Correlations and Vaccines, and Common Sense
The theory linking autism to a vaccine or something in vaccines (such as the mercury-based preservative thimerosal) has a certain simple elegance: A young child is developing normally. The child gets a vaccine. “Overnight,” the child changes dramatically, perhaps losing speech, having terrible gastrointestinal problems, lining up objects, spinning, flapping her or his hands, not responding to the people and the world around her or him—-”developing” or “becoming” autistic. Today on Assymetrical Information at The Atlantic.com, Megan McArdle writes that claims of a vaccine-autism link are based on associative thinking that confuses correlation with causation:
Our brains are designed to learn by associating events that happen at the same time, or in close sequence. When you were a little kid, that’s how you learned that if you touched the stove, you got burned, long before you understood how combustion worked. We have other ways of learning as well, but that temporal link is the strongest, most primal association. We go through our whole lives looking for those connections.
This is not a bad heuristic, but of course, it often leads one astray, which is why there are so many ridiculous “cures” for hiccups. The fact that your child regressed after having a shot doesn’t mean that the shot caused the regression. It suggests a theory . . . but that theory has been tested, and found wanting.
McArdle cites a paper by Darold Treffert, M.D., who has been studying Savant Syndrome for many years. In Autistic Disorder: 52 years late: Some common sense conclusions, Dr. Treffert describes the first autistic children he met while a second-year medical student in 1955. He argues that autism is not a new disorder, that it is a “group of disorders, not a single disorder” and that there is not a ‘single’ cause”; according to Dr. Treffert, there is no epidemic of autism but the incidence is rising. McArdle highlights one particular observation by Dr. Treffert:
well before the vaccine theory, parents always identified something to causally link with their child’s late onset autism.
It’s not so much what is said to cause autism that Dr. Treffert highlights, but that parents have, time and again, singled out some particular event or agent that caused their child to become autistic:
Perhaps the clearest examples of different forms of ‘autism’, with different clinical courses in terms of onset and accompanying symptoms, are the Early Onset and Late Onset forms of Autistic Disorder that Down described a century ago, and are now seen regularly in clinical practice.
On the Children’s Unit at WMHI [Winnebago Mental Health Institute in central Wisconsin] we had both forms of Autistic Disorder. In some children the clinical signs and symptoms of autism had been present from birth. In others, the child was quite normal (neurotypical) at birth and reached developmental milestones, including language acquisition at the usual times and in the usual manner. But then at age two, three or four, a conspicuous regressive process began robbing the child of all of that natural progress. Interestingly, in these late onset cases the parents all had some sentinel event that, in their mind, accounted for the cause of this dreadful regressive pattern: “ever since he fell off the pier and nearly drowned”; “the time he got trapped in the silo”; or “ever since he went into the hospital to have his tonsils removed”. [my emphasis]
The point is that there is a natural tendency on the part of parents to seek out and blame some event or procedure for the onset of such startling regression in a child who has otherwise been developing normally [my emphasis]. Dr. Down called that regression the “loss of wonted brightness”. Dr. Down attributed this regression to the “second dentition”. Obviously, in seeking causes, one has to separate out temporal relationship to causal relationship.
In my view Autistic Disorder is a group of conditions that share a common clinical path and outcome we call “autism”. But this group of conditions, while sharing a final common path, have different causes just as mental retardation, for example, has multiple causes including genetic, metabolic, structural and traumatic to name a few.
If you look for a cause, a cause is there to find—-but it might not be the cause at all, as Dr. Treffert concludes. Perhaps there’s more than a little magical thinking—-of associative thinking—about the causes of autism, going on. And the solutions don’t start with waving magic wands but by trying to help the persons standing before us in the ways best suited to them, here and now.
Tags: asd, asperger, autism, Cause, Epidemic, Health, magical thinking, measles, mercury, mmr, Parenting, pdd-nos, savant syndrome, shots, Vaccines
6 opinions for Correlations and Vaccines, and Common Sense
Leila
Mar 25, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Not to mention the “hindsight” correlation, when parents that didn’t notice the difference immediately after a vaccination, but after learning about the vaccine-causation theory all of a sudden remember that the child changed after the MMR or whatever shot.
In our case I could never point to a specific event because the autism symptoms started gradually, and instead of regression I only observed an atypical development. Features like hyperactivity and sensory issues were present from birth.
Donna
Mar 26, 2008 at 6:52 pm
I’ve wondered if this associational thinking is a strength of people with autism, and because of genetics often a strength of their parents as well. About one autistic child: “It became clear that at the root of these systems lay a remarkable ability to induce the rules and regularities that characterized any set of items – numbers, words, objects, or events.” Written about Jessy Park by Clara Claiborne Park, p. 69 of Exiting Nirvana: A Daughter’s Life with Autism. It is possible that it is a case of people’s strong abilities creating an illusion of causation.
In Ann Hewetson’s book Laughter and Tears: A Family’s Journey to Understanding the Autism Spectrum, she writes that her thirteen year old son was called away from a swimming match which the team then lost. “Nothing will convince him but that had he been there they would have won. In his view they lost the cup because he was not there to watch. He is adamant about this and will brook no argument. … As previously mentioned the underlying culprit in all of this is his pattern of thinking by association.” (p. 104)
Nate Brewer
Mar 27, 2008 at 1:47 am
I will say that my son, Brock, definitely regressed. In going back through old pictures and videos, we think he regressed at about the age of 20 months.
Now that Brock is four years old, and after much research, we have finally come to a place where we decided to give chelation a try (oral DMSA). Upon finishing his first three-day cycle, we noticed Brock was happier and more attentive . . . However, he still had autism.
His first week back in therapy, his teachers noticed that Brock had taken an interest in toys, something he had not done in the year they had known him.
Now, following his first three cycles of chelation (three days each cycle), his urine toxicology test has indicated he has elevated levels of Lead and Aluminum. His Mercury level was inconclusive.
Have questions? Reach out to Nate at 480-235-7692
Kristina Chew, PhD
Mar 27, 2008 at 1:54 am
@Nate Brewer,
thank you for writing about Brock here—a friend whose son is the same age as my own (nearing 11) has been chelating and using other biomedical treatments for many years.
He is still autistic and they are still using chelation etc.
Best wishes—–
Liquid Zeolite
Apr 9, 2008 at 2:12 am
I’m not a doctor, but I do have an high IQ and I do have a background in alternative medicine. I know without a doubt that the toxins in vaccines are to blame for the current Autism epidemic. These toxins wreak havoc on the child’s immune system. When the train wreak occurs, the brain has been damaged and the damage has been done. If the train wreak wasn’t that bad, maybe ridding the brain of these toxins can help allow healing, maybe not.
The question is whether or not Thimerosal causes Autism in and of itself or if the toxic brew in vaccines causes Austims as we know WITHOUT A DOUBT that Thimerosal is toxic and harms the brain. How do we know this?
Eli Lilly, the maker of Thimerosal WAS AWARE of the concerns resulting from Thimerosal exposure as far back as early 1940’s according to FOIA docs in the public domain and was advised by its own Medical Science Department in 1967 that the claim “Non-toxic” be removed from its Thimerosal labels. Currently, Lilly’s own materials safety data sheet acknowledges that exposure in children may cause mild to severe mental retardation and that mercury poisoning may occur. Now if that isn’t a smoking gun, what is? I understand the fact parents don’t want to feel they poisoned their kids and caused their brain damage. I understand the fact ignorance is bliss. I understand all that. What I don’t understand is how we as a nation stood silent as Eli Lilly was given 100% immunity against all future litigation for damages caused by their vaccines in the last 4 section’s of the Homeland Security Act, ostensibly for “national security measures”. More like population control measures if you ask me. It is important to note that former President Bush sat on the Lilly board in the late 1970’s. The White House budget director, Mitchell E. Daniels Jr., is a former Lilly executive. Sidney Taurel, the company’s chairman and chief executive, was appointed in June 2007 by President Bush to serve on a presidential Homeland Security Advisory Council. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that the gov. knows that vaccines have damaged millions of children and they moved quickly to protect their stock portfolio’s instead of moving quick to protect our children.
By the way, true or not true, the big tobacco companies knew way back when that their product was addictive and caused cancer but instead of pulling their product off the shelves what did they do, they funded HUGE studies that proved without a doubt cigarettes didn’t cause cancer and nicotine is not addictive. Anyone who believes any study by any FDA or government lap dog is just plain stupid and as feeble minded as the morons who to this day believe the studies that smoking does not cause cancer and nicotine is not addictive. Hell holds a special place for people who harm children. All in my humble opinion of course.
Steve
May 12, 2008 at 2:10 am
I couldnt agree more with Mr. Zeolite. Well said.
As for Kristine PHD, have you ever heard if it
smells like a …, and sounds like a … its probably a … You can do all the double talk you want and say that you cant tell anything form anything because the universe is so varied and random that no conclusion of any kind can ever be made. But the facts remain, Mercury is TOXIC, Vaccines are TOXIC, Kid is healthy, gets the vaccine, becomes retarded or worse overnight. Normal people make associations, and are usually right.
I personaly dont think Thimerisol was removed.
Yes weve been told, but has it been proven.
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