carrying fetuses. The federal

Environmental Protection Agency and most state governments warn against

eating many types of fish contaminated with tiny traces of this deadly

metal, especially pregnant women and nursing mothers.

Indeed, mercury has been known for hundreds of years to be deadly – a

compound that severely damages the brains of humans. The famous Mad

Hatter from Alice in Wonderland was made insane by breathing vapors of

mercury used in making hats, a common occurrence in the 19th century.

In the 1st century A.D., Roman prisoners received death sentences by

being forced to work in cinnabar mines, thus exposing them to fatal

levels of mercury. In Minamata Bay, Japan, over ten thousand people in

the fishing village were poisoned (and some two thousand killed, plus

numerous dogs and cats) by fish and shellfish contaminated with mercury

waste dumped into the bay in the 1950's and ’60's. In Iraq in 1971–72,

up to 1,000 people were killed and as many as 60,000 gravely poisoned by

imported U.S. grain treated with a mercury-based pesticide banned for

use in America.

Yet today, we inject mercury into millions of infants and pregnant women

while medical officials deny there is a risk of causing such

neurological disorders as autism, and ADD/ADHD.

Interestingly, the current autism epidemic coincides with the dramatic

increase of childhood vaccination shots, from ten in the 1980’s to some

36 today, perhaps overburdening the immune systems of some children. In

the 1970's, the autism rate among kids was one in 10,000. Today, it

averages one in 150, and one in 94 for boys.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), FDA, and

many pediatricians and scientists who defend vaccines are not

disinterested parties, because, for decades, they have been responsible

for permitting, promoting and administering the vaccines containing

thimerosal. The prestigious Institute of Medicine, a leading defender of

vaccines, has even opposed conducting research into their dangers,

concluding that efforts to find a link between vaccines and autism " must

be balanced against the broader benefit of the current vaccine program

for all children. "

Of course, if a link were conclusively established, the medical

community fears it would find itself accused of being responsible (and

perhaps financially liable) for poisoning and crippling the minds of

tens of thousands of children.

Now, the medical community’s unrelenting defense of vaccines seems to be

crumbling. Dr. Bernadine Healy, former head of the National Institutes

of Health and later the American Red Cross, writes of the Hannah Poling

case, " … the decision was a vindication for families who have been

battling with the vaccine community, arguing that some poorly understood

reaction to components of vaccines or their mercury-based preservative,

thimerosal, could cause brain injury. "

Even CDC Director Dr. Gerberding, who has led the campaign to

defend vaccines, reassure the public, and belittle parents’ concerns,

recently admitted during a CNN interview that vaccines can trigger

autism in a certain vulnerable subset of children.

Vaccines have done much good in preventing many dread diseases, and most

children suffer no apparent ill effects from them. But we cannot ignore

the possibility that vaccines, particularly the mercury component, may

be a factor in the current epidemic among children of neurological

disorders, perhaps exacerbated by a genetic or other underlying

disposition in some youngsters.

So what is to be done? To begin, federal health officials should conduct

the long-called-for comprehensive studies comparing vaccinated children

with unvaccinated ones, such as in the Amish community, where the

incidence of autism is said to be almost non-existent.

At the very least, why not remove mercury and other toxic substances

like aluminum, anti-freeze, and formaldehyde as preservatives from

vaccinations; space out the schedule of shots, instead of giving so many

at once; and delay giving some of the riskiest of them until infants are

somewhat older?

These would be good first steps in maintaining public confidence in

vaccines, and so much less trouble than providing lifetime care for

children with autism.

May 22, 2008

/ Regenstein [send him mail]

is an Atlanta environmental writer and author of /

America the Poisoned: How Deadly Chemicals Are Poisoning our

Environment, our Wildlife – and Ourselves

<http://www.amazon.com/Survive-America-Poisoned--Regenstein/dp/0874918383/l\

ewrockwell/>/./

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