Autism Isn't Epedemic

Which brings us to the point of the local news station WJLA-TV 7. They're reporting on the epidemic called AUTISM. It's another not quite true news report that's had us doing the search and checking our facts. We had to leave the comfortable confines of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and run all over the National Vital Statistics which directs me to the EXCEL spreadsheet that we don't completely understand but gave us the information we needed to compile the table of deaths in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia jurisdictions.

All while investigating the connection between Autism and the flu vaccine. The unrealistic fear is giving your child the vaccine will give them autism. Of course the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says there is no connection. Their the government and their distributing the vaccine. "Since 2001, with the exception of some influenza (flu) vaccines, thimerosal is not used as a preservative in routinely recommended childhood vaccines."

Speaking of getting things wrong the big boys at the New York Times (or rather reporter Roni Caryn Rabin) misreported the story that The Philadelphia Inquirer correctly reported connecting autism with higher mercury levels. The Philadelphia Inquirer gets it completely right while they leave it out: "The children with autism actually had lower levels of mercury. When researchers adjusted the results for fish consumption - autistic children tend to be picky eaters and so consume less fish, which contains mercury - their levels were comparable to those with typical development, as well as a representative national sample."

The epidemic that WJLA-TV 7 is reporting comes from a report that estimates in excess of the numbers given by the CDC. "It is estimated that between 1 in 100 and 1 in 300 with an average of 1 in 150 children in the United States have an ASD." To support WJLA the CDC uses from 2000 data in its 2007 opinion.

To be critical of WJLA the report uses parent-reported diagnosis and we accept that it doesn't matter how infrequently a piano falls on a persons head if you're the person that has a piano falling on your head. The odds don't matter when its happening to you. From the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP): "The prevalence of parent-reported diagnosis of ASD among US children aged 3 to 17 years was estimated from the 2007 National Survey of Children's Health (sample size: 78037). A child was considered to have ASD if a parent/guardian reported that a doctor or other health care provider had ever said that the child had ASD and that the child currently had the condition. The point-prevalence for ASD was calculated for those children meeting both criteria. We examined sociodemographic factors associated with current ASD and with a past (but not current) ASD diagnosis. The health care experiences for children in both ASD groups were explored."

Since the report is published in AAP we thought they might be the source of epidemic fear but a search of recent documents from the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics (APP) doesn't produce those results. APP considers childhood obesity and asthma at epidemic levels but not autism.

The real death statistics are the standards: cancer, heart disease and Cerebrovascular disease (CVD) in Maryland and Virginia. The number three (3) cause of death in the District is accidents CVD (strokes) are fourth. Accidents are the fourth (4) cause of death in Virginia based on 2006 data. Though they actively kill more residents than anything other causes none are considered epidemic. That's the real news.

Not Quite True News

We often cite Reuters as our news source. It's a very normally reliable source of information. When we saw this story (U.S. may end up discarding unused H1N1 vaccine) and only on Reuters we were concerned because we knew the information to be untrue. So we went to the source and lo and behold it wasn't true.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) knows there is a problem and is extremely aware. This agency is doing all it can with what it has to work with. Their awareness should mean we won't be having these problems in the future. The Reuters headline is a result of reporter Reuters Maggie Fox's question: "I want to follow up on this question about the perceptions about the vaccines, is it frustrating to you that people on the one hand are saying, hey, we can't get this vaccine but then there's plenty of people saying don't get the vaccine it's dangerous. I know the last time that there was a shortage of vaccine, you ended up throwing doses away. Is there a risk of that happening here?"

The director of the CDC Dr. Thomas Frieden answered in this way: "I think the likelihood is that we are currently in a situation where we too little vaccine in the community. It's quite likely that that too little vaccine is one of the things that's making people more interested in getting vaccinated, frankly. Were we have shortages we see an increase in demand. It is likely also as we produce more vaccine and as both people are given the opportunity to get vaccinated, and as disease maybe wanes in the future, we will have significant amounts of vaccine that can't be used. The challenge at this point is to get what vaccine we have out now available to people, provide it to doctors offices, school, health care facilities and others as rapidly as possible so that as much as is available can be used. One of the messages for states, localities and health providers is not to reserve vaccine that they have available, to give it out as soon as it comes in, because more is on the way. And the production is now in a scaled up mode, so more being produced, not as much as we would like, but more is being produced and made available as soon as it can be."

Maybe you heard what Maggie Fox heard but the entire exchange is available at the CDC website from yesterday. (LISTEN to the entire news conference)

Flu Lines

During the riots in the 60s the national guard was called out and a curfew was established. Now might be the time to enact such a measure. Why? Long lines of people queuing up to receive a limited number of flu shots seems counter productive. While most people are not infected allow for such a large congregations seems to us, whether waiting outside or inside for the vaccine, to be breeding ground for infection. We would discourage anyone from lining up excessively to receive treatment though we must admit awaiting further supplies to arrive seems extremely dangerous.

According to the manufacturer of the vaccine, Sanofi Pasteur, "Production of seasonal influenza vaccine for both Northern and Southern hemispheres is still a priority as seasonal influenza is a very serious illness, causing an estimated 250,000 to 500,000 deaths per year, according to WHO global figures."

Only the protected can be certain of survival. While the figures are worldwide the Associated Press (AP) reports: "Since April, swine flu has killed more than 800 people in the U.S., including 86 children, 39 of them in the past month and a half, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than half of all hospitalizations since the beginning of September were people 24 and under." Locally we know the number to be to date in our jurisdiction as reported to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to be in excess of 858 in our area alone. These are the actual figures reported to the CDC by our health department not reported to the public.

AP quotes the CDC as saying: "Federal officials counsel patience, saying that eventually there should be enough of both vaccines for everyone who wants them." The CDC reported through Dr. Anne Schuchat: "Influenza is widespread in the country and illness, hospitalizations and deaths continue to increase. 41 states are now identifying widespread disease from influenza, that's up from 37 last week. The other states are all seeing either regional or local activity. It's unprecedented for this time of year to have the whole country seeing such high levels of activity." (Listen)

The Associated Press added: "Flu vaccines are not nearly as profitable as other kinds of drugs, and most of the biggest vaccine makers have little incentive to switch from a method with which they are familiar. At its two plants in the Pocono Mountains town of Swiftwater, Sanofi Pasteur, the top U.S. supplier of seasonal vaccine, is churning out more than 75 million doses of swine flu vaccine and 50 million doses of the winter flu variety."

Sanofi Pasteur not getting with the party line reports: "For U.S. Residents Only - The $150 million, 140,000 square-foot vaccine facility is part of the company’s commitment to support public health and to protect individuals against seasonal and pandemic influenza. When operating at full capacity, the new influenza facility is expected to produce 100 million doses of seasonal influenza vaccine annually. In total, sanofi pasteur will have a capacity of approximately 150 million does of trivalent seasonal vaccine per year in the U.S. – 50 million doses from the existing facility and 100 million doses from the new facility when operating at full capacity." (Video)

We love the Los Angeles Times (LA Times.com) but they (actually reporter Thomas H. Maugh II) gets it wrong: "(C)oncern is growing that the vaccine may arrive too late to do much good. Statistician Sherry Towers and Zhilan Feng of Purdue University reported last week in the journal Eurosurveillance that a mathematical model of the swine flu pandemic predicts that the disease will peak this week."

What Eurosurveillance report actually states first off: "(I)t should be noted that the actual periodic function underlying seasonal forcing of influenza has not been well studied, and the uncertainties in the model predictions arising from seasonal forcing assumptions are difficult to quantify."

Total Doses Shipped as of	10/14/09
District of Columbia Maryland Virginia	14500 130700 265100
TOTALS	410300

There are people infected and recovering. Our warnings are to those who aren't feeling well enough after four (4) days when you've taken care of yourself as soon as you've felt more miserable than you ever have. Get treatment and get it right away. Have someone with you - don't make an appointment - it's too late for that get the shot. Demand the shot. IF YOU'RE ILL. We know you won't be able to do this yourself but have someone available to fight for you. Get someone to fight for you. Demand treatment regardless of whether or not your physician believes you need it or not. What will getting the treatment do to hurt you? It will save your life.

Staying Alive!

We don't want to be accused of promoting fear. What we have always asserted is information is power. The more you know the less fear you should have. To contribute to less fear we thought we'd highlight the positive as well as the negative in yesterday and today's news. We also don't wish to be the "flu police!" Our concern is health care not disease care. Focusing on the disease of the season isn't our raison d'etre.

First things first, in our jurisdiction, the District of Columbia still publicly maintains no deaths to the H1N1 virus though privately the number of deaths reported to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for flu or pneumonia from the first week of 2009 to the thirty-ninth week of 2009 (last week) is 94 as compared to 60 in 2008 during the same week and 44 in 2007. That's the official report to the government. While Maryland seems to be the hotbed of flu reporting to the feds 585 though the official count is ten (10). It's the unreported that begs to be counted.

Baltimore adds three more infections in a single location from their police department. Again we have to point out this isn't the beginning of the flu season which "officially" begins in November. This is indeed a pandemic. Though not unexpected.

Current news reports from other parts of the country suggests that seniors are largely immune to this virus and need no be concerned with it because they've developed an immunity because the strain (H1N1) isn't substantially different from previous strains. Following the report released yesterday from Canada - that would appear to hold true:

"Unlike some previous flu pandemics, which saw high death rates among the very young and the very old, "severe disease and mortality in the current outbreak is concentrated in relatively healthy adolescents and adults between the ages of 10 and 60 years," the authors write. The observation that Canadian women were at higher risk of severe illness is "striking," the authors said, noting that other swine flu studies have not noticed such a pattern." "The explanation for increased risk of severe disease and death among females in this report is unclear but the role of pregnancy as a risk factor has been noted in previous influenza pandemics," the authors noted. While the authors call the patients studied "healthy," it should be noted that 95 per cent had some underlying risk factor, such as asthma, smoking, obesity or high blood pressure. The researchers found that once swine flu patients were sick enough to need hospital care, they declined very fast, usually requiring ventilators and advanced "rescue" treatments. Patients who become severely ill had symptoms for about four days before going to hospital and then often required intense care in the ICU within one or two days; their average ICU stay was 12 days. Shock and multi-organ failure were common; 81 per cent of the patients they studied needed to be put on ventilators."

Using our "every living individual is sacred" credo playing a numbers game isn't good enough. While the stats may be in your favor you might not "want to be in that number." Get the shot - don't take the risk.

BizJournal was the ONLY article written about the affect of the flu on the non-human "corporation" - which in theory we find distasteful. In practice we can understand and would even suggest, distasteful, the loss of employees due to the virus could or would create new employment opportunities for the current and large numbers of unemployeed. Seeing the pandemic as a natural way of "thinning the herd" to paraphrase Bill Maher is in direct opposition to our very existence.

We do support the South Florida's publication's "warning." We just wish it was more humanly rather than fiscally addressed. Though in their defensive that's how a corporation shows its concerns. It just survive so that the people whom it employs can continue to thrive.

Believe it or not some paper's columnist are prompting the people should just say NO to vaccine - from California no less. Promoting oxygen therapy as a pancea for all things that ail you Lynne Gordon's article says:

Just Say NO to The Swine Flu Vaccine of 2009! & Ten things you're not supposed to know about the swine flu vaccine "I personally am NOT going to take the Swine Flu vaccine for several reasons. There are too many 'firsts' with this vaccine and because it contains Squalene..."

"...This is the third vaccine made with Squalene. (The first was the Swine Flu Vaccine of 1976 which killed 25 people and paralyzed and crippled thousands. Lawsuits from the after-effects reached 1.3 billion dollars)"

Thankfully the "informer" is misinformed and one commenter to the article point by point refutes Gordon's accusations. Most glaringly in error is that the vaccine contains "Squalene." When critics are so much in error it makes it easier to dismiss the quackery of the uninformed.

What's noteworthy of the article is that we've found a kindred in the commenters blog with which we hope to develop an association and that squalene ingested orally in olives can actually be a preventative and makes our list as what you can do for a dollar to protect yourself in this viral season. While your flu shot might not be the real deal - olives are a natural. A/H1N1 Influenza Outbreak Timeline which we highly recommend for an international view of the flu.

"...[T]he current stock of U.S. swine flu vaccines does not contain adjuvants, according to Anne Schuchat, MD, in an informational video produced by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Schuchat does acknowledge that there is an emergency provision to use them — should the pandemic accelerate.

Adjuvants are being used in swine flu vaccines in countries outside of the United States, including Canada, Europe and Australia. However, even though Canada is using an adjuvanted vaccine, it has also ordered 1.8 million doses of the unadjuvanted vaccine for use in pregnant women and children under the age of 3."

Protect yourself - be informed and forearmed. You can survive this! Let's let not be apart of the thinning herd. But do NOT be afraid. You know what to do and now what must be done - and OLIVES plenty of olives! What could it hurt? Buy 'em from the dollar store and pop 'em like grapes!

If you feel ill or if your children are ill take your: "...children to the hospital if they have difficulty breathing, their skin turns gray or blue, are difficult to wake up or become irritable and can't stop crying."

"Warning signs, respiratory symptoms and high fever are reasons to seek care or talk to your health care provider," Schuchat said."