autism

Cookies Are Not Causation

October 22, 2010
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He Who Will Not Be Ignored will not eat M&M cookies; he believes that they make him sick. It’s not a decision he arrived at arbitrarily, it is, in his mind, supported by hard evidence. Four years ago, while driving him home from a doctor’s appointment, I offered to buy He Who a cookie as [...]

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The Downfall of Vaccine Denial

March 30, 2010
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If you thought the vaccine denial movement was immune to the Downfall video meme, you’re in for a surprise. As you can see here, der Führer had a rough time of it after learning about a Danish study demonstrating no causal link between vaccines and autism. It’s worth it to hear him scream: It’s not [...]

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“Scientifically Unsupportable”

March 16, 2010
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Last Friday, special masters of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims released their findings on the second phase of the Omnibus Autism Proceedings, and found no evidence of a causal link between autism and thimerosal in vaccines. (The first phase, decided last year, addressed the claim that the MMR vaccine caused autism. ) Test cases [...]

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Try Reason, Not “Everything”

March 5, 2010
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Last week Time magazine published “The Autism Debate: Who’s Afraid of Jenny McCarthy?” As much as I’d like to rant about her, as I’ve done before, instead I’ll call your attention to this paragraph, buried halfway into the article: There are dark murmurings from scientists and doctors asking, Was her son ever really autistic? Evan’s [...]

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Irresponsible and Dishonest

February 2, 2010
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Almost exactly a year ago, I wrote about Andrew Wakefield’s falsification of data linking vaccines and autism, calling his behavior “irresponsible and criminal.” Last week the General Medical Council, the British medical licensing body, arrived at the same conclusion: In reaching its decision, the Panel notes that the project reported in the Lancet paper was [...]

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That’s My Kid Too

June 30, 2009

Michael Goudeau, writer and producer for Penn & Teller: Bullshit! and co-host of PennRadio, has written an excellent article for the James Randi Educational Foundation. That’s My Kid Too is his response to an anti-vaccination documentary that could have been directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Goudeau, like me, responds the only way we know how: You [...]

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Thinking About Rethinking Autism

June 17, 2009

“Autism. It’s all over the media. The conversation is focused on causation and cure. It’s time to change the conversation toward hope, support, respect and understanding. The facts are not sexy. So, we got someone who is to explain them.” Using a hot babe to direct attention to autism issues is a stroke of genius. [...]

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Don’t Listen to Jenny McCarthy

May 15, 2009

Oprah Winfrey (I won’t refer to her by just “Oprah;” one-name status is reserved for Dylan, Miles, Stravinsky, Joyce, and others who will be remembered by history.) has chosen to sign Jenny McCarthy for a talk show deal. It’s not something that anyone should care about — after all, what’s another show in the vast [...]

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Correlation is not Causation

February 12, 2009

I can’t say it any better than Kathleen Seidel at Neurodiversity Weblog: This morning, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims Office of Special Masters released decisions in the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) claims, Cedillo v. HHS (Case No. 98-916V), Hazlehurst v. HHS (Case No. 03-654V) and Snyder v. HHS (Case No. 01-162V), the first [...]

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Irresponsible, Criminal Behavior

February 9, 2009

I have written previously about the nonexistent link between vaccinations and autism, and the harm that has been caused by the acceptance of this variety of magical thinking. Yesterday, the Times of London reported the results of an investigation into the data collection and record keeping of Dr. Andrew Wakefield, the researcher responsible for publicizing [...]

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