truth~I find your rationale puzzling..and downright scary. You are spreading your propaganda into scaring others away from vaccinating. I suggest you research how vaccination works with our immune systems to keep us healthier. A little education can't hurt...

As for saying that the polio epidemic that spread across our nation (and was virtually wiped out by vaccinating) does not mirror the situation we face with a potential pandemic flu outbreak, THAT argument is just ridiculous.

..and comparing the situation as it is RIGHT NOW to the actual polio epidemic of the past is downright silly.

nurse- These tragedies happen, but that doesn't mean the "flu" was the sole cause of the death or that it was THIS particular strain, or that the vaccine would have prevented it...There IS also the possibility that the vaccine would have done the child as much harm as good.

There are 14 developmental research facilities in the US looking into Autistic Spectrum Disorders...The UW Waisman center, though they do a good job in diagnosing, is the only 1 in the US who does not believe that diet and the biomedical supports play any role in autism.
Of the supports groups I've visited in 4 different states I hear the least about functioning recovery from parents in Wisconsin.
Lastly, why do you think the federal government went through the expense of producing mercury free vaccines and left it to the parents to decide to immunize or not?
1 in 98 now fall on the autism spectrum....how many families do you that are affected?

Woman disabled by this year's flu vaccine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8riAeGh4...
Don't buy into the H1N1 hype and have this vaccine tested on your and your family.

truth1~The flu "is no big deal",,,tell that to the parents of the child that just passed away in Green County...

If a mom really does do her "homework", she will learn that vaccines have been proven beyond a doubt to be safe. Absolutely NO link to autism has been found from multiple, and I repeat, multiple studies involving the DTP, MMR, and thimerasol/mercury suspicions, among others. There only "appears" to be a link, because these injections are given at the same time that children begin to display the developmental issues of autism. Preservatives have been removed from all vaccines with the exception of the flu shot (and you can get that preservative free if you want to) in response to these unfounded concerns, and we still have an increase in the number of cases of autism every year. More children than ever are receiving preservative free vaccines these days, but it has done nothing to decrease the number of children who develop autism. If anything the numbers of autistic children are still increasing. As is evidenced by some of the posts above, there will always be what are called "true believers" who will persist in their belief that immunizations caused their child's problems despite the completely overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Most of the evidence given above such as that given by MW100 comes from websites or sources devoted to the anti-immunization cause. In fact, if you type in "immunizations" into a browser, you will hit on more unethical, bogus websites than legitimate ones, so it is very difficult to get accurate information and not just emotional hype. Instead you get a lot of statistics which appear convincing, but are just a small portion of the whole story. For example, there may be one non-scientific,flawed study supporting the link between autism and the MMR vaccine and 20 subsequent ones done scientifically which show no link. Yet the flawed study is the one from which the data is taken. How is the study flawed? For example, one person doing such a flawed study did it on only six children. This is not a large enough sample to provide accurate data. When confronted with this, supporters will still say that the one, flawed study proves their theory. You can show them study after study after study disproving the link and it won't do any good. They will still point to the one flawed study as evidence of the link they believe is there. I strongly encourage any parent wishing to cut through the hype, to visit the CDC website. To paraphrase the words of one of the leading autism experts from the Wiseman Center in Madison, who spoke at last year's Immunization Conference at the American Family Conference Center, "Jenny McCarthy and the anti-immunization crusade have done more harm to children than they can ever know."

does her child eat tOOOO much fish????

This all plays well with conspiracy freaks. Perhaps the ladies on The View will liken vaccinations it to the 9/11 Truth Squads - must be a government conspiracy to kill us all.

No real evidence that this "flu" is any big deal and some are comparing this to polio, etc??
GET REAL

Our life span is lower, because we fill our mouths with crap. Half of our population is obese and doesn't exercise.

With access to the best health care system and medication in the world United states still ranks 17th in average life spans.....Hmmmm, Whats going on kids? The medical model we have been taught to follow is corrupt and flawed. With Information at hand let Individuals decide whats good for them and there families With out persecution from others. JET

Thumbs down to RichE for having a closed mind. Perhaps if we were this enlightened in the 50's, then we'd have safer alternatives by now.

Thumbs down to the Gazette for giving credibility to disproven urban myths about vaccinations. Thankfully we were not so enlightened in the 1950's or polio would still run rampant.

Not enought kids with Leg Braces any more?. not enough young men sterile from Mumps? oh ya, last person living in an Iorn Lung died. Not enough cemetries with childerns Grave Stone lined up by age.

Kitten - thats right I want people to educate themselves. If you follow the current pediatric recommended vaccination schedule your children will recieve 237 micrograms of mercury preservative from vaccines by the time they are 2.
Vaccines played an important role in our history but lets make a healthier product now and DEMAND that of the drug companies...
lets look at this vaccine schedule and rethink it.....
Tens of Thousands of parents say I vaccinated my child and something happened!!!
if we don't reevaluate this issue...thousands more will say it

Here's some food for thought:
*Thimerasol is only 1 type of mercury preservative.
*The EPA says a level no more than 1 microgram of mercury is safe per day...the flu vaccine has 25 micrograms
*in 1987 the CDC Center for Disease Control recommended 11 vaccinations in 2008 they recommended 37
*Each shot contains 10 times the mercury than we allow in a can of tuna
*vaccines also contain antifreeze, aluminum and formaldahyde

1 in 100 children fall on the autism spectrum
it costs approx 25 thousand a year to provide supports

Thank you, MW100, for very useful information.

MW100, I know a physician who works for the Institute of Medicine. I know he takes his job seriously. I don't believe the Institute would issue its findings frivolously. "Ties to the CDC" is a silly thing to say as both are government agencies (the Institute is by design more independent). The best one can say is that the findings are disputed; I don't really get very excited by charges of a conspiracy theory where there is nothing to be gained.

I believe the mother of this article really just wants people to educate themselvels about vaccinations. You can look up ingredients in vaccinations at www.informedchoice.info/cocktail.html or just google ingredients in vaccinations. Thimerisol is still in a lot of vaccinations, not to mention formaldehyde, aluminum, and phenol (just to name a few). My point here is one vaccination may not seem like a big deal, but when children are getting 4 and 5 of them, then the quantity of these "chemicals" added to the vaccinations definitely increases. I believe people should educate themselves before just doing "what everyone else is doing". Vaccinations should be a personal choice and people should not be made to feel like they have to get them.

Also, Florence Nightingale changed the way hospitals worked and provided sanitation rationale during the Crimean War 1853-1856. So, while the frontlines were primitive, the rest of the world had made huge advances in healthcare before 1918.

evansvillehousewife~Where do you get your information from? The first IVs were used in the 1830s..almost a full century BEFORE the 1918 pandemic. Try again.

Also, the influenza virus is an ever mutating virus that has core RNA. The virus is able to invade a cell and use that cell to produce millions of viruses, however, only about 400 viruses actually survive. Sort of like an assembly line. These new viruses can have their RNA shift, creating a different mutant of the virus. A vaccination helps to provide memory to the B Cells in our immune system so that when the flu virus enters our bodies, the memory cells can launch an attack quicker because they recognize that virus as an invader, even if some of the RNA is different, some still remains the same. This offers protection and gives the human body a jump start on getting rid of the foreign viruses.

Nurse4u, while a nasty flu, the major killer in the Spanish Flu epidemic had more to do with the fact that there were no IV's and ways to rehydrate sick people. Also no loperamide to slow fluid loss through the large intestine, no disinfectant or decent sanitation, no clean hospital. Also no central heating, dialysis, or parenteral nutrition.

Whats so hugely ironic about this is the "agencies" that had info about 9-11 and said/did NOTHING......and now the other "agencies" are screaming "wolf" over this?....need any more be said?

FDA and CDC, nothing but liars and crooks...

tote:
The 70's swine flu vaccine did not save anyone. It was all hype, and the flu never killed anyone (and millions never got the vaccine) after one case was reported on a military base, and panic spread. You can google it, and read all about it, if you don't believe me. I am NOT claiming that is happening all over again. I should just make one caucious about trusting anything being touted. As lovemycountry posted..The FDA, has been in the bag for many of these drug companies for decades, and screwed things up, over and over.

If I had to make a choice to get flu or polio, it would definitely be flu.

I would rather get the swine flu then have the vaccine, myself. The swine flu is no big deal. I have a friend out East who got it after he came home from a Hawaiian vacation. You get over it in about a week. One of his daughters (10 years old) also got it. It's really no big deal. It's all been WAY over hyped. Serious problems only arise if you have other health problems that weaken your immune system.
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If it's a child, that's obviously a decision a parent should make on their own. I don't have kids, but I'm sure many parents would feel the way I would, and that is I don't need the government making the decision on my kids health and safety for me. Many of you do gooders may be surprised that people can actually make decisions on their own. Oh know that is shocking to many of you.

truth1~Tell that to the millions that died from The Spanish Flu of 1918...

When my children were vaccinated last week, I asked for the thimerosal free vaccine. The clinic vaccinated without that without a problem.I do NOT know if the mercury in the vaccines is causing autism or not, but why take the chance? Remember, Alice in Wonderland's The Mad Hatter? They used to use mercury to keep the hats in shape..hence, they became crazy...

In my opinion, its a gamble either way..
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I will NOT be getting any "vaccines"...Stuff like polio fall into a whole different category than flu and cannot in any way be compared in severity or risk.
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One of the things that makes me super-skeptical about vaccines is the use of the false terms "immunization" and "immunize"...NOTHING makes you "immune" to anything, it may help to a greater or lesser degree but it WON'T make you "immune", its silly and blatantly dishonest to use that term.
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The correct and honest term to use is "vaccination".

Which is easier to deal with, not getting your child a flu and the small chance that they die or getting a flu shot and the small chance they become autisic?

frusion-MW100 is NOT correct in regards to ethylmercury-it is not true that it is converted to mercury and deposits in brain tissue-it is excreted through the kidneys and eliminated from the body much faster that mercury,which is precisely the reason that it was/is used in some vaccines-and there is NO recognized reputable,controlled from any study ever done-including well controlled studies from outside the U.S.(which are obviously not controlled by the FDA,etc)- that has ever shown ANY association betwen thimerosal and autism-thimerosal DOES NOT cause autism-pure and simple

buckyboy, can you be more specific on how MW100 is stupid and ignorant? MW100 is stating facts relating to mercury and it's poison affects to humans and I need to understand how he is wrong.

MW100 what would you suggest pregnant women do about the H1N1 vaccine? They appear to be the ones most effected by the virus. If they don't get the shot, the virus could kill them.

Yes -as a matter of fact I am up to date-are you???????????? And have you seen anyone lately die from any vaccine preventable illnesses like I have? And if someone dies from a preventable illness because they did not receive a vaccine because of the advice you are giving, will you take personal responsibility for that death? 'Cuz if not you are a bigger hypocrite than anyone else on this web site

Janesvillean - you linked to the FDA website to show a finding supporting the FDA's past activity. That's like linking to Lex Luther's site quoting him saying he has not and will not harm Superman.

Buckyboy, Are you up to date on your 40 something injections of 17 different vaccines like the ones forced on our children. If not, you're a hypocrite.

Janesvillian, You cite the findings of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) without mentioning that the IOM was hired (paid) by the CDC to issue a report on "Vaccines and Autism." The CDC approves, mandates, promotes, and distributes vaccines. You do not mention that every member of the IOM committee had ties to the vaccine program. Also, there were no independent toxicologists on this committee. One would think this would be important when considering the safety of mercury in vaccines.

This is a page summarizing the results of a study by the US Institute of Medicine, which was charged by Congress with studying the question of a link between thimerosal and autism. The IOM concluded that while the hypothesis of a link was "biologically plausible", as of 2004 the "body of evidence favors rejection of a causal relationship between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism". Further, the IOM warned that the "benefits of vaccination are proven and the hypothesis of susceptible populations is presently speculative, and that widespread rejection of vaccines would lead to increases in incidences of serious infectious diseases".
http://www.fda.gov/BiologicsBloodVaccine...
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Barring dramatically new research, this is likely to be the final word on the matter for some time.

Thanks MW100 for your post. I was thinking the same thing about Ms. Cain's statement.

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!
Can't believe all the total and complete ignorance and stupidity of MW100 etal not to mention outright lies re:thimerosal as it relates to vaccines and autism. Perhaps we should return to the days of thousands of children dying from polio,whooping cough,meningitis,etc. Certainly would change the dynamic re:the current health insurance reform debate-don't have to offer insurance to all those dead people!!!!

Thank you for this article.

I have a friend who is the mother of six children. One day, she took the younger five, ranging from infancy to early elementary years, and all normal, healthy children, to the doctor for checkups. They were given shots that day, and, within weeks, all five became autistic. Only the oldest child, who did not receive the shots that day, was unharmed. You can't convince me that the change in the younger five, suddenly after having received shots from the same lot, was coincidence. Now, years later, after various sorts of behavioral, medical, and nutritional therapy, a couple of those children are able to be mainstreamed in school but are still considered "on the spectrum", while others are still severely disabled. The eldest? She's just fine, bright, and starting out in her chosen career. Too bad that her siblings' aren't still on the same path.

Now, over 1 in every 100 children in the U.S. is autistic, and I've heard many, many parent stories that seem to connect it to vaccination and to mercury/metal/chemical contamination.

totellthetruth, I see where you derive your logic toward the drug companies getting sued, but if they are not held culpable, they are going to go for the big profit and to get the big profit, they are going to push and lobby the FDA. We've already experienced drugs hitting the market after being approved by the FDA that were subsequently pulled because they were unsafe. Call me stupid, but I will not be in line for any flu vaccines.

Rock County Health Officer Karen Cain says,
"We get calls from parents periodically wondering about the [mercury] preservative in the vaccine," she said. But it's really such a tiny, tiny amount in the vaccine that it really isn't a concern."

This statement shows that Karen Cain, like almost all public health officials pushing vaccines, don't have a clue about mercury. Here are the facts for anyone who's interested;

0.5 parts per billion (ppb) mercury = Kills human neuroblastoma cells (Parran et al., Toxicol Sci 2005; 86: 132-140).

2 ppb mercury = U.S. EPA limit for drinking water

20 ppb mercury = Neurite membrane structure destroyed (Leong et al., Neuroreport 2001; 12: 733-37).

200 ppb mercury = level in liquid the EPA classifies as hazardous waste based on toxicity characteristics.

25,000 ppb mercury = Concentration of mercury in multi-dose, Hepatitis B vaccine vials, administered at birth from 1991-2001 in the U.S. but no other industrialized countries.

50,000 ppb mercury = Concentration of mercury in multi-dose DTaP and Haemophilus B vaccine vials, administered 8 times in the 1990’s to children at 2, 4, 6, 12 and 18 months of age and currently “preservative” level mercury in multi-dose flu, H1N1, meningococcal and tetanus vaccines. This can be confirmed by simply analyzing the multi-dose vials.

In addition, ethylmercury (the type used in vaccines), like methylmercury, is a short chain alkylmercury compound. Both of these compounds are readliy distributed to the brain. The problem is that ethylmercury rapidily converts to Hg++. This form remains permanently trapped and causes degenerative brain disease. The other big problem is vaccine injection, unlike food ingestion, provides rapid access to the bloodstream and bypasses all defense mechanisms offered by the GI tract. The continued use of mercury in vaccines in the U.S. is inexcusable. Russia, Japan, Austria, Denmark, Sweden and Britain have banned the use of mercury in childrens’ vaccines.

Michael Wagnitz
Senior Chemist
(27 years experience evaluationg material for mercury)

@lovemycountry, everything has a risk, the program was put in place to keep companies from getting sued for exorbitant amounts if there was a bad reaction. Every medicine has side effects, every vaccine has side effects. So let's just let all the drug companies get sued out of business! Let's just stop all medical advances, even those into autism, because, to tell you the truth, the drug companies will make money and stop making the low profit drugs first. You will be singing the praise of big Pharma as soon as a new discovery into cancer, AIDS or Heart disease is made.

Volumes are filled with the mistakes, lies, and deaths caused by the FDA and the medical-industrial complex. The vaccine maker executives and big pharma execs become FDA regulators and back again. One good example is the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act. It was passed into law by our federal government to reduce the potential financial liability of vaccine makers due to injury claims.
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Even healthcare workers don't want this vaccine.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009...
Human guinea pigs and their families - the line forms to the left.

I too have a daughter with Asperger's. I have stopped putting the blame on everyone and everything years ago. She was born that way. The Gov. or shots or something she ate did not give her Autism. Would I love to have a miracle cure for her, of course I would, but I do not foresee one coming. I feel blessed everyday for her. She is a sweet wonderful person. People are worried enough about the H1N1, lets not give them more reason to worry.

@kiowamohican, but how many more people would have died from the 70's swine flu if there had not been vaccinations. There is no science yet that proves a link between thimerosal and autism, just anecdotal evidence. So, let's not vaccinate anyone from anything and just let the illnesses take over population control. The timing of this article is poor, and though I feel empathetic toward the Goldstiens and their situation, the timing of this article is wrong. Since there is a link between vaccines and fever, maybe we should start to go after the manufacturers of Tylenol too, that makes just as much sense.

Good to see some reporting on this by the gazette, and many other media outlets. I personally would never trust a "vaccine" rushed to market in the matter of months; as this has been. Most any vaccine requires years or testing, and research, before it can hit the market. I would never trust some governmnet study, or even a study in some medical journal that it's "been cleared" as being safe. The fact is you don't know for absolute certain, no matter what some expert claims. Remember in the 70's you had a media manufactured swine flu pandemic that had people rushing to get the vaccination. The governmnet even promoted all over TV to get vaccinated, and said it was perfectly safe. Unfortunately it was the vaccination that killed far more people then the swine flu did. That story conveniently never seems to be told any more in this discussion.

I just came across this news article:

Vaccines cleared of autism charge (article at Science Daily)

"A new review finds that vaccinations do not cause autism. One concern was that a mercury-based preservative in vaccines was at fault, but the preservative was removed from vaccines in California, Denmark, and Sweden and autism rates continued to rise. And while many children exhibited autism after getting the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccination, this appears to be only because the vaccination is usually given about the age when autism first manifests. The actual cause of increased autism (aside from increased diagnosis and reporting) remains unknown."

It is also worth reading a little more about Andrew Wakefield. I came across an article which was a real eye opener (around the same time I was finishing reading McCarthy's books.) Well worth reading:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2009/03/11/...

McCarthy's and Oprah's hearts were in the right place but it's important to consider the source before blaming the medical community. Correlation and cause are not the same thing. Still following the advice about gluten/casein free diet which science seems to support. ABA and early intervention seem to be the things that are proven to help more than anything else. Have also read that 38% may lose autism diagnosis... this and hearing Einstein/Newton may have been on spectrum gives me hope since finding my 3yr has autism. We are trying to not think of this as a negative, but a paradigm shift and will put our energy into finding what he is good at and building on his strengths. Autistic people have many wonderful traits. They don't lie, they can be passionate and have a talent to focus on things till they become very good at them. Also worth reading:

http://hbr.harvardbusiness.org/2008/09/e...

If vaccines did not carry risk, then there would not be a National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.

Please read Vaccine Information Statements (VIS), available on the Centers For Disease Control website, www.cdc.gov - these explain pros and cons of each vaccine, as well as contact information for the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program in case of a severe reaction.

Another good educational site is www.nvic.org.

Please read, educate yourselves on both sides of the issue, and then decide whether or not to vaccinate.

I would go slow on vaccines, _if_ there was any evidence that vaccines really do cause autism.
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And the claim (by parents) that it was the thiomersal that caused autism? Not credible, and in fact contradicted by the evidence. Thiomersal was taken out of (almost all) vaccines in 2001, but the autism rate just kept on rising. If mercury was causing autism, wouldn't it have gone down once the thiomersal was taken out?
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And here's some more evidence: back when I was a kid, and in my parent's generation, it was common to swab on a red infection fighter on cuts and scrapes, called Merthiolate, the trade name of thiomersal. It was also common in creams, nasal sprays and contact lens solution. With all of that exposure, if thiomersal was the cause of autism, where are all the old folks with autism? Why has the incidence of autism gone up, rather than down?
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So, vaccines don't cause autism, not by thiomersal, and not by any other mechanism either. But we can go further -- vaccines save lives. What happened to smallpox? What happened to polio? When was the last diphtheria epidemic? What about measles, mumps or rubella? Vaccines save lives. Polio ruined more lives than autism ever will, but vaccines wiped out polio in the US, and came very close to wiping it out in the entire world, just like they wiped out smallpox.
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So why wasn't polio eradicated? Because of people who didn't think. Because of people who couldn't think rationally about risk, and inflated what could be a problem so that it overshadowed was was a problem.
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Let's not let that happen again. Get your shots.

While the preservatives found in insulin, m-Cresol and methyl p-hydroxybenzoate, are nasty themselves, they are not thimerosal and do not contain mercury. Insulin dependent diabetes has nothing to do with this article.

How many children have become obese after vaccination? We really need to look into that!

/facepalm

How many children have suffered broken arms after being vaccinated?

Has there been any link found between insulin injections in children and autism? The additive is used in any multidose vial and, thus, would include vials of insulin.