Give one to the conspiracy theorists...
The CDC is taking some heat. The reason? Mercury preservatives in vaccines cause autism:The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, rarely the subject of public controversy, is facing an emerging credibility crisis on the emotional issue of whether old-style vaccines containing a mercury preservative caused autism in thousands of children.
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A full-page ad scheduled to run in today's editions of USA Today, the nation's largest circulation newspaper, accuses the CDC of "causing an epidemic of autism" by recommending that children receive a series of vaccines that until 2001 contained thimerosal.
The ad, placed by various advocacy groups, quotes environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as saying: "It's time for the CDC to come clean with the American public." Looks like the battle royale is about to begin, and the CDC isn't going to be the one verifying the studies either.
Naturally, all of my children are vaccinated, so this isn't something that bends me out of shape. Still, I know several families who have held this concern and have not vaccinated their children as a result.
Here's hoping science trumps the day and puts this one to rest.
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James Young 
3 Comments:
Other countries were still using the vaccines with the preservative.
I don't know where the medical studies are going to come out on this, but supposing that it's true, it's still possible that the good of the use of thimerasol outweighed the damage. It allowed vaccines to last longer, which kept the prices low and the availability high.
Nobody who had a reaction to a vaccine would be expected to appreciate the "common good" argument, of course. General notions of "good" are outweighed by the specific bad.
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