Bush Administration Knew Childhood Vaccines Cause Autism

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Bush Administration Knew Childhood Vaccines Cause Autismhttp://www.dissidentvoice.org/Feb05/Pringle0207-2.htmDissendent VoiceBush Administration Knew Childhood Vaccines Cause Autismby Evelyn J. Pringlewww.dissidentvoice.orgFebruary 7, 2005Vaccines are the only drugs that American children are mandated toreceive. Although it may be true that state governments mandatevaccines, the decision to mandate a vaccine is based on therecommendations of Federal advisory committees. In the interest ofpublic safety, Congress has a duty to ensure that advisory committeemembers involved in vaccine policy making are not improperlyinfluenced by conflicts of interest. In recent years, public trust in the Federal policymaking related tovaccines causing Autism has been broken by the practice of ignoringobvious conflicts of interest. At this point, immediate action byCongress is necessary to restore public confidence in the safety ofchildhood vaccinations.Is There A Link Between Childhood Vaccines And Autism?Is there a connection? I'll let readers judge for themselves.Mercury is a toxic metal that can cause immune, sensory, neurological,motor, and behavioral dysfunctions similar to traits defining orassociated with autism.Thimerosal is an organic mercury compound. It is metabolized toethylmercury and thiosalicylate and has been used since the 1930s as apreservative in many vaccines and pharmaceutical products to preventbacterial and fungal contamination.On Feb 9, 2004, the National Autism Association issued a press releasethat reported on one of the larger studies under review based on theCenter for Disease Control's own Vaccine Safety Datalink. The releasereported that under independent investigation, CDC's data concludeschildren are 27-times more likely to develop autism after exposure tothree thimerosal-containing vaccines (TCVs), than those who receivethimerosal-free versions.Think about it, twenty-seven times more likely to develop autism. Then consider this, our government had this data for years, butdeliberately kept it hidden. This conduct was not due to negligence orlaziness, it was a deliberate cover-up. All those involved should becriminally charge, prosecuted and punished.The children who were affected by this cover-up will require care andsupport for their entire life. These children's lives have beendestroyed. The costs to their parents will reportedly exceed $2million dollars per child. Justice will not be served until thesemercury poisoned kids and their parents get everything necessary tomake the most of their lives.The criminals involved better get out there checkbooks, now!What Did They Know & When Did They Know It?Thimerosal is composed of nearly 50% mercury, which is a known to beespecially harmful to fetuses, infants and children. It has beenlinked to a range of symptoms jointly known as Autism SpectrumDisorders. At one end of the spectrum is severe autism, in whichchildren are socially withdrawn, do not speak and exhibit bizarre,repetitive, and sometimes aggressive behavior. At the other end, areAsperger's Syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism, PervasiveDevelopmental Disorder, Attention Deficit Disorder, and AttentionDeficit Hyperactivity Disorder.Thimerosal was regularly added to childhood vaccines as apreservative, and became a major source of mercury in infants andtoddlers. According to the American Academy of Pediatricians, withinthe first two years of life, fully vaccinated children receivedmercury levels that exceeded long-established safety limits by the FDAand other agencies.However, the focus did not zero in on thimerosal until 1997, whenCongress passed the FDA Modernization Act, which required the FDA toinvestigate all drugs that contained mercury to determine theiradverse effects on humans.Within one year, the FDA called for the removal of allover-the-counter products that contained thimerosal. However, thepreservative was still included in more than 50 vaccines until thePublic Health Service (which includes the FDA, CDC and NIH) and theAmerican Academy of Pediatrics issued a statement in July 1999"urging" vaccine manufacturers to reduce or remove Thimerosal becauseof "theoretical potential for neurotoxicity."So we know by the action taken by the FDA in 1999 that our governmentdefinitely knew about the dangers related to the preservative. But wealso know this because the staff for Rep Dan Burton (R-Ill) obtainedan incriminating FDA internal e-mail written on June 29, 1999, byformer FDA scientist Peter Patriarca, which offered a "pros and cons"assessment of the Thimerosal statement about to be issued at thattime, and listed the questions and issues that would be raised uponits release: (1) FDA being "asleep at the switch" for decades, by allowing apotentially hazardous compound to remain in many childhood vaccines,and not forcing manufacturers to exclude it from new products. (2)Various advisory bodies aggressive recommendations for use. (3) Thedose of ethyl mercury was not generated by "rocket science":conversion of the % of Thimerosal to actual ug [micrograms] of mercuryinvolves 9th grade algebra. (4) What took the FDA so long to do thecalculations? (5) Why didn't CDC and the advisory bodies do thesecalculations while rapidly expanding the childhood immunization schedule?So the experts in the FDA and CDC definitely knew about the dangers. However, an article published on In These Times.com on Nov 11, 2003,raised an interesting question: "If the CDC and FDA seemed toacknowledge the risks of Thimerosal four years ago and the need to getmercury out of medical products, today the official stance is tocircle the wagons against mounting public and scientific criticismabout its handling of the Thimerosal issue."I have the answer. The turn of events can easily be explained by thefact that there had been a changing of the guard under Bush since1999. Keep in mind that the stakes were high for the pharmaceuticalgiant Eli Lilly, a long time friend of the Bush gang, but also thecompany that invented Thimerosal.And sure enough, evidence that Bush came through surfaced when thepharmaceutical industry was granted protection (albeit short-lived)from lawsuits from parents of children who developed autism afterbeing vaccinated, by a provision sneakily tucked into the HomelandSecurity Act, at the very last minute, by Republicans who no doubtwere acting under Bush's direction.Well their little stunt didn't work because the provision was soonrepealed. While the effort to repeal it was under way, Senator DebbieStabenow (D-MI) told Wolf Blitzer on CNN, "What we have in the dead ofnight, a provision put in to help a pharmaceutical company or seriesof companies that help the parents and their rights for protectingtheir children right off at the knees."During the original final debates on the Homeland Security Bill,Senator Bill Frist (R-TN) had argued forcefully for granting liabilityprotection to makers of mercury based vaccine preservatives and saidsuch measures were needed to boost an industry essential for publichealth. He is the only physician in the Senate and one of his party'sleaders on medical issues, the Tennessean reported on Jan 11, 2003.But critics of the provision didn't see it that way and accused"Republicans of tilting the legal system in favor of drug companies atthe expense of autistic children," noted the Tennessean. "Hundreds ofparents have alleged in lawsuits that the vaccine preservativethimerosal caused autism in their children. Eli Lilly & Co., thepreservative's chief maker, and other defendants in the suits deny thecharge," it said.Frist's name came up more than others because he headed the NationalRepublican Senatorial Committee, the Republicans' politicalfund-raising arm. Critics were quick to note the large amount ofmoney that Eli Lilly had donated to Republicans. In fact, thepharmaceutical and health products industry was the largest corporatecontributor to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, whileFrist headed it.And not surprisingly, Eli Lilly was one of the most generouscontributors in the 2002 elections, giving about $1.4 million tofederal candidates and parties, according to the nonpartisan Centerfor Responsive Politics, and three-quarters went to Republicans.Some critics of the amendment pointed out that some top officials atEli Lilly had close ties to the White House. I'll let the readers bethe judge of whether Bush may have had less than admirable motives toallow that provision to remain in the bill. Here's a sample of peopleconnected to the administration who have been on the Eli Lilly payroll:* Former President George Herbert Walker Bush (one-time member ofboard of directors)* George W Bush's former director of Management and Budget, MitchDaniels (a former vice president)* George W Bush's Homeland Security Advisory Council member, SidneyTaurel (current CEO of Eli Lilly)* The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (recipient of Eli Lillyfunding)Reported by Bruce E Levine, PhD, psychologist and author ofCommonsense Rebellion: Taking Back Your Life (New York-London:Continuum, 2003).The Amendment Is RepealedAt the time of debate on repealing the provision, on Jan 3, 2003,MSNBC reported, "many parents across the nation are still fuming overfour small paragraphs at the end of 475 pages designed to protectAmerica.""What it did to the families is it took away their last option,literally or figuratively closed the door on their last access to thecourts of justice," said Professor Lawrence Gostin of GeorgetownUniversity School of Law.According to MSNBC, outgoing House majority leader Rep Dick Armey(R-TX) was behind the amendment and argued that if drug companiesweren't protected, they might refuse to make vaccines, a worry amidfears of bioterrorism.To that argument I would say good! If the richest industry in thecountry refuses to invest a portion of its outrageous profits intofinding vaccines the industry can guarantee are safe to administer tovulnerable children, then they shouldn't be in the vaccine business atall.After listening to Dick Army, congressman Dan Burton (R-IN) wasfurious. Burton has a grandson who is autistic. "For anybody to saythey're proud for putting that kind of an amendment in there is justbeyond me," Burton said.To begin with, when the provision was added to the bill, Burton saidhe was blindsided by Dick Armey's last-minute addition, according toMSNBC. "Now, he can take sole responsibility for it, that's hisprerogative if he wants to, but that amendment is criminal in myopinion," says Burton.In the end, Frist announced a proposal to repeal the amendment. Underthe repealed provision, plaintiffs involved in thimerosal litigationwere forced to seek compensation out of court through a specialvictims fund. Under the proposal Frist agreed to, the provision wouldbe repealed and the legal cases could proceed without interruption,the Tennessean said.Americans Must Demand AccountabilityIn May 2003 the AAP stated, "All routinely recommended infant vaccinescurrently sold in the U.S. are free of thimerosal as a preservativeand have been for more than two years." Yet because the FDA maintainedit did not have enough evidence to justify a recall of thimerosalvaccines distributed prior to the introduction of thimerosal-freeversions and they were allowed to remain on the market until theybecame outdated. That means that poisonous vaccines were stilladministered until November 2002."Because the FDA chose not to recall thimerosal-containing vaccines in1999," the April 2003, House Committee on Government Reform reportconcludes, "in addition to all of those already injured, 8,000children a day continued to be placed at risk for overdose for atleast an additional two years."The public needs to rise up and demand accountability from theofficials in charge of all regulatory agencies involved in concealinginformation that could have saved many families from the devastationcaused by these ill-administered vaccines.In order to enroll in public schools, children are forced to complywith mandatory vaccine programs, which we now know include vaccinesthat may not have undergone the scientific testing necessary toguarantee their safety, and have the potential to harm millions ofchildren each year.If families are expected to trust the Federal government's approval ofvaccines, they have a right to demand that the vaccines administeredare approved based on the best scientific advice possible, without theundue influence of money being handed to politicians, scientists, andthe heads of the regulatory agencies by the pharmaceutical industry.Evelyn Pringle is a columnist for Independent Media TV and aninvestigative journalist focused on exposing corruption in government.She can be reached at: e.pringle.Related Article* Bush Puppets Push for New Law to Protect Drug Companies