(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr. 3/4/06. Updated and bumped to top on 3/6/06.)
I saw this press release on PharmaLive.com Friday afternoon. (Original is here.)
The National Autism Association (NAA) today joined other advocacy organizations in calling for Senate investigations of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) regarding its failure to remove thimerosal (mercury) from pediatric vaccines when given the opportunity in 1999. This comes following a study released this week showing reduced autism diagnoses coincide with the reduction of mercury-containing vaccines given to children.
The study, conducted by Mark Geier, M.D. and David Geier and published in the peer-reviewed Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, shows reduced autism rates since the removal of mercury from most childhood vaccines. These findings bolster voluminous studies and data confirming that increased use of mercury-containing vaccines in the 1980's and 1990's led to an epidemic of neurological disorders among American children.
Here's the actual study. It's technical reading. If our in-house PhD statistician (Sir RandomJohn) has a chance to comment in between yoga poses, I'd be interested in his feedback. ;-) John takes on the challenge. See UPDATE 6 below.
Personally, I'm sort of reluctant to post and/or discuss studies because they are all so easily debatable. The tactics from the anti-mercury=autism crowd are totally predictable, especially in this case because the study was done by the Geiers who are almost as reviled as the "sinister" Dr. Buttar. ("that's a crummy journal", "these 'doctors' do this to make money so they can testify in lawsuits", "the study was paid for by NAA, so of course it makes a connection", etc. etc. etc.) Uhh, did I call this or what? See UPDATE 7 below.
I never blogged about it, but when I went to the ADA anti-mercury rally last October, I had dinner and lunch with a group of people that included David Geier, Dr. Mark Geier, and Dr. Rashid Buttar. I was blown away with how convinced these three extremely intelligent men were that mercury plays an absolutely central role to autism and many other learning disabilities. I mean, they were TOTALLY convinced. I think this is why I actually didn't blog about it, because I wasn't sure how to "balance" their absolute belief.
But it just hit me today why these men are so convinced; they believe what they have found to be true because they have seen it in clinical practice and they have done the data analysis first hand. These guys don't believe this because they read a peer-reviewed paper or attended a lecture. There is zero degrees of separation between them and this "theory." They are convinced -- and I actually found them to be more humble about it than I expected them to be -- that even if they don't quite understand everything about autism, they are 100% sure that mercury plays a central role.
Think about Dr. Buttar. In 2002, his son was autistic "developmentally delayed" and he cured him less than 2 years later by removing mercury using chelation therapy! (UPDATE: Dr. Buttar points out to me that technically, he never officially diagnosed his son as "autistic", but rather as "developmentally delayed.") Dr. Buttar has since duplicated the results in over 30 autistic/mercury-toxic patients. He still doesn't have a peer-reviewed paper out yet, but why should we not believe him? (For a minute, spare me the "Patrick, this is how the medical community and the vetting of scientific theory works and everything else is quackery" line.) What does Buttar really stand to gain by staunchly sticking to what the clinical evidence that he personally discovered is pointing to? Money? Maybe. Fame? Maybe.
But with all the crap that has been thrown at him in the last year, and having his name dragged through the gutter by pseudonym-ed skeptics, being on the road and away from his family (for how many days of the year I can only guess) to talk with parents at conferences, train other doctors, etc. Is all that worth it for a lie? If I was in his shoes, I'm not sure that I would have been able to stick to my guns like he continues to do.
Same thing with the Geiers. Read Dr. Mark Geier's CV. This is NOT the dumb guy that anonymous commenters would like you to believe he is! Yet, the Geier's have totally had their names dragged through the mud by people who aren't even brave enough to display their own real names! (All those veiled "I'm scared to be harassed at work" excuses are lame considering what you've done to these three men!)
And yet the Geiers, too, still believe TOTALLY that mercury is central to autism. Dr. Geier told me that when he first heard a parent mention the possibility of a link between mercury and autism, he was totally skeptical and didn't believe it was possible. But when he and David had a chance to analyze the VAERS VSD database, the connection was clear. What the Geiers know about the cover-ups that have happened at CDC, PHS, etc. since then is the stuff that you only see in movies. Shoot, this whole thing probably will become a movie someday. (See the update below about the video of the Geiers and read Erik's clarification.)
I'm not saying studies shouldn't be debated, peer-reviewed, etc. In agreement with his skeptics, I too wish that Dr. Buttar would have a peer-reviewed paper published on this. But I'm not going to judge him as "guilty until proven innocent" when there is so much clinical evidence backing him.
If someday, for whatever reasons, these men are found to be outright liars in total colusion to scam all autistics, then I'll be at the front of the lynch mob since I've put my own name on the line defending them.
But these online debates (screaming matches!) drive me crazy when the anti-mercury=autism crowd cite (questionable) epidemiology studies of millions of people, but totally forget that there have been a few hundred autistic kids that in the last few years have had their symptoms improve or totally abate because of chelation. (See the post Autism/Mercury -- How much evidence is enough?, part 2) This is one of the reasons I've just stayed away from these debates for the last few months. Too frustrating.
I will concede that maybe I'm just being too simple-minded about this, but until we can figure out why chelation is actually working for some autistics, the rest of the debate seems slightly irrelevant to me.
UPDATE 1, 3/4/06: Who's right?
UPDATE 2, 3/4/06: The published study by the Geiers is hitting the newsrooms.
UPDATE 3, 3/5/06: Erik Nansteil posted a new video on AutismMedia.org of the Geiers telling their story about trying to get access to the VAERS database.
UPDATE 4, 3/5/06: Dr. Buttar has videos on his website, mostly of parents talking about the progress that their kids have made following Dr. Buttar's protocol. Frankly, when I first saw these, I was expecting to see the dramatic before and after, "miracle diet pill" type videos. These videos are not quite those. HOWEVER, the testimonies of the parents are still quite good. In fact, maybe it's better that the testimonials don't reek of "miracle diet pill." Go check the videos out and form your own opinion.
UPDATE 5, 3/5/06: Just had this simple thought emailing back and forth tonight with Dr. Buttar tonight. Critics attempting to denounce the connection between mercury and autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders often cite (expensive, tax-payer funded) epidemiological studies noting that, "all the studies show that mercury does not cause autism." But think about this...what are all these studies attempting to accomplish? They're trying to show that a toxic substance (the second most toxic known to man, according to the EPA) is NOT toxic when put into children. (To quote my dad, "DUH!") Puts things in perspective.
UPDATE 6, 3/6/06: RandomJohn accepts my assignment, but posts his findings in Klingon. ;-)
[lots of technical blah blah blah...]
I would like to note the essential features of the graphs.
- The number of reported new cases stays flat until sometime in 1999.
- At that time in 1999, the new cases starts to rise until early 2003.
- From early 2003 until the last reporting date, the number of new reported cases falls.
[a bit more technical blah blah blah...btw, you can tell we have the best PhD statistician in residence of any other blog! ;-)]
Conclusion so far. I'm afraid it's not looking good for the Geiers here. Obviously something is going on, and I don't think that the Geiers' analysis adequately explains the upturn in newly diagnosed autism cases in the VAERS around mid-1999 and the downturn at around the beginning of 2003.
Before getting your engines revved up one way or the other, it's important to realize that many factors could have gone into this phenomenon:
- Increased awareness (addressed in the Geiers' article, and I'll let others debate the merit of that argument)
- Lags from the time vaccinations were rearranged to diagnosis age
- Changes in pollution, not even addressed by the article
- Interactions among any of the above, and any other issue people can come up with
Again, I don't think we've seen an adequate explanation.
Hmm...It'll be interesting to see where this goes. But I promise to stay intellectually honest and follow where a critical statistical review of the data leads. I'm on the edge of my seat for episodes II and III. (Read John's entire post.)
UPDATE 7, 3/6/06: I orginally posted the following on Saturday 3/4.
Personally, I'm sort of reluctant to post and/or discuss studies because they are all so easily debatable. The tactics from the anti-mercury=autism crowd are totally predictable, especially in this case because the study was done by the Geiers who are almost as reviled as the "sinister" Dr. Buttar. ("that's a crummy journal", "these 'doctors' do this to make money so they can testify in lawsuits", "the study was paid for by NAA, so of course it makes a connection", etc. etc. etc.)
From RandomJohn's post, I see that Orac is being repectfully insolent again. Like he could resist slamming the Geiers. The post begins with:
Curse you, Mark and David Geier.
I'm getting tired of having to subject my scientific and critical thinking skills to the assaults on science and reason that you routinely publish in dubious journals to use as weapons in your apparently never-ending crusade to extract as much money as possible out of vaccine manufacturers and the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.
Well, 2 outta 3 ain't bad.
As a backgrounder, Dr. "G-orac-ski" and I haven't spoken since our last email exchange in November of last year, that surprisingly, was never posted on his blog or this one. I don't like him because he won't listen to reason. He doesn't like me because I won't listen to reason. (Technically, I don't like him because he refuses acknowledge that a few hundred autistic kids seem to have had their symptoms abate, partially or totally, because of chelation. And he doesn't like me because I won't stop saying that.) So we've just stayed away from eachother. Not sure if it's fear, respect, or annoyance.
PS - I'm certain that TrackBack-ing to Orac's post is going to give me all sorts of "fun" comments to deal with in the morning. Oh well.
