April Oakes Speech at Autism Rally, April 21, 2002

Hello,

My name is April Oakes and no, I am not happy to be here!!!  I find it VERY heartbreaking to have to stand up here and be the voice for these children.  My husband and I started our organization in honor of our 4-year old daughter Casi, who passed away on June 13th, 1999.  The only reason I’m able to breathe today, after losing the most important thing in my life, is because God has made my mission in life very clear. We realized Casi was vaccine injured, before we received the label of autism.  I say labeled, because I believe this is what they want us to call these “vaccine injured” children.  I have dedicated the rest of my life to doing WHATEVER is necessary to help these innocent victims!!!!  That is why we have joined forces with Ray Gallup and his organization, “The Autism Autoimmunity Project”. “Casi’s Quest” is the Florida Chapter, which is a non-profit charity dedicated to obtaining funding for independent research addressing immune and immunogenetic abnormalities in autism. We feature prominent medical and natural practitioners with the latest and most successful treatment in autism and related disorders.  Casi's Quest and The Autism Autoimmunity Project need your help in supporting research leading to a reduction in the number of autism cases. We support biological research and feel this will get us the answers we are looking for, so we can eventually put an end to our project. We do not have 40 or 50 years to find answers, because our children are in a race against time.  This epidemic is due to an immune insult and as far as genetic research is concerned, it’s impossible to have a genetic epidemic!!

We sponsored one of the top researchers in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, on September 8th, 2000.  He is finding the live measles virus in the gut of autistic children, via the MMR vaccine.  He presented his findings, to close to 600 people and we were able to donate $40,000 towards his research.    What an amazing man!!!!  I’ve never met a more compassionate and determined doctor, who truly listens to the parents.  We also support the work of Dr.’s Vijendra Singh and James Oleske, who are finding elevated measles antibody titers in most of their autistic patients.  Hopefully soon, we will have more doctors jump aboard and pursue this much needed research and help stop this epidemic!!!

We believe autism is an autoimmune disease.  Autoimmune is when the body attacks itself because it recognizes its own makeup as foreign. We have learned that these multiple vaccines that are injected into our babies blood stream contain many toxins.  Vaccines contain ingredients such as Antifreeze, Phenol (used as a disinfectant), Formaldehyde (known as a cancer-causing agent), Aluminum (associated with alzheimer’s disease and seizures), Thimerosal (a mercury derivative linked to brain injury and autoimmune disease), Neomycin and Streptomycin.   These vaccines are also grown and strained through animal or human tissue like monkey kidney tissue, chicken embryo, dog kidney tissue, calf serum, human diploid cells (the dissected organs of aborted fetuses), pig blood, horse blood and rabbit brain.  We are led to believe that all these ingredients and genetic material can be injected into immature immune systems, with no negative effects!!  The problem with animal cells is that during serial passage of the virus, the contaminating animal RNA and DNA can be transferred from one host to another.  Undetected animal viruses and genetic material may slip past quality control testing procedures, as in 1955 through 1961 with SV40.  This stands for simian virus #40 (meaning the 40th monkey virus found), which contaminated the polio vaccine and has been linked to cancer.

We are told our children are not able to attend school without all the mandatory vaccines.  This is simply NOT TRUE!!  There are exemptions for vaccines in almost every state, which allows our children to get into school.  By the way, the people who mandate which vaccines are mandatory for school, are the same people who are funded by the pharmaceutical companies that make the vaccines.  Congressmen Dan Burton’s Committee on government reform found many instances of many federal government health agency officials taking money from or owning stock of vaccine companies. These same people were sitting on government health agency review boards, making decisions concerning vaccines. There are currently 200 new vaccines in the pipeline and many will be mandated. There are no long-term studies preformed on these vaccines, but we are required to inject them into these underdeveloped immune systems. One thing we have realized, is that this is a serious conflict of interest!!!!!

In conclusion, we want parents to realize you DO have options and you DO have the right to make an informed choice.  The solution to this problem is addressing the cause and not the symptom. There is no money in a cure for autism, but lots of money in treatment.  We do not want to create a new industry, we want to address the cause and put an end to this epidemic!!  One of the main reasons I am here today, is because I wish someone would have shared this information with me, before I chose to blindly hold my daughter down and allow her to be injected. Since Casi’s passing, life has not been or ever will be the same. PLEASE appreciate that 'special personality', and realize that you have been truly blessed with a  special gift. Thank you so much for listening to what I have to say and most importantly I thank GOD, for giving me the strength to get through this.