Blue Collar Scientist

There’s been quite a bit in the last few days on the science blogosphere condemning Clinton and Obama for ‘buying in’ to claims that vaccination causes autism. I thought it might be useful to go back to primary sources and see what was actually said.

Before we do that, a quick note about the issue (just skip all this and scroll down to the first quotation if you already know the history). The autism-vaccine “link” was dreamed up - or at least heavily promoted - by lawyers who want to make money at the expense of what they see as a rich pharmaceutical industry ripe for the taking¹. The plaintiff bar’s original focus was not on autism; it was on other sorts of vaccine injuries, some real, some make-believe.

Their litigation in the 1980’s essentially ended vaccine production in the United States; as a response to this critical threat to health, the government has had to take various steps to insure that vaccines are still made here, and are available to people who need them. One of those steps is the creation of the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, put into place in 1988. It was originally a response to litigation over the pertussis vaccine, in which lawyers introduced evidence, leading to huge payouts, that was later found to be false. Under current law, the plaintiff’s bar goes after the VICP when they think that something might possibly have gone wrong with a vaccine. Although the program is paid for by a small surcharge on vaccines, the court is government-backed, and it hasn’t always remained within its budget; so in essence, every plaintiff’s award or frivolous suit through this court costs the taxpayer a bit of money. It is still, of course, better than not having any vaccines.

The vaccine-autism link doesn’t appear to have become popular until the late ’90’s, and originally the proponents of the link claimed that thimerosal, a vaccine preservative, was the cause of autism. Thimerosal was removed from vaccines given to children starting in 1999², and if this hypothesis were right, a reduction in autism should have been noted in the following years - but it hasn’t. Rather than admit that they don’t know anything about medicine, proponents of the thimerosal hypothesis have moved on to become full-blown anti-vaccination campaigners. Among the claims they’ve advanced is that vaccination is part of a vast government conspiracy to keep people in their place.

That is where we are today. Given the political muscle behind the vaccine conspiracy theorists, mainly in the form of the plaintiff’s bar - who currently have billions of dollars of autism-related claims against vaccine makers in the VICP court - and the predatory medical and quack-medical practitioners following a buck, the issue is now, apparently, one for the presidential campaign.

So here’s what the candidates actually said (with links back to sources):

Barak Obama:

We’ve seen just a skyrocketing autism rate. Some people are suspicious that it’s connected to the vaccines. This person included. The science right now is inconclusive, but we have to research it.

Note that where Obama says “this person included,” he gestured to someone in the audience - he apparently doesn’t mean “myself included.” That doesn’t excuse the fact, of course, that the science is very conclusive that there is no autism-vaccine link.

John McCain:

It’s indisputable that (autism) is on the rise amongst children, the question is what’s causing it. And we go back and forth and there’s strong evidence that indicates that it’s got to do with a preservative in vaccines.

Strong evidence? John McCain basically accepts the conspiracy theory hook, line, and sinker.

Hilary Clinton:

Do you think vaccines should be investigated as a possible cause of autism?

I am committed to make investments to find the causes of autism, including possible environmental causes like vaccines. I have long been a supporter of increased research to determine the links between environmental factors and diseases, and I believe we should increase the NIH’s ability to engage in this type of research. My administration will be committed to improving research to support fact-based solutions, and I will ensure that the NIH has the staff and funding to fully explore all possible causes of autism.

What will you do to protect Americans, especially young children and pregnant women, from exposure to mercury through vaccines?

I will ensure that all vaccines are as safe as possible for our children by working to ensure that Thimerosal and mercury are removed from vaccines. I plan to fully invest in our research agencies so they can protect our children’s health, and so they can find the causes and cures for conditions such as autism.

There’s some more material there from Clinton, including something that I’d consider to be classical political weasel words.

Remember, folks, we live in the real world. Resources are limited. Every dollar we decide to spend researching this issue is a dollar we can’t spend some other, better way. What the candidates are talking about is the need to research an issue that has already been researched to death, with six or seven major - and expensive - studies already completed, and with thimerosal already removed from vaccines making a repetition of much of this effort pointless in the extreme.

1. Sometimes they are, and sometimes they deserve to be taken. But not over vaccines. [↩]
2. The only vaccines today that contain thimerosal are for influenza and tetanus, although if you get bitten by a snake, some antivenins contain thimerosal [↩]

Hot on the heels of an outbreak of measles in Tucson, there are reports of an outbreak of measles in Salzburg, Austria. About 180 people are infected, and most of them are children who attend the same private school.

Hubert Hrabcik, director general of public health in Austria’s Health Ministry, said the vaccination rate for measles, mumps and rubella, which are administered together, may have been “almost nil” at the school.

This would not be surprising, since if you aren’t immunized, you’ll very likely get the highly communicable disease. And as I mentioned before, if you get it, you are exposed to a significant risk of developing corneal ulcers and scarring, and blindness. There’s also a risk of encephalitis leading to brain damage. I don’t know whether this situation is a result of anti-vaccination activists (update: it is), but it nevertheless illustrates that their vision for the world has consequences: rampant disabling disease.

In an effort to curb the number of infections, Salzburg schools now will require students to prove they have been inoculated or that they previously had the disease. If students refuse to be vaccinated, they could be barred from classes, Hrabcik said.

Health Minister Andrea Kdolsky said in a statement there was “no need to panic,” but she and Salzburg Gov. Gabi Burgstaller urged people under the age of 40 who have not had measles to be vaccinated.

Keeping children away from the schools, and forcing others to bear the expense of immunization is necessary to deal with the outbreak, obviously, but it isn’t a particularly good thing. Yet that is the direction we’ll likely go if the anti-immunity crowd have their way.

Of particular interest to me because of the years I spent living in nearby Sierra Vista, Arizona, reports say that Tucson is experiencing an outbreak of measles.

Arizona health officials are concerned a measles outbreak in the Tucson area could spread across the state. There have been nine reported cases of measles in the Tucson area, the Pima County Health Department said Monday in a news release.

Public health officials are concerned because measles is extremely contagious. If you are exposed, and haven’t been vaccinated, the chances are 90% that you’ll get it. It is spread through the air.

Once you catch it, you are contagious for four to twelve days before you start showing symptoms. so you can be spreading it around for better than a week before you ever realize you’ve been infected.

Once you are symptomatic, if you get good health care, your chances of dying of the disease are only 0.1%. If you live in the developing world, your chances of dying are 10%.

So you shouldn’t worry too much about getting killed by measles. You should be concerned about going blind - for measles causes corneal ulcers and scarring. You can also get encephalitis, leading to brain damage. These are serious risks for a small child, the sort of thing that can lead to a lifetime of problems and suffering.

You might ask yourself why, since measles has a vaccine, that an outbreak has occurred in Tucson? It is because of anti-vaccination radicals:

Dr. Karen Lewis, a medical director with the Arizona Department of Health Services, said health officials are concerned that some parents aren’t vaccinating their children because of concerns about links to autism. “People have started to forget how bad of a disease it is and have started listening to people saying vaccines aren’t good,” Lewis told The Arizona Republic.

Fifteen of these peoples’ kids are now at risk for blindness and other lifelong complications of the disease. But worse than that, they have the potential to infect babies who haven’t reached vaccination age.

The health department recommends an accelerated schedule for vaccinating children, with one dose between the ages of 6 and 12 months of age and two more doses starting on the child’s first birthday.

So…. One way of looking at this is that thirty selfish parents who believe in a whacky conspiracy theory that claims vaccines cause autism which just enriches a medical industry that wants it to happen (so they can make more money) have now imposed upon thousands of babies the need to take vaccines earlier and more often. Which carries a small risk, as well as a small expense.

This should be illegal, folks.