Your article lies

II never read some stupid article on the MMR vaccine in 1997. In 1999 I had a normal child, cooing and beginning to speak, played with his brothers and sisters UNTIL his 2 year old shots. He got them on Friday and by Monday little Colten was catatonic and speechless, he remained speechless for 3 years... being diagnosed as a def mute. No one knew why he was so peculiar (also had other signs of autism). But back then Autism wasn't in the news. No one knew WHY Colten in Early Special Education, flapping his hands randomly.

I never forgot he was normal and cooing away at his grandpa just before his second birthday AND his 2 year old immunizations in which he got 3 different shots containing immunizations for up to 8 illnesses in ONE day.
Colten was finally diagnosed in 1st grade with autism, BEFORE the media made it popular to have.

Parents often know when their child changed. Back then right after Colten's shots I didn't know who to take him too with his new slough of what appeared to be mental symptoms.... too young to talk so a shrink was out. He seemed traumatized, but by what.

When he was 4, before we actually connected the dots and were supported the school nurse insisted (he was in Early Childhood Education program in school) that he be immunized again. I did and with in 3 days he turned into a giant watermelon and had to have an epi and steroid shot to stop this second reaction.
I don't care what articles you want to promote or the fact the medical science CANNOT admit any liability (or our CDC will grow broke from law suits).

I know what caused my son's autism. I can think for myself and I can evaluate all information involving my child and his medical care to come up with common sense answers.

Don't need you advising on this. You better stay objective. Remember back in the day when Doctors insisted smoking was not bad for your health?

Susan Harrison

[goldenlioness724]

Susan, I remember when doctors did not think cigarettes were bad for your health.  I also remember when lobotomies where cutting edge medicine and doctors flew from all over the country to learn to do this amazing procedure that ruined so many lives.

[goldenlioness724]

Dear Dr. Graff,

I do not have the energy for a visceral response to what you wrote, but I can begin by telling you that I think Ms. Harrison answered you very well and I understand the anger Tsilla1777 feels about your comments and observations.

It tends to anger me that ever since Dr. Wakefield's study has been debunked, and incidentally, it was debunked not because its conclusions were wrong but because its methodology was unsound and scientifically invalid, "concerned" doctors and other health care professionals cannot wait for the opportunity to write columns on how stupid and gullible parents have been and continue to be.  But, before it was debunked, the vast majority of that same population refused to spend five minutes seriously considering that vaccines might be a problem.  Right there, that's a credibility problem, and it gives rise to a willingness on the part of parents to believe in what you dismiss as conspiracy theories.  If you bring a confirmation bias to the consideration of the question, your conclusions cannot be valid.

I agree with Ms. Harrison...I too saw the moment when my child went from a normal, healthy baby to a child who stared into space and did not respond to her name.  My child is 11-years-old now and the exact age she was is cloudy to me, but she was 1 1/2 to 2 years old.  She received several vaccines in one day and it is therefore impossible to know which vaccine caused the problem.  The same thing happened to her younger sister a few years later when we were STILL not believing fully what our own senses were showing us precisely because of the arrogant, self-serving opinions of doctors on the subject of vaccines.  No intelligent person wants to be classified as a villager with a pitchfork, and we certainly do not want to fight with our pediatricians, which I have had to do any number of times, or be classified as bad parents.  So, we partially ignored what we know, to the detriment of our children.  But I will say this.  Whereas with my elder child, I let the doctor convince me to continue to vaccinate albeit "more slowly," with my older child, when it happened to my younger child, I stopped.  Today, I have one child who is autistic and one who is not.  The one who is not received fewer vaccines even before the day when she seemed to react as her sister did, which I believe explains why that reactive incident knocked one into autism and the other not.

My husband had a co-worker who simply could not understand why we do not vaccinate our children, until her son wound up in the hospital and almost died from a blood infection related to his DTaP vaccine.  Then she said to my husband, "I understand now why you don't vaccinate your kids.  I'll never do it again."  Did you hear me say that it was DTaP that almost caused the death of that child, not the MMR vaccine?

The truth of the matter is that the worst thing Dr. Wakefield did was to create the mother lode of all red herrings around the issue of vaccine safety.  Dr. Graff, the MMR vaccine is not the only problem.  

Are you listening?

The Thimerisal in the MMR vaccine (and others) is not the only problem, though it is a problem.  It is also a problem that my elder daughter's original pediatrician looked me in the face and promised me in 1999 that Thimerisal was not a problem because it had been removed.  It wasn't removed until 1999 and the vials already containing it were not discarded.  I was still seeing package inserts with Thimerisal years after the fact.

Are you listening?

Vaccines contain any number of impurities and additives, the vast majority of which a parent could be sent to prison for forcing their child to ingest.  It is unknown and has not been fully researched what effect these vaccines have in certain children over a period of time.

Did you hear me?

Would you hear HIM?:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atPYt4xes80

Incidentally, it's egotistical to say that nobody is going to believe you until you are invited on Oprah.  Do you honestly believe you are saying anything original?  Do you honestly believe we haven't been forced to listen to other people saying exactly what you do?  It is sadly entirely legitimate to see conspiracies around this subject.  The pharmaceutical industry makes huge amounts of money from vaccines.  Pediatricians lose about 90% of their practices without vaccines -- and that's a conservative estimate.  Physicians all too often rely entirely on the word of their pharmaceutical sales representatives to tell them what is in a medication and what it does.  Insurance companies? I have no idea how they make money.  They seem to pay out much more than they take in to me given how crazily expensive medical care is, but clearly there is some part of that equation I am not considering.  What I do know is that they pay for vaccines but refuse to pay for immune titers to either test for the need for a vaccine or test to see if a vaccine even worked after it was administered, so if there were ever to be a time when vaccines were ALLOWED to be proven to be dangerous, all of these groups would face staggering liability lawsuits.  You're lying to yourself and to us if you do not think that would motivate a group of people to want to debunk something before it got serious consideration.

Thank you for your time.

Nikki Edmonds

[Superbuggg]

I have keenly followed the debate involving Andrew Wakefield and his assertion that vaccine-induced inflammatory bowel disease can cause severe autism. I have read 'Silenced Witnesses' - the book written by the parents of Wakefield's 12 child patients.

You are so wrong with your article that I am strongly considering boycotting medhelp.org - an otherwise powerful means of patients access to medical help! If this nonsense you repeat on Wakefield is the agenda here... goodbye!

[SNS]

I am also strongly considering boycotting medhelp.org, and unsubscribing to all medhelp.org emails, BECAUSE OF THIS ARTICLE BY DR. RICHARD GRAFF. Seriously, how stupid do you think we are?

[gewandern]

I want to know what you all feed your children before accusing vaccines of causing autism.  Preservatives?  Food coloring?  Artificial flavors?  What medications?  Are you aware of all the chemicals present in the air we breathe?

It is upsetting to have a child with autism because you feel helpless to "fix" it and you want to know why this had to happen to your perfectly normal child all the sudden--perhaps you want something to blame so it makes more sense--but vaccinations help more people than they allegedly harm.

Remember the woman who claimed to have dystonia or any other number of neurological problems because of a swine flu vaccine?  She doesn't really have any neurological problems, her symptoms are most likely psychogenic.  Just keep that in mind.

[rjsj]

As a parent I can truly understand the controversy over to vaccinate or not vaccinate.  I have two daughters and both has been vaccinated.  At the time my oldest received her vaccinations there wasn’t this big controversy over this issue, however when my youngest was born the controversy was in full swing.  I talked with our Pediatrician and voiced my concerns and asked if my daughter could get her vaccinations one at a time rather receiving 4 at one time.  This allowed me to monitor any affects from the different vaccines.  As for the MMR she received 3 different individual shots rather than receiving the one combined shot.  No reactions at all with receiving the vaccines in this manner.  I fully understand how this article has touched a nerve for many; however, I don’t think we should not continue to visit this site as it has offered great information in the past.  It also allows everyone the opportunity to voice their concerns and many can learn from the opinions, and experience everyone post.  

[goldenlioness724]

The thing is, we didn't notice a relatively immediate reaction in our children after any of those substances, which, by the way, I try to avoid giving them as much as I can.

If we are to discuss the full scope of the vaccine debate, it involves understanding that there are possibly some children who are unable to process these vaccine ingredients particularly because they have acquired environmental toxicity passed through in utero or even in early childhood.  Unfortunately, powerful interests stand in the way of ever truly exploring and studying that.  It is a travesty where the children are the victims and we should all be upset.

[goldenlioness724]

I understand fully the anger over this article.  If some of you do not mind my saying so, and I hope you don't, I think that when you respond by storming off and refusing to patronize this site anymore, you have the opposite effect of what you intend.  If by some chance you manage to pressure the site owners into ceasing discussion of the topic, you will have changed nothing, you will simply have silenced the debate.  You also present yourselves, and possibly the rest of us, as exactly the kind of emotionally reactive people that physicians seem to think we are when they treat us like, to quote myself, villagers with pitchforks.  I get it, I totally get it.  I'm just saying...

[oeyshiehyuen]

I still remember watching a black and white show about Bayer spraying DDT on a line of pretty models dressed in 1950's outfit to prove DDT harmless.
I wonder what happened to the girls.
We ought to remember the kind of lawsuit some people are going to face if others can establish a connection between vaccines and autism.
And watch how many ingredients have been phased out since 2000.
That is probably an economical way.
The number of testimonies are too high to ignore !
Watch out !!!

[smartesusieq]

Thanks for many of your support, as some of you have similar stories. I feel for your situations as well.
As for wanted to know what my kid eat as perhaps a cause. Out of 4 kids and 4 grandkids, they all eat typical stuff and I have not noticed such an abrupt immediate and devasting reaction to any cereal or macaroni and cheese like I did with little Colten.
Also, parents aren't just trying to find something to blame.... I know society does that in general. It is funny because parents all over the world with autistic children can see the obvious side effects of these 'over' immunizations and science WON"T listen to them.
This only makes parents more eager to share THESE side effects since SCIENCE won't warn others. Also isn't SCIENCE suppose to take in consideration the evaluations of others? Isn't observation PART of science?
I am NOT against vaccines, not at all, but in the doses and very early ages of children it is ridiculous. AND parents don't have a say. The government requires all children to get so many shots before they attend school. Parents have no right to refuse (with out a real fight, like me). I was threatened with police and CPS if I didn't CONTINUE to immunize my autistic child. Of course I got the media and school board involved and finally they accepted a 'religious waiver' in protest.
I asked the school, if my child suffered dangerous side effects from immunizations who would be held responsible... the school? the state? the federal government? the CDC? No one wanted accountability, but I was suppose to ignore the side effects and be coorced into the shots anyway. Why even have a 'side effects' waiver to sign?
Parents informed discretion is best. Why not leave it at the 6 immunizations I had as a child that were to stop the spread of fatal and infectious diseases.... not things like the chicken pox (which I survived quite well).
I hope sharing our stories will make 'science' think, but even tho most of their facts are based on theory, it is based on controlling the masses.

[Tsila1777]

It just hurts so badly to see my beautiful, healthy, happy, intelligent baby boy change so drastically, so suddenly. It took away something so wonderful and special and has caused so much heartache and loss. The baby I knew is gone, he's gone! I will never see him grow up, I'll never get to know him. I still love my little boy of course, just as much, but it really does not seem like the same child at all.  I grieve for the baby I lost, even as I love and cherish the boy I have left.  It did not have to be. It should not have happened to any of those wonderful babies. I believe it is motivated by greed and no on except the family really care about those babies.  And we have no say, and get warned when we speak out. God help us.

[Hawkeyes29]

As I read your posting and I do not disagree, because not only what you list, but also vaccines and everything else are to blame.

I want to know what you all feed your children before accusing vaccines of causing autism.  Preservatives?  Food coloring?  Artificial flavors?  What medications?  Are you aware of all the chemicals present in the air we breathe?


Chemcials we breathe" would like to know how we can go about facing this and preventing this problem"  Do we just strap a mask on our children each and everyday they walk out the house?

Now like I said I don't disagree here but the main problem we face is not only the food/air/vaccines/etc, but pretty much everything our children come into contact with.  We can sit here and point fingers all we want for what we believe is the cause of such tramatic disorders/mental illnesses/diseases, etc...that may be caused by all of these. But we need to stay focused and protect our children and not single one idea out.  We need to tackle all this as a whole and make sure that we all realize that everything we do affects our children and every action of thier own also reflects and makes a difference.  This does not mean you need to go out and be over protective of them but do your own homework and stand up for what you feel is right.  

In other words I agree with you all, as the only feeling I can not relate is what most of you are going through with your children.  My kids at this very moment "appear" to be fine however and I quote that strongly only hoping these very symptoms do not arrise later in life. At this point all I can do is research and come to my own conclusions for what I think is best to protect my children from all this.  Good luck to you all, but again its not one specific blame its everything as a whole.  

[oeyshiehyuen]

Would it be more accurate to say
MMR does not cause autism
but it brings out all the symptoms?

[TysMom1229]

My daughter is a Teacher of a Self-contained Elementary AU Class and a Behaviorist who has worked w/ numerous families in which the children displayed the symptoms of Autism immediately following immunizations...immediately meaning 48-72 hrs. How can the medical community ignore this??  Several of these children's parents are MDs who now agree that vaccinations are too risky.

My daughter, herself, was diagnosed w/ a reaction to her own DPT vaccine in 1985. 2 weeks following her vaccine when she was around 8 mos old, her Aunt Carolyn, who was babysitting, found her lethargic, in her crib following a nap.  Had it not been for Carolyn's checking in on her, she may have been another SIDS statistic!  Following that episode, she received DT vaccines.  Had I known then what I know now, she would have never had another vaccine of any kind under the age of 10 yrs old.  

My daughter has recently given birth to an infant son of her own. She and her husband have decided against infant/child vaccines. I applaud their courage!

GOD BLESS the babies!