JABS bleating over well argued points. Funny that.

"The Vaccine Book" by Dr Robert Sears has become a big hit among the worried well and University Of Google-educated American middle classes. It's written to sound like a reasonable discussion, but in fact repeats all the anti-vax lies that the JABS crowd spew out - it just suggests that they might be a problem, rather than stating them outright. Planting a seed of doubt - the most effective way of getting the anti-vax ideas propogated. At the end of the book, it suggests an alternative schedule of vaccination for children - one that sounds reasonable to those worried parents who don't have the critical faculties, or the time to actually read any primary sources.

Dr Paul Offit has written an excellent critique of the book, which has been published in Paediatrics.

It's well written, calm and collected, and extremely well referenced - and it acts as an excellent reference for debunking a lot of common anti-vax lies and misinformation that you might come across being spread by the likes of JABS, or parents at your child's school or pre-school.

For this reason (probably more than the takedown of the "alternative schedule" - which obviously isn't as anti-vaccine as the foaming JABS nutters would like), they're doing the usual trick of rubbishing it without producing any reasons why it's wrong.

Cybertiger is, unsurprisingly, banging on about trust:

Why not look again at 'trust' and the controversy Paul Offit has stirred up over 'trust' in the scientists who work for the great medico-pharma-vaccinology-industrial-complex.

Dr Paul Offit MD etc, reviewed 'The Vaccine Book' by Dr Robert Sears with its suggestions for boosting flagging trust in what the vaccinologists say about vaccines and their safety.

Um - because this isn't about your paranoia regarding the whole medical community; this is about keeping children and adults safe and healthy, not spreading lies about vaccination programmes. You twat.

Minority View throws a non-sequiteur in:

Ah! So it doesn't count if children end up dead, paralyzed or brain-damaged from vaccines. Glad to have that cleared up.

But, as I never tire of pointing out, there's no evidence that this happens, is there, MV? You'd like there to be - but there isn't. And you're worried that sensible writing like this points out the huge holes in your flimsy anti-vax arguments and lies.

Have a read of the pdf linked above - it's quite long, but well worth it.

Lalala, we're not listening

Just quickly…
Gus the Fuss has linked to a piece on Age Of Autism which is "covering" a new study which again suggests that there isn't any evidence that thimerosal causes autism. The AoA piece is here: www.ageofautism.com/2009/01/feeding-the-hungry-lie-italian-style.html, but you can read a quick précis here if you like:

"A new study has shown that thimerosal doesn't cause autism. *insert fingers in ears* LA LA LA LA!!! WE'RE NOT LISTENING!! WE KNOW WE'RE RIGHT!! LA LA LA!!!"

The original piece, in "Pediatrics", is here.

Edit: I've just come across Orac's excellent explanation of this research and the stupidity of the anti-vax crowd.

Autism may or may not be a medical condition

Gus the Fuss has posted a snippet of a quote from Simon Baron-Cohen (who seems to have turned into some kind of bogeyman for the JABS crowd recently) which includes the line:

Because autism is a medical diagnosis, it shouldn't be given out lightly

Gus has picked up on this line, but I have no idea what he's arguing when he says this:

If autism is a medical diagnosis why is there no protocol of medical testing in place---blood/urine/stool/hair?

He appears to be saying autism isn't a medical condition - which, coming from the father of an autistic son is rather odd. He also appears to be saying that every condition should be testable by looking at something physical. So is he denying the existance of (for example) Alzheimer's? Clinical depression? I really haven't the foggiest idea what point he thinks he's making.

(I suppose it's possible he just can't stand Professor Baron-Cohen, and so feels he has to disagree with every statement he makes…)

Just how stupid is Gus the Fuss?*

Rosemary has, for once, done a sensible thing. She's reposted a letter to the Guardian from Prof Simon Baron-Cohen (I can't find it on the Guardian website, so I'm taking it on trust that she's copied it properly - it's here: http://jabs.org.uk/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3474) in which he bemoans the poor and misleading reporting of his recent study which "found a correlation between levels of foetal testosterone (FT) and the number of autistic traits a child shows at the age of 8."

He's gone through the errors point by point, and explained, in simple terms exactly what was wrong with the reporting, and how his work was misrepresented.

This isn't enough for Gus the Fuss, a man who is apparently psychic and psychotic in equal measures, believing that a) He knows more than Professor Baron-Cohen does about his own work, and b) That the reporters from the Daily Mail, and the lunatics who inhabit the insane world of JABS have a better insight into his work, despite most probably having not actually read the research.

Looks like Cohen and Fitzy re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic!

While the band plays on ..we believe you Cohen along with your other crack-pot theories..DUH we all got it wrong,BBC,Mail, and your right ?NOT!

The Big Lie has nothing on you,you now have surpassed all your peers in producing the most irrelevant, inaccurate and stale study on autism yet.

I don't understand the mindset of someone who rabidly rants at an article, but when the author of the original source material says "Let's clear this up - actually, that's not what I meant…"; then rants at them for lying, maintaining the first version was true.

As ever, let's not let facts or research get in the way of irrational belief.

* a rhetorical question.

Obviously this is only anecdote…

A new poster by the name of Maxybrown has asked if anyone on the JABS site has an unvaccinated child with autism.

Amethyst, a fairly regular poster and anti-vaxer has politely replied:

Yes I have a 5 year old who has autism and he is free from vaccination, apart from VIT K which was administered without our knowledge or consent.

He was born 10 weeks prem so at the moment, we put his condition down to that.

I have a 17 year old damaged by the MMR who is on the AS and a 14 year old who was vaccine damaged by the DTP, causing him massive brain damage, also on the AS.

This, to me, and probably to you too, suggests that Amethyst's family is a prime example of autism being primarily a genetic condition; three children on the autistic spectrum, blamed on three different environmental factors? You've got to be pretty pigheaded to just deny out of hand that this could in any way be genetic.

Another new poster, by the name of Forbalance has pointed this out:

Several studies have demonstrated that autism has a strong genetic component. If one child in a family is autistic, there's about a 10 percent chance that a sibling also will have autism.

Hurrah for Forbalance. But then Cybertiger - who let's not forget IS A DOCTOR, a real, medical doctor - not a naturopath or anything else made-up; a proper doctor - sticks his oar in:

And your point is, Mr. Balance?

Now, Dr Struthers, you know perfectly well what Forbalance's point is. He's suggesting that in this case it would not be unreasonable to suggest that the cause to Amethyst's three childrens' atuistic spectrum disorders is genetic. However, because you need the loons and the nut-jobs, the religious nutters and the out and out liars on your side to bolster your own agenda, you're using your status as a doctor to imply that you believe this to be absolutely not the case. You've been quite clever - you've not actually written anything that could get you into trouble - just implied it. I'm prepared to bet that this thread will be full of the usual suspects by teatime, claiming that there's no genetic component to autism, and that it's all environmental.

I feel so sorry for Amethyst - I can't begin to imagine what she must go through every day - but Cybertiger is quite happily propping up her paranoia and fears by suggesting that no, it's not genetic, yes, it's something she did to her children, she's to blame, and she has to live with that for the rest of her life. Dr Mark Struthers should be stuck off.

ABORT! ABORT!

Over the last few days, several newspapers (The Guardian, The Telegraph and others) have carried a story about research done over eight years to test for a correlation between high levels of testosterone in fluid surrounding foetuses, and higher levels of “autistic traits”, such as poor verbal and social skills later in life. None of the children in the study were autistic, the study did not seek to develop a test for autism. The conclusion of the research was that their findings fit with the theory that exposure to testosterone in the womb is related to higher levels of autistic traits. That's it. There's an extremely good write-up on NHS Choices. The research team was led by Professor Simon Baron-Cohen, director of the Autism Research Centre at Cambridge University.

So far, so good.

You'd've thought that this kind of research into autistic traits would be welcomed at JABS, as while it doesn't actually look at autism, it's sensible, thorough scientific research in that direction, which may, just may help us understand some of the real causes of autism.

Oooohh no. That's not how it works over at JABS. Sensible research is there to be rubbished, built up as conspiracy and completely misunderstood and lied about (whereas anything "alternative" is to be praised and lauded - clay baths for detox, weird tests for monkey viruses, drinking bleach etc). JABS is fundamentally anti-science. This is how Gus the Fuss hysterically reports the story:

Baron-Cohen wants to abort autistic foetuses

All these a*** lickers are trying to do is test a babies suitability to take the massive ammount of vaccines they pump into them just now.

Does the test include Aspergers, ,ADHD, both on the Autism spectrum.If it did on current goverment Autism figuresare 1 in 100 babies would be terminated take ADHD and aspergers in with the autism and every 2nd and 5th child born in a family of 5 babies would be terminated.

and hes meant to be looking out for the good of autistic children
Sounds like the return of holocaust

Hmm. The study isn't aimed at creating a "test for autism", vaccines aren't mentioned, none of the children involved were actually autistic, and I'm buggered if I know where licking arses comes in.

Gus's post was quickly followed by another which likened Baron-Cohen and his team to Nazi eugenics enthusiasts, but this was (surprisingly) removed fairly quickly. However, Aasa has chimed in with some words of "wisdom":

I think the idea of developing a screening test for autism "in the womb" is ridiculous. The testosterone in the womb could be interacting with heavy metals that the mother and fetus are exposed to. Whether the children will develop "autism" later also depends on their exposures to heavy metals and other toxins which can affect their development, even after birth. If they haven't even figured out how autism is caused, how can they expect to screen for it in the womb? Aside from that, the idea of screening for something which is likely environmentally caused, and then terminating pregnancies on the basis of that, certainly does not seem ethical.

So, what Aasa is doing here, as well as completely misunderstanding / not reading the research, is dismissing it out of hand, in favour of her (I just assume Aasa is a "she" - don't know why) own pet theories of environmental factors for autism, especially heavy metals - a theory for which there is no evidence, and which is primarily pushed by private "clinics" offering dangerous, expensive and useless chelation / biomedical therapy.

As I said earlier - you'd think that research along these lines would be welcomed by parents of autistic children; after all, it may eventually provide them with some reasons for their children's condition. But no - because it doesn't support their own theories, for which there is no evidence, it's lied about, blown up out of all proportion, and misrepresented. It's a prime example of the anti-science agenda at JABS.

-- later that day --

A bit more on this - Suba has confirmed what I pointed out about Aasa's post:

The plethora of possible causes of Autism especially genetic ones are but a smoke screen to divert one's attention from the real environmental causes. Vaccines being the major insult to the immune system are consistently swept under the carpet. The carpet has a luxurious deep pile of excuses but the threads will soon wear thin under the weight of a big white elephant.

Doing research into topics the JABS crowd are interested in is no good if you don't come up with results that match their preconceptions.

That cock Mark Struthers has also weighed in with a smattering of abuse for Professor Baron-Cohen - although what he's actually done to annoy Struthers is mysteriously not mentioned. (I get the feeling that Struthers is a very bitter man, ending his career as a salaried GP in Flitwick, instead of with the titles and knighthood he feels he deserves. This may explain his hatred for anyone who's had some degree of success in medicine.)

Sacha (Borat) and Simon make splendid pantomime dames. Any thoughts on a stage name for Sir Simon Baron-Cohen?

What a cock.

Truth Seeker has posted a load more nonsense all over the JABS forum, including this spectacular piece of misdirection about vaccines in general - as a response to Reality Check's very reasonable post (see previous post).

You should reassure us that vaccine cell lines are not contaminated, with bovine,chicken or monkey contaminants.
see http://www.jabs.org.uk/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3469
You should be able to prove beyond all doubt that vaccines are not capable of suppressing TH1 immunity, foreign DNA does incorporate into our own dna and is not linked to auto immune disease.
You should have some ethical arguments as to use of aborted fetal cell lines in vaccines and why we should not have moral issues regarding this.
You should say why you think its safe to inject aluminium into babies and why this can not cause nerve damage.
You should say why babies who have not deveopled full Myelin sheath protection are not more at risk from vaccinations.

You see, Truth Seeker, the problem is that there is no evidence, nor suggestion that any of these are true. You know (actually, you may not, as you appear to have the intelligence level of an out of date packet of Weetabix) that it's not possible to disprove a negative - however, the fact is that, when applied to vaccines, none of your assertions have any evidence to back them up. You may as well demand; "You should say why vaccines do not increase the likelyhood of being struck by a meteorite, cause gang war, or cause the sacking of football managers". There's no evidence to suggest that any of these are likely outcomes of vaccinating - just as there's no evidence to suggest that any of your hypothetical problems are anything more than ramblings that you've just picked up from you latest favourite fundamental Christian or alt-med website. Yours sound a bit more "sciency", and scary, but have no more basis in fact. Why don't you change your forum name from "Truth Seeker" to "Credulous Prick"?

Sensible post drives JABS regulars into frothing frenzy

A new poster on JABS, who has one post to his name (and is unlikely to be allowed to post again) has written a splendid rant, which, before it's deleted, I'll post in full here. Let's hear it for "Reality Check"!

Suba
Dont be silly. This article, like all those before it state quite clearly that vaccines save lives. Stop getting your evidence from daft websites and face up to facts. Vaccines are the best tool we have in medicine and that is why we are working to develop more. Obviously websites like this one (and its adherents) are doing lots of harm as highlighted by the BBC today http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7819874.stm
..or do you think the Beeb is in the grasp of your "big pharma".

Vaccines are developed in laboratories, universities, research institutes, hospitals - do you think we are all corrupted to tell lies so that kids get sick?

At what point in the last few years did Wakefield become a hero figure to you lot? He is one of the biggest crooks going who made a fortune out of the worried well (as we call them) who were gullible enough to buy his single shot vaccines and made him very rich as a result. Can't you see when you are being taken for a ride?

Actually, a lot of this anti-vaccine stuff is generated and stirred by the alt med sector, like it has been doing for the AIDS story, because it seeks to profit from those who cannot tell the difference between manipulated anecdotes and facts. Remember, many of the contributors to this website (and other similar ones) are trying to sell you rubbish medicine – don’t fall for it - look at the REAL evidence, the sort of analyses looking at thousand of patients over many decades. If you must get your evidence from the internet, at least bother to check out the author – are they qualified? Are they selling something? Where is the article published?

The bottom line is - if you want to be a good parent, get your kids vaccinated. And always remember - wanting to believe something, does not make it true.

Get real folks, before its too late and more kids die from our collective stupidity.

scarter

This has, predictably, driven the regulars into a hysterical rage. Let's take that grade-A moron Truth Seeker first, as he goes down the "informed choice" / big pharma route, before reeling off a load of made-up "ingredients" of vaccines:

What nonsense if you want to be a good parent you will not blindly vaccinate like a robotic sheep but make a fully informed choice based on the truth, not coporate bad $cience.

If you are happy to inject your child with such filth as animal pus, fetal bovine soup, DNA from aborted babies, monkey glands, aluminium rat killer,and other toxins go ahead but dont tell me anyone else what to do with our children based on silly emotional arguments about being "good parent"

"Emotional arguments" Truth Seeker? You're the one who posted a picture of bottles of brown liquid with the words "Fetal Bovine serum" photoshopped onto the labels so badly that it could only have been worse if whoever did it had used Comic Sans.

Following hard on Truth Seeker's heels in the moron stakes comes that venal bastard Cybertiger. He replies to the comment about Andrew Wakefield's dishonesty with this gem:

Don't be silly! I think you'd better take a reality check before you shoot yourself up your backside.

Dr Struthers - everyone knows by now that you have no actual arguments other than innuendo and insult, but "don't be silly" is pathetic, even for you.

Minority View then sticks her oar in, with a big old juicy lie, accusing the poster of being heartless:

I think you win the tactless of the year award. The majority of the posters on this site have a vaccine damaged child.

Hmm. For starters, MV, you're not one of them. You don't have a sick kid. You're just pushing your bullshit anti-vax agenda, using those parents who do have sick kids as a crutch to support your vile propaganda. Secondly, parents on the forum do not have vaccine damaged children. They have ill children, certainly; desparately ill in some cases, I'm sure, but vaccine damage is a self-diagnosis. That diagnosis hasn't been provided by real medical professionals, has it? It's a belief, not a medical fact. And you're just trying to exploit that belief to push that murderous agenda of yours. Now who's the heartless bastard?

Oh, and Gus spouts some shit a bit later on. Nothing to worry about - just some abuse.

So, hurrah for Reality Check!

Sugar pills to replace MMR vaccine?

Another new poster as coincidentally popped up on JABS to ask about single vaccines - what a coincidence, as Merck have announced in the last few days that they'll no longer be producing single vaccines. I claim "sock puppet" again - still, no matter. Single vaccines and "choice" is at least in line with the claimed JABS agenda. However, Truth Seeker then chimes in with a claim for "twat of the week":

Have you considered homeopathic nosodes of mumps, measles and Rubella?

Now, this is a bit sneaky. What Truth Seeker would like to see is the whole population rejecting all vaccinations, and as a result having a fair proportion of children ending up in a hospital or a mortuary. However, he seems to have realised that this is an unpopular point of view among new posters, and is making out that he's suggesting a valid alternative, when actually he's advocating treating children with, well, nothing at all - a treatment that if followed nationwide would end up with thousands of children in hospitals and morgues. Evil bastard.

John Stone posts the same old crap. Again.

John "Cock" Stone has again shown his skill in the use of CTRL-C and CTRL-V by copying a post from AgeOfAutism, regarding a groundless and timewasting complaint made about "eleven British health officials" by Bill Welsh, an anti-vax "activist" from Edinburgh. These are his primary complaints:

1. The inexplicable, and unforgivable, failure to react appropriately when it was established in 1998 that autistic children had a novel form of bowel disease/ inflammation.


2. An insistence on an “MMR or nothing” policy in face of the initial, and accumulative, scientific and anecdotal evidence re MMR’s lack of safety for a sub-set of children.


3. A refusal to press for proper investigation, using the most appropriate scientific means of research, of the claims of thousands of parents that the MMR vaccine had damaged children.


4. The promulgation, in conjunction with the Health Protection Agency, of information relating to MMR vaccine safety that is likely unreliable and potentially misleading in that context.


5. The recommendation that unethical treatments be given to children when there is no clinical need and irrespective of whether the child might be prone to adverse reactions.

Let's just take these one by one, shall we?

1. In 1998 it wasn't "established" that there was any such link. It was suggested in one paper, a paper that ten out of its twelve co-authors have since disowned. There was no good evidence.


2. There was no initial scientific evidence, and is no accumulative evidence for a lack of safety. Anecdote and conclusions drawn from coincidence are not evidence.


3. Now, I don't know how many parents Andrew Wakefield and friends, the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph frightened into complaining about MMR, but any claim that there hasn't been follow-up research is ludicrous. It's just that there's been no good quality, peer reviewed, published follow-up research that agrees with the conclusion Welsh and Stone would like.


4. The information put out by the Department of Health that MMR is safe seems, in the face of a total lack of evidence showing it to be anything other than safe seems to me to be perfectly reasonable.


5. Unethical treatments? Like what? As head of the Autism Treatment Trust, Bill Welsh is no stranger to dangerous and unethical treatments, such as "maximised heavy metal detoxification" - when there's no good evidence that autism is caused by heavy metal poisoning. I assume he's implying that MMR is an unethical treatment. Sadly for Welsh and Stone - all the evidence says otherwise.

All this stuff, John Stone is completely aware of - but as I've pointed out before, to admit it would mean a massive loss of face, so he continues on his ever more ridiculous quest, grasping at thinner and thinner straws. The man's an immoral cock - he's campaigning for something dangerous, when he knows his position is a lie.

So - that's Welsh dealt with. Can we have him locked up for malicious time wasting?

Anti-vaccination is a religion

Now tell me that these people aren't nutters. Truth Seeker has posted a quote from immunizationinfo.org, which explains the science behind the myth that vaccines contain foetal tissue.

"Some vaccine components have been derived from human fetuses. The abortions were not conducted for the purpose of vaccine discovery or vaccine production"

Perfectly reasonable.

However, as Truth Seeker has shit for brains, he then goes on to claim that this is an absolute lie, by copy-and-pasting a great long diatribe from a website by the name of www.jesus-is-savior.com. The specific page is: http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/Evils in America/Abortion is Murder/aborted_fetus_vaccines.htm. You can imagine the kind of reasoned discussion you'll get on that site, can't you…? To save you the bother of your own copy and paste job (as I refuse to link to this kind of crap), it starts with a big gory header that reads "The Abortion Industry Contributes To Vaccine Manufacturing", and carries on in much the same vein for pages of shite.

When the JABS crowd resort to backing their arguments with quotes from fundamental religious whack-jobs, any last remnants of their supposed sheen of respectability drains merrily away down the toilet.

Amusingly, the next post, from that halfwit aobbard reads:

Brings it home doesn't it?

Err, no. It makes you all look like twats.