Show About Discredited Science Airs Tonight
Despite protest from the American Academy of Pediatrics, ABC has decided to air the controversial first episode of its daffy new show "Eli Stone" tonight. It's about a money-grubbing drug company-representing lawyer who has a saintly conversion and helps a winsome momma win $5 million by convincing a jury that the mercury-containing preservative in a flu vaccine--thimerosal--gave her kid autism.
The AAP wanted ABC to cancel the show because the narrative gives credence to a theory long-since discredited by science. In doing so it may lead parents--especially the dopey ones who get their medical advice from fantastic TV dramas--to avoid vaccinating their kids. AAP's effort elicited howls from David Kirby that it was trying to "crush artistic freedom." Kirby's tendentious 2006 book Evidence of Harm is largely responsible for the vaccines-cause-autism zeitgeist. In the face of growing evidence against his thesis, he's been getting more and more shrill on Huffpo. (Yo, David. The AAP is a prestigious group, but it certainly doesn't have the power to "crush artistic freedom" even if it wanted to).
The vaccines-cause-autism meme is particularly strong among Hollywood celebrities, fictional and otherwise. In the movie "Knocked Up," for example, Katherine Hegl's sister doesn't vaccinate her kids. Anne Sweeney, president of ABC-Disney TV Group, sent her autistic child to a therapy center where most parents are obsessed with vaccines, according to a parent whose child was there. ABC will run a "this is just fiction" disclaimer on the show. What the hell, it's all good publicity, right? But pediatricians--that's kid doctors, for those of you who don't know any--are worried. When vaccination rates in communities fall below certain levels, diseases like whooping cough and mumps can make comebacks. To get a share of the news cycle, the AAP yesterday released early a study from an upcoming issue of its journal, Pediatrics that adds more evidence thimerosal is quickly flushed out of the bodies of babies. This is not a major study, however, and it won't convince any diehards. Besides, as I predicted in my book Vaccine (pp 421-3), the slow death of the thimerosal theory is only leading vaccine opponents like Barbara Loe Fisher to blame vaccines in general for autism.
Comments:
Posted 01/31/2008 02:34pm with
Oddly, a sweeping study done by the CDC, that linked autism/ADD related condition to thimerasol, that has been suppressed by the Bush administration has been studied by RFK,Jr. (whom I trust) and he says that there was a definite link between thimerasol and autism/add/related conditions. He also said that there was a big meeting of the pharmaceutical industry about that (the concerned public wasn’t invited) and the study was suppressed. The gentleman that ran the study? He then went to work for Glaxxo-Smith-Klein. Thimerasol was forced out of use for livestock by law, why? And why was it voluntary for removal from human vaccines? Do you think maybe, human vaccine’s net a lot more money? So, there’s more money to be lost on them? I do.
Posted 01/31/2008 02:35pm with
This has never truly been discredited.
Posted 01/31/2008 02:38pm with
Thimerasol may be one of several causes, have you thought of that?
Posted 02/01/2008 10:21am with
It has been discredited, actually, by a wealth of studies. I’ve been following this story since its inception. In fact, I bear a share of responsibility for creating the mess, because I wrote a NYTimes Magazine article in 2002 “The Not-so-Crackpot Autism Theory” that raised the possibility that there was something to the theory of harm from thimerosal. Since then, scientific evidence has demolished the theory.
I’ve reviewed all the documents that RFK Jr. says he saw, and then some, believe me. I like the Kennedys and had only respect for Bobby Jr. until he started his misinformed rants about thimerosal, which are completely erroneous and off base. Here’s an early piece of mine [http://www.slate.com/id/2123647/] in which I critiqued RFK Jr’s argument. There is a ton of good evidence out there showing that thimerosal doesn’t cause harm. The only people who continue to cling to the theory are a handful of scientists who bought into it and have published results of little significance in marginal journals, and a few professional court witnesses, like David and Mark Geier, who have no real expertise, publish laughably stupid papers, and treat autistic children with dangerous protocols based on unfounded scientific theories. Them, and parents (and grandparents, such as Rep Dan Burton, R-Ind., who was educated in Bible School but held 12 or so hearings into the theory without succeeding at making a dent in it) who for one reason or another need to blame someone for their child’s condition.
Posted 02/01/2008 10:55am with
At what point is an idea so discredited that journalists will stop treating it as a legitimate, opposing point of view? No responsible news organization would quote a Klansman to balance a piece on civil rights. The 9/11 Truth nuts have been given no quarter by the popular media. Even “creation science” claims raise eyebrows in the newsroom. So why not the thimerosal-autism canard? It’s as destructive as the notion of white supremacy. Vaccine scare mongers such as David Kirby and RFK, Jr. take as many liberties with the truth as the ironically named Truthers. And like the young-earth zealots, the Mercury Militia also bow to the God of confirmation bias with every new, crackpot “study”.
Posted 02/01/2008 11:12am with
Brant,
Maybe you don’t know that eight large studies conducted on vast populations of children in Europe and the U.S. have looked for evidence of an association between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism. None of them has found any such indication.
You refer to a CDC study. After adjustment for various confounding factors, that study found no link between TCVs and autism. It is one of those eight studies.
You refer to a secret meeting. If you are referring to the discussion of the CDC paper above held at the Simpsonwood conference center, this meeting involved fifty scientists and their support staff; a transcript was generated; and it occurred at a place of public accommodation. That doesn’t sound very secret to me. Also, there may have been a handful of representatives of vaccine makers there, but the vast majority of participants were from academia and government.
I’d urge you to think critically about the claim that childhood vaccines are a moneymaker. Except for the newest vaccines, they are so low-priced that there has been a constant danger of manufacturers finding the cost to produce them unjustified.
Posted 02/01/2008 06:29pm with
Brant,
Could you provide some idea of where you found the study you mentioned? How were you able to find it when it was supposedly “suppressed”? Clearly, government conspiracies aren’t very effective if you were able to find evidence of it.
If you’re referring to the “infamous” Simpsonwood meeting that RFK Jr. wrote about, you should go read the transcript (hint: it’s on the SafeMinds website). It’s 286 pages long, but you should read it in its entirety before you “believe” what RFK Jr. wrote about it.
Jim