►December 27, 2003 - Florida needs strict rules not to reduce toxic threat of mercury - Herald-Tribune guest columnist - "Mercury is extremely toxic, and there is no safe level of exposure for humans. It can cause brain damage, particularly in children under the age of 6. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control reports that one in 12 women in the United States has absorbed enough mercury to pose a threat to a developing fetus."

►December 27, 2003 - Medicine industry fights bad image - Even a miracle pill might not improve the perception of pharmaceutical giants. - Gannett News Service via StatesmanJournal.com - "Yet, even though drug companies make products that help people feel better and live longer, the industry’s image is on life support...Fewer than half of Americans surveyed in a Gallup Poll in August had a positive view of the drug industry. Drug companies ranked below the federal government and airline companies and just above the legal profession in the public’s eyes."

►December 26, 2003 - Local Soldier Given Anthrax Vaccine - www.kpvi.com - "Wednesday, a U.S. district judge ordered the military to stop adminstering the anthrax vaccine to service members without their consent until a trial can be held on the matter. Plaintiffs in the case argue that the anthrax vaccine is being used as an experimental drug...But for one local Air Force member, the ruling may have come too late. Bryan Latham explains...'Last Christmas Eve, they had to have an ambulance come and get me because my wife thought that I was dying because I stopped breathing and my eyes rolled in the back of my head.'...It is just one of the many traumas Vance Wasden lives through. But it wasn't always like this..."

►December 26, 2003 - Private schools low on funds - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review - "The schools charged with educating the state's most severely disabled children say they are slowly going broke, and it could mean that some will have to close their doors at the end of the school year."

►May 1999 - Marked elevation of myocardial trace elements in idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy compared with secondary cardiac dysfunction. - journal article (J Am Coll Cardiol) - "RESULTS: A large increase (>10,000 times for mercury and antimony) of TE concentration has been observed in myocardial but not in muscular samples in all pts with IDCM."

►May-June 2002 - Mercury exposure and early effects: an overview.. - journal article (Med Lav) -"Infants exposed to phenyl mercury from treated diapers and young children ingesting mercurous chloride in teething powders have developed acrodynia (pink disease), and Kawasaki disease and the use of mercurial skin lightening creams has been followed by the development of the nephrotic syndrome...CONCLUSIONS: As mercury can give rise to allergic and immunotoxic reactions which may be genetically regulated, in the absence of adequate dose-response studies for immunologically sensitive individuals, it has not been possible to set a level for mercury in blood or urine below which mercury related symptoms will not occur."

►December 19, 2003 - Autism and Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR) Vaccination: A Challenge for Pharmacoepidemiology - Pharmacotherapy via Medscape - "Childhood autism was first described 60 years ago,^[1] but this distressing condition has attracted increasing attention recently...Autism tends to appear at around the age when children receive their vaccinations. The onset is usually gradual, so it is difficult to see how parents could reliably link the start of the condition with an event such as administration of a vaccine."

Comment:  This author is ignoring a number of relevant and important points.  First, it may not be a coincidence that autism was first described around the time DPT vaccine first began to be administered.  Second, the fact that autism tends to appear around the time of vaccinations is no reason to assume autism and vaccinations are not related.  Vaccinations are the most obvious potential cause, not the potential cause which should be automatically dismissed as coincidental.  If autism was non-existent or infrequent prior to widespread use of vaccination, that is even more reason to think they may be related.  Third, while the onset may be gradual in some cases, this author is apparently ignoring the significance of a new form of autism, "regressive autism", where a child was developing normally and then lost his or her skills.  While it may not be possible for a parent to "reliably" link the two, where a parent has linked the two, their observations should be taken seriously  Moreover, all efforts to study the question should be directed at determining if there is, rather than disproving, any link between the two, as has been the case with most studies alleging to do so.

►December 28, 2003 - Millions at risk from script errors - The Australian - "Australian doctors are making potentially deadly mistakes in more than 4½ million prescriptions each year...Almost one in 40 prescriptions contain errors, ranging from simple administrative mistakes to dangerously incorrect drug types and doses...Decimal points placed in the wrong spot, illegible handwriting, adult drugs given to children and wrong instructions are some of the mistakes putting lives at risk."

Comment:  First, what do they consider rare?  Second, how is it they know it is rare?  The fact is, they probably don't KNOW it is rare; rather, they assume it is rare.  But so-called "absence of evidence" is not evidence of absence.  There have been 23 reports of Kawasaki disease to VAERS since 1990.  Estimates of under-reporting in a passive reporting system range from 90-99%, which means these 23 reports probably reflect between 230 to 2300 actual vaccine-associated reactions.  230 to 2300 is a fairly large range, however, one which makes it almost worthless as a marker for actual vaccine damage.  Shouldn't we know exactly how many cases of Kawasaki disease have been associated with vaccinations?  Shouldn't a biological product (i.e., vaccines) given to healthy children in order to prevent an event (one or more diseases) which in all likelihood will not cause permanent damage, but which itself has the potential to cause permanent damage, be painstakingly followed?  Shouldn't it be required that an active surveillance system (a post-marketing system following all product users) be employed, rather than one that relies on both voluntary compliance and recognition that an adverse event might be related to use of the product?

►December 26, 2003 - Something fishy - St. Petersburg Times editorial - "In his first public speech as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Michael Leavitt gave Americans a hint of what to expect from the agency under his leadership. "I subscribe to an environmental philosophy called Enlibra. It's a Latin derivative meaning "to move toward balance,' " Leavitt said...Sounds good, until you apply it to an actual threat - such as mercury pollution. In that circumstance, the position sought by the EPA looks more like a dangerous imbalance."

►December 27, 2003 - U.S. Mad Cow Link Questioned in Creutzfeldt-Jakob Cases - Reuters - "Family and friends of American victims of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, the fatal brain disorder sometimes linked to mad cow disease, on Friday questioned whether the wasting illness that killed their loved ones was actually due to eating contaminated U.S. beef."

►December 27, 2003 - As Probe of Infected Cow Spreads, So Does Worry - Washington Post - "Cattle in other states may have eaten the same contaminated feed that infected a Washington state Holstein with mad cow disease, but investigators who want to track the infection to its source are being confounded by the lack of an organized system that would lead them to the herd where the cow was born, officials said yesterday."

►December 27, 2003 - U.S. Asks Judge to Lift His Ban on Pentagon's Anthrax Vaccination Program - "The Justice Department has asked a federal district judge here to withdraw his preliminary injunction halting the military's mandatory anthrax vaccination program, or at least limit his ruling to the six plaintiffs whose suit prompted it."