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The "Open Question" On Vaccines and Autism
CBS News ^ | May 12, 2008 | Sharyl Attkisson

Posted on 04/22/2018 7:17:20 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Perhaps the most puzzling thing about autism and ADD is that more than a decade into this public health crisis, our best, smartest government scientists and public health officials still say they have no idea what's causing it. Scary stuff, when parents having a child today realize there's at least an estimated 1 in 150 chance their child will have an autism disorder (1 in 90 if it's a boy).

While the government has been utterly unable to stop it, or even tell us what is causing it, they say they do know one thing: it's not vaccines. But today, in an exclusive interview with CBS News, Dr. Bernadine Healy becomes the most well-known medical voice yet to counter the government on that claim.

Healy's credentials couldn't be more "mainstream." After all, she once was a top government health official as head of the National Institutes of Health. She founded the first school of public health in Ohio, and then headed both the school of public health and the school of medicine at Ohio State University. She's an internist and cardiologist. And she's a member of the Institute of Medicine, the government advisory board that tried to put the vaccine-autism controversy to rest in 2004 by saying a link was not likely.

According to Healy, when she began researching autism and vaccines she found credible published, peer-reviewed scientific studies that support the idea of an association. That seemed to counter what many of her colleagues had been saying for years. She dug a little deeper and was surprised to find that the government has not embarked upon some of the most basic research that could help answer the question of a link.

The more she dug, she says, the more she came to believe the government and medical establishment were intentionally avoiding the question because they were afraid of the answer.

Why? Healy says some in the government make the mistake of treating vaccines as an all-or-nothing proposition. The argument goes something like this: everybody gets vaccinated at the same time with the same vaccines or nobody will get vaccinated and long-gone deadly diseases will re-emerge. (When I asked about cases of brain damage resulting in autism that have been quietly compensated by the government in vaccine court over the years, one government official recently told me that "it's still better overall to get vaccinated than not to get vaccinated.")

Healy says the argument need not be framed in those terms (vaccinate or don't vaccinate). Instead, she says, we should vaccinate, but work to do it in the safest manner possible based on what we know and what we can find out.

That's what the parents of autistic children have told me as well. If we can screen children to see which ones might be more susceptible to vaccine side effects, and vaccinate them on a more personalized schedule that is safer for them, why wouldn't we? If it's safer for all children to have their vaccinations spread out, why wouldn't we? Healy says it's called "personalized medicine" and is being done in virtually all areas of medicine today with the exception of vaccines. Yet the government continues to frame the conversation in all-or-nothing, "one-size-fits-all" terms.

Lastly, Healy says the government has a long way to go to even do basic research that could get at the heart of what she believes is an open question. For example: why in the past decade hasn't the government compared the autism/ADD rate of unvaccinated children with that of vaccinated children? If the rate is the same, it tends to point away from vaccines. If the rate is markedly lower in unvaccinated children, it tends to point toward vaccines.

The government has a dataset of unvaccinated children available. It has published more than one survey of parents of undervaccinated and unvaccinated children (to find out why the parents are choosing not to vaccinate). It would seem simple to use those same families to measure their rate of autism/ADD. Also, why hasn't the government used vaccine court as a resource to ask the autism/vaccine question. There, nearly 5,000 families have self-selected as believing their children's autism was caused by vaccines. Many have expressed willingness to let their children's medical records be released and studied; but nobody in the government has been interested.

As if that's not scary enough, look down the road a little. Millions of autistic children will - in the not-too-distant future - outgrow their parents, or their parents will no longer be able to care for them. Their only option in many cases is institutionalization. Who, but a parent or family member, can and would devote the moment-by-moment attention it takes to raise an autistic child? Our nation has not, to my knowledge, begun to build these institutions, or figure out how to pay for them.

Back to the subject at hand. If the day comes that public health officials can finally tell us with reasonable certainty what is causing all the autism and ADD, and if the cause has nothing to do with vaccines, I think most people will just be relieved to know what it is and feel that we can, then, be closer to stopping it. Until then, in the minds of many, including Healy, it remains a sad, open question.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: autism; children; conspiracy; coverup; link; safety; studies; vaccines
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Oldie but a goodie. Video and embedded link in original.
1 posted on 04/22/2018 7:17:21 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Asking the wrong question leads to the wrong conclusion. The right question is not ... is there a link between vaccines and autism.

the right question is ... Who controls the citizen’s health care? The government or the citizen?


2 posted on 04/22/2018 7:20:32 AM PDT by taxcontrol (Stupid should hurt)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Oldie but goodie? How so? For fake news?


3 posted on 04/22/2018 7:22:32 AM PDT by dangus
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Autism increases because the establishment dumbs down the definition.

For God’s sake, there is now constant talk of “autism spectrum”, and seriously, they’ve got most of us on it. It’s BS. Even more is ADD.

Look into the gov-driven education system. They are hand-tied on the 1 hand to do anything about difficult kids, and on the other they love the dollars for “disabled” kids.

It’s true. Ask my mom, the special-ed teacher/leader.


4 posted on 04/22/2018 7:28:36 AM PDT by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs.)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Gee. Do you think in a hedonistic debauched culture pregnant women using drugs of all sorts and alcohol just might be spawning offspring with scrambled brains? Sorry but there is no cure or effective treatment. Today’s medical scientists simply do not understand the biochemical pathways the human brain that make higher intellectual function possible, much less how to treat defects. Its not the vaccines.


5 posted on 04/22/2018 7:29:52 AM PDT by allendale (.)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

ADD is easy - it’s parents who actually believe in Dr. Spock and don’t spank their kids.

Autism, I suspect, is more a WPA for the millions of people who majored in Psych and wanted to actually work in the field.


6 posted on 04/22/2018 7:30:05 AM PDT by BobL (I shop at Walmart and eat at McDonald's...I just don't tell anyone)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Vaccines can't cause autism because we rely so much on vaccines.

It's like that time many years ago when I was having a problem with my old '76 Honda Civic. "It sounds like the carburetor," said my wife. Being a man, I ignored her. I checked every ignition component possible, replaced everything I could replace, and the problem remained.

"Maybe it's the carburetor," my wife persisted.

"It can't be the carburetor," I replied, in my best patronizing male tones.

"And why not?" she demanded.

"Because," I said, imperiously, "I can't fix a carburetor!"

7 posted on 04/22/2018 7:31:04 AM PDT by Mr Ramsbotham (Laws against sodomy are honored in the breech.)
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There is absolutely no reason to think vaccines cause autism. No valid research has ever indicated that vaccines cause autism. It’s disappointing to see Dr. Healy giving support to an idea with no basis at all.


8 posted on 04/22/2018 7:33:51 AM PDT by David in Cal
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

It seems strange to me that Autism/Augsbergers spectrum cases seem to be vastly greater in the US.

Much more uncommon in Scandinavia and northern Continental Europe.

And seemingly rare in Asia, Russia and Baltics.

Of course they have so many other child health issues that it might get lost in shuffle.

But there does appear to be an issue in the US that needs addressed.


9 posted on 04/22/2018 7:36:43 AM PDT by Bartholomew Roberts
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

People who question the government line on the safety of these vaccines are attacked most viciously as ‘”Anti-vaxxers”

Child affected personal experience here


10 posted on 04/22/2018 7:40:05 AM PDT by silverleaf (A man who kneels for the national anthem doesn't stand for much of anything)
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To: allendale

You do realize that your last 2 sentences are contradictory?


11 posted on 04/22/2018 7:42:08 AM PDT by silverleaf (A man who kneels for the national anthem doesn't stand for much of anything)
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To: taxcontrol

I see plenty of lefties who angrily denounce any vaccine doubtlers/refuseniks and demand they be quarantined or even imprisoned.

Meanwhile, they gladly throw the borders open to multitudes with active cases of infectious disease.


12 posted on 04/22/2018 7:42:41 AM PDT by relictele
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Great Vaxxer bait. Comments should be rife with hypocrisy about Attkisson.

“According to Healy, when she began researching autism and vaccines she found credible published, peer-reviewed scientific studies that support the idea of an association. That seemed to counter what many of her colleagues had been saying for years. She dug a little deeper and was surprised to find that the government has not embarked upon some of the most basic research that could help answer the question of a link.
The more she dug, she says, the more she came to believe the government and medical establishment were intentionally avoiding the question because they were afraid of the answer.”

The fact is that Polio was on the decline before Salk came along...just one matter which clearly points to other factors for consideration.

Healy’s right: It’s a “sad open question.”

But don’t tell that to “vaxxers.”


13 posted on 04/22/2018 7:47:59 AM PDT by logi_cal869 (-cynicus-)
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To: Bartholomew Roberts

And based on others’ comments while I was writing:

A believe that there is a mental issue that many young children have that cannot be fixed by being “better parents” or some such solution.

I know many great parents in the US that have the burden of children who show the traits identified in descriptions of Aspergers Syndrome and Autism.

But with an equally large circle of friends in Northern Europe, I know no one who has a similar child. It cannot be explained away as poor parenting.

Though I could believe it is handed down through damaged genes or some other type of hereditary issue.


14 posted on 04/22/2018 7:52:41 AM PDT by Bartholomew Roberts
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Did anyone else read the report on drudge.com about the effect of low frequencies on the mind. Makes me wonder are all these electrical appliances we have in ever increasing numbers possibly the problem!


15 posted on 04/22/2018 7:53:08 AM PDT by Retvet (Retvete)
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To: logi_cal869

“The fact is that Polio was on the decline before Salk came along...”


It certainly was not. Where on earth did you get that info?

.


16 posted on 04/22/2018 7:54:22 AM PDT by Mears
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

“Autism”, another word for “I hate being a parent, and I am too lazy to discipline my child so I blame their out of control behavior on vaccinations.”


17 posted on 04/22/2018 8:01:26 AM PDT by CodeToad (The Democrats haven't been this pissed off since the Republicans took their slaves away.)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Scary stuff, when parents having a child today realize there's at least an estimated 1 in 150 chance their child will have an autism disorder

What the author doesn't say is that the majority of people on the spectrum are fully capable of functioning that way, and would not have been considered autistic 30 years ago.

Speaking as one, I do not consider myself a "public health crisis". I am what I am. And I will fight to the death anybody who tries to force me into being "normal".
18 posted on 04/22/2018 8:01:55 AM PDT by Ellendra (Those who kill without reason cannot be reasoned with.)
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To: allendale

So we don’t understand all the “biomedical pathways,” and all of the chemicals that pregnant women use and abuse could definitely be the cause. But NOT things such as the TDAP vaccine, which has never been tested on pregnant women but is routinely given to them. Or the flu vaccine, now routinely given to pregnant women, never tested for safety for them, and includes thimerisol. But of course, these could have no effect on a developing fetus, because the government and Pharma industry tells us they don’t. SMH


19 posted on 04/22/2018 8:14:50 AM PDT by republicanbred (...and when I die I'll be republican dead.)
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To: David in Cal

If I post hundreds of research articles from all over the world showing links between vaccines and autism will you take the time to read them? Just because they are not in your “approved” journals does not mean they do not exist. They are literally HUNDREDS of them. And it terrifies me that freepers are as brainwashed as those on the democratic underground when it comes to believing that their government (CDC, fda), etc., would share the research with them if it was out there. Have mercy.


20 posted on 04/22/2018 8:19:44 AM PDT by republicanbred (...and when I die I'll be republican dead.)
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