Over the last decade, autism has gone from a rare and misunderstood condition to a disorder that may affect as many as 1.5 million Americans. Without a clear explanation in sight, parents and doctors have worked tirelessly to pinpoint the cause of autism, but the answer remains elusive. Are vaccines the missing link?
The US Government have not said that vaccines triggered a regression into
autism. If you believe this to be true, please could you provide a link
to this statement.
What I believe you will find is that HHS stated:
"In
sum, DVIC has concluded that the facts of this case meet the statutory
criteria for demonstrating that the vaccinations CHILD received on July
19, 2000, significantly aggravated an underlying mitochondrial
disorder, which predisposed her to deficits in cellular energy
metabolism, and manifested as a regressive encephalopathy with features
of autism spectrum disorder."
1) encephalopathy is not autism
2) 'features of autism spectrum disorder' does not equate to 'diagnosis of autism'.
It
is clear that Ms Poling was vaccine injured. It is also clear that she
is autistic. What is also clear from both this document and the Case
Study is that her vaccines did not cause her autism.
A key piece of evidence in the Poling case was the Case Report[1] on Hannah Poling authored by her father, John Shoffner, Richard Frye and Andrew Zimmerman. This case report lists all of the symptoms the authors considered to have been caused by her vaccines. I list these below:
fever to 38.9°C
inconsolable crying
irritability
lethargy
refused to walk
waking up multiple times in the night
having episodes of opisthotonus
no longer normally climb stairs
Low-grade intermittent fever
generalized erythematous macular rash
spinning
gaze avoidance
disrupted sleep/wake cycle
perseveration
expressive language was lost
chronic yellow watery diarrhea
appetite remained poor for 6 months
body weight did not increase
decline on a standard growth chart
atopic dermatitis
slow hair growth
generalized mild hypotonia
toe walking
normal tendon reflexes.
When one compares this list to this DSM (IV) diagnostic criteria for autism, we can only find three matches:
gaze avoidance
perseveration
expressive language was lost
This is not, I repeat, not, enough to meet a diagnosis of autism. Please do not take my word for it. Ask autism diagnostic specialists. I asked three and the consensus was the same as mine. The symptoms described as being caused by vaccine damage are not enough to give a diagnosis of autism.
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