Nasty and distasteful. Also physiologically impossible, you are merely trolling now and in a hurtful way.
Autism scare a hoax
- Thread starter billc
- Start date
Nasty and distasteful. Also physiologically impossible, you are merely trolling now and in a hurtful way.
If a fetus is a partially grown adult human, and a 5 year old is a partially grown adult human, why is it OK to kill one with no qualms but, even discussing killing the other is trolling and hurtful? You realize, of course, that some see abortion as being exactly as unconscionable as killing a 5 year old. But, they are intolerant, or ignorant for their view?
I'm not getting into the abortion argument again, for a number of reasons not least that it is sidetracking the thread.
Don, I know yours is a genuine question that deserves an answer just not here, but I'm afraid that Billichik's posts are getting closer and closer to crossing the line between serious posts and trolling. I'm not convinced anymore that what he says is actually meant as a discusson point or whether it's mean to push buttons to enable a flame war on here.
The comment 'maybe they should extend the abortion age to 5 years' was a single sentence, there was no explanation, no comment such as you made which is a reasonable one in my mind, it was just posted and left at that, if it was meant to be amusing it wasn't, if it was meant to convey a serious issue, it didn't. As I said it was distasteful in that form.
OP
- Thread Starter
- #64
I was making the point from the other thread, that you were involved in, that you, granfire and others supported abortion on the grounds that an unwanted child may grow up in the foster system or have a bad life. Granfire, here, pointed out how expensive it is to raise a child with a disability and how difficult it could be. I simply extended your argument about a bad life outcome here. It was late and I didn't feel like spending time elaborating for everyone else out there about the " death sentence t.v." thread.
That word "troll" seems to get tossed out pretty easily by some people who disagree with other people, either what they post or how they decide to post. If you do not like how I post my threads or replys, please, be an adult and do not read them. It is fairly easy to do. Thanks.
That word "troll" seems to get tossed out pretty easily by some people who disagree with other people, either what they post or how they decide to post. If you do not like how I post my threads or replys, please, be an adult and do not read them. It is fairly easy to do. Thanks.
That was another thread, not this one. If you wish to continue the abortion argument either return to that thead or start another.
I don't mind people disagreeing with me in the least, it's interesting to be able to argue my case against another's point of view. However you are constantly posting links from media sites and constantly telling us we are wrong, sometimes you seem to post, as you have done here, sonething to trying and spark an argument off that doesn't belong on here.
Attention all users:
Please keep the conversation polite and respectful. Please return to the original topic.
jks9199
Super Moderator
Everybody -- this is easily another hot topic, but it too can be discussed civilly. Leave the abortion stuff in it's own thread, and let's talk about autism here, OK?
Please keep the conversation polite and respectful. Please return to the original topic.
jks9199
Super Moderator
Everybody -- this is easily another hot topic, but it too can be discussed civilly. Leave the abortion stuff in it's own thread, and let's talk about autism here, OK?
Nomad
Master Black Belt
Multiple studies have looked at the toxicity of thimerosol; the W.H.O. concluded that there was no inherent danger caused by thimerosol in the doses used by vaccine makers. Thimerosol was never in the MMR vaccine (the subject of Wakefield's original research), since it is incompatible with live-virus vaccines.
Nonetheless, US vaccines for children have been thimerosol-free since 1999. If this is the culprit in autism, we should be seeing a drop in autism rates now, not a continued increase.
So where are the "Children injured by heavy metals in pharmaceuticals"? There is no causal connection here, nor even a plausible link.
I am definitely not implying that parents with autistic children are only suing for the money; I think that they're desperately looking for answers of why their children did not turn out like so many others they see around them everyday. Answers which may or may not exist, depending on exactly how big the genetic component turns out to be. There have always been children who were born with a variety of physical and/or mental birth defects, and the only way to prevent this would be to develop better prenatal genetic testing and then choose to intervene and abort the fetus; something many would choose not to do for their own reasons.
I do think that the pharmaceutical companies make attractive targets with deep pockets for lawyers, especially when the burden of proof is not really scientific. You don't have to have sound scientific evidence backing up your claims; you just have to convince a jury that it's true (not the same thing at all, really).
Mercury was a common ingredient to most vaccines prior to 1999 and it still is an ingredient in many vaccines that people take. Please check the insert to the Swine Flu jab I posted above. The ingredients clearly say thimerosol.
After reading the studies and listening to researchers on the matter, the difference between the studies that show it is harmful vs the ones that are not harmful is the time that the various tissues are being tested. For example, one of the studies that looked at the excretion of Hg looked at subjects for four days and noted that mercury levels dropped in the system for four days. The conclusion was that it was all excreted out of the system.
The studies that show that it is unsafe, check the subjects after four days and they test other tissues. They find that the mercury is NOT excreted and that it has accumulated in the brain tissues. Over time and several vaccines later, that mercury bio-accumulates with any other mercury that is coming into the system. The result is poisoning and with individuals who are intolerant to even small amounts of mercury, the brain goes haywire.
IMHO, I think we need to be very careful with pharmaceuticals. The FDA, the WHO, and the NIH are captured agencies. They have revolving doors for Big Pharma and Big Agra execs in high places throughout the agencies. They have billions of dollars riding on making sure these products are marketed and if they can cherry pick the science that supports their product, they will. And if this gambling goes bad, the same people who put in the Revolving Door, make sure to have laws crafted that protect them and to make sure the Justice Dept. looks the other way. This is the level of corruption we are dealing with and I don't know if people can accept that. It's really scary. However, the problem will only get worse until we see this for what it is.
I'm not anti-vaccine or anti-science. I vaccinated my children according to the best information that I could find, because I know these drugs protect humanity from all sorts of terrible diseases. I want safe products, however. I want to have truly independent regulatory agencies that will study these products and have have no vested interests slanting the results. I believe that we need to have a Ralph Nader of Big Pharma, "Unsafe at Any Dose." Americans need to learn about and pay attention to what is happening inside their government and act accordingly.
In the end, I think it comes down to one question. How much do you trust the government? Do you really think they are going to give you a fair assessment of safety even if it eats into the profits of their bosses?
After reading the studies and listening to researchers on the matter, the difference between the studies that show it is harmful vs the ones that are not harmful is the time that the various tissues are being tested. For example, one of the studies that looked at the excretion of Hg looked at subjects for four days and noted that mercury levels dropped in the system for four days. The conclusion was that it was all excreted out of the system.
The studies that show that it is unsafe, check the subjects after four days and they test other tissues. They find that the mercury is NOT excreted and that it has accumulated in the brain tissues. Over time and several vaccines later, that mercury bio-accumulates with any other mercury that is coming into the system. The result is poisoning and with individuals who are intolerant to even small amounts of mercury, the brain goes haywire.
IMHO, I think we need to be very careful with pharmaceuticals. The FDA, the WHO, and the NIH are captured agencies. They have revolving doors for Big Pharma and Big Agra execs in high places throughout the agencies. They have billions of dollars riding on making sure these products are marketed and if they can cherry pick the science that supports their product, they will. And if this gambling goes bad, the same people who put in the Revolving Door, make sure to have laws crafted that protect them and to make sure the Justice Dept. looks the other way. This is the level of corruption we are dealing with and I don't know if people can accept that. It's really scary. However, the problem will only get worse until we see this for what it is.
I'm not anti-vaccine or anti-science. I vaccinated my children according to the best information that I could find, because I know these drugs protect humanity from all sorts of terrible diseases. I want safe products, however. I want to have truly independent regulatory agencies that will study these products and have have no vested interests slanting the results. I believe that we need to have a Ralph Nader of Big Pharma, "Unsafe at Any Dose." Americans need to learn about and pay attention to what is happening inside their government and act accordingly.
In the end, I think it comes down to one question. How much do you trust the government? Do you really think they are going to give you a fair assessment of safety even if it eats into the profits of their bosses?
There has also been a lot more autism diagnoses based on what has been learned about the disorder and the spectrum. In order to see a statistical causation since 1999 we would have to be using the same criteria that was used in 1999. I don't think that is possible.
And yet, through all the bull ****, there remain children who react to vaccinations, are never the same and we're supposed to just believe their high fevers, their seizures, their extended projectile vomiting and explosive diarrhea lasting years just appeared on its own.
The biggest point Wakefield and McCarthy and any parent who has watched their child wither post-vax can make regarding vaccination and autism is this:
Something is going on. We don't know what and neither do doctors. And to turn a deaf ear to people reporting symptoms immediately following a vaccination is unforgivable.
When scientists refute correlation while patients insist correlation, something has to be done. Someone has to research something.
I've had this argument so many times, it's just bizarre to read the same old crap over and over again.
As for hospital data: My son reacted to his first two rounds of vaccinations - none of which, btw, contained the MMR vaccine. We visited the ER four times - none of these visits exist in his medical records. I wonder if this would change if I found a lawyer or joined a class-action suit?
Keep judging, armchair quarterbacks. Unless you've lived it, you ain't got ****.
The biggest point Wakefield and McCarthy and any parent who has watched their child wither post-vax can make regarding vaccination and autism is this:
Something is going on. We don't know what and neither do doctors. And to turn a deaf ear to people reporting symptoms immediately following a vaccination is unforgivable.
When scientists refute correlation while patients insist correlation, something has to be done. Someone has to research something.
I've had this argument so many times, it's just bizarre to read the same old crap over and over again.
As for hospital data: My son reacted to his first two rounds of vaccinations - none of which, btw, contained the MMR vaccine. We visited the ER four times - none of these visits exist in his medical records. I wonder if this would change if I found a lawyer or joined a class-action suit?
Keep judging, armchair quarterbacks. Unless you've lived it, you ain't got ****.
Empty Hands
Senior Master
No, we got a raft of scientific evidence and reasoning. This isn't a "my opinion vs. your opinion" thing, this is about the facts. The best evidence to date indicates with some confidence that vaccines do not cause autism. Like all scientific statements, it is value-free. No judgments involved.
Which is not to say that vaccinations are harmless. Vaccinations have a defined adverse reaction profile, which in some rare cases can even be deadly. According to the CDC for instance, the anaphylaxis (which can be deadly) rate with the MMR vaccine is 1 in 600,000. Like all medical treatments, the risk (there are always risks) must be weighed against the benefit. A child's chance of getting M, M or R and being damaged or killed must be weighed against the chances that the vaccine will be harmful and that the harmful effects will match or outweigh the disease. For society at large, the calculus clearly favors vaccination.
Which is cold comfort for those who react adversely to the vaccine, I understand. But getting the disease could have been worse. Or maybe it would never have happened. It's all about probability and random chances, there are no guarantees.
I don't think anyone is stating that vaccine reactions should be overlooked. Nor is anyone saying that vaccine reactions do not occur. Most (if not all) parents are given a sheet to sign that they are aware of potential reactions, including death and that they should report reactions.
I cannot quote offhand the studies, but I know there are some searching for the relation between kids with autism and 'gut' issues. (Not a vaccine related study, simply a gastroenterology type one). I think it's possible that while kids with autism can have diarrhea/constipation/reflux, etc. without it being a vaccine reaction.
I completely agree.
I agree. I will say that parent observation has flaws. And sometimes parents, while well-meaning and possibly believing every word they say is true, sometimes re-create the past. They listen to other parents and chime in to agree. However, if you track back their posts, blogs, etc far enough, they are proven wrong in their own words. The sad fact is that sometimes parents listen to hype and believe it.
I think Wakefield has done more harm TO the autism community than any medical establishment could ever do. He had significant financial gain with his findings and stood to gain a lot more if the stories are true of his patent on single jab measles (or was it rubella?) went through. He is the person we should be mad at, not each other and not 'Big Pharma'.
No kidding. This is part of the harm I think Wakefield has caused. There is no other disability related community that is so outspoken and divided as Autism. We have the most god-awful treatments for our kids all for the sake of 'curing' them and bringing back our star football player or our head cheerleader. We have clean rooms, chelation, electric parasite zappers, numerous vitamin/supplement protocols, hbot, the list goes on.
There is a specific phone line to contact if you have reactions. Did you ever call it? I do think it's important that reactions are documented. Depending on the age of your child (I believe there is a 3 yr cut off after the date), you may still be able to report it. You can absolutely insist that your pediatrician put this in your child's medical records. I've found that most doctors do not correspond with each other unless the parent initiates it. For us, we have all doctors and hospitals send a copy of everything to our pediatrician. He is the 'hub' so to speak. Every medical facility we go to, I ask if they are going to send it and there is usually a form I have to fill out. Sometimes, I call our pediatrician's office and leave a note for the nurse to document in our file that my daughter had to go to this or that facility for treatment, illness or whatever.
I'm sorry that your son had such a bad reaction. If i were in your shoes, I would be worried (and angry) about them as well. Just as a side note, if you haven't tested for allergies, you may want to look into that. I know that some kids with allergies (I think eggs?) react to vaccinations.
I don't think anyone is judging. I do think that the topic is a sensitive one for many people.
All the best to you and yours...
Archangel M
Senior Master
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http://autismvancouver.blogspot.com/2011/01/vaccines-do-not-cause-autism-something.html
The signs of autism often begin to appear around the same time that children are vaccinated, it is just a coincidence, not a cause.
The signs of autism often begin to appear around the same time that children are vaccinated, it is just a coincidence, not a cause.
Nomad
Master Black Belt
Um, sorry, I'm not buying this. As a researcher who works in the Pharmaceutical Industry, I can definitively state that the job of the FDA has absolutely nothing to do with helping the pharmaceutical industry. They are there to protect the public, and do so vigorously. They are the biggest hurdle (with the possible exception of Japanese regulatory bodies, but that's another story) in the world to introducing a new medication.
In fact, rather than the revolving door you're suggesting, the FDA has been constantly raising the bar for new medications for the last few decades; requiring longer and more expensive Phase III (safety) trials, and looking into ANY adverse effects very carefully before allowing new drugs on the market. In some areas, they have in fact stifled research into certain targets (for example PPAR agonists as anti-diabetes drugs) by making the hurdles too high and expensive for any potential new drug to clear them.
They do not cherry pick the data; all data related to any potential new drug is very carefully evaluated, and the FDA often requires further testing to follow-up anomalous data (for example, an adverse effect seen in rats that doesn't translate into the higher species like dogs or monkeys (whose genome is much closer to ours).
Companies who have failed to disclose results or who have misrepresented their results (not the same thing) have been severely punished, and often face shareholder lawsuits like the ones that recently hit Sequenom (an interesting case study in mis-representing how their data was collected).
It is MUCH more difficult to get a new compound to market with FDA approval than it was 10, 20, or 30 years ago. Many drugs which have been marketed for decades, like Tylenol for instance, would never make it today.
There have been a number of medications withdrawn from the market years after release; in the vast majority of these cases, it was based on data of adverse responses which only became apparent after many years of dosing in very large populations. The FDA is then the organization which usually initiates the withdrawal, although many times the "evil pharmaceutical company" voluntarily withdraws a multi-billion dollar drug when the science indicates that it is causing harm beyond what's acceptable for the class of drug (different toxicity or adverse effect profiles are acceptable for different drugs; ie the acceptable profile for an efficacious drug against a virulent form of cancer is far different from one for diabetes, where the patient is expected to be on the medication for a very prolonged period).
I know less about the NIH and WHO other than their stated missions, so won't comment on them.
Well, if you want to see this from another perspective, here are some resources.
1. Seeds of Deception - This book is about GMO, but it details the FDA Revolving Door better then anything I've seen and is a great topic for another thread. This book relates to this thread, however, because it details how the FDA cherry picks studies in order to approve products that Revolving Door execs want approved.
2. The Risks of Prescription Drugs is a tome that details two decades of research from 1985 to 2005. It shows how the Revolving Door has compromised the FDA's regulatory power to a point where anything can get through if you have the right connections.
In the end, believe what you want. Give your children injections with thimerosal if you wish. You are responsible for it. I have seen enough evidence that suggests that this is a bad idea. The revolving door in government agencies is clearly documented. The negative impact on public health of rushing all of these products through is heavily detailed. And the justice system in this country is heavily skewed in their favor.
If you take these drugs and are hurt by them, you will find no justice. From what I have read and experienced, I have drawn the conclusion that the regulatory agencies in government are compromised, that the Justice department is compromised, and that Congress is bought and paid for. I don't know how bad it has to get before some people finally accept this, but I'm hoping it doesn't take too long.
The longer we wait and twiddle our thumbs and pretend like everything is OK, the more people are going to get hurt. Also, the longer we wait, the more laws are passed that protect the real culprits from accountability. It's a perfect storm of corruption and we are standing in a hurricane of pills, needles, and processed food. If you don't have even a mild skepticism on this matter, you are playing Russian Roulette and you don't even know that their are bullets in the gun.
Nomad
Master Black Belt
All drugs have risks.
Any time you're putting a foreign substance into your body (or artificially manipulating levels of endogenous chemicals, hormones, etc), there is an inherent risk involved. This risk arises partially from the fact that we're not all clones of one another, and have different dose requirements, different gene sequences and genetic predispositions.
Making a new drug that can intervene in human disease is an incredibly difficult process. Finding one that can do so with perfect selectivity is nearly impossible, since often the same drug targets in different tissues may serve different functions, since many drug targets are VERY closely related to many other receptors or proteins we'd rather not cross-react with, and since the full mechanisms of biofeedback, receptor agonism and antagonism, and protein-protein interactions are often not fully understood.
In short, manipulating people's health is an extremely complex job. With any medication, there are inherent risks involved. Part of the job of the drug company and the FDA are to have as clear an understanding as possible of the risks, and to weigh them against the benefits associated with that drug.
Personally, I prefer to avoid medications unless absolutely necessary, and take a prophylactic approach to health; I try to eat right, exercise, and minimize my need for drugs. Still, when I've had a life-threatening pneumonia in the past, I was awfully glad that the greedy pharmaceutical companies had several varieties of penicillin for sale to fix it.
Characterizing pharmaceutical companies as evil is simply false. Collectively, they have done more to increase human lifespan, health, and quality of life than any other industry. Period.
The vilification of this industry to me is quite sad; the vast majority of the scientists, researchers, and physicians I know in pharmaceuticals are not here to make a quick buck (trust me, I'm in the wrong job for that!), but are here to help intervene and make a positive difference in world health through the application of solid science. Yet somehow many people view the industry worse than Big Tobacco, Big Oil, Gun Manufacturers, and maybe a little higher than child pornographers.
This is based on a few fairly isolated incidents where there was clear wrongdoing or outright greed that led an individual or a company to some bad decisions, and gives the entire industry a black eye. Isolated incidents where researchers have knowingly falsified data have led to severe punishments within the scientific community and frequently also large lawsuits against the company he/she worked for at the time. Case in point, and somewhat relevant to the OP, would be Dr. Wakefield himself.
If you have worked at the FDA and have observed the corruption you described, or have managed to get a drug to market through this revolving door, then I'll stand corrected, and will go find another line of work. If not, it's hearsay from people that may simply have their own axe to grind, and it does not match with my experience at one of the top 5 pharmaceutical companies in the world at all.
Any time you're putting a foreign substance into your body (or artificially manipulating levels of endogenous chemicals, hormones, etc), there is an inherent risk involved. This risk arises partially from the fact that we're not all clones of one another, and have different dose requirements, different gene sequences and genetic predispositions.
Making a new drug that can intervene in human disease is an incredibly difficult process. Finding one that can do so with perfect selectivity is nearly impossible, since often the same drug targets in different tissues may serve different functions, since many drug targets are VERY closely related to many other receptors or proteins we'd rather not cross-react with, and since the full mechanisms of biofeedback, receptor agonism and antagonism, and protein-protein interactions are often not fully understood.
In short, manipulating people's health is an extremely complex job. With any medication, there are inherent risks involved. Part of the job of the drug company and the FDA are to have as clear an understanding as possible of the risks, and to weigh them against the benefits associated with that drug.
Personally, I prefer to avoid medications unless absolutely necessary, and take a prophylactic approach to health; I try to eat right, exercise, and minimize my need for drugs. Still, when I've had a life-threatening pneumonia in the past, I was awfully glad that the greedy pharmaceutical companies had several varieties of penicillin for sale to fix it.
Characterizing pharmaceutical companies as evil is simply false. Collectively, they have done more to increase human lifespan, health, and quality of life than any other industry. Period.
The vilification of this industry to me is quite sad; the vast majority of the scientists, researchers, and physicians I know in pharmaceuticals are not here to make a quick buck (trust me, I'm in the wrong job for that!), but are here to help intervene and make a positive difference in world health through the application of solid science. Yet somehow many people view the industry worse than Big Tobacco, Big Oil, Gun Manufacturers, and maybe a little higher than child pornographers.
This is based on a few fairly isolated incidents where there was clear wrongdoing or outright greed that led an individual or a company to some bad decisions, and gives the entire industry a black eye. Isolated incidents where researchers have knowingly falsified data have led to severe punishments within the scientific community and frequently also large lawsuits against the company he/she worked for at the time. Case in point, and somewhat relevant to the OP, would be Dr. Wakefield himself.
If you have worked at the FDA and have observed the corruption you described, or have managed to get a drug to market through this revolving door, then I'll stand corrected, and will go find another line of work. If not, it's hearsay from people that may simply have their own axe to grind, and it does not match with my experience at one of the top 5 pharmaceutical companies in the world at all.
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I think the problem is that autism is a very broad disorder, diagnosed by its symptoms rather than by cause. Autism also begins to be evident around the same time as various vaccinations take place. There are anecdotes of "overnight" changes at the time of vaccinations; it's hard to refute an anecdote, though perhaps with the vast increase in video records over the last few years, we may have some better evidence in the future to support the anecdotes.
We also have more behaviors diagnosed as autistic or autism spectrum disorders -- just like we have ADHD because in the past, the same behavior would have been called boys being boys. We're more sensitized and so we diagnose autism or Asperger's or something similar in cases where, a few years ago, we would have simply labeled the kid as "a little odd" or being "a shy one" or "reserved."
There's no easy answer, and there's no quick way to solve this. I suspect that, in time, what we label as autism and autism spectrum disorders will be further broken down, and that some of the causes will be identified. Much like we've come to recognize different forms of depression, we'll probably identify different forms of autism. Some will be caused by structures within the brain or nervous system, some will be developmental, and some will be triggered by outside factors in a person with predispositions. Some will be treatable; some won't.
We also have more behaviors diagnosed as autistic or autism spectrum disorders -- just like we have ADHD because in the past, the same behavior would have been called boys being boys. We're more sensitized and so we diagnose autism or Asperger's or something similar in cases where, a few years ago, we would have simply labeled the kid as "a little odd" or being "a shy one" or "reserved."
There's no easy answer, and there's no quick way to solve this. I suspect that, in time, what we label as autism and autism spectrum disorders will be further broken down, and that some of the causes will be identified. Much like we've come to recognize different forms of depression, we'll probably identify different forms of autism. Some will be caused by structures within the brain or nervous system, some will be developmental, and some will be triggered by outside factors in a person with predispositions. Some will be treatable; some won't.
Nomad
Master Black Belt
This has already started to happen, and some of the genetic culprits of some forms of autism at least are starting to come to light. Intervention in these is tricky, but possible, and I know of groups working on the problem as we write this.
