Autism and the Immune System

     Vaccines are the third rail of American medicine, touch them and you become a pariah. But the issues just won’t go away. Usually the focus is on the mercury based preservative thimerosal which was supposedly banned in childhood inoculations beginning in 1999. In fact it is still widely used in flu shots given to pregnant women and infants. Analysts have calculated that adjusted for timing and body weight, fetuses and infants are being exposed to about as much thimerosal as ever. The CDC refuses to ban it in flu shots, insisting it is safe and arguing that manufacturers don’t produce enough of the mercury free version to go around. Most OB-Gyns and pediatricians take the CDC at its word and routinely prescribe the cheaper and easier to handle version containing thimerosal. The preservative is required in multiple dose vials to prevent fungal or bacterial contamination. It is not needed with individual doses. The CDC takes the not entirely unreasonable position that the known risk of an influenza epidemic trumps the unproved risk of autism. (Don’t try this argument on the average parent of a child with autism.) They acknowledge the need for more research but actively obstruct any meaningful inquiry that might cast doubt on the safety of the vaccination programs.
     There is an emerging consensus that autism affects a genetically susceptible subgroup in the population and that it may have multiple environmental causes. There is a small but growing body of evidence that the vaccines themselves may be a part of the problem. They have been suspect for years because so many children with autism, my grandson being one of them, also have auto-immune issues. They have that in common with people who have allergies. A few people have begun to ask why it is that among those who have never been vaccinated, like the Amish and groups that practice alternative medicine, autism seems to be unheard of. They don’t have allergies either. Authorities respond that the Amish aren’t representative and alternative medicine folks don’t keep reliable medical records.
     Now a new pair of studies is out to throw fuel on the fire, one from UC Davis linking thimerosal to immune system damage in mice even with very low levels of exposure, another from Europe associating early use of antibiotics, fever reducers, and the MMR vaccine with increased risk of allergic symptoms.     The UC Davis study involved placing dendritic cells from mice into Petri dishes and exposing them to varying levels of thimerosal. Dendritic cells are signalers that are responsible for summoning white blood cells when an invasion is detected. Damaged cells send faulty signals. Whether similar damage occurs to cells exposed inside the body is another question as is whether human cells would be affected in the same way. But thimerosal exposure has been shown before to produce autistic like symptoms in laboratory mice.
     No one really knows what the connection between autism and allergies is other than they both involve dysfunctional immune systems. None of this proves that either can be caused by thimerosal or vaccines but it does suggest immune systems are fragile things and the excessive use of medication in early childhood can have unintended consequences. It also suggests the decision to dramatically increase the number of inoculations on the childhood schedule, and to inject pregnant women and infants with a known toxin, may have unforeseen side effects. CDC reluctance to investigate looks less and less defensible. They appear to be taking unnecessary risks when safer alternatives are readily available. The medical community has some serious questions to address here.