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Tuohon rokotetutkimukseen liittyen:
"The authors of the Andrew et al. study failed to disclose their significant conflicts of interests to the readership of Pediatrics: Elizabeth Miller disclosed in her 2001 publication (1) and in 2002 to the Committee on the Safety of Medicines previously disclosed that she has received funding to study vaccines from Aventis Pasteur, Wyeth Vaccines, SmithKline Beecham, Baxter Health Care, North American Vaccine, Wyeth- Lederle Vaccine, and Chiron Biocine; and Nick Andrews, Julia Stowe, and Brent Taylor all disclosed in 2001 that they received funding to study vaccines from Wyeth Vaccines and SmithKline Beecham (1). These companies all are or were makers of thimerosal-containing vaccines.
This study seems disingenuous, since the British Government has announced the removal of thimerosal from their routine childhood vaccines effective the end of September 2004. The BBC wrote on 7 August 2004, “Vaccine scrapped over autism fear. A vaccine containing mercury given to babies when they are eight weeks old is to be scrapped amid fears of a link with autism. The move follows recent research in America that suggests a connection between mercury used to preserve whooping cough vaccine, and autism.” Health Minister John Hutton confirmed the changes stating, ‘Childhood immunization has been extremely effective in protecting children from serious-life threatening diseases, We are continually looking at ways to improve this program as new, more effective products become available.’ We congratulate the British Government for doing the right thing, and predict that the new vaccine will soon result in a concomitant drop in the currently devastating rate of neurodevelopmental disorders in England as has already potentially been seen in California which has reported a three-consecutive quarter decrease in the number of new cases of autism for the first time in approximately 20 years among children receiving childhood vaccines with reduced thimerosal content.
Unfortunately, thimerosal continues to remain in many vaccines in the US. Influenza vaccine has been added to the routine childhood immunization schedule, and the CDC has refused to state a preference for children to receive thimerosal-free influenza vaccine despite their position of encouraging the removal of thimerosal from childhood vaccines,
The current study was extremely underpowered in its ability to discern the effects of thimerosal on neurodevelopmental disorders because it only examined a maximum exposure of 75 micrograms of mercury in the first year of life and further limited potential thimerosal exposure differences by excluding children that had not received 75 micrograms of mercury from childhood vaccines by age one. The study did contain analyses for tics based upon exposure at 3, 4, and all mercury exposure, when using a reference group of children not receiving any mercury from thimerosal-containing childhood vaccines during the first year of life. The results of these analyses showed that there were statistically significantly increased hazard ratios for tics at 3 months. By comparison, there was no statistically significant correlation between mercury exposure from thimerosal-containing vaccines and tics by excluding children not receiving thimerosal-containing vaccines during the first year of life. The authors provide no other complete data for any other outcomes when employing children receiving no mercury during the first year of life as the reference population. The tic result in the Andrews et al. study is similar to a previous study, from the Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) database (2), indicating an apparent causal relationship between mercury containing childhood vaccines and the development of tics.
This study has virtually no applicability to the US experience with thimerosal. Despite incorrect statements to the contrary by Andrews et al., by 4 months of age US children received approximately 2-fold higher doses of mercury from vaccines (125 micrograms) compared to those England (75 micrograms). This study contains significant biases because sicker children were the ones that tended to have vaccinations delayed resulting in an apparent preventive effective for mercury on the risks of neurodevelopmental disorders.
It has become apparent from recently emerging clinical, animal model, and molecular evidence that thimerosal is indeed responsible for neurodevelopmental disorders in a substantial number of children, regardless of the findings of large population-based epidemiological studies. Independent investigators have shown children with autistic spectrum disorders have significantly higher body-burdens of mercury than those of neurotypical children (3-5), a genetically susceptible mouse strain develops autistic features, including: growth delay, reduced locomotion, exaggerated response to novelty, increased brain size, decreased numbers of Purkinje cells, significant abnormalities in brain architecture, affecting areas sub-serving emotion and cognition, and densely packed hyperchromic hippocampal neurons with altered glutamate receptors and transporters following administration of thimerosal mimicking the US childhood immunization schedule (6), and molecular studies in vitro have demonstrated that acute thimerosal exposure at extremely low concentrations (i.e. at parts-per-million or lower) (7-9), that are comparable to the expected body distribution of mercury resulting from thimerosal-containing vaccines that were administered in the US, can kill or significantly adversely effect neuronal growth and development. Pharmacokinetic studies on infant primates exposed to solutions containing similar concentrations of thimerosal, as thimerosal-containing vaccine childhood vaccines, have shown that the half-life of mercury in the brain of the infant primates was approximately 28 days (10). Male mice were at considerably more sensitive than females to the neurotoxic effects of low dose alkyl mercury exposure (11). These results were consistent with some human fetal/infant population exposures to low doses of alkyl mercury where it has been observed that males were more sensitive than females to psychomotor retardation. Autistic spectrum disorders, of course, are significantly more prevalent in males than females (12).
In conclusion, we are, and always have been, strong supporters of the US vaccine program and of pediatricians that administer vaccines, but given the fact that many US states now have either banned (Iowa), or are in the process of banning thimerosal, (California, Missouri, Nebraska, and New York, among many others) and given that fact that there is now a bipartisan national bill introduced in the US House of Representatives (Weldon/Maloney bill) to ban it nationally, we now strongly suggest that the United States pediatricians should insist on giving only thimerosal- free vaccines, lest they become involved in the terrible morass of lawsuits that are already beginning on this issue.
Mark R. Geier,MD, Ph.D.,
geneticist/vaccinologist
THE GENETIC CENTERS OF AMERICA,
David A. Geier , Medcon, Inc.
References
1. Miller E, Waight P, Farrington CP, Andrews N, Stowe J, Taylor B. Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura and MMR vaccine. Arch Dis Child 2001;84:227-9.
2. Verstraeten T, Davis RL, DeStefano F, Lieu TA, Rhodes PH, Black SB, Shinefield H, Chen RT; Vaccine Safety Datalink Team. Safety of thimerosal-containing vaccines: a two-phased study of computerized health maintenance organization databases. Pediatrics 2003;112:1039-48.
3. Bradstreet J, Geier DA, Kartzinel JJ, Adams JB, Geier MR. A case- control study of mercury body-burden in children with autistic spectrum disorders. J Am Phys Surg 2003;8:76-9.
4. Holmes AS, Blaxill MF, Haley BE. Reduced levels of mercury in first baby haircuts of autistic children. Int J Toxicol 2003;22:277-85.
5. Hu LW, Bernard JA, Che J. Neutron activation analysis of hair samples for the identification of autism. Trans Am Nucl Soc 2003;89.
6. Hornig M, Chian D, Lipkin WI. Neurotoxic effects of postnatal thimerosal are mouse strain dependent. Mol Psychiatry 2004;9:833-45.
7. Baskin DS, Ngo H, Didenko VV. Thimerosal induces DNA breaks, caspase-3 activation, membrane damage, and cell death in cultured human neurons and fibroblasts. Toxicol Sci 2003;74:361-8.
8. Waly M, Olteanu H, Banerjee R, Choi SW, Mason JB, Parker BS et al. Activation of methionine synthase by insulin-like growth factor-1 and dopamine: a target for neurodevelopmental toxins and thimerosal. Mol Psychiatry 2004;9:358-70.
9. Brunner M, Albertini S, Wurgler FE. Effects of 10 known or suspected spindle poisons in the in vitro porcine brain tubulin assembly assay. Mutagenesis 1991;6:65-70.
10. Institute of Medicine (US). Immunization Safety Review: Vaccines and Autism. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 2004.
11. Clarkson TW, Nordberg FJ, Sager PR. Reproductive and developmental toxicity of metals. Scand J Work Environ Health 1985;11:145- 54.
12. Bertrand J, Mars A, Boyle C, Bove F, Yeargin-Allsopp M, Decoufle P. Prevalence of autism in a United States population: the Brick Township, New Jersey, investigation. Pediatrics 2001;108:1155-61.
Dr. Mark R. Geier has been a consultant and expert witness in cases involving vaccines before the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program and in civil litigation. David A. Geier has been a consultant in cases involving vaccines before the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program and in civil litigation. "
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