RFK Jr and Mark Blaxill are just trying to help

The commentary below is from Michelle Dawson's comment board.
The usual topic for discussion on her board is her own work, which is usually in the area of civil rights for autistics and in cognitive psychology in autism.

Michelle is well versed in the reading of scientific literature.

Readers might find it interesting to see what she found in the way of a conflict between the work of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Mark Blaxill in the area of autism epidemiology and thimerosal.

Michelle Dawson quotes Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as calling a study out of the U.K. "ginned up".

Below, Autism Diva highlights the words "ginned up" in purple.

Autism Diva does not know the meaning of "ginned up" but assumes that this may be a Kennedy family expression.
Autism Diva assumes that it's an insult of some kind.

Without furthur annoyance from the Diva -

Michelle Dawson:

Robert F Kennedy, Jr has recently posted a pdf http://www.robertfkennedyjr.com/docs/AutismHgPolitics_6_22.pdf on his website. The pdf is called "Tobacco Science and the Thimerosal Scandal".
On page 40, RFKJr writes (the numbers 112 and 113 are footnotes):

"The children who were subjects of the U.K. study (another ginned-up study done at the prompting of and in cahoots with the CDC),112 received 75 micrograms of thimerosal during their first 6 months compared to 187.5 micrograms given to U.S. kids during the same period.113 Furthermore, American children got a giant dose of 62.5 micrograms on a single day, whereas the maximum one-day dose for British kids was 25 micrograms.Dr. Neal Halsey, Director, Institute of Vaccine Safety at Johns Hopkins University and Chairman of the Committee on Infectious Diseases of the American Academy of Pediatrics told me that it was this giant so-called bolus dose that most shocked and frightened him due to its potential to damage a child'’s brain."

The British study cited is: Andrews et al.(2004). Thimerosal exposure in infants and developmental disorders: A retrospective cohort study in the United Kingdom does not support a causal association. Pediatrics, 114, 584-591.
The 75 micrograms in the UK is three time 25 micrograms (of mercury, not thimerosal as RFKJr writes) in the DTP vaccine, the only UK vaccine that ever had thimerosal (prior to 2004, when it was scrapped). The doses were given at 2, 3, and 4 months (since 1990; previously at 3, 5, and 8 or possibly 10 months--this is variously according to what the CDC and Andrews et al write about the UK program).

RFKJr is arguing in his paper that the UK and the US situations aren't comparable. The US kids got more thimerosal, as well as more thimerosal within one day. I agree (US kids also got thimerosal earlier, in the Hep B vaccine shortly after birth, so far as I can tell). He should also have noticed that the UK amount had not changed for decades (two decades, per Andrews et al; more than that, according to the NHS, which also claims that the amount went down), whereas the US amount of thimerosal had increased, as new thimerosal-containing vaccines were added to the routine childhood schedule.

RFKJr later cites the work of Marc Blaxill. Mr Blaxill is a big wheel at Safe Minds, a thimerosal-causes-autism group which has apparently earned RFKJr's respect and support. Mr Blaxill has called autism a "silent holocaust". He recently published a study called "What's going on? The question of time trends in autism" (2004) Public Health Reports, 119, 536-551. I took that cite from RFKJr's pdf, page 50, footnote #145. It's not considered good practice to cite a study you haven't read, so it's fair to conclude that RFKJr read this study by Mr Blaxill.

And here it is, Blaxill's published study http://www.safeminds.org/Blaxill%20Paper%2...ealth%20Reports.pdf .

From the abstract:
"Comparison of autism rates by year of birth for specific geographies provides the strongest basis for trend assessment. Such comparisons show large recent increases in rates of autism and autistic spectrum disorders in both the U.S. and the U.K. Reported rates of autism in the United States increased from <3 per 10,000 children in the 1970s to >30 per 10,000 children in the 1990s, a 10-fold increase. In the United Kingdom, autism rates rose from <10 per 10,000 in the 1980s to roughly 30 per 10,000 in the 1990s. Reported rates for the full spectrum of autistic disorders rose from the 5 to 10 per 10,000 range to the 50 to 80 per 10,000 range in the two countries."

Note the great similarity between the UK and the US data as they are graphed in this study: the same apparent increase around the same time, resulting in the same current prevalence rates circa 60/10,000 in both countries (across the spectrum). Blaxill writes: “The results of seven U.S. surveys are also shown in Figure 2. These surveys support conclusions similar to those for the U.K.




(Graphic image showing increase of ASD diagnoses in U.S. and U.K. taken from Blaxill's article - red text and yellow highlighting added for clarity)

Mr Blaxill aside, there is enough epidemiology to show that that UK and the US both underwent a rapid increase in autism diagnoses at about the same time and both now have the infamous 1 in 166 rate (or 60/10,000).

But RFK states with certainty that UK kids got much less thimerosal than US kids, and did not at all have the "bolus" dose which is cited as the most likely suspect. RFK neglects to mention that there was no increase in the UK vaccine schedule re amount of mercury over the years, very much unlike the situation in the US.

For a similar situation re epidemiology to exist in the UK and the US —and such a similar situation is documented by Mr Blaxill —the dosage of thimerosal injected into children in both countries should be similar, and should have undergone similar changes at about the same time. RFKJr denies this entirely. Re children in the UK getting similar doses of mercury compared to children in the US, RFKJr writes (page 40 of his paper), That is flat-out untrue”.

In short, RFKJr and Mr Blaxill are in contradiction with each other. RFKJr is sure that a dramatic difference between amounts of thimerosal between US and UK vaccination schedules renders irrelevant (to the US) a UK study showing no relationship between mercury and autism. Mr Blaxill "proves"” there has been a similar increase in autism in both countries, at about the same time, therefore showing that there is no relationship between dose of mercury and prevalence of autism.

In fact, because there was no conveniently-timed increase in thimerosal in the UK schedule on which the UK's autism "epidemic"” could be blamed, as I wrote chez la Diva, the UK epidemic was blamed on MMR.

Okay, I've gotten that out of my system (dusts off hands).

Outside of the non-existence of an "“epidemic", this is not my area. And I should not pursue it any more. And anyone who can shoot down my analysis is welcome to."


Thank you, Michelle Dawson.

So, let's recap.

Kennedy says that there's no comparison between the usage of thimerosal in the U.S. and the U.K., and if the Brits say they can't see thimerosal as a cause of autism it's because they have used so much less of it --

and Blaxill says that the increase of autism has been the same in the two countries.

hmmm.

Anybody got a problem with that?

Autism Diva agrees with the premise.

The conclusion is: thimerosal usage has no effect on autism diagnosis rates.


Autism Diva
Nothing but the truth