December 30, 1999
Dr. Neal A. Halsey
Division of Disease Control
Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene & Public Health
615 North Wolfe Street
Baltimore, MD. 21205
Dear Dr. Halsey:
I have been following the issue of Thimerosal in vaccines
very closely over the past few months.
First and foremost, I want to thank you for your proactive stance
concerning the issue of potential toxicity from excessive mercury exposure in
vaccines and your efforts to decrease this unnecessary source of neurotoxicity
for our children. You were correct in
your opinion that CBER’s findings were worthy of alarm. What is disturbing to me is that in many of
the recent articles I have reviewed there is a consistent theme that there is “no
evidence of harm having occurred from Thimerosal vaccine administration”
following the ACIP guidelines. No
evidence of harm does not equate with no harm having occurred! As you stated in the Hepatitis Control
Report Summer 1999 interview “we can say there is no evidence of harm, but the
truth is no one has looked.”
Our son’s pre and post natal history was unremarkable and
he easily met all his early developmental landmarks until shortly after his
first birthday. It was at that time
that he began to slip away from us. He lost
speech and eye contact, developed a very limited diet and experienced
intermittent bouts of diarrhea. After a
series of tests and evaluations, he was ultimately diagnosed with Pervasive
Developmental Disorder, a form of Autism.
The most profound abnormality was his global receptive and expressive
speech delay. (It is interesting to note a case report of a 44 year old
gentleman who received excessive Thimerosal in a BIG preparation and his first symptoms
of mercury toxicity were speech difficulties).
When the concerns with Thimerosal surfaced this summer, I
reviewed my son’s vaccine record to find that all his early vaccines contained Thimerosal
and he had received 187.5 mcg of mercury in his vaccines given the first six
months of life. At each visit, two,
four, and six, he received a total of 62.5 mcg of mercury. These levels exceeded EPA’s allowable daily
exposure of 0.1 mcg per kilogram at two months 125 fold. Since the half life of mercury in the blood
is only 50 to 70 days before moving into this tissue, there would be no way to
detect his level of exposure now that he is five years old without a
provocative agent. Fortunately I had kept a lock of his hair from his first
haircut. Analysis of this sample
revealed 4.8 PPM mercury and 40.2 PPM aluminum, both present in his
vaccines. These levels represent a
fourfold increase above reference ranges.
Please note that my son has never eaten fish or had amalgam dental
fillings.
It is documented that children with PDD/Autism have been
found to have mercury toxicity which previously had been thought to be
attributed to environmental exposure.
At a recent national conference on Autism I was shocked to find many
other parents who also reported mercury toxicity in their autistic
children. I do not think this is a
chance occurrence. Nor do I think that
the documented epidemic of Autism beginning in the early 1990’s, which
coincides with the addition of multiple vaccines the first six months of life,
is a coincidence. The recently
described clusters of autism in Brick Township, New Jersey and in California
where incidence rates are 1 in 150 or less are occurring in every state. The state of Maryland just released their
Special Education Census Data. While
the overall population increased only 7% from 1990 to 1998, Autism increased
513% from 1993 to 1998, while mental retardation increased 13%. A cursory review of those children in our
county who carry a diagnosis of Autism with overall enrollment in kindergarten
puts our incidence at 1 in 125. Just in
our town, there were 55 children born in 1994, two of which are now diagnosed
with Autism, a 1 in 23 incidence. Another
sobering statistic is that out of a total enrollment of 18,476 children in our
school system, approximately 2,100 were served in special education programs
during the 1997-1998 school year, including 125 preschool three and four year
olds. This equates to approximately 1 in
9 children receive some form of special education. Could it be that a lesser degree of mercury exposure could be
expressed as speech and language impairment or ADD/ ADHD?
According to your recent JAMA editorial, data from two
recent studies examining the relationship between methylmercury exposure and neuropsychological
outcome in children suggest that intermittent large exposures (which our
children have received with immunizations) may pose more risk than small daily
doses. I feel it is more accurate to
view these exposures as a bolus dose occurring on one given day verses calculating
this exposure over six month period as Dr. Ball presented. This
only serves to falsely minimize this toxic exposure. If you look at the mercury from a daily dose
perspective, then no one vaccine containing Thimerosal would be able to meet
EPA’s limit of 0.1 mcg per KG/Day guidelines the first six months of life. You have obviously identified a problem as expressed
in the CBER data. My question is why is
this being allowed to continue?!
Delaying Hepatitis vaccine until six months does little to address this
problem.
Thimerosal containing Hepatitis vaccine only contribute
12.5 mcg of mercury per dose, whereas the majority of mercury exposure comes
from DPT and HIB vaccines, each with 25 mcg of mercury per dose. The American Academy
of Pediatrics position statement that “Infants and children who have received
Thimerosal containing vaccine do not need to have blood, urine or hair tested
for mercury since the concentrations of mercury would be quite low and would
not require treatment” was obviously not the case for our son. I ask, is this statement based on scientific
evidence or speculation? What is of
upmost importance is that any child who presents with neurological impairment
who has received mercury in excess of Federal Guidelines receive prompt
evaluation for mercury toxicity.
With appropriate early intervention and mercury
detoxification many of these children have made significant neurological
improvement. There is currently almost an entire decade of children who have
been exposed to levels of mercury in vaccines that exceeded Federal Guidelines
for total mercury exposure. The reality
is these numbers will only continue to increase until all Thimerosal is
withdrawn from vaccines. Not being forthright
with this information will only serve to further compromise the integrity of
vaccine programs. In the recent JAMA
editorial you expressed your personal preference that Thimerosal free vaccine preference
should be extended to HiB and DTaP vaccines, not just hepatitis vaccine. The Advisory Committee on Immunization
Practices of the CDC’s decision not to give preference for Thimerosal-free
vaccine is a grave injustice to the health of our children that borders on
medical negligence. It appears that the
“Vaccine Program” itself has taken priority over the children that it is
responsible for protecting. We must
first remember to “do no harm.”
In the Summer 1999 issue of Hepatitis Control Report, you
were quoted as saying “pediatricians who continue to administer Thimerosal
containing vaccines could face a flurry of lawsuits, perhaps claiming that
children had acquired learning disabilities from mercury exposure.” This statement
may well be predictive of the future unless something is done now. You are now aware of evidence of harm having
occurred from excessive Thimerosal exposure from vaccines in our son and
others. What I would like to know is
your recommendations concerning this serious issue. Who will be responsible for investigating reports of
neurotoxicity from Thimerosal? Who will
be responsible for uncovering the truth that no one has investigated? I do hope this task will be accomplished by
physicians and not attorneys. I look
forward to your response to our inquiry.
Sincerely,
Lyn Redwood, RN, MSN, CRNP
William T. Redwood, MD
cc.
U.S. Surgeon
General
U.S. Public
Health Service
American
Academy of Pediatrics
American
Academy of Family Medicine
CDC National
Immunization Program
ATSDR
Rep. Dan
Burton, Indiana
Rep. Frank
Pallone, New Jersey
National
Vaccine Information
Autism
Research International
Autism Society
of America
Cure Autism
Now
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