Surprisingly, all the scientific evidence to which Jenny McCarthy had access didn't indicate any logical cause for autism in children. Of course, she didn't let that stop her from zealously broadcasting that she was 100% sure that vaccinations cause autism in children.
The issue I have with this sort of opinion- particularly coming from someone with the access to a very large and easily influenced audience- is that it can cause parents to decide not to have their children vaccinated.
This might be fine for them, but by not getting their children vaccinated, they're increasing the risk to my children. Fortunately, my children attend a school where vaccination is not mandatory, but if your children are not vaccinated, they aren't welcome to attend.
With the rate of diagnosis for autism being 1 in 110 children in recent history, it just didn't make any sense that vaccines would be the cause. Children have been receiving vaccinations for decades but it's only recently that such high incidences of autism have been showing up.
Some of you might argue that this is due to better diagnostic methods and doctors who are better educated than their colleagues were in the past. I would argue that due to its popularity, autism is being over-diagnosed. However, accurate diagnosis is not the point of this post.
Well, leave it to the scientists to come up with a reasonable and logical explanation:
(Newser) – Scientists have a new lead in the search for the causes autism. Research presented this week provides strong evidence of a link between infertility treatments and the disorder. A Harvard study has discovered that treatment with Clomid and other ovulation-stimulating drugs doubles a woman's risk of giving birth to an autistic child, with a higher risk the longer the woman took the drugs. A second Israeli study has found a tie between in vitro fertilization and autism.
The Harvard study controlled for the women's age at the time of pregnancy—a known factor in autism—but had no access to information about premature birth, whether the children were twins or triplets, or their birth weights, all additional factors in autism. "This study is addressing a really important question but we need more data," a scientist tells Time.
January 5, 2011 UPDATE
(CNN) -- A now-retracted British study that linked autism to childhood vaccines was an "elaborate fraud" that has done long-lasting damage to public health, a leading medical publication reported Wednesday.
An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study's author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study -- and that there was "no doubt" Wakefield was responsible.
Actress Jenny McCarthy, founder of Generation Rescue and whose son also has autism, declined to comment on Wednesday's developments, but has previously supported Wakefield.Why is the truth always a "conspiracy" with these people? Maybe Ms. McCarthy should stick to sophmoric comedy and taking her clothes off.
"It is our most sincere belief that Dr. Wakefield and parents of children with autism around the world are being subjected to a remarkable media campaign engineered by vaccine manufacturers reporting on the retraction," she said after the Lancet retraction.
Deer said Wakefield "chiseled" the data before him, "falsifying medical histories of children and essentially concocting a picture, which was the picture he was contracted to find by lawyers hoping to sue vaccine manufacturers and to create a vaccine scare."
Complete article HERE.
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